FOR all the talking points surrounding the Gen3 project ahead of the Newcastle 500, there is one common theme on the tip of every tongue: the unknown.
And that applies to far more than the competitive pecking order, as V8 Sleuth explores with leading team principals Tim Edwards (Tickford Racing) and Jamie Whincup (Triple Eight).
How will the cars handle the punishing Newcastle circuit?
The Gen3 Mustang and Camaro are facing a major test straight up with the opening round being held on a street circuit in Newcastle.
While the prototype cars were run on a host of tracks including Townsville and Adelaide, there remains significant questions over how robust the Gen3 cars are.
One of the most brutal elements of any street track are the kerbs, which has Edwards concerned.
“We were having the conversation the other day, should we just keep driving around them until we watch a few other teams hit them and see if anything breaks on their car before we try it?” he says.
“And it’s a valid thing: we really don’t know. And you also don’t know, if you clip the tyre bundles, how your front bumper is going to react.
“I mean, how are they constructed: will it just snap the front corner off?
“We don’t know what this is going to do. You might hit a kerb and it might smash the whole corner off the bumper because it is all constructed differently.
“The previous front undertray which effectively had a diffuser in it, actually the way it was constructed could flex a bit.
“This kind of spiderweb thing that holds the front bar together on these cars is very rigid, it doesn’t have any movement so it’s mode of failure will be to snap.”
VIDEO: Gen2 versus Gen3 front bumper explained
Whincup was more optimistic, albeit quick to point out that its outlawed front bar which had featured a sort of damper would have helped manage any issues.
“The original brief for Gen3 was let’s try to save the splitter, so let’s incorporate some sort of dampening set-up, so if you hit a kerb the splitter comes up and comes back down again and doesn’t create any drama,” he said.
“It seems like Ford have forgotten to do that from the brief… we’ve had to modify the splitter to downgrade it to what the Ford guys have produced.
“That’s how it should be but hopefully at some stage we go back to the original design which is better for everybody.”
How will cockpit temperatures and driver comfort be?
Triple Eight struggled with cabin heat more than Tickford during pre-season, and has a category-wide fix up its sleeve if needed this weekend.
“From our data, the cabin temp is hotter than the old car and it makes absolute complete sense,” said Whincup.
“The old car had heatshielding all through the bottom of the car, all around the engine bay, it had coated exhausts and a wrapped exhaust.
“We used to coat it and wrap the exhaust in like this hessian cloth that would lower the cabin temp like you wouldn’t believe; that’s all been banned.
“So it makes complete sense that the cabin temp is hotter and we’re working with Supercars to try to lower the temps if we can and we have offered some suggestions.
“We’re ready to go. If our guys are getting too hot in the car tomorrow, then we’ll take steps to change the rules for everybody to lower their cabin temp.
“It’s quite an easy fix: wrap the exhaust with a cloth.”
The aluminium engine blocks (replacing the previous cast iron units) and the positioning of the fuel tank are also said to have contributed to higher cabin temperatures.
Edwards though is not as worried: “We have had some test days at Winton in the high-30s and drivers haven’t had any issues.
“But I know there’s been some Queensland teams complaining a bit about their test early last week in similar temperature so I’m not quite sure… we haven’t seen any high temperatures but it’s going to be different once you’re racing in a pack of cars, there’s less airflow under the car, all those things.”
VIDEO: How teams are trying to keep cabins cool
Are there enough spare parts to get all 25 cars through the weekend?
“We have not got as many spares as we would normally have but we do have spares,” said Edwards.
“Each car has got one spare front bumper, each car has got one spare rear bumper.
“We have some spares but we would normally have three or four bumpers per car, so we are a bit on the lean side but as is everybody.
“There’s certain things that will be pooled as spares up and down the pitlane, doors and things like that which you generally don’t use.
“We’ve got some spare suspension but same thing, front spindles have been problematic to make due to lack of material… so that’s obviously a worry for everybody because there is minimal front upright spares.
“There’s certain things that we’re okay with and certain things we’re skinny with.”
Whincup said he’s comfortable with spares levels and in any case is not buying into any doomsday predictions about cars having mass mechanical failures.
“I think the real majors would have reared their head already from the testing we have done at all different circuits with the prototypes and of course the testing we have done with the current cars at SMP and QR,” he said.
“So no, I reckon we would have seen any majors before now. I think we’re going to be alright.
“It won’t be a clean sheet, there’ll be niggling issues here there and everywhere, but I would be very surprised if we found ourselves in a situation where half the cars didn’t finish the first race.
“I don’t believe that’s going to happen.”
What both team bosses can agree on is that they won’t be telling their drivers to take it easy to conserve machinery.
VIDEO: Old versus new Supercars wheel nuts
Is the wheel nut issue fixed?
Loose wheels were a noticeable problem during pre-season testing, with at least David Reynolds and Nick Percat triggering red flags upon shedding a wheel.
Coincidentally, Tickford and Triple Eight have converged on a solution created by the latter. Erebus Motorsport has also devised an alternative wheel nut.
“We’re pretty comfortable with that now,” said Edwards.
“We’ve had all of our 160 wheels in our machine shop and bored them all out so that will overcome the cold wheel/hot spindle issue, and we have also got a stronger clip.
“We did 11 pitstops in a row up until last Wednesday and all of them were faultless so touch wood that will continue.”
Pressure on wheel changes in pit stops should be lessened by a new, slower flow refuelling system, although the implementation of that – and questions over potential economy differences between the two engines – add yet more unknown elements to the mix.
VIDEO: Gen3 refuelling changes explained
Will there be parity between Camaro and Mustang?
At least in terms of aerodynamics, all parties seem to be comfortable following a second VCAT test – not that Newcastle is an especially aero sensitive track in any case.
“I went to Temora and I was very pleased with what I saw,” said Edwards of last week’s airfield running which finally led to sign-off of the cars on Wednesday.
“There was great transparency, great repeatability, so it was enlightening but it was also comforting to see it so I’m very comfortable with where they have arrived at from an aero perspective.”
Whincup is also convinced that Supercars has achieved aerodynamic parity, although slammed Ford’s approach to the homologation process as ‘disrespectful’ to the category.
Ford’s global motorsport boss Mark Rushbrook said on Thursday that aero parity has been reached but the relative performance of the two new engines needs further monitoring.
As for the competitive pecking order between drivers and teams with these new, harder to handle cars in Newcastle?
The first clues will come today through three practice sessions, ahead of qualifying and racing across Saturday and Sunday.
