Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Uchibori + Tec Art's?

Will somebody who speaks Japanese please explain to me by Uchibori is testing their N2 car? I'm really curious, and there's 7AG mentions too. What the hell is going on? Somebody please??

http://www.tecarts.com/event/p10/index.html

*******Just got this translated
Looks like they do just what we do. Takao, the Tec Art's driver and mechanic was driving the car and testing with a backup motor. He anticipated the car to be 1.5 seconds slower than usual, but clocked a fastest lap time 3 seconds slower than usual. He then gave the car to Uchibori, who then proceeded to beat his time by .5 seconds! Its cool to see that they do the same fun stuff we do here in the states.
In addition, looks like Tec-Art's brought a customer/student with them. He runs a 7AG setup with 195/50/15 goodyear tires, and was 7.3 seconds slower than the full N2 Tec-Art's car. They were baisicaly praising the 7AG, and were mentioning that from this point forward, the request for that engine will be high among Tec Art's customers. Who knew?

Back in the saddle again


Ok, so I've been slow to blog lately. I found out I actually have more than 1 person that reads this thing, so that makes me feel pretty good! Anyhow sorry you guys (the two of you!) but I do have some interesting things I'd like to cover.




First, Andy got married. For the third time. I'm sure it sounds funny, but it has to be one of the best weddings I've ever gone to. Partially because there were no "adults" (funny how I still say that and I'm 29) there, so everybody felt like they could be as silly as they wanted to be. See photos above for evidence. What also helped was the open bar. Go team Yen! Congradulations!






It also looks like Scuderia Torro Rosso took Sebastien Bourdais. Booo. I mean I don't dislike him, but I'd surely rather see Takuma Sato at the helm. This comes in wake of some interesting news though, as it looks like there will be a USF1 team being assembled this year, while looking to run their first race in 2010. Rumors have it that Scott Speed and Danica Patrick are being looked at, but Peter Windsor (one of the two men spearheading this project) states that they're looking at "everybody". He even noted that there's a chance that two car team will be helmed by one American driver, and one "veteran" driver, which by nature will be somebody foreign. If they do go with a more "experienced" driver, I think they'd probably pick Jensen Button or Takuma Sato. There's hope yet!


I've also been helping my friend, Alex Pfeiffer with his 2009 Drift season planning. He finally bit the bullet and purchased a new chassis, which is a US spec Lexus SC300. He's currently doing the cage, and starting to gather all the parts he needs to make it into a badass machine! The plans are to do a simple 2JZGTE and have somewhere in the real of 500 horsepower. Keeping things simple keeps them reliable, and keeping this reliable means he's got a better shot at performing well. We are currently looking for sponsors, so if you're interested, don't hesitate to email me or leave me a message! His build thread is here: http://forums.club4ag.com/zerothread?id=45392

Last but not least I've also done some interesting stuff. I've also taken that plunge, into what Taka Aono calls the "up to here" in Corolla.

Imagine if you will, that you own a Ferrari. You have a weekend car, let's say something V8 powered. You race it every chance you get and love driving it. Then you get the chance to purchase some parts. The best parts in the world. Formula 1 parts. You have the opportunity to use the same parts that propel Kimi to a world championship. The same parts that sing to astronomical RPM's. The same parts that have been computer and endurance tested.

While I don't have a Ferrari, I do own a 4AG powered vehicle, and I've done the equivalent. Very few people can use these parts, as the majority of AE86 people will never build nor use a full race motor. I certainly will, so I've decied to obtain the absolute best engine parts available from the Formula Atlantic race series. These are, simply put, the best 4AG parts in the world. Nobody makes parts better than the items used in the Formula Atlantic series. A testament to this (besides those open wheeled cars themselves) is the fact that Keiichi Tsuchiya, the AE86 and drift king himself, uses the same parts in his N2 AE86 that was built by Sakurai. TRD and Sakurai know what the best stuff is, and even though they have the entire Japanese TRD parts inventory at their disposal, they still chose all TRD USA Atlantic components. Needless to say, I'm very happy with my "box".
Sneak peek:



Needless to say, I'm a happy boy!