After their original car was destroyed during Petit Le Mans practice, the Patrón Highcroft ALMS team was forced to rebuild their Acura LMP1 racer overnight. Below, the time-lapse build video, Scott Sharp's Porsche-tagging crash causing the all-nighter and the time-line.
So to put it in simple numbers, the team put together a 4,000-part race car in 21 hours and 45 minutes. Simply brilliant. Here's a few slugs from Patrón Highcroft Racing:
Patrón Highcroft Racing's won their "race" to make the grid and maintain the team's championship assault after taking a bare tub into a complete racecar in less than 24 hours today.
After a horrifying crash for Scott Sharp on Thursday, the tub of the team's Acura ARX-02a was badly damaged and Honda Performance Development flew out a replacement overnight from its headquarters in California.
Beginning the build at 8:00am on Friday morning preparing parts, the Patrón Highcroft squad kicked off when the tub arrived at 9:20am and worked throughout the night to build up a new machine for today's 12th running of the annual Petit Le Mans endurance classic.
The car was ready to roll at 5:45am the following morning - in time for the team to take part in the morning warm-up. Heavy rain overnight actually pushed the warm-up back - allowing the team to take a breath before beginning race day.
The Crash:
THE BUILD RECAP / TIME-LINE
Pre-petit work list items: 190
Acura ARX-02a Statistics:
Chassis mechanical parts: 4000
Chassis electrical parts: 250
Engine parts: 100 (excluding internals of engine)
Gearbox parts: 350
Parts with tracked life: 1000 (excluding internals of engine)
Custom hardware (fasteners, o-rings, bearings): 450
Rebuild Statistics:
Parts reused: about 10%
Rebuild Timeline
(times are when tasks were completed, unless otherwise noted)
Thursday
3:43 PM - Accident
4:15 PM - Damaged assessment finished
4:45 PM - Spare part serial numbers allocated for car build
5:00 PM - Finalized arrangements to ship spare tub
6:00 PM - Spare tub picked up by freight service in California
6:45 PM - Damaged car stripped, reusable parts identified
11:00 PM - Replacement parts prepared and arranged for assembly
12:00 AM - Team back to hotel
Friday
7:10 AM - Spare tub arrives at Atlanta airport, met by team members
7:30 AM - Breakfast
8:00 AM - Begin preparation for car build, organize and layout assemblies
9:30 AM - Spare, bare tub arrives at track
11:00 AM - Tub preparation finished
12:00 PM - Lunch
11:30 PM - Fresh engine fitted
1:30 PM - Fresh gearbox fitted
6:00 PM - Dinner
8:00 PM - Four corners fitted on car
9:00 PM - Race spare preparation begins
11:45 PM - Hydraulic/fuel/electronic systems tested
Saturday
1:00 AM - Engine fired
4:30 AM - Car on ground
5:45 AM - Set up finished
6:45 AM - Race strategy meeting
8:15 AM - Warmup / Practice Session
[via Axis Of Oversteer, Patron Highcroft Racing, GrandTouringPrototype.com]