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MAHLE Selects Second Winner of Engine Giveaway
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By NAPA
Christian Eckes orchestrated complete dominance at Martinsville Speedway by sweeping both stages en route to his second victory of the season on Friday night. The driver of the No. 19 Adaptive One Calipers Chevrolet Silverado RST scored the maximum 60 points and pocketed seven playoff points to make a massive swing in the NASCAR CRAFTSMAN Truck Series point standings. He gained two positions to fourth in the standings and is only 11 markers out of the lead.
Eckes displayed considerable pace by positing the third-quickest lap in practice and qualified on the outside of the front row on Friday afternoon. He made a statement at the drop of the green flag by using the outside lane to take the lead on the initial start. During the first 50-lap stage, Eckes methodically paced the field and asserted his dominance. Following a restart on lap 37, Eckes pulled away to comfortably take the Stage 1 win along with 10 points and one playoff bonus point.
Crew chief Charles Denike kept Eckes on track to maintain the No. 19 team’s track position and set up a one-stop strategy. Eckes picked up where he left off in Stage 1 on the lap 61 restart. He jumped out to another quick lead and cleanly executed two additional restarts during the second stage to tally 10 points and a second playoff bonus point for leading at lap 100. Under the ensuing stage caution, Denike brought Eckes to pit road for his only four-tire pit stop of the evening and made a minor air pressure adjustment.
As several trucks stayed on track with alternative pit strategies, Eckes lined up 19th on lap 110. During the second half of the race, Eckes conducted a masterclass in slicing through traffic. It only took him 11 laps to crack the top-10 and was back inside the top five by lap 142. On lap 165, Eckes arrived on the doorstep of the lead and took the runner-up position. Shortly thereafter, he reclaimed the lead with a power move on the outside for the second time on the night. Two cautions over the final 23 laps forced Eckes to execute crucial restarts to defend the race lead, which he did with complete authority. He led the final three-lap dash to the checkered flag and captured his first Martinsville win and grandfather clock by a margin of 0.64 seconds.
“Something really special,” Eckes said of the victory. “It hasn’t been an easy regular season so far, to say the least. We came here and we weren’t that great last year, maybe a sixth-place truck. We worked really hard on it and here we are in victory lane. So, just super proud of everyone on this team. Huge thanks to Adaptive One Calipers, NAPA Auto Care, Gates Hydraulics, all of our partners, and Chevrolet. It’s a good day to be in victory lane. Can’t wait for that clock!”
Start / Finish: 2 / 1
Points Standing / Total: 4th / 237 pts. (-11)
Next Race: Friday, April 12, Texas Motor Speedway
How to Watch or Listen: 8:30 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN or SiriusXM
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By Counterman
On modern vehicles, overheating is a rare occurrence thanks to high-quality hoses, thermostats and better engine management. Unfortunately, the weak point is still the coolant. Whether it’s a 100,000-mile or 150,000-mile coolant, eventually it will break down and lose the ability to protect the components with which it comes into contact.
Coolant at 100,000 miles may look the same as coolant with zero miles, as the real difference between good and bad coolant can’t be seen with the naked eye; it is in the chemistry and based on mileage.
Coolant contains additives called buffers that keep it at a neutral pH but these buffers are meant to last forever. When these chemicals become depleted, the pH can’t be controlled. It rises dramatically in a short period of time the moment the buffers are fully depleted. This is why replacing the coolant at the recommended interval is critical.
Coolant has two specifications that can be used to justify replacement — the condition of the additive package and the freezing point.
The additive package is the secret sauce for a coolant. Its main function is to control corrosion. Other components of the additive help with heat transfer and cavitation reduction. Some additive packages use seal conditioners to extend the life of the gaskets and plastic carriers.
The freezing point is measured by the overall specific gravity of the coolant, which has a direct relationship to the coolant/water mixture. This test can help spot coolant that has been compromised by the owner topping off with water. This measurement works well on systems that do not have pressurized reservoirs.
The strength or freezing point of coolant can be measured with a simple hydrometer. This device uses a calibrated float or plastic balls (not as accurate) to show the specific gravity of the coolant. This, in turn, shows how much freezing/boiling protection the coolant offers. You must remember to compensate for temperature because the specific gravity (density) of the coolant is lower when the coolant is hot.
The more professional tool for this purpose is an optical refractometer because it is very accurate and automatically compensates for temperature. Be aware: these are not simple, inexpensive tools. A refractometer can cost up to $300 or more because of the precision optics in its lens. Ethylene glycol (EG) and polyethylene glycol (PG) antifreeze have slightly different densities, so you have to use a hydrometer or refractometer with the appropriate scale (or one with a dual scale) for accurate test results.
Color-coded chemical test strips that are dipped into the coolant can be used to quickly and easily reveal the condition of the coolant. These strips of coated capillary paper react to the presence of certain dissolved minerals in the coolant and change color to give a good, marginal or bad indication of the coolant’s pH condition. Some test strips also show the concentration of antifreeze in the coolant.
The added benefit of test strips is that the results can be shared with the owner by attaching the used strip to the inspection form.
But, mileage is the gold standard for any coolant replacement recommendation. Engineers and chemists spend a lot of time formulating the coolant to match the engine and interval.
If you are performing a water pump, heater core or hose repair, recommend a full coolant flush. Just topping off the coolant can lead to a mixed bag when measuring the pH and freezing point. Also, check the specific gravity before a repair. Many customers know how to top off their coolant with water that could dilute the coolant concentration.
Selling any fluid maintenance service is difficult these days. But, if you document and educate customers on the importance of coolant, it becomes more than just an “add on” service.
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By NAPA
Three-time NHRA Funny Car world champion Ron Capps didn’t predict that a double-step and a red light in the second round would mark the end of his weekend on Sunday afternoon at the season-opening NHRA Gatornationals at Gainesville Raceway. When opponent J.R. Todd double-stepped while waiting for the tree to drop, Capps reacted early and turned on the red light in his quick and consistent
link hidden, please login to view Toyota GR Supra. Capps in his Dean ‘Guido’ Antonelli-tuned hot rod qualified third after consistently going down the track and making the third-quickest pass in all three completed qualifying sessions; Saturday’s fourth session was canceled due to weather. He picked up one bonus point in each of those sessions. It was Capps’ 3.871-second pass at 333.00 MPH in Friday’s second session that put him third on the final qualifying order.
In the first round of eliminations on Sunday, Capps left the starting line first against Jim Campbell and charged to a 3.870-second pass at 332.18 MPH to get the win over a tire-hazing Campbell. It was the second-quickest performance of the round and Capps’ quickest of the weekend, extending his record over Campbell to a class-record 18-0 and giving him lane choice in the second round.
Capps met up with past world champion and fellow Toyota driver J.R. Todd in the second round. Todd double-stepped the throttle, leading Capps to smash the throttle pedal in his NAPA Auto Care entry. He hit it .037 seconds too soon, as the red light came on in his lane. The third-year team owner coasted to a 4.185-second run at 249.39 MPH knowing he was disqualified due to the red light.
“A heartbreaking Sunday race day, obviously, more so because we had such a great race car,” Capps said. “We were so well prepared for our NAPA Auto Care team to go down the track every single run we were here. Even the run that we lost, with all that went on at the starting line, this car still went down the track under power until they killed the ignition switch on me. It probably would have gone to the finish line, but we didn’t want to take a chance after the weird starting line scenario.”
Capps went into the weekend as a four-time Gatornationals winner who was attempting to tie former boss Don ‘The Snake’ Prudhomme’s record as the second-winningest Funny Car driver at the historic Florida track. He said the bizarre second-round incident spoke to the pressure that exists in the Funny Car class, especially at the season-opening Gatornationals.
“Obviously, we wanted to get another Gatornationals win, but that was so weird up there,” Capps said. “You’re so keyed up. It was a long delay for the starting line, which is great because I love that. It really makes everybody be on their toes. But when your right foot and your butt is strapped into 13,000 horsepower, you could cut the air with a knife. J.R. just made a mistake, and he felt terrible, but it’s nothing he did wrong. It’s just part of it. I tried to hold my foot, but I heard his car and reacted.”
Capps took comfort in the fact that he didn’t lose due to the performance of his NAPA Auto Care Toyota GR Supra. He’s confident the car’s consistency will carry over to the next race at one of his home tracks, In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip.
“It’s upsetting because of how good a car we had, but it’s also a silver lining leaving here,” said Capps, owner of Ron Capps Motorsports. “It makes it a little less agonizing because I know how good we are right now. We’ll just move on to Pomona with a great hot rod.”
Capps and the Ron Capps Motorsports Funny Car team will be back on track March 22 – 24 at the NHRA Winternationals at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip in Pomona, Calif.
Start / Finish: No. 3 / def. in second round
Points Standing / Total: 5th / 59 pts.
Next Race: March 22-24, NHRA Winternationals, Pomona, CA
How to Watch or Listen: FS1;
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By Counterman
It seems like everything old is new again. TV and movie producers love to “reboot” our favorite classics, musicians regularly cover or sample from songs we all know (and sometimes loved). Fashions from high school that make us cringe will be back in style sooner or later.
It can serve to bring us together by introducing younger generations to the things their parents knew and loved, or drive a wedge between us as we argue over which version is better. For the record, I’m the grumpy old guy who argues that the original is always better … but I don’t think I ever expected to see another Mazda with a rotary engine.
The Wankel rotary engine was a unique (if somewhat flawed) design that had last appeared in the 2012 Mazda RX8. Designed by German engineer Felix Wankel in the 1950s, various displacements of the two-rotor engine appeared in Mazda production vehicles beginning in 1967. In addition to the more familiar RX7 and RX8 sports cars, Mazda also produced roughly 15,000 rotary-powered B-series pickups from 1974-1977, and even put its tiny 1.3-liter rotary into a small bus in 1974. A prototype four-rotor engine powered Mazda to a win at LeMans in 1991.
The rotary design is unique in that it only has three moving parts. An eccentric shaft and a pair of three-sided rotors move inside a pair of roughly oval chambers, completing the traditional Otto-cycle of intake, compression, combustion and exhaust without the use of reciprocating pistons or a valvetrain. Instead, the twin rotors spin around the eccentric shaft like a hula-hoop. The secret to the Wankel design is the geometric shape of the rotor, known as a Reuleaux triangle. The fattened triangular shape of the rotor has a constant width, always sealing the chamber in three places throughout the cycle … in theory.
Sealing was an issue for the early Mazda rotary engines, with the apex seals at the three points of the triangle tending to fail. Like a piston ring in a reciprocating engine, the apex seal is responsible for maintaining compression throughout the cycle. This problem dogged the brand for years, but another inherent issue is in the housing design itself.
With the intake and compression strokes occurring at the top of the oval chamber, and the combustion and exhaust events at the bottom, the housing experiences uneven heat buildup. This leads to one of the more confusing cataloging elements of the rotary Mazdas: “leading” and “trailing” spark plugs.
Due to the heat differential between the upper and lower portions of the housing, the stock spark plugs are of different heat ranges. The leading plug (the “lower” position) is a hotter plug than the trailing (“top” position), although some enthusiasts prefer to run trailing plugs in all four positions. (Each rotor/chamber houses a pair of plugs.)
Inability to meet increasingly strict fuel-efficiency and emissions requirements ultimately killed the original rotary engine, but in 2023, Mazda resurrected the design. A single-rotor 830cc Wankel engine can now be found in the Euro-spec MX-30 e-Skyactiv R-EV plug-in hybrid. Unfortunately for RX enthusiasts, the engine serves only as a range extender for the PHEV variant of the MX-30, powering a generator rather than powering the drivetrain directly.
With improved compression, gasoline direct injection and an EGR system, this engine is much cleaner and efficient than previous rotaries. We’ll see if this improved technology can make its way back into the U.S. market, but for now, the European-engineered Wankel rotary engine has returned to its roots, thanks to the Mazda engineers who have believed in this funky little powerplant for nearly 60 years.
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