Changes have already been made. More are in the offing.

PPI Motorsports team owner Cal Wells III is determined to avoid the collapse that saw the No. 32 Tide Pontiac driven by Newburgh’s Ricky Craven plummet from seventh to 27th in the Winston Cup points standings over the final 26 races of the 36-race season.

It is Craven’s worst finish in his three seasons with PPI Motorsports. They were 21st in their first year together and 15th in 2002.

Craven had three top-five finishes in the first eight races, including the thrilling paint-swapping win over Kurt Busch in the Carolina Dodge Dealers 400 at Darlington Raceway (S.C.).

But he never had another top-five placing.

Mike Beam, who was the crew chief in 2001 and most of 2002, will return as the competition director for the Tide racing program, and David Charpentier will replace Scott Miller as the crew chief.

Beam had been the crew chief for Steve Park and the No. 30 Chevrolet, while Charpentier had been the engineering manager for Dale Earnhardt Inc. and will making his debut as a Winston Cup crew chief.

Craven said having Beam and Charpentier on board are positive developments.

“Mike coming back is important to the team. He and I work so well together and we really enjoy working together. He’s a good friend,” said Craven. “And I’m looking forward to working with David. He will bring some new technical support and ideas.”

Wells said he was “very pleased” to have them on board and indicated there will also be personnel changes in the engine program.

The PPI Motorsports team built its own engines for the first time this past season instead of leasing them, but the Tide Pontiac’s average qualifying position was a dismal 26th. The team failed to finish 10 races, six more DNFs than it had a year ago.

Four were the direct result of engine failure.

“Our qualifying was poor all year. That was our weak link,” said Craven. “We ran well at times, but we obviously had too many DNFs. We didn’t have the 11th- to 20th-place finishes.”

Instead, Craven had 14 finishes of 30th or worse.

Still, Craven was quick to point out that they had only one less top-10 finish (8) than a year ago and the same number of top-fives (3). Plus they won a race this season and didn’t last year.

“Without the engine failures, we probably would have finished 18th,” said Wells, who shouldered a lot of blame for the team’s performance.

“I made a couple of fundamental mistakes. There was a consulting deal for our engines that didn’t work out. I failed to put all the pieces of the puzzle together and it cost us dearly,” said Wells.

Wells and Craven praised Miller for the job he did as a crew chief.

“He was in a tough position. He was hired at the end of 2002 and he came in during a transition period because two people had left: Mike and [race engineer] Roy McAuley,” said Craven. “It was like having a sixth man coming off the bench and having him play a couple of positions. I certainly appreciate Scott.”

Wells said Miller “didn’t have the right chemistry” with Craven.

Craven and Wells both termed the 27th-place finish “very disappointing,” but they are looking ahead to next season.

Wells did say there won’t be a second team as he and Craven had hoped. So they will again be a single-car team competing against the multi-car teams that dominate the point standings.

Each car is allowed seven test dates, so multi-car teams get the benefit of more test time and being able to compare notes to produce the right setups.

“One of the reasons we didn’t run well in the second half is we ran out of tests in July,” said Craven.

Wells pointed out that “three months ago, I would have said the chances were nine out of 10 that we’d land another sponsor and a second team.”

But it didn’t work out.

“That was pretty disappointing,” said Craven, whose two wins over the last three years are tops among single-car teams.

Pontiac has pulled out of Winston Cup racing, so the Tide logo will be on a Chevy next season. Neither expects the transition to be difficult.

“There isn’t a big difference between the Pontiac and Chevy. I’m glad we’ll still be with General Motors,” said the 37-year-old Craven.

“NASCAR has done a good job making sure the cars are aerodynamically similar,” said Wells.

They also hope to keep the pit crew together.

“We had a great pit crew this season,” said Wells.

Craven said the objective next season will be the same as it always is.

“We want to run up front and win races. We’d rather have wins than [more] top-fives or top-10s,” said Craven. “We’d like to get back in the top 15 in points and I feel it’s attainable.”

He also said the fact they already have a crew chief means they are already ahead of where they were at this time last year.