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V8 Supercars is moving to clarify a rule in its operations manual to make it absolutely clear that chassis must only be built in Australia.
The rewrite means a DJR Penske investigation of whether it should exploit its parent’s robotic chassis building ability at its NASCAR operation in Mooresville, North Carolina.
“They (Penske) spoke about what they wanted to do, so we thought it best to clarify what the intent of the operations manual is,” explained V8 Supercars sporting and technical director David Stuart explained.
DJR Team Penske plans to roll out two new Ford Falcon FG Xs for the 2016 season, to ensure it can continue its chassis rotation even though it is expanding to a two driver team, with Fabian Coulthard joining Scott Pye.
DJR Team Penske will have Gold Coast-based Pace Innovations continue to build its chassis, with the first car now on the jig and scheduled to hit the track early next season.
“The motivator for us was not the propensity to build a super-chassis as it were, but to utilise Team Penske's resources to have cookie-cutter chassis punched out that are extremely cost effective,” explained DJR Team Penske managing director Ryan Story.
“With so much invested in the NASCAR and IndyCar programs in the United States, as you might appreciate, it made sense to explore consolidated economies of scale as those benefits may apply to the Australian racing team.
“That was a motivator and one of the key rationales for Team Penske entering the series, being able to utilise resources already at their disposal. For example, they have in their Mooresville facility an industrial robot which is used to build NASCAR chassis.”
This is the second time V8 Supercars has clarified an ‘internationl’ rule in relation to Penske. The first time came in 2013 when old Dick Johnson Racing was not allowed to ship a racer to the USA for testing.
Stuart said the intent of the rule had always been that race cars be built in Australia. He said the Penske clarification followed on from earlier questions along the same lines during the time the current NextGen chassis was being developed.
“With the advent of NextGen and the advent of new manufacturers, there were other manufacturers that had enquired in the course of that phase of development of that chassis as to whether they could build the cars overseas.
“And at that time they were told no by V8 Supercars.”
“So the intent - although not written into the Racing Entitlements Contract or a rule - is that the cars be built in Australia.”
Stuart explained there were a number of important reasons for having the cars built locally rather than overseas.
“The intellectual property (IP) for the NextGen chassis belongs to V8 Supercars. The IP of the control rear suspension belongs to V8 Supercars and is listed in the operations manual under design.
“So therefore we had some responsibility to look after that.
“Secondly, if the cars are being constructed in Australia it gives us the opportunity to go and inspect the cars… it gives us the opportunity to check the tubes for diameter and wall thickness, the construction method of the car, the gusseting, the quality of work, etcetera.”
Stuart said that ability to inspect the chassis under construction gave V8 Supercars the chance to address issues before they became major.
“It is always easier to fix something in its infancy than at completion.
“Once the cars are ready for paint we go and mark all the relevant tubes of the roll-cage so we can track it,” he added.
“And we will give the team a plate to affix to the roll cage once it is painted. We also now put a wire seal through that cage so we can track that cage through its life.”
Story admitted DJR Team Penske wasn’t happy with the clarification of the rule.
“It was flagged to us earlier this year that a rule change in 2016 would require chassis to be built in Australia,” he told v8supercars.com.au.
“Whilst we are disappointed, we respect the change and understand the reasoning behind it, being that it allows the Technical Department at V8 Supercars to oversee the build steps and tag the chassis through the build processes, something that would be difficult to police and manage with chassis made offshore.”
Stuart conceded the issue had exposed a need for V8 Supercars to continually review the operations manual.
“If somebody new is coming in and they don’t know what history and intent of a rule is then as we move forward we have to do a better job of clearly articulating in the rule book what the intent is and what the effect is,” he said.
