continued from above
Since nobody made a serious offer on it, our black 2013 GT is getting taken back to stock very soon and will likely be sold on CraigsList to some random schmuck, as the "track ready" set-up didn't get me any legit buyers (just a couple of fast talking con men and a few low ball pranksters). Our red 2011 GT will be posted up as it sits in TT3 trim now, with the aero front end and one set of 18x12" wheels and tires. If that is a bust we'll put it back to nearly stock and sell it that way, too. Don't PM me about parts off of either car just yet, as I will ignore those straight off. When/if these cars have parts pulled off they will go for sale all at once and I'll post an ad here.
What's Next?
There are still a lot of events we might be able to squeeze in with the red 2011 GT. And who knows? Maybe the 2013 GT will sell and some other things will fall into place and we won't have to sell the red GT right away, and I can make all of these events (fingers crossed!). Here's what is on the race schedule for the next few weeks.
- NASA @ TWS on Sept 21-22 - we've completed this event and I will have the write-up shortly.
- Camaro Vs Mustang Battle on Oct 5 @ Texas Motorplex - sign up here. Vorshlag is putting together the autocross portion, so if you have a GM or Ford powered vehicle, please come out and join us. Only $45 to both autocross and drag race, and we will make sure it is going to be fun!
- Goodguys Lone Star Nationals Oct 4-6th @ TMS - We will go to this on Sunday Oct 6th for the Autocross (the last Optima Qualifier for 2013) in the red car on whatever street tires we can scrounge up. Any American built or American powered vehicle is eligible.
- SCCA Autocross @ TMS Road Course Oct 13 - if we still have the red Mustang by then we will run this event in that car. This is their once-a-year "road course" event, with the infield road course at Texas Motor Speedway lined with some cones and packed with a bunch of autocrossers. Walls beware!
- NASA @ ECR Nov 2-3 - Again, assuming we still have a TT3 car to race by then, we will be there trying to finish out the NASA Texas calendar with a 100% track record sweep in TT3 for 2013. We're 7 for 7 so far....
2015 Mustang for 2014 in... TT2?
So to recap a few of our 2014 plans, we plan on buying one of the all-new 2015 Mustang GT's as soon as it is available. From talking to a few key people that have sources at Ford, we think the new S550 chassis is going to be at least 100 pounds lighter. The Coyote 5.0 engine choice is assumed to carry over, and if it is like previous "chassis changes" it will likely have a small power bump, too. We will get the V8, manual transmission, and likely red again - but that's it. I'm not letting Amy pimp this one out with a bunch of options.
So this means it will be even lighter and more powerful than the 2011 GT which we have been playing with in TT3, so we'd have to cork up the engine and/or slap on a bunch of extra weight to stay within the 9.5:1 pounds per hp ratio of TT3 class "with aero".
The next class up the Time Trials ladder is TT2, which has an 8:1 ratio. We have extrapolated that this S550 will likely end up there, once we upgrade the suspension, wheels/tires, and aero like we have the 2011 (and that will happen quickly). So TT2 is what we are shooting to run next year, again with a goal of developing new parts for this new Mustang chassis (S550), and hopefully racking up a few more NASA TT track records along the way. We haven't found a better venue to test new products for a car than the competition that NASA Time Trial provides. Unfortunately the NASA Texas the season starts in January, and the new car might not be out until April or May... and we had the TT3 regional championship for 2013 wrapped up by May of this year, so we can't wait that long to get a race car built.
Some of you may already know that Vorshlag is a lot more than just a "Mustang suspension shop". One of the many series of products we have developed over the years is our LS1 V8 swaps into various BMW chassis. We've done E30, E36, E46, Z3 BMW swaps and have kits for most of those, plus a V8 Miata kit that is under development. Our service shop has been cranking out a lot of BMW V8 swaps of late and I have a couple of E36 donor chassis at my house right now, without a clear purpose. So....
Vorshlag TT2/ST2 E36 Build Thread: http://www.vorshlag.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8254
Over the winter we will be building a
TT2/ST2 BMW E36 LS1. The chassis is a white 1992 325is "E36 Coupe", with a tired motor and interior. This will be stripped down, caged, flared, painted and built into a W2W race car. We might briefly run it in TT2 before we sell it, too - that's my goal if we do end up selling the red 2011 GT before the new 2015 GT arrives.
Above: Our TT2/ST2 build is already underway with the BMW E36 chassis being stripped and readied for a cage
I know, its not a Mustang, but it will allow us to at least get in the class with something while we await the S550's introduction. We will
also be building our E46 LS1 Alpha car with a 5.7L motor around TT1 class rules, also over the winter, which we plan to race and develop that kit with as well. The Alpha LS1 Miata that is moving forward (customer car), among other builds in our shop.
Don't worry - we're not done developing S197 parts, not hardly. Lots of S197 Mustang race prep, development and upgrades are still going on at Vorshlag on a daily basis. And we might be able to hang onto the red GT for a while, or if it is sold in "near stock form" I will look for a front damaged '11-14 GT as soon as we can and transfer over the front sheet metal and aero updates from this car, as well as some new shock and suspension options we are working on for this chassis.
So I hope this last series of posts wasn't too long and boring, and I apologize that my "Nationals Event Coverage" spanned so many days and too many words. I've already started my write-up for the
TWS event on Sept 21-22nd, where the car again did very well. There was a host of updates done to the car before we took it to Texas World Speedway for this NASA race weekend, including a new "shorter" splitter which balanced out the aero imbalance we had at Miller. Our painter also reworked the hood and it looks top notch, but we lost the vinyl stripes in the process. I'll get that update posted shortly. Until next time...
Thanks for reading,