Originally Posted by
Rick Hohwart
The fuel window is anywhere from 8 - 12 minutes depending on which pro guy is driving it.
I don't know which carb or restrictor he was using. Ryan is the kind of guy who wants to feel power and is reluctant to restrict the engine power with a smaller carb insert. He will get less run time.
I don't think his pit crew is confident in his ability to make long run times which means he comes in early on his first stop which sets the tone for the rest of the race. In buggy at Columbus, he came in two laps earlier than Tebo on stop 1, but then they stopped after an equal number of laps the rest of the race.
I was told that in Truggy, his pit man was not sure how much fuel he had left so he had to err on the side of caution and stop earlier to be safe.
The best part of this whole project has been proving that our group can make a good engine. It is a good feeling when drivers who are not required to run a Reedy engine are dropping their RB, GRP, and OS sponsorships so they can run it.
I have been running the Reedy engine for the past few months, switching from RB C6. The feel of the two engines is very, very close. I ran a O.S. VZB V-Spec before the RB. With the O.S. I thought all engines had to be this much of a light switch, but the RB was much smoother and the Reedy is even smoother. Some may equate "smooth" to slow, but that's not the case. The Reedy engine has a very usable powerband.
I too was at the CRCRC race and opted to pit at 9 minutes in buggy...from what my pit crew told me, that was very comfortable on fuel level and I never felt the engine go lean (sign it's getting low). With only 5 minute practice runs it was tough to get a gauge of mileage, so we decided to pit Ryan at 7:30. This is what Tebo did as well.
In Truggy, I was pitting for Ryan and we considered going 9 minutes. I stopped him at 8 minutes the first time to get a gauge of his usage, but I wasn't confident that I got the tank full on the first stop, so this dictated him having to stop at 7:30. My fault...Tebo was able to stop one less time. Who knows how the race would have ended without the extra stop, but at the end Ryan was 3-4 seconds behind Jared.
If it's any consolation, after the race Ryan easily had 1/3 of a tank left after 7 minutes of running...lol. Also, the race didnt' tech tanks so who knows who was legal or not. I know both of Ryan's tanks were legal or under.
As Rick said, it's great to hear so many people interested in the engine. Once we have a production version look to see drivers from other car companies to be using the engine as well.