AIM Autosport: Pirelli World Challenge Progress Report with Always Evolving Replay XD Nissan GT Academy
Exclusive by RaceCanada Staff
April 13th, 2015
With two stops (four races) complete on the Pirelli World Challenge Championship 2015 tour out of the way, we took a moment to follow up with AIM Autosport Team Principal Ian Willis on how things are shaping up for the team. With World Challenge being a completely new series for AIM, we were interested in how the team approaches certain aspects, especially as they are also fielding a brand new car. Ian's answers to our most recent questions provide us with some interesting insight.
Of course we will all be watching this weekend to see how it is all coming together for the AIM Autosport-managed efforts for the Always Evolving Replay XD GT Academy Nissan GT-R GT3s this weekend in the next two races for the series at the Grand Prix of Long Beach which gets underway on Friday (17th)
Oh, and we also decided to throw him a non-sportscar curveball question at the end.
RC: Just before the opening round of the season, we asked how long it takes to build a relationship with a new driver. Other than round two at Circuit of The Americas (CoTA) in the rain, things seem to be going well with James Davison, although it's probably a bit tougher to gauge progress with Bryan Heitkotter at this point.
IW: I think in qualifying at CoTA Bryan (Heitkotter) showed what he will be capable of this season, when he was just slightly quicker than James (Davison). It is very clear why he was picked by the Nissan GT Academy program. The two guys are different personalities, but they are working very well together as teammates and both have the same desire to succeed. James' experience helps Bryan to figure out where he needs to improve and Bryan's pace keeps James honest!
RC: What happened in the rain at CoTA? Both cars looked good in qualifying for round one, although Bryan seemed to drop back a bit during the race, James finished pretty strongly, but both cars appeared to struggle in the rain.
IW: That was basically a wrong tire pressure setting. In the wet warmup the tire pressures rose more than we anticipated so in the race we ended up over-compensating and the rain was worse so the pressures never got high enough. That will be the one and only engineering mulligan for the season...
RC: You've now done a permanent road course and a street circuit. How did the Nissan respond to set up changes between the two types of tracks? Were there any surprises?
IW: We anticipated that we would be ok at CoTA since it is very similar to most European tracks and the baseline setup worked well. The GT-R GT3 has not raced on any street circuits so we had to rely somewhat on our experience for St Pete and I was pretty happy that by the second race we were running ahead of the Cadillacs, Bentleys and Acuras, all front engine cars. I am still trying to get my head around the fact that the majority of this car's weight is on the front axle. All our experience has been mid engine cars with the exception of dabbling in NASCAR Canada stock cars a little, amazingly even they have a more favourable weight distribution than the GT-R. With not enough weight in the rear we struggle to get all that Nissan twin turbo horsepower to the ground!
RC: After two races, how would you compare and contrast Pirelli World Challenge and the IMSA Tudor United Sports Car Championship?
IW: The biggest adaptation for the team has been during the race, the crew guys have nothing to do and there is no strategy to call. At CoTA we started joking around about bringing a leather sofa to pit lane for the guys to sit in and watch the big screen, put fout casters on it and tow it up behind the pit equipment sort of thing. Seriously though, the two series are quite different, the Pirelli series is in a major growth spurt at the moment and quite frankly, they are trying to catch up with their growth. As we are new to the Pirelli paddock there is not the same familiarity and comfort level that we had in GRAND-AM and then IMSA. Everyone in the series has been very accommodating and they listen and react to the feedback that we give them which is a refreshing change.
RC: Knowing you aren't doing endurance races this year, how does that change your between-race routine?
IW: The between race routine is not much different other than we don't practice pit stops or obsess over fuel fill times. We still track mileage and change out parts on the manufacturer recommended schedules, there just isn't the bigger rebuilds like you would have after races like Daytona and Sebring. As the program came together so close to the start of the season we haven't really caught up yet with things like spares preparation, pit support and setup equipment, so it is still extremely busy between races.
RC: How much damage was done to Bryan's car? Was there any consideration of getting the car ready for Sunday or was there too much damage? From the photo it looks as if the damage may go up to or past the C pillar.
IW: That is a full story in itself, as it turned out to be much more damage than we thought based on watching the contact with the wall on the big screen.
Since the Nissan GT-R GT3 is a full road car shell with a roll cage installed in it, when you have a crash like St Pete, the energy of the impact is absorbed by the unibody shell collapsing. This design feature is what has made cars so much safer today, as less energy is transferred to the occupants during an impact with an immovable object like a cement wall. What this means however, is that the car was not immediately repairable and we had to miss the Sunday race, the first "DNS" in AIM Autosport history!
Although the damage was confined to the right rear corner, the rear shell and right hand main chassis rail were severely damaged. It was not readily apparent to us how damaged until we got back to the shop and went in deeper. Before we left the track on Saturday night we had already started to put a plan in action to try and get a replacement shell to "re-tub" the car. Unfortunately there were no shells available fully built up with a roll cage and all the GT3 mods installed. The only solution considering the time frame we had to work in was to take a stock bare shell that was sitting in England and have the GT3 modifications done then dissect the rear 1/3 off that shell and ship to Canada. We would then dissect the rear 1/3 off the back of our shell and weld the new rear shell section from England onto our main shell.
Before the car even got back to the shop we went to the only Nissan GT-R authorized repair facility in Toronto, explained what we trying to do and more importantly the time we had to do it in and they politely said; no way, not in that time frame! A job of that scope usually results in writing off the car because the costs are prohibitive. In racing, the words "can't be done" are not an option, so I asked where else can we get access to the frame fixtures required for us to put the car together. They helped us out by directing us to the company that owns the GT-R fixtures and it turns out they were just around the corner from our shop and the fixture was portable so we could bring it right to our shop!
We got the car stripped to the point we could put it on the fixture to confirm exactly where the shell was bent and how much we would have to replace. While the new shell section was being prepared and dissected in England we were dissecting our shell at the same time. Lots of pictures and calls back and forth made sure we dissected at exactly the same joins so that when the new shell showed up there were not any issues. Modern car shells are many pieces of varying grades of stamped steel that are spot welded together in an intricate puzzle of layers and interconnections. Finding the correct point to dissect the car in two that could be accessed enough to weld back together and not compromise the structural integrity was not easy. Couple in the added complication that the GT-R is a mix of regular and high tensile steels depending on the structural needs we needed to work closely with England to make sure it was done right and they sent us everything we needed to put humpty dumpty back together again.
The AIM guys have done a tremendous job grafting the two pieces together and making the car just like new in under seven days with the Easter holiday weekend thrown in the middle as well.
RC: Okay Ian, here's one out of left field. With everything going on, will Craig's (Willis) car be ready for the Toyo Tires F1600 opener on Victoria Day weekend at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park?
IW: That is a question for Keith! I don't think Craig will be doing as much racing this year, school takes priority (second year engineering at UoIT) and budget, as always, is a limiting factor.
Photo Credits:
Ray MacAloney (St. Petersburg Grand Prix)
Always Evolving/AIM Autosport (header)
RaceCanada / Mike Sullivan (Craig Willis F1600 CTMP)