Ford Has Made ‘Big Progress’ on LMGT3 Torque Sensors

Photo: MPS Agency

Ford Performance is still coming to grips with the LMGT3-mandated torque sensors in the FIA World Endurance Championship, which its global sports car manager Kevin Groot believes has made “a lot of progress” with the system since the start of the season.

The Detroit brand, along with McLaren, were the only two LMGT3 manufacturers with no previous experience of the MagCanica UHA-supplied sensors that have been installed on the driveshafts to regulate and measure various power parameters for Balance of Performance purposes.

The WEC became the first sports car series to utilize the torque sensors on its LMH cars during the platform’s launch in 2021 and expanded to use in LMDh-homologated prototypes last year.

Speaking with Sportscar365, Ford Performance’s Groot said it has continued to be one of the manufacturer’s biggest challenges given the majority of its competition had previous or simultaneous experience in the Hypercar class.

“The challenges haven’t gone away,” Groot said. “We’ve had some bodywork updates. We’ve also been working hard on torque control. Our guys are in here en force and have made a lot of progress.

“To be honest, getting to this point was tough because we had limited test days on the torque sensors.

“Now we’ve had a little bit more time to spend time on the car getting it right. Hopefully that’s going to yield some fruit here on Sunday.”

The No. 77 Proton Competition Ford Mustang GT3 of Ben Barker was quickest in Wednesday’s qualifying session heading into this evening’s Hyperpole, which will be contested in LMGT3 by each of the team’s Bronze-rated drivers.

Groot said its development work with the torque sensors has been done entirely in-house by the Ford Performance team.

“It was a very steep learning curve,” he said. “Our Ford guys are the ones doing it; we’re not farming it out. We’re doing it here and the guys are helping the team directly, sitting in the pits, and doing the work.

“It’s good practice for IMSA.”

With the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship set to introduce the same sensors in the GTD Pro and GTD classes next year, Groot is hopeful that the sanctioning body will mirror the WEC’s implementation.

“I don’t know what IMSA will implement in terms of regulation but I hope it’s going to be similar,” he said. “Clearly the LMDh and LMH [torque sensor regulations] are the same, so I would hope it’s the same.

He added: “The cool thing about it is that it’s a new challenge. It’s not cheaper and I don’t know if it’s better but it can eliminate some discrepancies between perceived performance and actual performance.

“It’s for sure a new challenge and that’s exciting to us, rather than slapping on restrictors and going racing. This is a good thing.”

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John