Opening season for the GTM

[Cobra 61]

April 20, at Las Vegas with the USTCC championship series. 17 cars were in attendance in four classes. Warm ups and the GTM posted fast time. Time for qualifying and the gremlins began to appear! The car decided to overheat and managed to get two laps in while the temp gauge was trying its best to escape the dash pegging out t 250 degrees. The car had been sitting since Decembers 25 hour 2nd place finish, we focused on some obvious visuals. The radiator cap and some corrosion around the inlet of the tank. New cap and wire brushed the debris from the seating area. Then the thermostat may have stuck shut so we got in and changed the thermostat. It was stuck but not in the way of not opening. Then it was test time, bleeding the system and a note: we have installed early on a petcock at the radiator for quick air evac of the system. fired it up and went right to 250! This happened about 8 years ago in a 6 hour endurance race and the motor decided to vapor lock with 20 minutes left and we lost the win finishing 2nd. Calls went out to crew members that were unable to attend. All agreed that we had covered all the bases so we continued to work the system for air. We once used a shop vac to push the air out so that's what we did next. Three times and fired it up. The temp was slower but went to 250 again. One suggested a faulty sensor on the gauge. Radiator was 130 at the outlets, thermostat 130 at the neck, and the heads were 202. It eventually burped itself out with 20 minutes before race time. Carl manged to put the GTM on the pole! Standing start and the GTM took the lead into the first turn and never looked back! Carl posted 15 fastest laps of the 16 race lap race, winning the GT class and overall. Our next stop is California Speedway where we finished 2nd two years ago.

Team Prototype Development Group

See you at the races!

[beeman]

Nice work getting the car right! Congrats on the domination!

[Shoeless]

Excellent work, thanks for sharing. I love hearing how well the GTM is doing.

[KGTM]

Great Run, I can not imagine having to change the thermostat.

I may be few months away from running on the roads and as hot as this cars get it always scares me and not sure if I can feel comfortable driving it around, feel like I need an escort for first few drives with tool box specially in bay area one get get stuck in traffic easily.

[tanderson1]

I bought this unit that can fill the coolant system using vacume pressure from a regular aircompressor.

https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B06...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Not sure if its up to racing standards but could work well for you in the future.

[KGTM]

I tried all sort of stuff some advise from forum, none worked.

Did what OEM do, My old bmw 635 has small valve om the top of the water pump, so added the 1/8 NT and hose ( so I can access from engine area) on the top of the Water pump to bleed the system problem was solved, just leaver the end of hose loose air was gone.

Mostafa

[crash]

I tried all sort of stuff some advise from forum, none worked.

Did what OEM do, My old bmw 635 has small valve om the top of the water pump, so added the 1/8 NT and hose ( so I can access from engine area) on the top of the Water pump to bleed the system problem was solved, just leaver the end of hose loose air was gone.

Mostafa

Yep. I run that setup on my personal LS configuration and have recommended it to PDG. This line can be -4 as there needs to be little volume, just a small path for the air to escape. Mine is open all the time and returns to the header tank.