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Hello, Friends!
As we enter the beginning of the busy Vintage Race and Dyno season, I thought I should let you know what is going on at EPS and wish you all the very best for 2002.
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RMVR Rocky Mountain Vintage Racing
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60’s Trans-Am Racing Invitational Commemoration Race
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June 22 & 23, 2002 at Pueblo Colorado
Go to http://www.rmvr.com and then click on “Trans-Am Invitational” for details.
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April 12,13, &14 were the dates of the RMVR annual Driver’s school. The Chief Driving Instructor is Chip Hane. There were about 55 entries including 10 in the Touring group, which was new this year. The weekend was very successful with no contact incidents and few spins. It was rated one of the best schools ever.
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Wiring Diagram for Oil Pressure Safety Circuit
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We have received many requests for this circuit. The basic circuit has now been included in Tech Tips 2 – Loss of Oil Pressure. Check it out on our Techtips page.
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The dyno building continued to be a very busy place last year. We saw many new cars of all kinds. They ranged from some old and rare sports cars - Dave McDermott’s Targa Floria ExWorks Sunbeam Tiger to Dave Manobla’s 1937 very rare small Diamond T pickup with a Ford 300 6 engine. We are getting more of the fuel-injected cars that are set up with a lap top computer. And, of course, as race season gets under way, we are loaded up again with various racecars. Chip (Dr. Weber) was plenty busy doing various Italian and other cars with multiple Weber Carburetors. We have seen more new cars, such as Ford Cobra Mustangs with blowers. Fortunately, the number of Nitrous powered cars decreased. They are always a challenge.
We increased our already large inventory of tuning parts for Weber, Edelbrock, SU and Holley carburetors. In addition to all the fans we have for both air & liquid cooled cars, we have been using the water-to-water intercooler for the more serious jobs. We adapted it from our engine dyno.It replaces the vehicle radiator and allows automatically holding the engine temperature to within two degrees of a dialed-in value. But, best of all, it removes all the heat that normally comes out of the radiator and over the engine and sends it down the drain as hot water. As a result, there is much better stability and accuracy of our readings and plenty of time to take them.
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We also put in an 8000 cu ft/min outside wall fan that changes the air in the building about every minute. It maintains a stable fresh air environment. It moves outside air along under the vehicle somewhat simulating the air movement of a moving vehicle. It also helps to remove exhaust products.
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Over the winter, we again worked on the engine dyno, getting it closer to completion. The load & cooling water lines have been run to the dyno. The high pressure load water pump 3 phase wiring has been completed. Other electrical wiring was completed. Our work on Casper Mustang, going to England, took priority over the Engine Dyno. We hope to get more done on it this summer.
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Casper Mustang Coupe off to England
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This is the 65 K Mustang that we completed for vintage racing in 1996. It has been a very competitive and reliable A Sedan racecar. It has been sold. We spent the last several months reworking it to meet the strict FIA rules in Europe. We delivered it to Denver International Airport on April 15th to fly to London. We wish Casper well in competition over on the other side of the Atlantic. A photo of Casper is shown in the Chassis Dynamometer section.
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On April 27th, Casper made its initial appearance in England, running at Silverstone Race Course. Here are the comments from the owner:
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"We are very pleased with Casper. We had racing coinsures drive from all over England to check her out for FIA approval. Their consensus of opinion is that Casper is one of the best Mustangs in the European theatre of racing - praise indeed."
"Gerry Marshall, who is England’s top driver with over 600 wins to his credit and our “tin top” legend, who took Casper out for a quick test and pronounced her very good."
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Last fall, we completed various portions of this 1966 Shelby for Pat Hogan. The car is equipped with complete EPS suspension, electrical, fuel system, & other items. Dave Berns painted & completed the assembly of the beautiful blue & white car. The car ran the RMVR Driver’s school, April 13th & 14th flawlessly. Dave & Pat’s wife, Shauna, shared the car as students. I felt like I was driving my Hertz car. This car is pretty much a clone of my Shelby. Also, both Dave & Shauna won their student races. Two weeks later, they ran the RMVR race at 2nd Creek. With same engine and rear end as before, Dave dropped his best lap time from before of 1:26 to a low of 1:18.8. Shauna turned a 1:22, which would have put her well up in the men’s big bore group. Dave contributes most of the improvements in his lap times to handling made possible by the EPS suspension system. These times should come down even more as these two up & coming drivers get more experience.
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As Casper was about to leave, this 66 Shelby arrived. It belongs to Roy Allen from Texas. A full EPS race restoration is about to start. Another clone of the Hertz car is in the making. Our goal is to be track testing next spring. This car, also, will be blue with white stripes.
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Due to obsolescence of the 1-196(4742) and then the 80145 Holley carbs; we were left without a suitable one to set up for racing. After many years working with these carbs, we decided to do a run of reworked ones to our specifications. We expect the first shipment around the first of May. You will love the price!
Here are some of the characteristics:
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- type 4150, 600cfm,
- vacuum secondary,
- jets front and rear,
- down leg booster,
- choke free milled air horn,
- solid throttle body with no vacuum ports,
- square bore Ford pattern,
- road race nitrophyl floats,
- bowl vent whistles,
- see-through float level sight plugs,
- secondary spring quick change kit,
- original finish, no glitz silver.
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We will also be testing some optional features on the dyno.
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We are gradually getting our parts and assemblies production up to where we can soon supply these to other than our restoration and local customers. The coordinated front & rear spring assemblies are now in stock. The next run of front suspension control arms and strut rods still has some assemblies available.
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This very popular item will be available again late this spring. It is popular, do to the easy installation without drilling, it’s adjustability for vehicle variations, and it’s appearance.
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We will be experimenting with a new Panhard Rod design on our car this spring with plans to make it available this summer. This is part of our ongoing suspension development since 1988.
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We plan to do dyno testing very soon with the goal of improving mid-range torque of our already highly successful Cobra repro dual plane intake manifolds.
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Last but not least, will be adapting our Shelby/Mustang suspension to the Vintage Race Falcons. I have a 1964 of my own in slow restoration process, which will be used as the test bed.
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I have a 1965 K Mustang with 1967 A Sedan SCCA race history. Chip and I have been talking about building a 1967 very correct 289cid engine. Casper got us pumped. We had to change the Casper engine Ford distributor to dual points, & no electronics anywhere. We tested the engine with the dual points up to about 7200 RPM with no, that’s no loss of horsepower. We could see some timing jiggle starting at about 7000 RPM but the power held up. Then we had to run stock rockers. We did a little stress relief on the stock rockers, and after several dyno runs and readjustment, they ran 45 minutes under heavy loads with little need for readjustment. We did find that the 1.6/1 rated rocker ratio is actually 1.54/1.
I remember in 1966 at Riverside, I turned the engine 7800 RPM with old stock rockers and won the national championship. It is kind of strange in this day of modern trick stuff, that we would want to go the other way, but we are not trick stuff people.
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