UNDER THE SKIN: SALOON CAR – THE LONE RANGER
Under The Skin of Brent Edwards’ Ford Falcon BA in Saloon Cars
Brent Edwards drives the only New Generation Ford Falcon BA in Saloon Car racing in Victoria. It is one of the best-developed of the new-shaped cars, and provides an insight into the future of Saloon Cars…
By HEATH MCALPINE
BACK IN 2015 when Brent Edwards decided to commit to building a new generation Saloon Car, he couldn’t predict what would happen to the class in the next two years.
Mid-way through the 2015 season, it was announced that CAMS were going to take away the National Series status away from five categories, including the Saloon Cars (or Australian Super Six Touring Car Series as it was known). This was on the back of an announcement of the newer shaped Ford BA Falcon and Holden VY Commodore being permitted to enter the ranks alongside the elderly EA and AU Falcons and, VN and VT Commodores.
Brent Edwards commenced the build with the national series in mind
Enter Saloon Cars competitor Edwards, who had just transitioned from Production Cars to racing an AU Falcon in the Saloon Cars. Edwards took up the story.
“The reason why they brought these [new generation] in because at the time Shannons, through the Shannons Nationals asked the category to build a new shape car because they had TV with VTs and AUs, they were starting to look a bit tatty and all that sort of thing, they were old race cars.”
But when the CAMS decision was announced for season 2016 it was too late for Edwards, who had already started building his new BA Falcon Saloon Car. This left he and his team with a half built race car, but no national series to race it, so the team decided to stick with the car and race it at state events. But that was not the only issue, as Edwards explained.
“We had already started the build on it and the whole idea was to run with the Shannons Nationals and then CAMS dumped the class of the nationals, so we were left with a half built race car so what do we do with it and at the time we could still do state stuff. They’re still in the regulations, but unfortunately we’re still a guinea pig.”
There are a few cars in various forms of assembly, said Edwards, with many competitors seeing how the regulations go before fully committing to the new generation vehicle. Edwards’ current car will be changed at the end of the year as the regulations have been revised, though Edwards is keen to continue the cars development.
Brent Edwards racing his Ford Falcon BA at Phillip Island
“There are three or four partially built waiting to see what happens [with the regulations] and we have had some other competitors building them come and have a look at ours,” said Edwards. “We’ve been offering them assistance to try and get our numbers up. There are a few around in various stages just waiting to see when the dust settles and what the rules come up as. Whether they go ahead, it’s disappointing really because we have built a really nice car and did the right thing to bring the class into the future and clean it up.”
“Ian Chivas has also got one in New South Wales, they went down a different route, it’s a lot heavier than this and they were trying different things. They probably didn’t have the experience that we had to start off with. We knew what to do virtually straight away because we worked with them a lot. We knew what the problems were, the Achilles heels, and it’s just trying to work with them to try and get them accepted. To change it at the end of the year is going to cost us a lot of money now because they’ve changed the rules when the category management changed. We’re going to make the decision at the end of the year whether we do it or not.”
Initially when the regulations for the new generation VY and BA Saloon Cars were tabled, they were aimed for the new cars to be comparable to the VT Commodore, which Edwards said was pretty much spot on.
“Kudos to the guys that wrote the rules, they weren’t far off straight off,” praised Edwards. “It was meant to be on parity with the VT, which with development it probably will be. They’re pretty hard on front tyres, a wider front rim would be nice, but we knew that from production cars that they were hard on front tyres. We have the package where we need to be and with a bit more development it should be a competitive thing. It’s virtually on the mark now; we’re not all that far off.”
Though there continue to be speed humps for Edwards and his crew, they have pushed on with the development of their BA, which started off as an Ebay purchase in 2015.
“We bought it as an Ebay purchase, a repairable write off and fixed it ourselves in our shop,” Edwards smiled. “We were running the AU in the Shannons Nationals at the time, so it didn’t really get going until the 2015 season finished, doing it all in-house and part-time, while working full-time jobs, it took about eight months to build.”
The cage of Brent Edwards’ Ford Falcon during the build process
“We did everything at our Carrum Downs workshop, built the engine, did the cage in it and taking into account it was a much heavier vehicle than what we had previously with the AU, we had to have it to full national standards and have it safe enough, but not have too much bar work in it. It seems to work well enough.”
It certainly did work well, having only turned a wheel on the Friday of the fourth round of the Victorian State Race Series at Winton; Edwards qualified the car on the front row, finished second in its first race and fourth for the meeting.
The car uses the same Ford Barra engine as the road car
Moving onto the technical side of the car, the BA Falcon Saloon Car uses the same Barra six cylinder motor as the road car, but it is lightly modified to handle the E85 fuel Saloon Cars run on and to handle the strains of being in a race car.
“The engine is Saloon Car-spec. We have a control cam, currently a control set of headers, control inlet,” explained Edwards. “We’re required to use a certain Ford piston, we use the Ford LPG gas piston out of the Ford FG Falcon in there to give us the compression and that seems to work okay with the E85.”
“Currently we have to run a Haltech engine management, the AUs and all the other cars run a Stinger EMS but at the time when they did the regs for these, EMS didn’t have a fly by wire ECU solution. As of next year we will have to change to an EMS if we are going to continue running in this class. Les Small Motors tuned it all, my brother Travis Edwards virtually built the car with us as well and he did his own engine work. He has a lot of experience with V8 Utes and other categories as well.”
One of the main advantages with the updated model is that the BA has more power, which is levelled out thanks to the weight disadvantage the newer model currently faces.
“We’ve got a bit more power than the AU, we’ve got a better package to start with because we’ve got twin cams and VCT,” enthused Edwards.
“We have the extra weight over the AU, so we have to compensate for that. When it’s developed it will be a better thing than the AU, I believe, but the whole idea was that it was to be imperative with the Commodore and the Commodore is really the benchmark of the class. I think we’re not far off.”
Edwards runs a Tremec 6060 six speed gearbox, which has been proven to be quite reliable compared to the previous gearbox used in the AU. Not only is the engine beefed up for on-track duty, but the drivetrain has been replaced with an upgraded unit suited to more power.
“We are allowed to run a Tremec six-speed in it and the good thing about having the Tremac gearbox in it was that it was an Achilles heel of Saloon Cars. When we were running the T5 gearboxes we were changing gearboxes every couple of meetings,” explained Edwards.
“The drivetrain we run is the same as a V8 or a Turbo, so it’s the same differential as a V8. They have to run a spool and we run the same driveshafts as a V8 as well. Differentials, and the like, are things you don’t want to be replacing in these down the track because you have to drop down the whole cradle so to speak.”
The class has mandated a control wheel and tyre package, which consists of an 18-inch rim and a Bridgestone RE11 semi slick tyre. Wilwood is the chosen brake set up for Edwards on the front, while the rears are standard BA Falcon equipment, which Edwards elaborated further.
The Saloon Cars controlled front brake package
“We run Wilwood front calipers and they are a Saloon Car control item. It’s a six-pot Wilwood, while we run a PFC disc and Project Mu pads all round. Rears remain standard Falcon; these don’t use a great deal of rear brake.”
Edwards heaped praise on the BA Falcons handling, which he has found to be a significant improvement over the AU. But there are reasons for this.
“Compared to the AU and VT, they’re very well balanced because the fuel cell is mid-car, so it has very good weight distribution corner weight-wise and we have independent rear suspension whereas the AU had a live rear axle in Saloon Cars, so that works real well for us as well,” Edwards continued.
“The strength of the car is definitely the handling; it’s a great handling car.
“We had a lot of experience with these because I raced Ford’s in production cars for a few years and we knew what to expect from these set up-wise. We knew what they liked and what they didn’t; it’s got great balance whereas with the older generation Saloon Cars you have to really rag them to get a time out of them, this you could drive with your fingertips, so it’s like a proper race car.”
The BA runs the control Pedders Sports Rider coil-over kit, which looks like it may change for next season. As previously mentioned earlier in the article the newer model Falcon suffers from a significant weight disadvantage compared to its older counterparts. Edwards has worked hard to lose as much weight as possible, which involves a stripped out interior and still retains a user-friendly feel.
“A lot of weight was in the loom, we stripped out the loom and basically all we needed for safety and to run the car is left with a lot of wiring for the engine management,” said Edwards.
“Running the switch panelling on the front whereas with the HANS device in the older cars you can’t see that, so everything is at the fingertips and nice to use. It’s a really functional race car to drive. It’s a nice thing to drive and I love driving it.”
Brent Edwards racing his Ford Falcon BA at Winton
Even though Edwards and his team have worked hard to get as much weight out of the car, it still weighs 1440kg without driver. This makes it around 90kg heavier than the opposition, which in a closely fought class is a significant disadvantage.
“There is not a great deal we can take out of it for now to make it much lighter,” Edwards lamented. “We built it with that in mind, but it was going to be the biggest killer for the car. When the regs change and they take the weight out of it that we’re forced to run.
“25kgs is a large difference in a class that is very tight at the top.”
Overall, Edwards and his team have built up the car for around $42,000, but much of the work was completed by the team in-house making the build more cost effective. Considering how close the car was out of the box and how competitive it is given its continued development it has a definite bang for your buck element.
Though Saloon Cars do not have a national series, there are competitive state championships in most states and excitingly, a Saloon Car Nationals that will take place as part of the Island Magic weekend at Phillip Island on November 24-26.
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