Ford GT Team - Still at work

[sahlman]

This thread has already achieved epic status. Please make it a sticky. Better yet, create a hall of fame category.

Thank you Xcentric and thank you to all of you guys for the great comments on our work. Very cool to be back working hard on the GT with my teammates.

Scott

 

[sahlman]

Thank you to Mark for such incredible support and help on this project! I cannot start to repay him enough for his contibrution to this project. Very, very cool. The Bstones have good life still, hopefully they stay that way for him to burn up on his own as one very small part of compensation.

One note, Dave road in the setup with the car lowered 1.0" front and 0.75" rear with 50% more spring rate! This will be a more aggressive track biased setup, but still very reasonable on the street...even on the very crappy Detroit roads!

Scott

 

[Triheart7]

Great post.

 

[sahlman]

I would like to recognize some of the team on this FGT suspension project who have gone way above and beyond to help make it a success. The work is not done yet, but close:

The Car, Driver/Evaluator and Facility Coordinator
Mark McGowan – as noted I can’t start to repay him for his generosity and involvement. It is very cool to be driving and evaluating with him again.

Shop/Setup Facility and Data Acquisition
Cayman Dynamics
Data Acquisition - Chris White (FGT ride and handling teammate) and Bob Smith (Ford Racing teammate and Co-owner of Cayman) and Greg Gach technician support
As Mark noted, Chris spent some very long days with me for instrumentation and Bob had to put into extra effort as well due to his “day job”! But the data turned out awesome.
Facilities and Equipment including Track Usage – John Heider, Bob Smith and Craig Mackay (Co-Owners)

Base Shock valving built to Ahlman Engineering Spec’s
Ohlins– Christer Loow (Engineer – I met him back in 2006 at the start of my NASCAR work) and Marty Lange. Incredible shocks- performance, reliability, adjustability, craftsmanship and support for my work.

Predictive Analysis – Vehicle Dynamics
JPC Engineering – Jeff Chrstos – 15 year Ford Racing teammate who I hired to write some specific code for this work. Awesome stuff that has helped me nail the settings out of the box.

Packaging
Jim Dunham - Ford Motor Packaging expert and GT owner. Jim helped out with some great packaging checks on his car to see if we could and what it was going to take to package these no remote shocks.

Springs
Eibach - Christian Sebralla and company - He was my engineer during the GT program and still there helping out with detailed information I need!

Prototyping CNC Work
Savannah Company - Pat, Al, Alex and owner Mark - awesome high precision work with great support.

Write Up, Photography and Video
DBK (Dave)- Awesome write up and pics. Can’t wait until you guys see some of the on-car video
And DBK gave me thoughts on the market as well for the shocks like the guys below.

Owner/Customer Input
SpecRacer – Andy
Andy has become a very good friend and I talk often with him about his input on my projects and get his perspective as an owner. He was the first to give me great feedback on my intended direction and features to highlight. I will put out the “flier” this week.
Roketman- Ron
Ron gave me some very good feedback on my path for this project as well...OK, and a friend too! My wife and I did better kart wheels at the bar at NOLA than you Ron!
2112 – Michael
One of the few who is way more of a Rush fan than me! And also gave me great feedback on the product features.

All of these people are the best of the best and always go way beyond to get results! Thank you so much for your support on this very cool project. Plenty more to come!


Scott

 

[Indy GT]

Thanks Mark and Scott

Please, put this thread where IndyGT won't see it. Really cool stuff. When does production start?

Sorry Frank, I found it….

For many of the new owners of the Ford GT (as well as older ones who already know) this is what makes FGT ownership and participation on the Forum so rewarding. To have engineers and technical experts, originally on the FGT development/build Team, STILL working, tinkering, refining important systems and offering the fruits of their work to us, is quite spectacular. IMO unparalleled. As someone pointed out previously, go see if you can get that type of post production support from another supercar manufacturer. Or for that matter this type of technical information on ANY other forum.

Mark and Scott thanks from the FGT community!

Your passion and dedication are abundantly obvious. For two primary people (with appropriate accolades to the support staff enumerated in Scott’s earlier post) to undertake suspension modifications with the depth, understanding, data acquisition, engineering calculations and testing protocols used by billion dollar car companies is truly amazing. Our ownership fraternity is very blessed to have your automotive talents alive and well, continuing to advance the performance characteristics of an already unbelievable Ford product.:thumbsup

 

[RALPHIE]

Sorry Frank, I found it….

For many of the new owners of the Ford GT (as well as older ones who already know) this is what makes FGT ownership and participation on the Forum so rewarding. To have engineers and technical experts, originally on the FGT development/build Team, STILL working, tinkering, refining important systems and offering the fruits of their work to us, is quite spectacular. IMO unparalleled. As someone pointed out previously, go see if you can get that type of post production support from another supercar manufacturer. Or for that matter this type of technical information on ANY other forum.

Mark and Scott thanks from the FGT community!

Your passion and dedication are abundantly obvious. For two primary people (with appropriate accolades to the support staff enumerated in Scott’s earlier post) to undertake suspension modifications with the depth, understanding, data acquisition, engineering calculations and testing protocols used by billion dollar car companies is truly amazing. Our ownership fraternity is very blessed to have your automotive talents alive and well, continuing to advance the performance characteristics of an already unbelievable Ford product.:thumbsup

:agree:

:thumbsup :thumbsup

 

[Wwabbit]

:thumbsup Just awesome! My visor is starting to mist up.

 

[BlackICE]

With a great team of experts working on shocks. I know they are going the be a fantastic option for owners. :thumbsup

 

[sahlman]

Wow, thank you to all of you guys for such great support and comments! Today was another one of those days that went really, really great on the track and had a blast. We are a fortunate bunch (GT team and Owners) to share such passion for a very, very cool car

It appears I have about 6 sets to manufacture and build so far. Any other interest for the very near future please let me know since I am working on a production run ASAP after our testing tomorrow.

Mark and I got a couple more hours of track time in today with a great combination of small and large changes including tire pressure on the Bridgestones. I sure hope the GoPro in car video stuff turns out for our slalom work, avoidance maneuvers, ride roads and three 0 to 150 mph to 0 runs on black lake. (Dave I have the video card that was approved from the other day) I am pretty sure you could see the grins on our faces through our closed face helmets on a fairly blue sky Michigan day! Unbelievable fun and very productive.

Will keep you guys posted and more info on the shocks and packages later this week after testing.

Scott

 

[Cobrar]

Boy’s we are getting the band back together, all we need is Jeff Walsh and Jamie Cullen and we are ready. What a week, shades of the vehicle dynamics days of GT for sure. You need to understand that Scott has spent months using the original data as a starting point for his suspension project. We froze the design in 2004 for production so it’s been almost a decade since a real development has been done on the car. All of the development is being done on Bridgestone’s as they look to be the tire of choice with most Ford GT Forum members. Then Scott needed to find someone stupid enough to loan him a car for week or two so he could instrument and trash, thanks GT Guys for making it possible to own the car. Like I said I plan to drive the car, my ideal of driving may be a little different than most but it is fun. So the moons and star all got aligned last Tuesday when we delivered the car to Cayman Dynamics to start the instrumentation and tire change. Chris White (one of my dynamics engineers on the GT program) and Scott worked till 11 pm every night till we started the base line runs late Friday afternoon. Instrumentation is critical in this type of testing and getting that much on a car in under 3 days is unbelievable, remember this a my personal car not a prototype that you just hack and whack on. Right out of the box the setup is amazing remember we are on Bridgestone’s and the ride is every bit as good as the production and the handling is far superior than production. And that is just the standard ride rates and heights. The setups keep going down in ride heights and up in wheel rates and the handling keeps getting better. And yet the ride is still very good, we all were convinced that when we went to the rod ends on the Olin’s that ride isolation and impact harshness would suffer but it does not, very impressive. Small changes on the Olin’s yield big changes in how the car behaves. It is a very tunable setup and we are not done yet, more testing tomorrow. Can’t wait till tomorrow like a kid on christmass eve.

Time on my hands today, watching the black GT from the tower in Dearborn about 1:30 pm.

Either the transient response with those B-stone tires is poor - or - somebody had too much lunch at Mati's. :lol

 

[Mark McGowan]

Hell no time for Mati's. Between the day job and Scott they are working me to death. Could of picked me up an Carol's Temptation not to mention a brownie.

 

[roketman]

Your to old to be worked to death!
You must be going to bed before sunset to keep up!
L0L

 

[Cobrar]

Hell no time for Mati's. Between the day job and Scott they are working me to death. Could of picked me up an Carol's Temptation not to mention a brownie.

ny time Mark, drop a note on your schedule.

 

[sahlman]

Just a quick update while Mark is still resting from our hard week of testing...and hopefully getting a lunch at Mati's! I have been working hard on making sure production is running right on the first sets ordered and ready for the follow on sets that have been ordered. We will post some video from our track testing and a summary on the coilover packages for sale and options next week. Thank you much to the guys who have ordered sets and for the FGT Forum support!

Scott