Congratulations to Ecutek, ADR Motorsports, Ralliart UK, and all others involved for finishing the 24 hour Britcar race at Silverstone with a completely stock engine. This was the car’s first time out and it set the fastest lap time within the beginning 30 minutes of the race and during the last 30 minutes of the race. Here’s an email from David at Ecutek:
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Ecutek are pleased to be able to announce it’s involvement in the Official Mitsubishi UK race programme.
Mitsubishi UK decided that the best place to publicise the strength and power of the EVO X is in endurance racing.
They commissioned a car build by ADR Motorsport and Ecutek was asked to produce a 400bhp package for the engine capable of running for 24 hours.
ADR Motorsports: http://www.adrmotorsport.com/news.php?newsid=46
The request was that the engine remain completely standard apart from external modifications.
We took the brief so seriously that we did not change the spark plugs, nor did we lift the cam cover or remove the sump.
We changed the oil, fitted a new turbo and higher flow injectors. The engine is totally stock, it using the stock air filter and airbox and a high flow exhaust with catalyst.
The car competed in it’s first event last weekend at the Britcar 24 Hour race at Silverstone.
Like all new car builds everything was last minute.
The car missed qualifying and as it crossed the line for the start of the race it had completed a grand total of 5 laps and for one of those it was on fire!! {turbo oil feed pipe union failed}.
The single aim of entering this race was to prove the endurance of the car and not to worry about position.
The bare fact that the car finished in 25th place does not do justice to it’s performance. The final position was due to a fuel tank problem which meant we could neither fill the tank up or run it to empty, meaning we had to pit 45 times compared to others who pitted as little as 9 times.
It produced a fastest lap 30 minutes from the start and again 30 minutes from the end. That shows it’s class.
It completed 1651 miles (2657kms) without an engine hitch.
We ran a PC in the car and using FlashCAN we datalogged the whole race. We were able to use remote desktop via GPRS to access this PC and analyse the log files. This allowed us to make changes to the ROM file during the race and then program a spare ECU in the garage and when the car came in for a pit stop we could change the ECU.
We only had to do this three times as we made some fuel and boost trims.
This is a major achievement for the car and for Ecutek and of course benefits all of our partners with the experience we have gained.
More images here: Mitsubishi Works Rally Team