2002 Acura RSX - RSX Record - Super Street Magazine

SS: What's the record of the RSX right now?
FB: It went 9.80 last year and 9.85 at an NHRA event. Normally it runs 135 mph in competition, but we have hit 140.

DH: We did have to tone it down a bit for the beginning of the season just so we didn't get weight penalties slapped on us. It's been kind of a cat and mouse game with everyone in our class.

SS: Do you want to disclose the horsepower of the engine?
DH: With the configuration that you guys have seen run, it makes between 310 and 320 hp on the Super Flow dyno. It will probably read a lot more on a Dynojet or Dynapack.

SS: What do you think of Norris' record breaking run?
DH: It's great, but I'm not worried about it. I wish we could have taken the lid off it sooner. Right now we have drivers in the first and second position. The second half of the season we'll be going for extra points for breaking records. It's been rough this year because we've been so busy around the shop that there's no time to actually work on the racecars.

SS: How many off-the-shelf Skunk2 products are actually on the RSX?
DH: The retainers and valve springs are the Pro Series stuff that we're selling right now. The parts we ran on the car last year are our street stuff this year. And it propelled the car to 9.80. It's more than enough for 99 percent of the people. Right now we're on our second generation of parts and by the end of the season we'll be on the third. I probably wouldn't sell the camshafts to anybody unless they were flying our flag really big. It'd have to be a really good team. I don't think we're running as big of displacement as the other guys. We're making all of the power in the top end, which has always been our claim to fame.

SS: How often do you help out other teams?
DH: We're reluctant to release some of these drag race profiles because when people start using them they say it's something else. There's this racer ego thing that's pretty crippling for some of them. I have no problem providing some of the racers with more parts than they need for free. The thing is that they always want to keep a lid on it because they can't admit they're using a Skunk2 part on a Skunk2 killer. Everyone's approach when building an all-motor car is to beat us whether we're racing or not. That little flaw in thinking keeps them from using our stuff or admitting to using our stuff. I know there are a lot of cars out there that are running our parts but won't admit it because they feel like it downplays their program. Maybe the best thing for us to do is to not race and just supply people with parts.

SS: Do you use the RSX for R&D on parts for the consumer?
FB: I think everything we do revolves around getting products to the consumer. Our test beds are the racecars. From engineering side to all the development, what we find here we try to apply to the consumer component.

DH: We learn a lot just by slapping the engine onto our dyno. That tells us what we can get away with. Any problems we run into with our racecar will be worse on a streetcar because it runs more.

SS: Tell us about your relationship with BFGoodrich and how the tire testing has been going.
DH: Our relationship with BFG is very good. I think that was a project that everybody underestimated a bit, even themselves. Their engineers had to basically do an about-face from when they started the project to where they're at now. Some of the directions they thought we had to go down were completely wrong. Now, I believe we have a superior product at this point. With their resources and R&D it's going to be right, without a doubt.