Some Sprint Cup Toyota teams concerned about engine wear issue

Kyle Busch Lee White, president of Toyota Racing Development, said some of the Sprint Cup Toyota teams have serious concerns about an engine wear issue that has caused problems the last two weeks.

White said four Toyota teams were forced to change engines Saturday at Las Vegas Motor Speedway because of the issue with this generation of the motors.

Two of the cars making changes are the Red Bull Team Racing entries — the No. 82 Camry driven by Scott Speed and the No. 83 Toyota driven by Brian Vickers. The other two are the No. 47 Toyota driven by Marcus Ambrose and the No. 00 Camry driven by David Reutimann.

“It’s embarrassing,” White said. “Whatever conditions we’ve created ourselves, stupidly, we suspect it’s a wear issue between the cam shaft and lubricant. It’s either a lack of lubrication, too much lubrication, not enough coating, whatever.”

The team of pole winner Kyle Busch in the No. 18 Toyota also changed an engine Friday, but White said that was an unrelated issue. All five cars will move to the back of the field to start the Shelby 427 Sunday.

“This is something the drivers don’t notice,” White said. “What we see first is a lash widening up on one cylinder or the lifters slowly wearing away. Once that starts, it’s hell and gone. You can’t stop it.”

White said the problem first came to light last week before the Cup race at Fontana, Calif.

Vickers won the pole at Auto Club Speedway, but was forced to start in the back after the engine problem was discovered. Michael Waltrip had the same issue after qualifying at ACS and changed his engine. Neither driver had a problem during the Auto Club 500.

“That clouded my view of the whole situation,” White said. “I was confident in my people, but I guess I’m willing to say now we went the wrong direction.”

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