Should NON-US motors be allowed in ST?

[Greg Amy]

Given the fact the average import owner (Honda, Nissan, Audi, VW, Mazda, etc) can build a 350hp engine that will last 100,000 miles for under $5k in his garage, it's just ludicrous that I should be required to spend upwards of $8k to build a 220whp, 100hour engine...

The rules aren't designed for that possibility. They're designed for the probability that another guy will take that same "...350hp engine that will last 100,000 miles for under $5k," spend $10k on it, and get 425hp. And not care how long it lasts.

You can't legislate dollars. But you can legislate ultimate performance. And the class reg are built around that...

GA

 

[Matt93SE]

I can't argue with that either..

... And that's why NASA's Performance Touring setup is so popular. unfortuantely the unscrupulous are screwing that up too with 'cheater ECUs' and whatnot... but simply limiting power to weight ratios and letting people do what they want to get there is a damn good idea to me..

 

[Xian]

$8K???? That's actually pretty reasonable, if it's not a grenade with the pin already pulled. Milledge (A known sharp Porsche 4cyl. guru) charged a minimum of $15K for the basic motor rebuild, and then you went to the dyno, and added an ECU. He liked MoTec, IIRC. So, you were talking mid 20s all said and done.

I guarantee that there are SM motors that are more than $8K.
And lot's of IT motors as well. I shudder to think what Autoechnic has spent on it's E46 ITS BMW motors.

Yep. A common IT D16 (CRX/Civic) is in the $3-4k range if it's from scratch.

That doesn't mean it should be the norm.
That's one of the things that REALLY frustrates me with SCCA. You can make a lot more reliable and faster car for a lot cheaper if some of the rules weren't stuck in the stone ages. up until about last year, Prod guys were required to run leaded fuel. For anything built in the 90s or newer, you had to build the engine differently speficifcally so it would survive with leaded gas. that's bassackwards, IMO.

Given the fact the average import owner (Honda, Nissan, Audi, VW, Mazda, etc) can build a 350hp engine that will last 100,000 miles for under $5k in his garage, it's just ludicrous that I should be required to spend upwards of $8k to build a 220whp, 100hour engine is ludicrous. The rest of my car has barely cost that much!

As Greg points out, you can't legislate cubic dollars. The best you can hope for is to create a point of diminishing returns for those intent on spending their way to max parts/power. I also guaran-damn-tee you that the engines you reference lasting 100k miles sure as shit aren't race engines. Street car? Sure, I'm with you 100%. No. Way. In. Hell. that a race engine will last that long and still have the same performance it had at the beginning.

FWIW, I'll bet that most IT folks would be pretty happy with a 100 hour engine that's still making competitive power. If you figure 1 hour total race/qual time per event, 100 hours is about 5 double weekends per year for 10 years. If all you have to do is pull the head to freshen it after half that many seasons, you'll be doing really well in most cases.

The rules aren't designed for that possibility. They're designed for the probability that another guy will take that same "...350hp engine that will last 100,000 miles for under $5k," spend $10k on it, and get 425hp. And not care how long it lasts.

You can't legislate dollars. But you can legislate ultimate performance. And the class reg are built around that...

GA

Bingo.

I can't argue with that either..

... And that's why NASA's Performance Touring setup is so popular. unfortuantely the unscrupulous are screwing that up too with 'cheater ECUs' and whatnot... but simply limiting power to weight ratios and letting people do what they want to get there is a damn good idea to me..

NASA's PT classes are popular b/c there haven't been 2 people who "really" wanted to win. The instant you have 2 guys with the drive and funds, it turns into a spending war (either in build $$, testing, tires, whatever). PT is what it is right now b/c it's in its infancy. Give it time and the point juggling, track specific setups will begin to show up. That's without even talking about the potential problems of dyno classing and re-classing (advantage to fast spool turbo engines that have very flat power/torque curves) along with the potential for multi-map ECU's, etc, etc. Cool idea but it'll have its share of growing pains..

Remember, this is racing and folks are going to want to win. It's very difficult to make a ruleset (that will work) where used, junk-yard, stock engines are the "go to" winning option. I'd also argue that a class for retired WC cars is about as far from that idea as you can get and still be on the same planet.

Christian, who probably sounds like a jerk but doesn't mean to.

 

[Matt93SE]

Completely understood and valid points. The big issue is there are easy options where people can make cheap, reliable power, and they're legislated out just because one or two people on the CRB don't want anything from overseas here.

As for a $3k junkyard engine being competitive to something built to the limit of the rules? no. my point was something that makes a helluvalot more power out of the box than what the current options are, and it will do it in stock-ish trim that will be much more reliable than something that puts out the same power in NA trim.
Several local DE guys running these engines have 100k+ miles on them with original turbos and internals and have been putting down 300whp for years. Of course someone else could come along and throw a bucket of coin at it and make a whole lot more power on a 10hr engine, but there's nothing any of us can do about that.

The good thing about STU and turbo engines is you're limited through the inlet restrictor, which physics will dictate just how much air can flow through that hole and thus maximum power output.

I'm always going to get out-moneyed no matter where I go and what class I'm in.. At this point I'm just trying to help raise the potential of the bottom end of the playing field.

 

[JoshS]

I'm always going to get out-moneyed no matter where I go and what class I'm in.. At this point I'm just trying to help raise the potential of the bottom end of the playing field.

I think that's very well said. But raising the potential at the bottom end means also means raising the potential at the top end, and that's where things get hung up. My guess is that the PTB didn't want to muck with the top.

I understand the argument that maybe restrictors make it so that the gain at the top isn't as big as the gain at the bottom, that's also Christian's point about making it so that there are diminishing returns for spending more money. But there's still likely a change at the top and it appears that the PTB felt that they would have a hard time quantifying it, so it's not worth the risk.

 

[lateapex911]

I can't argue with that either..

... And that's why NASA's Performance Touring setup is so popular. unfortuantely the unscrupulous are screwing that up too with 'cheater ECUs' and whatnot... but simply limiting power to weight ratios and letting people do what they want to get there is a damn good idea to me..

How popular is it, really? I really don't know.

But I do think it's a VERY 3 dimensional ruleset, and that cubes the difficulty in finding the "Right" combination. By that I mean, will THIS combination make the most competitive package, or this. Or this? Testing testing testing.

Then there's the "make the power below the curve" challenge. More testing, experimentation and parts swapping.

I keep hearing people say,
"It's hp limited, you make more and up a class you go. They have dynos at the track and you roll off and right on the rollers".

SOUNDS like they have it all figured out.
But...... Bob loves PTE, and wants to win. So he hits the top number he can. Now it's time to make that power from 300 rpm all the way to 7500. He doesn't care if it costs money, or if it blows up after three races.
Then he chases his chassis 'point combos' to find the velocity made good winning combo.
At the end, he's faaaaast. And wins. And he spent $$$$$. And everyone else is sad.

Really, that ruleset can be VERY expensive to fully exploit.

Then there's the fact that it's easier than stealing broccoli from a baby to game the whole dyno thing.

What you want is to be able to run a mildly tuned easy to build long lasting motor. You can. BUT, if you want that to be a good racing engine, you need everyone else to agree to the same build. What you really need is somebody to build them, seal them and sell them reasonably to you and all your classmates..

Honda has an ad where they brag about how not one single Honda Indy engine has ever failed. "Because we build it with heart" is their conclusion. Hahahha...no, it's because they build it with a limit. It's powerful but low stressed spec engine. Of course it's not going to blow.

 

[Matt93SE]

The PTB also puts GPSs in cars at random, and STO is doing the same thing at some races.
As well, I kinda like the 'pick your points' strategy- you can focus on power, handling, weight, mechanical grip, or aero.. or a combination of any of the above. All of them make the car faster so it's a matter of figuring out what you want to do and going with it. Of course anyone can throw cubic yards of cash at any car in any class and make something really fast- there's nothing anyone can do about that.
But until then, why not give us po' folk a fighting chance?

 

[Mrsideways]

The PTB also puts GPSs in cars at random, and STO is doing the same thing at some races.
As well, I kinda like the 'pick your points' strategy- you can focus on power, handling, weight, mechanical grip, or aero.. or a combination of any of the above. All of them make the car faster so it's a matter of figuring out what you want to do and going with it. Of course anyone can throw cubic yards of cash at any car in any class and make something really fast- there's nothing anyone can do about that.
But until then, why not give us po' folk a fighting chance?

The GPS doesn't work for 2 reasons. ONE not everyone has the oppertunity to calibrate to it. TWO it's still got some bugs to sort out, I was at the NASA event this past weekend at sebring and The TT director put the GPS on several different cars. All registered the cars at signifcantly more horsepower then they actually made (like 100 or more). It also said we had a 5 foot rise in the backstraight (at sebring). The Dyno doesn't work either because there are plenty of ways to "cheat" a dyno. One being to let the car sit there and heat soak like crazy while you wait to roll across the dyno in tech. My old Mini which dyno'd 216whp at normal opperating temp but after coming off track and sitting running for 20mins with the hood down only dyno'd 184whp. Had I know this I'd have showed up with the thing tuned to 250whp cause that's what it did on the first calibration pull at NASA nationals and I was left trying to figure out how to get 34hp out it to pass the dyno. We pulled the rev limiter down 1000rpm on it.
My car runs in PTA because of all the nick nack points it takes for a Splitter/air dam , Tiny SCCA legal wing, remote reservior shocks etc etc. It's a hopeless car in PTA but after seeing that Both honda and BFG pay for REGIONAL NASA races the car is taking a turn and being built as a NASA PT car first and STU car second. I'm thinking about Bolting a Turbo on and removing it for SCCA races. With Two races in a 2 day weekend and both being relatively short the car actually has a chance of Breaking even in the money department which is the goal.

 

[Matt93SE]

It doesn't matter what rule people make or what device you use to try to keep people within those rules, there will ALWAYS be someone that tries to cheat.

I'm not sure how you need to "calibrate" a GPS. I use them all the time in survey work and there's no calibration needed. It's a pretty simple device that spits out a location and a time. you then chart time elapsed, distance traveled, enter the car's weight, and you can calculate a horsepower number based on those three numbers. throw in transmission ratios if you want as well. If they're 100hp off, then it's because the operators aren't doing something right. Physics doesn't lie.

If you're getting a rise of 5' across the straight at sebring, then there's something else in the GPS unit- accelerometers or something as well.

As for the dyno fooling, that's a matter of policing and proper test methods. you can make any dyno read what you want it to read with tricks like heat soak and multiple computer programs and everything else. proper impound/testing would solve that.

But then again, for every rule you make, there's some unscrupulous bastage out there that tries to circumvent it. I see the same in SCCA too.

 

[Chip42]

cheating a dyno test is as simple as reading non-drive wheelspeed as an indicator for advance or a fuel table. if the non drive wheels are sitting still on the dyno then the ECU never leaves low power mode. hard to catch without having a tuner there.

 

[Matt93SE]

lots of ways to cheat in IT too.... For every rule that says "you can't ______" there's been someone who has or is now...

 

[Mrsideways]

cheating a dyno test is as simple as reading non-drive wheelspeed as an indicator for advance or a fuel table. if the non drive wheels are sitting still on the dyno then the ECU never leaves low power mode. hard to catch without having a tuner there.

I'm pretty sure the car I ran aginst at NASA Nationals 2 years ago had that set up in his ECU. Car was smoking fast on track but laid down a pretty unimpressive dyno number.