The new "FR9" engine from Ford is being raced in NASCAR Sprint Cup Series events in 2011. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

Besides that, the current engine makes plenty of power as is.

“The old “452” engine, compared to the other engines out there, is really competitive,” said Simon. “I mean, it’s not just hanging on because it’s old, it’s really competitive so we haven’t been under a lot of pressure to roll the new engine out early. With that said, the new engine is at a point where we’re very confident in it.”

Still finalizing the details on the engine requires track time.

“We didn’t want to do development on the race track and continuously be changing it while being under the pressure of racing it,” said Simon. “The other reason is that once you get the package set, you’ve got to get the entire pipeline going. The engine shop has a lot of parts they need to make, and we have parts to supply, so if you do that before your race package is set, you run the risk of having to change things and ending up with a lot of scrap parts. We didn’t want to be in that situation, so that’s why the rollout of this open engine is gonna be a little bit slower.”

Logistics clearly play a factor as well.

“It’s not just as simple as changing out the old engine for the new engine in an hour,” said Wood. “There are different motor mounts in the car for the FR9 and it requires the cable drive fuel pump, which we had never used before until Daytona. The headers are different and some of the radiator connectors are different, so there was a changeover period we went through to get ready.”

With that in mind, the Wood Brothers team is ready for Atlanta.

“I’m excited about it,” said Wood. “We’ve talked about it for over a year now and the time has come to move to the future. … We’re taking a car that we built last fall for Homestead and qualified in the top 10 (ninth) and then we had a pretty decent run in the race and finished 16th. They’ve massaged on that car this winter and they’re building another one just like that to go to Texas, and I actually think it will run at the Charlotte test March 23 and 24.”

Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEEDtv.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100 and e-mail him at Jensen is the author of “Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of Speed,” and has appeared on numerous television and radio shows. Jensen is the past President of the National Motorsports Press Association and an NMPA Writer of the Year.