[s-cars] RE: Stebro

[Theodore Chen]

the SCCA also penalized the heck out of AWD when audi showed up in
trans-am and started winning all the races with a production-based 5000/200.

my point, though, was that the trans-am cars are running solid axles and
still manage to go very fast and handle well.

from a racing standpoint, the big advantage of IRS over a solid axle isn't
so much the independent rear suspension, but the reduction in unsprung
weight.

american production cars didn't get IRS because the bean-counters figured
everybody wanted FWD and it was cheaper to do.  they also figured that
most american drivers couldn't tell the difference anyway.  they're 
finally realizing that nobody's buying their cars any more because they've 
been investing all the money in SUVs.  for example, the ford expedition got 
IRS and a SLA front suspension, while the taurus soldiered on with a 
chassis that traces its roots back to '86 and the mustang continued with 
a '78 fairmont chassis.

it'll be interesting to see how the high gas prices affect the domestic
companies.  sales of SUVs have fallen a lot, and ford and GM are going to 
be hurting, because most of their profits come from SUV and their finance
operations.

-teddy

--- Kirby Smith <kirby.a.smith at verizon.net> wrote:
> Time for a historical factoid.  The reason the Transam cars use live
> axle rear ends, and why American cars were deficient for years in IRS
> (excluding the Corvette and Corvair) for RWD cars was that the SCCA
> prohibited IRS in Transam cars.  I was there.  The SCCA didn't want Mark
> Donahue, driving for Penske, to have an even more unfair advantage than
> he had (by being smart and having $$$ behind his car).  Instead of
> letting IRS loose on the American cars via racing the way disk brakes
> came to be on American cars, the SCCA blocked development. I still
> consider this a crime against American car development.



	
		
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