CUP CAR AT BRANS

[gt3rs]

At Brans last Saturday I saw a 996 cup car with RANCE indicated as the driver. Was this you Steve? If so was it a one off or are you racing next year?
Come on spill the beans I need to know if we have a new man to champion next year.

[steve rance]

It was me in a 2004 spec cup car that I'm racing in next years Porsche open series. I was shaking the car down and Brands Indy.

Steve R

[gt3rs]

Here are a couple of pictures of the car it looks well prepapred.

www.titanic.co.uk/cgi-bin/galleryimage.py?intReqPict=4190&intReqGall=12
www.titanic.co.uk/cgi-bin/galleryimage.py?intReqPict=4191&intReqGall=12

Are you looking for any sponsorship?

[Steve Rance]

It's a lovely car with a known history and beautifully prepared by Parr motorsport. It was the first time that I'd driven the car and unfortunately it triggered the drive by sensors at 115DB on the first lap so it was 6000rpm from then on! Got some very encouraging times though. It's a great car to drive, the same characteristics as the GT3 but far more focussed. I didn't need to adapt my driving style which was a comfort but found it quite difficult getting used to driving a lhd 911 after completing so many laps in a RHD GT3. Strange, Ive never had that problem before. I was very happy with the day, factor in full revs and i think we would have been a row one or two contender at this years Open meet. That was very encouraging because there was a lot of traffic and we were on ancient tyres. There is a lot more time to come from me in terms of entry speed so i'm pretty happy. The team were very happy. We have some budget but are looking for more sponsorship. We've got some great PR focused packages availiable, not just a case of space on the car.

Steve R

[ballcock]

Excuse a possibly silly question Steve , but whats the difference between the classes ... i.e. GT3rs is in the first class , the cup cars seem to be in the second class ... I would have thought it would have been the other way around?

[Steve Rance]

Its confusing but the racing GT3RS is not the road version it is effectively a heavily developed version of the cup car and was built to race in the am lemans series and latterly the FIA GT series via the homologated road GT3RS.

Basically its an even more balls out race car than the GT3 Cup.

Confused? you will be...

Steve

[ballcock]

:scratchbaldypatch:

Thanks Steve , I think!!

Edied to add... Would you post a linky to next years race days at some stage , maybe we could organise a Porsche PH p1ss up event around one of em (we're good at piss ups...)

Edited by ballcock on Friday 15th December 12:21

[Steve Rance]

ballcock said:

:scratchbaldypatch:

Thanks Steve , I think!!

Edied to add... Would you post a linky to next years race days at some stage , maybe we could organise a Porsche PH p1ss up event around one of em (we're good at piss ups...)

Edited by ballcock on Friday 15th December 12:21

Ha ha...

Yep, I'm up for that. i will let you know the calandar when I get it..

Steve

[DiscoColin]

Just thinking alound without any intent - would it be viable to replace the exhaust on a few year old cup car with something that would pass noise restrictions (at full chatter of course) at any track day? You would have to trailer it, but even with the cost of a trailer and something to pull it, that would seem to be quite a cost effective piece of track day pork (compared to the cost of newer GT3s and the like). Or is there some other reason why that plan wouldn't work?

[Don]

Depends on how many hours you get out of the engine before a rebuild is necessary...race engines can have short lives.

Is this true for a Porsche Cup car?

Given its a development of a road car would it be possible to make the thing road legal I wonder...would be a LOT of fun...

[Steve Rance]

Basically a cup car engine needs a rebuild after about 45 hours of running. A top end rebuild is 7K plus vat and a full rebuild is 12k plus vat. An engine generally suffers much less abuse during a track day than it would a race, but it would be good practice to regularly rebuild the engine. Cup cars are far less user friendly than the road GT3. For example, if you rev the engine before it is warm, it can go into safe mode and the ecu needs to be re set before you can run it again. it also has no fan so you cant leave it running while it's static or it will over heat... and go into safe mode again no doubt! You also need to trailer it every where as i dont think it is viable to road register one. On saying that, it is a huge step up from the road car. An incredible driving experience. In terms of prices, a tired car can be picked up for high thirties/low forties but you could be buying a huge repair bill. With cup cars beig so few on the ground and being elligible for more race series, they are very difficult to find. After driving one, no other tin top that I have ever driven comes close..

Steve R

[WetWipe]

ballcock said:

:scratchbaldypatch:

Thanks Steve , I think!!

Edied to add... Would you post a linky to next years race days at some stage , maybe we could organise a Porsche PH p1ss up event around one of em (we're good at piss ups...)

Edited by ballcock on Friday 15th December 12:21

ooh yeah. we're partial to a piss up. all in the good name of PH of course

[Don]

Steve Rance said:

Basically a cup car engine needs a rebuild after about 45 hours of running. A top end rebuild is 7K plus vat and a full rebuild is 12k plus vat. An engine generally suffers much less abuse during a track day than it would a race, but it would be good practice to regularly rebuild the engine. Cup cars are far less user friendly than the road GT3. For example, if you rev the engine before it is warm, it can go into safe mode and the ecu needs to be re set before you can run it again. it also has no fan so you cant leave it running while it's static or it will over heat... and go into safe mode again no doubt! You also need to trailer it every where as i dont think it is viable to road register one. On saying that, it is a huge step up from the road car. An incredible driving experience. In terms of prices, a tired car can be picked up for high thirties/low forties but you could be buying a huge repair bill. With cup cars beig so few on the ground and being elligible for more race series, they are very difficult to find. After driving one, no other tin top that I have ever driven comes close..

Steve R

Great post. Thanks for the info...

[Maxamillion01]

Exactly, that's the kind of info I come on PH's for. I've often thought about buying a Cup car instead of a GT3RS for track fun and Brit Car 24hrs but wondered what the real differences were, both with regard to driving and running costs.

Thanks Steve, and good luck.

Quite a few Cup cars on www.racecarsdirect.com if anyone got the taste.

[henry-f]

If you want a race car there really isn`t any alternative to the GT3 cup car. It would be impossible to road register a cup car, there isn`t a handbrake & you would come up with other issues, certainly the overheating one / lack of any heater would be a problem. If you keep the cup car running without moving it doesn`t go into safe mode. It overheats! You`ll have a big red light on the centre console which lights up. You do sometimes get it on when you`ve come into the pits & there is a bit of heat build up but it should clear it`s self once you get back out there.

If you are doing long races (rather than short sprints) then you can push the 40 hour rebuild envelope a bit. We try & do one big rebuild a year although it can go out of sync & you end up doing 2.

Henry

[hunter 66]

It will be good to see with us having a bit of fun next year Steve , there seems to be a lot of renewed interest in the OPen which si great as it is a well run series and with the 1 hour races now good fun. A lot of other new cars for 07 posssibly 4 GT3RS etc.
Regards Peter