Werks Racing GT Engine
 

Hi guys I thought that I would put up a quick thread about our new GT engine that we are now launching across all of our markets. We've been test marketing and developing this in South America the last few months but we've had such great results racing with it and are starting to see interest in the GT class grow quite dramatically so we have decided to also offer the product in our other markets.

For those that may not be familiar with our company Werks Racing actually started off as a heavily on-road oriented company starting back in 2000. We were the first company to introduce 5 port .12 engines to the market, we were the Kawahara importer for the US and started the whole outlaw touring class thing with the 200mm Lola bodies, solid rear axles and multi port engines etc. We imported Collari and Picco engines as well as fielded the on-road racing team for Picco 1/8th cars for several years with the likes of Darin ishitani, Scotty Kimbrough etc. etc. driving for us. In addition we were really the first company to develop performance optimized high end racing fuel which we won the 1/8th on-road nationals with Kyosho's Joel Johnson running it along with several top racers like Josh Cyrul, Billy Easton etc. who won the Winter Nat's etc with it. So to say that we have a little bit of history in the on-road world would be a fair statement and after having been involved predominately with off-road engine development I was quite excited when we first started discussing this product!

So I'm very happy to introduce the new GT engine from Werks Racing! It's an 5 port EFRA and ROAR legal GT racing engine. We use a lightened, epoxy filled and triple tungsten balanced crank shaft for improved acceleration and vibration reduction. Along with this engine we have also released a new 2068 pipe set to match which offers exceptional performance across the board with excellent fuel economy. Combined at recent race events this has proven to be quite a dominate package exceeding the performance of most other offerings on the market at this time! I have attached a few snap shots of our new GT engine. If you have any questions or require any additional infromation please do not hesitate to ask!

Great news, and who will carry your products in the USA and when will they be available.

AFM

Bore, Stroke, Crank diameter ????

AFM

Hi AFM,

I just sent info over to Great Planes on these, so I would expect them to have them in stock in a few weeks which means just about every hobby shop in the US will have access to them in addition to the traditional mail order companies like Tower Hobbies and A-main Hobbies.

Bore is 17.1mm, stroke is 16.1mm

With that bore and stroke isn´t it more de 3.5cc???....my calculations give me 3.697cc:confused::confused:

Afm

Sorry, I was trying to do two things at once and wrote the numbers down wrong! Correct bore and stroke numbers are:

Bore is 16.1mm
Stroke is 17.1mm

So I had them reversed, again sorry about that!

Just a quick update on the performance of the WERKS GT engine at the 1st round of the Brazilian Nationals at the Americana track, the track who hosted the 2015 1/8 Pro World Championship. During 2 out of 3 days, we have been doing very good, but on the final day, luck left us and didn't permit to turn the hard work done in more tangible results. After qualifies, 4 out of 5 WERKS drivers were sitting in the top 10. None of the engines was modified, only work done was on the compression ratio, nothing else. We have been minimally equal to some heavily modded engines in the field in both torque as well as topspeed. During the semifinals, two or our drivers got unlucky and had to abandon the semis due to technical issue with the cars (not the engines), provoked by racing accidents. That left us with two cars in the A-Main, sitting in position 6 and 9. While being in the chase group of the leader, I got t-boned by an another car with that much force that the engine got deslocated and destroyed the clutch shoes, race over for me, while the other driver brought home a 6th place. While the end result doesn't really show the engines performance, we had an awesome first two days and other racers were clearly surprised by the performance and especially top speed of this engine. During 3 days of racing, no single failure on the WERKS engines, no flameouts, no overheating...

I have been testing this engine since last September, and besides being a top engine, the engine has proven as well that it is a very durable engine. The prototype engine was heavily abused during the tests, both in practice as well in racing, and after 5 gallons is still running strong and only now am I changing the conrod because of very little play.

If you are looking to have an edge over the competition, check this engine out!!

Check out as well www.facebook.com/werksracingbrazil/ for additional information, especially about achievements in race events.

Just figured that I would pass on some testing information that we got from one of our customers in Puerto Rico from a race on the 5th. Jose just received our new GT engine and 2068 pipe set 2 days before the event so he had to do a real quick break in and the engine was still tight. Although he ultimately broke he did make the finals, lead a big portion of the race and turned the fastest lap! Another thing that was interesting is that as they had radar present we were able to get comparative top speed info on the straightaway and again even though his .21 GT engine was still really tight he had the fastest car at the event hitting 53mph on the straight!

I have to dig through my e-mails but I got information on various different engine models and the speeds they were showing on the radar gun at that event also. I'll find them and post them up shortly for comparison.

Before I forget we also got feedback on run times and with again a tight engine Jose was getting run times with our GT engine of 7:40 a tank, compared to the OS GT at 7:00 and the Nova Mito GT at 7:20. This is in the hands of comparable drivers all in the same main. Again I'll be back shortly with radar gun information that I received from the event.

Ok, had a chance to dig up the e-mail with comparative speed information from the event. This is the same day and all speed readings were taken using a radar gun during the A-main (so they were all in similar level/capability drivers cars):

Werks 53mph
Os speed THS mod. (os vzb v2 cranks for more top speed) 51mph
Capricorn Tesla Gt black edition (tesla blue edition crank for more top speed) 50mph
Novarossi Mito stock 48mph
Novarossi Mito THS mod 49mph
Novarossi Mito Murnan mod 50mph

Ron, these numbers confirm what we seen on the tracks throughout Brazil. With engines completely stock, only adjusting deck height and plug depending on altitude / temperature, we have both the torque and speed necessary to perform with or outperform the modded engines. That said, we are able to use stock engines, eliminating the risk that come with modding engines, especially if the mods are aiming at taking weight out of piston or conrod, as well as the additional $$$ involved in getting the engines modified. We have not measured and compared top speeds, but at the Brazilian Nationals, it was possible to judge by naked eye that our engines had an edge over the competition there. Looking forward to see this engine used around the globe...

Thanks, it's good to hear that you were able to judge the difference with the naked eye! That pretty much confirms what I've felt which is that we are on the right path as far as performance and top speed with our new GT engine. It's going to be interesting to hear the feedback that we start to get from the rest of the world once these start getting out there. Samples are heading to our importer in Australia for testing now and the engines are already in stock at A-main Hobbies and being set up in the system for sales as we speak. So they should start getting out here in the US in the next few weeks also :nod:

Well I'm happy to say that our new GT engines and pipes are now in stock at A-main! The Werks GT engine can be found here:

https://www.amainhobbies.com/werks-r...tl21gt/p632604

And our new 2068 exhaust system for the GT engine can be found here:

https://www.amainhobbies.com/werks-r...x6632c/p632605

I'm very happy with how we were able to price our new GT engine and at a $309 street price, only $20 more than the Picco GT engine and a whopping $190 less than the OS GT engine I feel it offers the best bang for the buck performance wise of any GT engine on the market at this time!

Is the header conical?? what lenght is it??

Rgrds
AFM

Well it looks like A-main sold out their first batch of engines in 1 day lol. Thank you guys for the orders, more engines are on the way and will be there Thursday!

No it's not conical. I know we used to make conical off-road headers back in the early 2000's but as far as I know I think that we were the only one doing so. Is someone else making them now???

Yes, Novarossi 41032, Tesla and REDS I think, don't know their pn´s though...for GT engines it is a plus to have conical header for more botton end. Hope you have them soon. I´m about to receive my engine + pipe & header that i bought from A Main and will try it at the South American Championship in Buenos Aires this end of the month.

Rgrds
AFM

Awesome, thank you for picking up one of our engines and pipes, please let me know what your thoughts are once you get it broken in and have some time on it. If you have any qeustions please do not hesitate to contact me or you can also contact Thommi who is out importer for Brazil and is also fluent in Spanish if that is easier for you.

In regards to the conical manifold though while we may not currently offer it please keep in mind that this is just the start for us of getting back into the on-road racing end of things, where we actually started. So we will be continuing to develop on-road oriented engines and products for the GT market and if it's found or felt that a conical manifold is needed, it will be made.

I'm just not the type of person that makes a product just for the sake of having something to sell though. So if we make it, it's going to be tested and will have to be something that I would run my self. That's a basic question I always ask before releasing each of our products. "Is this something that as a regular racer I would spend my own money on and be happy with"? If the answer is no, then the project gets trashed and we do not sell it.

Back in the early 2000's when we did sell conical off-road manifolds we offered 3x different lengths and in testing we found that as you mentioned there was a noticable increase in bottom end, however we also found that the engines (from that time) then topped out so quickly in rpm that real conical manifolds were pretty much only suitable for use on small to medium sized tracks. My saying this though may have something to do with the difference in actual manifold designs because back in the days I found that a lot of manifolds that are referred to as conical (meaning the tubing that the manifold is made of expands in diameter from the start of the manifold (at the engines exhaust port) to the end where it connects to the pipe) were actually not really very conical lol! So it was really more of a marketing term used by most companies. Most of the exhaust stuff back then was (and is still) being made by hand in really small factories in Italy and it was quite time consuming and expensive for us to have actual conical manifolds made. Again though that was with 1/8th buggies with older engine technology and probably most importantly only single speed transmissions not two speeds like in todays GT cars. So again please let me know what you find in testing as I'm always open to input from others on ways that we can improve our product offerings! :nod:

Unfortunately, I will not be able to be in Buenos Aires for the GT championship :( There will be a number of WERKS drivers present from Brazil, who already have experience with the engine, and please count on me as well to give you indications about how we have set up the engines for different track conditions and layouts.

Breaking in the WERKS GT engine...

As a general rule, please follow the instructions for the break-in process published by Ron on the website Werks Racing

The GT engine piston uses top quality material for the piston, and this material does need a bit longer to be completely broken in, but will maintain a very high compression for a much longer time than standard material combinations. We have found that the engine, even after 20 tanks, can still get stuck at TDC when cold. The engine, even getting stuck in cold conditions, is absolutely raceable, but be carefull that you get the engine up to temperature before you go WOT on the long straights. I mostly run the engine at temperatures between 120 and 125 Celsius, using 25% Nitro and either RP7 or RP8 plugs.

For tracks with long straights, we have found that an additional 0,1mm shim will give you added topspeed without damaging the bottom end.

Please feel free to contact me on here or via PM.

There is two from Novarossi; 41032 and 41031.
I'm not aware of any other, but most have enough meat on them to grind them a little.
I like them for Offroad as well... :)

I have tested the 41032 with the prototype engine last year. It's a much shorter manifold, giving you higher top-speed, but I haven't been happy with the bottom power in the thight infield sections of the track. As said before, I have come back to the standard 2068 pipe with standard manifold always. It just seems to be the best combination for this engine, working on short and thight tracks as well as on wide and flowing tracks.

Thommi,

as you know Sudam will be run on 16% nitro and as i understand the engine comes shimmed for 25 to 30% nitro. Have you tested on 16% and if so, what is the ideal head clearance for it.
Have you been in Bs. As in the past? what would be your suggestions.
Who are the Brazilian drivers who will race with Werks engines??

Rgrds

AFM

I have tried the engine with 16% and it works fine, and for a start, I would actually stick to the original deck height with a RP7 plug. As the B.A. track seems to have a very long straight, this might give you an advantage there. If you need more torque, reduce by 0,05mm and/or try the RP6 plug.

Yes, the engine comes shimmed for 25% and it works fine out of the box. For original deck height, I recommmend using the RP8.

Increasing deck height gives you a bit a wider tuning window, and this might be helpful, and it's less stressful as well on the plugs.

Look out for Felipe Chaud, who is on the official WERKS Brazil Racing Team. I am not sure if Rafael Alves will be there too, he is a very experienced engine guy and can help you with whatever you need. Besides them, there will be Hernan Uner and Nando Lima (who might use the WERKS engines, not sure yet, as he has multiple engines to choose from).

I have never been racing on the B.A. track myself, but heard it's quite big and with a pretty long straight. This should actually favor our engine. I have tried short manifolds to simulate such track conditions, and if you have some short manifold around, put it into your baggage. The ultra short manifolds are in my opinion too short, especially running lower nitro content.

Hope that helps!

Thank you all, a good exchange of information above! :nod:

Ron, you are welcome. I have been running about 9 to 10 gallons through my GT engines in total, and I am convinced that this is the best engine you can get for the GT class at the moment. I am happy to share what I have learned in this time about the engine, and I would like to help everybody to get the expected results out of it. Remember... if it works, it's WERKS !!!

Anyone in the US running this Werks .21 in their GT yet?

I just got one from A-main for my GT - running in Texas Southwest Series. I ran a B7 Pro back in the day and it was a monster! Will finish break in this weekend, race at the end of the month. Fired up on first rip, always a good sign. Will report back.

Question, since I'm here - are Werks motors an evolution of the old Collari engines?

Feel free to PM for any info about settings, breaking in etc...

Awesome, thank you for picking up one of our engines and glad to hear that she fired right up for you! Please keep us in the loop on how break in goes and your overall thoughts on performance etc. once you start getting it on the track.

Regarding your question about Collari, the answer to that is yes. We worked together with Collari initially to develop an engine line that was initially exclusively on-road oriented many years ago. We then expanded that engine line to also include off-road engines (the first of those were the B3, B7). In roughly 2004/2005 we then took over production of that engine line and released the product under the Werks brand.

Ironically the first new model that we released under the Werks brand was the B7-Pro that you mentioned you had! A lot of people may still not be very familiar with us by name but over the years I believe we've had quite a bit of influence on the industry and the B7-Pro was imho a revolutionary engine that changed things for everyone! I say that because it was the first regular production engine from any brand to come stock out of the box with a lightened cooling head be it on-road or off-road. Prior to that you had to buy a Fioroni, O'Donnel or some other brand aftermarket cooling head to get one that was quality built and lightened, we put it on stock saving the consumer $60-$100. It was also the first production off-road engine to ship stock with a lightened, epoxy ramped and balanced crank. Prior to the B7-Pro off-road motor that had only ever been done with the absolute top end big dollar on-road engines! And it was also the first production off-road engine to ship stock with a ceramic rear bearing! Again something that had only ever been done in the absolute top of the on-road engines up to then! Now, these are features that you find in off-road engines from almost everyone!

One of the things that I really do not like though is that beside Nova with their Top engine line (which they were really not doing anything with at that time), we were also the only company to use black for our cooling heads. This completely bucked the trend at the time of using bright colors like purple, blue and orange as signature brand colors for cooling heads. I chose black because it not only works better to dissipate heat but also thought it would be an ideal signature color for our brand. As the manufacturing guys asked me when I proposed that "with a black cooling head how is anyone going to be able to tell which brand of engine is in a person’s car when it passes by on track"? My thoughts was exactly the opposite, a black cooling head would first get people wondering what type of engine was in the car and then once people knew about our brand it would then make it quite easy to see on track who was using our motors! Something that unfortunately since then just about everyone has decided to copy.

That turned into a bit of a history lesson lol, sorry about that!


Thomas, if you do get questions PM's to you from others please take a second and re-post the question and answer's on here for all to see. That way this thread will become a repository of both technical and set up information for all to see and easily reference down the road.

Ron, my idea is to put that into something as close to structured as possible. Sometimes, questions need clarifications and the whole back and forth might be confusing for some. If I get questions, I will make sure they are shared for the whole group, as everybody should get all the information, tips and hints so that together we will be successful with this little powerhouse :)

Sounds good, thank you!:nod:

I just got a rtr cobra and been trying to a find a motor after I read this thread think this going to be my choice!!! Motor sounds great and werks guys seem great as well!! Thanks for all the info!!!!

Thank you, we try our best and I think that you guys are going to find that we are one of the most responsive and hands on (as far as support as well as interacting directly with customers) engine companies out there! We are big believers in treating our customers the way that we would want to be treated our self!

If you give one of our GT engines a shot please report back and let us know what your thoughts are once you get some fuel through it!

For sure will do thanks

Haven't been on in a while. Thanks for your reply!! Yes, I used to run the old 3 port Collari 10 years ago in my off-road days - always like the grunt of that engine.

My GT break in is coming along, think I'm on the 6'th tank now starting to lean a little, just started shifting into second gear - it seems to keep up with others even though blowing smoke on the straight. I've left the bottom rich and just leaning the top needle at this point. I haven't pushed the engine hard as yet but the race is this weekend. Plan to run as is for a couple more tanks before race tune. Its running just over 200 F about 220-230 at empty tank. Any suggestions on that temp, needle settings etc? It's about 85 deg here in Houston, not very humid yet. Thx

The engine will need a good number of additional tanks to become completely free, I usually run about 20 tanks through it before race tuning it.
Even you can still feel the engine getting stuck at TDC, you can race it, but give it a couple laps to get to temperature before you give it full throttle. For the moment, keep the engine running at that temperature. What nitro percentage are you running, and what plug? My prefered settings are 25%, deck height increased by 0,10mm, OS RP8 plug.

You're right still mechanical pinch @ TDC turning over with the plug out.
Running 25% 11% oil, plug that came with engine. I'll run a few more tanks through before pushing it.

Change the plug as soon as you can. The original plug is only for the very initial fase of the break in process. Move to an onroad plug to avoid potential issues.

and raise the deck height too. I really recommend this.