Our region has a DE in April. As part of the tech inspection a notice was sent out for all 996 cars requiring use of Water Wetter, or similar, due to known issue of "catastrophic coolant system failures when tracked". It goes on to say if the coolant pipe behind the power steering pump has been welded the car will be in compliance.

Haven't had my '05 GT3 pipes welded yet but was planning on Water Wetter at least so I'm glad to see it. Curious if other regions are doing this?

 

Kind of ridiculous they'd take the steps to implement that, but only include 996s.

 

Personally I think this is overreaction and an irrational response by the region. The number of coolant system failures documented is very small compared to the number of cars. I have been tracking for years and run with countless GT1 based cars and NEVER seen a system fail.

This is a DE, not a race. That is an expense that you cannot require the participants to undertake because of something read on the internet and is not even recognized by PCNA. What about other marques of cars? What about other models in the Porsche lineup that has their own potential malady?

And lastly, there is virtually ZERO difference in the level of traction on the track when several liters of coolant, water wetter, or straight water is dumped en masse. If a car in front of you dumps its load of water (zero coolant and zero water wetter) you are still going for a ride.

 

Dell is correct about the friction coefficient between these fluids. The difference is that water will evaporate pretty quickly, where as coolant will have to be cleaned up. AFAIK, few other failures in other P-cars will cause potential hazard to other cars to the extent that a coolant dump will. The failure seems to be age related, or more likely, heat cycle related. If this is the case, the frequency of this failure should increase as more cars reach this threshold.
I'm glad I had mine fixed. As it was disassembled, we found 2 lines were very loose.

 

Good point Chuck. So really, this is a track cleanup of coolant issue. Something they could do while they are towing in the car that blew a line(s)

 

and probably to minimize liability. OVR's incident with coolant dump in a bad place wound up in 4 cars being pretty heavily damaged including one Rennlister's car.

I still thank my lucky stars that when I had my failure it did not results in damage to anyone else's car.

 

How would they minimize liability?

The odds that damage would have been reduced through the use of water wetter is small.

 

Good point.

It's somewhat humerous that the one fitting they focus on for their technical inspection doesn't even exist in the 997 cars

 

I just saw that. I found that comical as well. So not only are they fabricating a "SAFETY RECALL", they are also diagnosing what they feel is the best diagnosis.

 

I had two fittings fail the first one was at CALSpeedway and lucky for us it was as my wife was just entering the track and not in turn one at high speed. The dealer fixed that one, my mistake they replaced that one. The next one failed at another TT at Buttionwillow mid session while I was driving and two cars behind me went off again lucky they did not have contact. I made the desission after that I would not put my car on track again until I properly corrected the problem, in my case that was welding the fittings. No other related problems since but I try not to stay behind others that have not resolved the issue. I hope this is not as big of an issue as it may seem but I did not feel it was worth the risk for me or others around me.

 

This is spot on. Overraction is my first thought and second, the language of "welded" is not correct in my opinion. If you read the Sharkwerks thread on this issue, they do not weld their fittings and have had zero issues. In addition, they have had cars come in that have had the weld and found pinholes in the weld spots resulting in leakage. Moral of the story is if you're going to have a weld done, have it done by someone who knows what their doing. To exclude an entire class of car without a weld seems like improper policy.

 

I agree that the region is going overboard. But it's not that difficult to switch to water/wetter to comply. Although the welding solution proposed for a DE is pretty ree-diculous. Especially if your car is still under some type of warranty.

As for coolant, it does take a lot longer to clean up. And it actually takes cleaning. Cars drag coolant along the track extending the "spill" area. It might take an hour or more to clean a coolant spill. But you can just toss a debris flag for water. The cars dragging the water actually speed up the drying process. Also, coolant on your tires doesn't evaporate as quickly as water potentislly making the "danger zone" longer.

-td

 

I believe choosing to do something is better than sitting back and doing nothing. I'm sure OVR's policy will undergo a few modifications. I haven't seen the OVR requirements in writing so I can't comment of the OP's post.

I've probably been running events as long as Dell, 22 years, and I'm glad he hasn't experienced the topic of this thread. In my case I was one of the cars on the receiving end of the GT3 leak. There were 2 other occurrences at Mid-Ohio last year. I've advocated water wetter for several years. It is friendlier to the track and can get the session underway quicker after a spill. The difference in friction between a track wetted with glycol/water and water/water wetter is not that great. The cars I ran in club racing had water wetter in them.

About the bad welds. I would find a good shop to TIG the parts just as I would find a shop that would use the correct drill size for the tap used. I's also want to be sure that the tech didn't strip the threads. Everything has its own set of issues.

Dell if you become a data point let us know how you feel about it. And the last time I looked the wall didn't care if it was a race or DE.

 

Classless post.

 

I'm glad I replaced the coolant with waterwetter prior to the trackweekend where it blew with a vengence.My friend with a 997.1 gt3 saw me sidelined at edge of track. He didn't even know I blew a coolant fitting plus all the other cars that wizzed on by. I laid a strip almost half mile long. Mike