New Member, Just Got My New Cougar

[23racer]

I just wanted to introduce myself and say Hi. I am the new owner of the ex-Mumm Bros. Speed WC Cougar. My plans for the car are to run it in some Castrol Touring car races this summer and if I can get this thing going fast enough, I will run the Speed World Challenge race at Mosport later this summer.

I am new to FWD Ford products, but have been racing for longer than I care to remember and I am very impressed with the quality of this car. It has all the race toys you could imagine. It has a Kinetic Race Engines motor in it now with well over 290 HP naturally aspirated, a spare Reinke engine with over 265 hp. It came with 2 transaxles the first a complete Quaife gear cluster and diff MTX 75, the second a Houseman gear cluster and Quaife diff. A spare SDS programeable setup. Just tons and tons of stuff.

The car needs some cosmetic work like a new drivers side fender, headlights and rear hatch with a paint job, but the car is a monster.

I have an RX7 CCTCC race car as well and that is cool (self built) but this car is at a completely seperate level.

I just wanted to say hi and I will keep you guys informed of my progress and any lapping days I take the car out to while I shake it down before we start to race it again.

Here are a couple of shots of the car when it was raced in th Speed WC series and I thought I would throw in a shot of my RX just for kicks.

Eric Nummelin

[Mike]

You definitely need to keep us posted. Maybe we can setup a meet during one of the events. :biggrin:

[LadyX]

Sweetness!! Welcome to the forums!

[MaverickFlyer]

I would definitely be interested in seeing this car do some corner carving. Keep us updated of any lapping days you attend as I would love to see it.

[michcougar]

Wow, keep us updated!

[MOMO]

Wow, welcome! keep us updated!

[fordrule]

welcome to the boards. we hope u keep us posted and feed our need for pictures of that rare beauty

[MUSKOKN]

Let me be the first to say:

BUMBA-CLAAT


Nice ride!!! :thumbsup:

[Comando489]

:wave: you just found your number 1 fans.

[23racer]

Here are some more shots of the car when I picked it up. I have a ton more shots, but I need to size them down before adding. Who can guess what the first shot is showing. The second shot shows the modified Wings West nose that develops a ton of front end downforce.

Some more details. The car has Dynamic 4 way adjustables on it with in-car adjustable rear sway bar. It also came with a set of brand new 4 way adjustable Morris Dampers. All of the control arms are fabricated from scratch, the engine cradle is 2 piece to allow easy transmission removal. The motor mounts and diff mounts are made from billet aluminum and aluminum tube and are extremely light. It has a 7.25 lb flywheel with a triple plate Quartermaster clutch. The car has been fully developed and everything that was not perfect was totally fabbed from scratch. It also came with 2 sets of like new Forgeline 12 lb wheels.

What is really cool, is that the car came with 3 4" binders filled with technical information about everything from aero, to suspension design, chassis FEA's, shock mapping, wiring diagrams stock and actual race car, etc.... The motor has a number of dyno program printouts showing that back in 2000 the car made 296 hp and 198 ft/lbs of torque at approx. 7,000 rpm. Further exhaust and intake work over the years boosted the upper rpm limit to close to 8,000 rpm and hp is estimated at over 314. I need to clean up the car, replace a few hoses. Check out all the operating systems and replace the bad body parts. Anybody know a good bodyshop that needs some free publicity,LOL?????

The best thing is that the engine picks up rpm like an F1 car and is just scary sounding. The worst thing is that it will only run on VP Fuels C12 or equivalent at $14 a gallon. So each race will cost me over $200 in fuel alone.

The previous owners are great guys and I can hardly wait to get it back on track in its former glory :biggrin:.

Eric Nummelin

[23racer]

Here is a link to the original build shots of the car being built by the Mumm Bros. It shows the quality of their work.

The car is something special.


Mumm Brothers Racing (http://www.mummbrothers.com/T2_Stuff/T2Main.htm)

Have fun, I hope to be.

Eric Nummelin

[fordrule]

i contacted mumm brothers and they said all the paperwork, blueprints and specs for some of the custom work went with the car. the suspension on that thing is awesome. would u be willing to scan any of the technical info. i am sure some of us would love to read some of it.and possibly copy some of it lol

first pic is that a fresh air pump for the helmets? i see its in the rear with air coming in and it looks like a pump of some sort

love to see a video of that thing just idling and going through revs.....gives me chills just thinking of it. cant wait for more pics of the beauty.

[hamill]

a little late...but welcome to the forums.

By any chance did they give you a spare front bumper you are willing to sell :)

EDIT: Were you by any chance at any of the London auto expo or Speedorama shows in the past 4 years with your Mazda? If so...I talked to you at the show.

[timeless420]

So you bought this from Jr?

[23racer]

Yes, it is JR's old car. They are great people to work with and with a little cleanup (especially body panels as JR can be aggressive, LOL) we should have the car running very well.

I have just been gathering the information and parts to assemble the spare motor and working with my crew chief on a plan and timing to get this car back on track. Until the car is ready, I at least have my RX7 ready to rock.

Regarding the suspension information, the suspension book is over 3 inches thick with tons, and I mean tons of information. Most of the information is very interesting and it shows the level of development that the Mumm Bros. went to to build this car. :bowdown: They really really researched the car.

Eric

[TheWingsER]

i guess i'll be the last one, but welcome to the furoms.. nice cougar.. i have to say

[gamiller]

i contacted mumm brothers and they said all the paperwork, blueprints and specs for some of the custom work went with the car. the suspension on that thing is awesome. would u be willing to scan any of the technical info. i am sure some of us would love to read some of it.

Very interested in seeing the more interesting designs. Barry Mumm offered to scan it for me but it seems it's all in your hands now. We'd love to see some of the more interesting information. If you don't have time to scan the documents, consider loaning one or more of them to me. I'm currently unemployed, so I have time to do the scanning. It would be great to have some of the information available to the community since guys here are starting to build track cars.

Best wishes this season!

[23racer]

Sorry, for the delay in responding as I have been travelling like a mad fool since early July, New Orleans, Houston, Montreal, Chicago and this week coming up Vancouver and Calgary. Anyways, enough sob stories. When I get back I will post a bunch of the information about the suspension for you guys.

It is a bit difficult as I have at least 6 3" binders full of information and a completly full CD full of technical stuff as well. The car also came with all the jigs to make the control arms and fabbed motor mounts and Barry Mumm even forwarded his setup sheets from Sebring, the complete parts list and some pictures of the car when it ran in the WC series. Just for general info, the Mumm Bros. are great guys.

For general information, we have been very busy over the last few months since we got the car. We had to go through the car system by system to figure out what is working within standards, as well we moved the seat lower and closer to the tunnel, removed a bunch of weight, raised the shifter up so that my right hand only has to go sideways now from the wheel to bang the next gear and I have done a ton of body work on the car. It has its first coat of white paint on it now and this morning I wet sanded the car completely to smooth out most of the remaining (from the previous paint job) orange peel and when I get back the car is going back to the painters for its last coat of white and about 4 coats of clear. We then will change the spring rates a bunch, it presently has 400 lb fronts and 300 lb rears and we will be ready for a test day.

Eric

[gamiller]

Sounds like you've been busy! If you find the time, please update your website and/or blog with build photos as well as news.

I just finished overhauling my front suspension with new bushings everywhere, urethane roll restrictors (a.k.a. insulators), and Cougar S struts with Roush springs. i decided against the D2/Ksport coil overs everybody is gaga over. i just don't believe enough engineering went into adapting them to our platform. I hope to be proven wrong, but I'm sticking with proven parts for now.

I sure would love to have the camber plate blueprint... or the jig itself! Did the Mumms install a stab-o-shock or equivalent between the engine and transmission? The SVT Contour came with one.

[boarder4life]

How about the control arm jigs? are they just a tubular form of our original a arms or have they re worked them into a stronger structure?

[23racer]

The control arms are not just a tubular version of the stock control arms. They have the capability to adjust caster, camber and bump steer. They are also different from side to side to maximize caster gain. Based on the documents I have, they were designed based on results of suspension design data as calculated by Bill Mitchell, Dynamic Suspension and Ford Engineering. They are stronger than stock and lighter as well.

I have attached the information I have on the a-arms.

Eric

[MUSKOKN]

:bowdown: Serious business going on in that car. :tongue:

[MaverickFlyer]

The control arms are not just a tubular version of the stock control arms. They have the capability to adjust caster, camber and bump steer. They are also different from side to side to maximize caster gain. Based on the documents I have, they were designed based on results of suspension design data as calculated by Bill Mitchell, Dynamic Suspension and Ford Engineering. They are stronger than stock and lighter as well.

I have attached the information I have on the a-arms.

Eric

Very Nice!

i wonder if my Stangkiller a-arms will be as nice? :confused:

$706.02 those ain't cheap! :eek:

[boarder4life]

thats mainly labour though, if we had the capability to do it ourselves price would drop significantly

[23racer]

The price breakdown was provided to me with the car. The prices are from 2002!!!!

I expect that the cost to produce the arms today would be at least 15 to 20% higher with the increase in steel costs and labour costs. This is the same for every part on the car. Barry Mumm kept incredible records during the build and I can see where all the parts came from and I can compare the prices on some of them from 2000 - 2002 and today. They are all far more expensive now. This is why it is always cheaper to buy an already built race car and upgrade it than build one from scratch. For example, I have over $40,000 in my RX7. If I wanted to sell it today I would be lucky to get $10,000 for it.

The Cougar must have cost well over $150,000 to build. I bought it for around $10,000 with a very large spares package. If I had to replace the wheels and tires alone, it would cost more than what I paid for the car. I don't think I would ever build a car from scratch again.

Eric

[gamiller]

Maverick, these arms are adjustable in every direction; whereas Stangkiller's are not adjustable. Nevertheless, I hope you like them.

Eric, did you take the jig to RPM Performance yet? Did Garth get you a quote yet?

The price will likely come down some if we order 5 sets, 10 sets, etc.

[23racer]

I haven't taken the jig to RPM yet as I was out of the country all last week and got in on the red eye Friday morning, then I went to bed. I have meetings today and tomorrow and will be able to drop them off on Wednesday. Contact RPM for the quotes as I am just dropping off the jig for their use.

As a side note, yesterday we were under the car installing the new raised shifter (it is 4 inches higher) and I noticed that all of the rear suspension arms and toe links were not only fully adjustable but every rod end point had an adjustment indicator strip on it. WOW!!!!! The Mumm Bros. really built a professional car and it will be very easy to perform at-track adjustments to the alignment.

The car is like an onion, every time you peel back a layer there is another layer of technology waiting for you. Now if I can only figure out why my truck keeps vapour locking..........:banghead:.

Eric

[RPM Motorsports]

Hey all, first off Congrats on the car Eric! It looks like a beast, cant wait to see it in person.

Eric dropped off the jig for the lower control arms yesterday to us and we will take a look at what the cost of materials is going to be like to make these for people.

Anyone interested in getting a set of these made, please pm me here so I have an idea of how much material would be needed.

Thanks
Joe