roberga

So now that the GT3 street cars have center lock, will they still have to run 5 lug in the future series?

MUSSBERGER

Good question. If they didn't it would be a mod?

analogmike

It doesn't depend on the car, but the series. Our GT3 cups come with center locks but we need to change them for 5 lugs for NASCAR (Grand AM). But center locks are legal in ALMS, SCCA, etc.

Larry Herman

Did you see the piece at Daytona about the lug nuts being shot down the pit lane by spinning tires? It's silly for the GTs not to be able to run center-locks. It will change when someone gets seriously hurt. That's what it takes, doesn't it?

Bryan Watts

NASCAR seems to have done just fine for years without anyone getting killed. I don't see injury as a pressing reason to change. Some of the best endurance racing in the world with some of the best teams and drivers...who cares what kind of hubs they run? The teams obviously don't, or they would have already lobbied for a change.

Laura

I was told that one reason they use the lug vs center lock was to slow the pit stop down. Gran Am thinks the GT teams need a little more time to get thing sdone in a safe manner. Was told by a tire engineer and team owner.

mklaskin

A left-over from the early days of the Daytona Prototypes.

Larry Herman

NASCAR crews seem to do a better job of picking up all of the lug nuts after a pit stop. I never heard of this problem before, but they clearly showed that today at Daytona the pit lane was littered with them.

Bryan Watts

Strange. We grabbed everyone one of ours whenever we changed tires in the pits as a Conti team. I noticed all of the other Conti teams doing the same.

Bryan Watts

It still takes them longer to fuel the cars than it does to change all four tires based on my view from the pits, so center lugs wouldn't do anything to speed up the stops anyway.

brendo

i watched the teams pick up lug nuts the entire race. periodically, they certainly get away, especially during the pits under yellow and after the fatigue really hits.

earlyapex

Grand Am changed the rules years ago after TRG won the whole thing after the DP's all broke. They gave the GT's smaller fuel cells and lugged wheels to make sure the DP's won the next year.

Bryan Watts

I remember that back when the DP's were newish race cars and teams were still figuring them out. But I'm still not sure how it would help, as nearly every GT car I watched seemed to get tires changed before the fuel was done anyway. Perhaps they had different fuel rigs back then?

Cory M

Pretty sure the GT cars have to run a restrictor on the fueling rig to slow down the process...

Veloce Raptor

IIRC, rules require teams to either retrieve them or sweep them out of their pit area.






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