Vipers at the Nurburgring

[CoupeKing]

Well 2 Vipers from a showroom floor made their way over to 'The Ring' thanks largely to GoFundMe donations.

They had been there for 8 days when they got a chance to do a run without traffic or rain, taking 3 records so far.

- Fastest American-Made Production Car Lap
- Fastest RWD Production Car Lap
- Fastest Manual Gearbox Production Car Lap

A time of 7:03.45 was officially recorded and plans are already set in motion to go back next month (if they get the funds) and try for a sub-7 time. With more track-time one of the drivers said it's possible to shave another 4-5 seconds off that first run - time will tell!


This is one hell of a drive:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgv32Zib2KE

[Pedro]

Nice find ... good to watch.

[PHawk]

Wow! Awesome work

[M&Ms]

Wow that gearing is long, 110 in 1st, 170 in 2nd, 220 in 3rd, 275 in 4th.
So much torque though, awesome

[bangm001]

Always have loved the Vipers. Have been in the older 1998 R/T 10 that my cousin owned. It handles unbelievably well for a car that people say cant turn corners! Must be the something like 335 rubber in the rear and 275 fronts! Anyway mountains of torque etc etc. Can only think of how awsome the new generation vipers are. Its only a lotto win away for me!

[CoupeKing]

They have managed to get the funds for another crack sometime this month, and this time the driver has ''promised'' that he will post a time that breaks into the 6's, exciting stuff!

[Windsor220]

Wonder if we will ever see the new GT there

[CoupeKing]

The team have been testing for a couple of days now but still no word on a sub-7 time.

I don't know who this guy is but he was lucky enough to take the Viper out for a lap. Audio is a little vague, but other than that he seemed to be genuinely excited.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72Luk8fjvWc

[Polyal]

To me this car mightnt have the history of a gt40 but omg they are animals. I would do all kinds of illegal things to have a gen2 gts. Simply the greatest car the us has made.

[futura]

Thats a pretty wild ride. Alot of steering correction.

[CoupeKing]

Latest update from someone at the track (no video yet)


''Today is our last day at the track. WOW, talk about emotional highs and lows. Since Dom and Mario were racing this weekend, Luca was in one car and we had another.

After some due diligence, we found one of the fastest Ring drivers, Lance Arnold, who joined us in the second car. We also found 5 hours of track time, with a group that was renting the track for their club day. Both Luca and Lance were on track and Luca failed to come around the track. He had a tire failure at a high speed (left front) on the final straight. We put some fresh rubber on his car and sent him back out. Unfortunately, the next thing that happened was our own fault. In changing the differential fluid, the drain plug was only finger tightened and mistake slipped through the cracks. Oil leaked out until there was too little left in the diff and it broke. We were now down to one car.

Rain was predicted for 1PM and our solo track time was 2PM. I cut a deal with the track days owner to let us go out at noon and we’d give him our 30 minutes at 2PM. We re-prepped Lance's car, put fresh tires on it and waited. He went out at 12 noon. On his first lap he turned a (wait for it......) 7:01.3. We were elated. We couldn't wait to see the time for his second lap. It was then that we were informed that there was a problem. Apparently, his left front tire (like Luca's) had a sidewall failure at about 160 mph while he was in a corner. He ALMOST saved it but the car brushed the left guard rail ever so lightly. At that speed, anything that upsets the car is bad, so it slid across the track and contacted the right guard rail. While it definitely wasn't the worst incident in the world, Vipers with broken parts are never pretty. The airbag went off and all of that (that's what happens when you run production cars). Lance was fine but bummed out because he felt the car was ready to best the 6:57 mark. He did the 7:01.3 on his FIRST lap.

I want to point out that the cost of all of the damage now falls on Bernie and Ben at Viper Exchange, who own the car. This is why I found it odd that some folks were saying that Viper Exchange would profit on selling these cars when we were done with the record runs. Any possible profits will be used to repair the car that contacted the armco. The gofundme donations will pay 1) the track for repair to the rail and 2) the owner of the track-day because we took up 1.5 of his hours instead of 1 and he asked that we compensate him, which is fair.

So, there you have it. Our big adventure to the Nurburgring comes to an end. We have not had a driver who feels that the car is not a mid 6:50's car. I think that we asked a bit much of the tires on this particular track. There's a reason it’s called "The Green Hell."

Viper Nation, we did the best we could with what we had to work with. It's hard not being supported by the factory in any way. We did it with YOUR gofundme contributions, tires and funds by Kumho, spare engines by Prefix (fortunately we didn't need them), 2 complete and free cars from Viper Exchange and BJ Motors, and other generous donations by members of the Viper community. So many donations, that the only way to list those who gave more than $250 is on the poster, which we will start working on.

I will try to write a post-script from the plane, on the way back to the states.
We will post the video and data shortly. Our data guy is on vacation and we have to figure out how to get it off the drive. As soon as we do, we'll post it.

Again, thank you all and please know that the only thing that kept us apart from a 6:5x was time and money.''

[solarite_guy]

Sorry about the shunts, but looked like the car was running well. My uncle had his best overall finish at the ring. I think was running group 3 in world sports car.

[lucas2]

I think the ACR has too much downforce for the ring. Especially through the high speed straights and corners where cars like the Performante have active downforce. We know on medium length tracks the ACR is a beast.

[CoupeKing]

Originally Posted by lucas2

I think the ACR has too much downforce for the ring. Especially through the high speed straights and corners where cars like the Performante have active downforce. We know on medium length tracks the ACR is a beast.

I wouldn't say too much down force, yes it's got heaps (770kg peak at top speed) but if you alter that significantly you lose time on overall average speed. There's plenty of cars that will beat it on the straight but can't get anywhere near 7:01 - and there's room for improvement..... 3:20 to 3:50 (video time) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgv32Zib2KE.


You're right about the medium length tracks though and this is where one of their main problems lay, the tyres. Kumho designed this tyre strictly for the Viper and I'm assuming it was intended to be raced mainly on the circuits throughout North America and not the ring. The tyres get destroyed because not only is the length of the track 21km but the warm-up lap is also 21km. So towards the end of the hot-lap they've been having problems, especially when the track temperature is higher than usual. The other problems are funds and time.

Fun fact? Owners that choose to tow their Viper to the track (loses all it's cool factor if you ask me) notice the extra fuel consumption due to the increased drag lol.

At then end of the day they will probably go back and hopefully get a sub 7 time, but even if they don't a 7:01 from a production car that has a base-price of 130k (139k tested), naturally aspirated, RWD, manual.....has gained respect and street/track-cred like no other modern-day car.

Still no footage of the 7:01, but this is 2 years old tearing up the circuits in NA.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIqbm0Dzzv0

[CoupeKing]

Here's the 7:01.3 run:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-Qb7W0OD4M

[CoupeKing]

[CoupeKing]

Here's the full doco: