Nascar fuel injection

sam60 · Mar 22, 2012

Minimum 9V to start the car with the new setup and less than 9V delivered when cranking with 1 weak cell in a battery. A 16V charge applied from battery charger kills the ECM. Heard on XM 90 today that this is a problem with the new system. How will they fix this?

Outsider · Mar 22, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

Just off the top of my head, howz about keeping a good battery in there and not charging at 16v? :facepalm:

sschefer · Mar 22, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

mzahn said:
Minimum 9V to start the car with the new setup and less than 9V delivered when cranking with 1 weak cell in a battery. A 16V charge applied from battery charger kills the ECM. Heard on XM 90 today that this is a problem with the new system. How will they fix this?

Disconnect the battery when charging.

roscoe · Mar 22, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

Isolate the ecm from the main power grid and use a small secondary battery just for the ecm?

I don't know, how WILL they fix it ?

You would think they could drop a small battery on the passenger side in place of one of the frame weights.

The bigger question, is what will NASCAR allow ?

bassman284 · Mar 23, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

Outsider said:
Just off the top of my head, howz about keeping a good battery in there and not charging at 16v? :facepalm:

I'll go a step further and ask, who charges at 16v?

bigdee · Mar 23, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

Simple....just add a VR circuit set at 12 vdc between battery and ECM and use a 6 volt & 12 battery in series to supply 18 vdc. Those high comression engines would love 18 volts for starting.

LippCJ7 · Mar 23, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

Here is the problem with race cars guys, it is the standard that once the car comes in off practice or any testing or even during race stoppages that one person will hook a charger up to the battery, its so important that it is a priority duty for one team member to do this and another team member to check it, Race cars (NASCAR all the way down to local circle tracks) do not have alternators since they are a horse power drain and nobody wants to do anything to lose horsepower, they will run an entire race on a battery since once the car is going it needs very little volts. The other side of this is that batteries are heavy so dual batteries are out as well.

I see a voltage Regulator being needed, Our late models always had the battery behind the drivers seat and it was a chore to access, nearly impossible if the driver is in the car.

Now road racing cars are very different so thats another animal

roscoe · Mar 23, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

LippCJ7 said:
Here is the problem with race cars guys, it is the standard that once the car comes in off practice or any testing or even during race stoppages that one person will hook a charger up to the battery, its so important that it is a priority duty for one team member to do this and another team member to check it, Race cars (NASCAR all the way down to local circle tracks) do not have alternators since they are a horse power drain and nobody wants to do anything to lose horsepower, they will run an entire race on a battery since once the car is going it needs very little volts. The other side of this is that batteries are heavy so dual batteries are out as well.

I see a voltage Regulator being needed, Our late models always had the battery behind the drivers seat and it was a chore to access, nearly impossible if the driver is in the car.

Now road racing cars are very different so thats another animal

Nascar cars run alternators.
They put a stronger one in this year.

Running dual batteries is common in nascar. Unless the rules changed this year, it is allowed.

sam60 · Mar 23, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

mzahn said:
Minimum 9V to start the car with the new setup and less than 9V delivered when cranking with 1 weak cell in a battery. A 16V charge applied from battery charger kills the ECM. Heard on XM 90 today that this is a problem with the new system. How will they fix this?

The above was from Robbie Gordon on Claire B Lang show yesterday. He said he won't be running much longer. Love him or hate him, he is a racer. I am a traditional die hard Earnhardt Sr. fan but have always liked R Gordon for his off road, road course and Dakar skills.

It's fun to put something up here and watch the comments.

WIMUSKY · Mar 24, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

roscoe said:
Nascar cars run alternators.
They put a stronger one in this year.

Running dual batteries is common in nascar. Unless the rules changed this year, it is allowed.

They run 2 ignition boxes, not so sure about the batteries... I usually saw them replace a battery when needed.....

puddle jumper · Mar 24, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

roscoe said:
Nascar cars run alternators.
They put a stronger one in this year.

Running dual batteries is common in nascar. Unless the rules changed this year, it is allowed.

With the fuel injection they probably run a alternator that is incorporated into the water pump. These are not the same as one that would be on you daily driver. These alternators barley put out a charge to free up HP.

I think they will have to ether run a separate power source or some kind of isolator on the ecm.

roscoe · Mar 24, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

They started using slightly stronger alternators than a few years ago, after they were losing races with the cheaper ones.
Jr lost a couple that I remember.

Then this year, with the fuel injection, they decided to beef it up a little more to handle the load.

I think they are using 140 A units this year.

Lots of custom air ducting and custom alternator covers being used to cool them.

Quote from Jeff Gordon after Loudon race in 2011.:

"But when I switched over to the other battery, yeah, everything was lighting up and flashing and going crazy. Sometimes we only run one battery, so I was pretty happy to have two batteries [Sunday].

This was written in 2010:

NASCAR race car alternators are a bit more expensive: five years ago a NASCAR alternator would run about $500. Last season Cup team alternators were being priced at $2900. This year -- the price has jumped to $6,000.

TilliamWe · Mar 24, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

roscoe said:
...

This was written in 2010:

NASCAR race car alternators are a bit more expensive: five years ago a NASCAR alternator would run about $500. Last season Cup team alternators were being priced at $2900. This year -- the price has jumped to $6,000.

Yikes I hope Mercruiser and Volvo Penta don't know this! They'll have $10,000 alternators on all their engines next week!

Tail_Gunner · Mar 26, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

TilliamWe said:
Yikes I hope Mercruiser and Volvo Penta don't know this! They'll have $10,000 alternators on all their engines next week!

Shhh did you have to let the cat out of the bag..geesh. Ciricut isolation is the very last issue these guys face...i cannot even believe this merits press. What will be intresting is how they develop Fi...If anyone can squeeze Hp out of Fi you can bet they can and will.

bigdee · Mar 26, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

Tail_Gunner said:
Shhh did you have to let the cat out of the bag..geesh. Ciricut isolation is the very last issue these guys face...i cannot even believe this merits press. What will be intresting is how they develop Fi...If anyone can squeeze Hp out of Fi you can bet they can and will.

Nascar officials have got a learning curve ahead of them.....I see a golden opportunity for a whole lot of cheating. "Smokey Yunnick style" with modern day technology.

bassman284 · Mar 26, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

Smokey would already have it doped out and be showing the rest of field his rear bumper.

Don S · Mar 26, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

Funny how Smokey was known as an innovator, pushed the limits of everything on a race car, and did wondrous things for racing..

Now if someone tries to do what he did and play in the gray area, they get fined, points taken away, and not allowed at the track for a number of races, and is labeled as a cheater.

TilliamWe · Mar 26, 2012

Re: Nascar fuel injection

Don S said:
Funny how Smokey was known as an innovator, pushed the limits of everything on a race car, and did wondrous things for racing..

Now if someone tries to do what he did and play in the gray area, they get fined, points taken away, and not allowed at the track for a number of races, and is labeled as a cheater.

And his name is Chad Knaus!

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