Those discoveries were that the Ford was better in colder conditions and the Chevrolet V8 better in hot conditions, the latter obviously being more prevalent in racing scenarios.
It is also believed that the advantage enjoyed by the Chevrolet was significantly greater than that from the Ford.
Kostecki is known to have been a driving force behind the change, given he arrived into the Ford fold this year with significant Chevrolet experience.
He met with Supercars chiefs in Taupo and has been vocal on the need to push these initial changes through.
According to Kostecki the job isn’t done, though, with the reigning Bathurst 1000 winner claiming more work is in the pipeline.
“I think just from the very start I noticed a few subtle differences between how the motors drove, mainly off throttle stuff, when you try and brake,” Kostecki told Speedcafe.
“It was quite a big deficit in Sydney, but it’s a hard one, because Cam [Waters] dominated Sydney, but he was 17th down the speed trap. So it looks good on paper, but the facts are there that the Ford is slower in a straight line.
“[Albert Park], I felt the motor was off around three or four tenths per lap in the races. I got laughed at when I made that remark.
“We’ve come [to Tasmania] and made some changes to correct that, but I think there’s still a lot of work to be done between the two motors, to be honest. There’s a lot of unknowns and they dyno the motors, but it’s not how they run on track.”
Kostecki called for urgency in further changes given the season is rapidly unfolding, as well as noting that testing should be done outside of race meetings.
“I think everyone can do a better job on a lot of things,” he said. “I’m sure our team could have done a better job and the category could have done a better job.
“It’s just trying to work out the best way to move forward. There’s still a lot of altitude stuff that needs to be done and that was meant to be done last year, and it hasn’t been done yet.
“It’s unfortunate. The Ford motor has spent two years behind the ball in racing conditions. We don’t have time on our side and these problems need to be fixed. It comes at the expense of all the teams.
“It needs to be sorted, and testing needs to be done outside of rounds. We can’t be going to rounds and putting changes in. It needs to be validated. The guys that are in Fords should know going to a round if it’s going to be right or not.
“Going to AVL [transient dyno testing] was meant to clean up a lot of this, but out of all the things that were supposed to happen, I think only a third of what was outlined was actually achieved.
“There’s a big onus on the category. They said they can paritise two different architectures and the teams can only do so much behind the scenes without asking for approval. Most of the time, the team’s hands are tied.
“It’s a really funny one, and really frustrating at the same time.”
As for his role in the parity push, Kostecki said: “I don’t think I was really taken seriously at the start, it’s one of those things where I’ve echoed a lot of the comments from these other guys that have been in this car for a while.
“It shouldn’t have to take me to come in from a different side and really push hard behind the scenes to make things happen.
“No other category in the world has done what Supercars is trying to do and make two different motors equal without doing BOP.
“There just has to be more work to be done and we’ve got another manufacturer coming in. Everyone’s doing their best, but it’s simply not good enough and that’s just the facts of it.”
Discussion about this post