207 replies to this topic

[MPR22]

And that he is not a King or Emperor as well  God, dont get this red neck started...

 

Michael...respect accepted! Maybe for me knee jerk is a time thing, It didnt happen overnight and many were involved. And I get why they went there...but I'm with you and think it over-reached. Still time to rectify I believe and hope. We are paired up in the gunny sack race with everything else you mentioned! And it should be 2mm and 300rpm

I will see what I can do for you.  Next time I head out to the vineyards, I will look you up.  I can only afford to buy so much wine, racing a car looks inexpensive compared to the trips with the wife to NAPA. 

[Bench Racer]

  Hopefully on the same test mule.  

Presumably the test mule is a flywheel dyno.

[MPR22]

Presumably the test mule is a flywheel dyno.

same bottom end? 

[LarryKing]

 

I think OBAMA said we would have full transparency also

 

And that he is not a King or Emperor as well God, dont get this red neck started...

 

Did anyone else notice the Dow and S&P hit record highs this week?

 

(I would happily leave politics to Facebook arguments - but you started it  )

[Bench Racer]

same bottom end? 

   untill something started getting kinky, then find the kink, elminate, prove and continue. 

[Tom Sager]

Did anyone else notice the Dow and S&P hit record highs this week?

 

(I would happily leave politics to Facebook arguments - but you started it  )

Yes, which is proof that one man can f&%! up a lot of things but not every single thing.  

[pat slattery]

It's way to quite on the site.

How about some speculation/WAG's on who is doing the dyno tests and gathering the data. 

Drago?

[Johnny D]

There's seems to be a trend for press releases on Friday. But IDK.

Maybe John M will do another soon/at some point.

J~

[john mueller]

Drago?

 

Tests are being done by an independent (from the SM community) and very well respected engine builder.  They ONLY build and develop racing engines of all sizes.  It's good, the process will be detailed and complete.

 

There's seems to be a trend for press releases on Friday. But IDK.

Maybe John M will do another soon/at some point.

J~

 

None that I'm aware of. 

[john mueller]

So they are testing 1.6, 1.8, NB, and NC cars all on the dyno with and without plunge cuts, I would like to see that data

 

 

NC?? Did I miss something? I hope this is a typo. I haven't seen anything stating NC is being considered in SM.

 

NC will NOT be a candidate for SM, well not in the foreseeable future anyway...  So I'm not sure how this was brought into the discussion.  Notgonnahappen.

[pat slattery]

NC will NOT be a candidate for SM, well not in the foreseeable future anyway...  So I'm not sure how this was brought into the discussion.  Notgonnahappen.

 

That was my typo error John putting NC in the mix.  Sorry

[Cnj]

This whole STR thing has driven me a little crazy.  Something fundamentally simple blew up into something complex and highly political.

 

Some guys figured out that others were probably breaking the STR rule.  They protested at the big show.  The protested guys were judged guilty and paid the price.  Lots of press and embarrassment for the club, Mazda and SM racers.  Then it went crazy.  Rather than saying “we have a major existing rule compliance problem – lets aggressively fix that”, we now have a complex proposed plan, everyone ticked off at each other, factions and enormous amounts of money on the line, not to mention negative impact on the clubs.  The current proposal in the SCCA press release penalizes those who played by the rules, promotes a “cherry performance" stock head hunt which will be won by the wealthy and forces a massive scrapping of existing heads when many may be willing to have a minor weight penalty for a period until their heads need replacing.  I am grateful for the tremendous amount of work the SCCA Working Group is putting into this, but I have an idea:

 

If I were king for a day:

1. Stick with the existing plunge cut rule and weights.  Tweak if needed to address standard machine shop cleanup procedures – but no allowance for blend.  No weight penalty for following existing rules.  (Don’t penalize people who faithfully followed the rules set 4 years ago).
2. If someone wants to run a junk yard head, their choice, but they don’t get a performance benefit via weight offset.  Ie. They run the same weight as legal plunge cut heads.  (Kill the proposal which will lead to an expensive race to cherry pick great stock heads and result in compromised parity)
3. Evaluate gains from modest STR blends - defining a modest blend and measurement - and add weight to equalize performance if shown from SCCA testing to be  needed.  Add an additional 15 pounds as penalty weight (above any legitimate equalizing weight) to move people to the current legal rule.  This allowance has a sunset of 1 year, thus 2015 only.  (Lots of people got caught up in this thing and this allows them time to transition, but at a modest performance price â€“ thus keeping participation high and competition fair) 
4. Anyone outside of a defined modest blend is out of luck.  (You cheat you pay).  

Finally take some money and apply it to a more structured compliance set of testing nation wide – preferably with factory trained Mazda support.  

 

Can we please get back to the good old days of arguing endlessly about NA/NB parity?

 

CNJ

[Johnny D]

We may be thinking the same thing but my version...

 

Legal guys stay were they are, doesn't cost anything.

 

Illegal guys get the weight penalty, a little to the unfair side.

 

Give the stock head a little advantage with RP/Weight to sway people in that direction.

 

And yes, tech was/is the problem.

We'll see how tech is after the dust settles.

 

And how do we know everyone in running the correct weights, etc. IDK?

Do you care if he's 15+ back?

 

But the group handling it has their points in cleaning up and returning things so lets see what they give us.

 

Just some thoughts.

J~

[James York]

 

This whole STR thing has driven me a little crazy.  Something fundamentally simple blew up into something complex and highly political.

 

Some guys figured out that others were probably breaking the STR rule.  They protested at the big show.  The protested guys were judged guilty and paid the price.  Lots of press and embarrassment for the club, Mazda and SM racers.  Then it went crazy.  Rather than saying “we have a major existing rule compliance problem – lets aggressively fix that”, we now have a complex proposed plan, everyone ticked off at each other, factions and enormous amounts of money on the line, not to mention negative impact on the clubs.  The current proposal in the SCCA press release penalizes those who played by the rules, promotes a “cherry performance" stock head hunt which will be won by the wealthy and forces a massive scrapping of existing heads when many may be willing to have a minor weight penalty for a period until their heads need replacing.  I am grateful for the tremendous amount of work the SCCA Working Group is putting into this, but I have an idea:

 

If I were king for a day:

1. Stick with the existing plunge cut rule and weights.  Tweak if needed to address standard machine shop cleanup procedures – but no allowance for blend.  No weight penalty for following existing rules.  (Don’t penalize people who faithfully followed the rules set 4 years ago).
2. If someone wants to run a junk yard head, their choice, but they don’t get a performance benefit via weight offset.  Ie. They run the same weight as legal plunge cut heads.  (Kill the proposal which will lead to an expensive race to cherry pick great stock heads and result in compromised parity)
3. Evaluate gains from modest STR blends - defining a modest blend and measurement - and add weight to equalize performance if shown from SCCA testing to be  needed.  Add an additional 15 pounds as penalty weight (above any legitimate equalizing weight) to move people to the current legal rule.  This allowance has a sunset of 1 year, thus 2015 only.  (Lots of people got caught up in this thing and this allows them time to transition, but at a modest performance price â€“ thus keeping participation high and competition fair) 
4. Anyone outside of a defined modest blend is out of luck.  (You cheat you pay).  

Finally take some money and apply it to a more structured compliance set of testing nation wide – preferably with factory trained Mazda support.  

 

Can we please get back to the good old days of arguing endlessly about NA/NB parity?

 

CNJ

 

You make too much sense to be a SM driver.......

[john mueller]

 

This whole STR thing has driven me a little crazy.  Something fundamentally simple blew up into something complex and highly political.

 

Some guys figured out that others were probably breaking the STR rule.  They protested at the big show.  The protested guys were judged guilty and paid the price.  Lots of press and embarrassment for the club, Mazda and SM racers.  Then it went crazy.  Rather than saying “we have a major existing rule compliance problem – lets aggressively fix that”, we now have a complex proposed plan, everyone ticked off at each other, factions and enormous amounts of money on the line, not to mention negative impact on the clubs.  The current proposal in the SCCA press release penalizes those who played by the rules, promotes a “cherry performance" stock head hunt which will be won by the wealthy and forces a massive scrapping of existing heads when many may be willing to have a minor weight penalty for a period until their heads need replacing.  I am grateful for the tremendous amount of work the SCCA Working Group is putting into this, but I have an idea:

 

If I were king for a day:

1. Stick with the existing plunge cut rule and weights.  Tweak if needed to address standard machine shop cleanup procedures – but no allowance for blend.  No weight penalty for following existing rules.  (Don’t penalize people who faithfully followed the rules set 4 years ago).
2. If someone wants to run a junk yard head, their choice, but they don’t get a performance benefit via weight offset.  Ie. They run the same weight as legal plunge cut heads.  (Kill the proposal which will lead to an expensive race to cherry pick great stock heads and result in compromised parity)
3. Evaluate gains from modest STR blends - defining a modest blend and measurement - and add weight to equalize performance if shown from SCCA testing to be  needed.  Add an additional 15 pounds as penalty weight (above any legitimate equalizing weight) to move people to the current legal rule.  This allowance has a sunset of 1 year, thus 2015 only.  (Lots of people got caught up in this thing and this allows them time to transition, but at a modest performance price â€“ thus keeping participation high and competition fair) 
4. Anyone outside of a defined modest blend is out of luck.  (You cheat you pay).  

Finally take some money and apply it to a more structured compliance set of testing nation wide – preferably with factory trained Mazda support.  

 

Can we please get back to the good old days of arguing endlessly about NA/NB parity?

 

CNJ

 

 

Best post I've seen on this issue since it all started.

 

This was NASA suggested path but the 'lack of measurability" of the STR made the difference.  Now that all everyone, and I mean everyone is beginning to understand the measurement issue as a major problem in enforcement,  the "King for a day" as proposed above is being to look not so far away (IMO).

 

For the "SM group" the results of the testing we are conducting are the key to everything here.   Testing to the level we'd like to see to validate (or void) the STR proposals and to have REAL data to make an informed decision about parity is gonna take time.  We met this morning, it's on track but it's going to be some time yet.  Sorry, hang in there please.

[Ron Alan]

 

This whole STR thing has driven me a little crazy.  Something fundamentally simple blew up into something complex and highly political.

 

Some guys figured out that others were probably breaking the STR rule.  They protested at the big show.  The protested guys were judged guilty and paid the price.  Lots of press and embarrassment for the club, Mazda and SM racers.  Then it went crazy.  Rather than saying “we have a major existing rule compliance problem – lets aggressively fix that”, we now have a complex proposed plan, everyone ticked off at each other, factions and enormous amounts of money on the line, not to mention negative impact on the clubs.  The current proposal in the SCCA press release penalizes those who played by the rules, promotes a “cherry performance" stock head hunt which will be won by the wealthy and forces a massive scrapping of existing heads when many may be willing to have a minor weight penalty for a period until their heads need replacing.  I am grateful for the tremendous amount of work the SCCA Working Group is putting into this, but I have an idea:

 

If I were OBAMA for a day:

1. Stick with the existing plunge cut rule and weights.  Tweak if needed to address standard machine shop cleanup procedures – but no allowance for blend.  No weight penalty for following existing rules.  (Don’t penalize people who faithfully followed the rules set 4 years ago).
2. If someone wants to run a junk yard head, their choice, but they don’t get a performance benefit via weight offset.  Ie. They run the same weight as legal plunge cut heads.  (Kill the proposal which will lead to an expensive race to cherry pick great stock heads and result in compromised parity)
3. Evaluate gains from modest STR blends - defining a modest blend and measurement - and add weight to equalize performance if shown from SCCA testing to be  needed.  Add an additional 15 pounds as penalty weight (above any legitimate equalizing weight) to move people to the current legal rule.  This allowance has a sunset of 1 year, thus 2015 only.  (Lots of people got caught up in this thing and this allows them time to transition, but at a modest performance price â€“ thus keeping participation high and competition fair) 
4. Anyone outside of a defined modest blend is out of luck.  (You cheat you pay).  

Finally take some money and apply it to a more structured compliance set of testing nation wide – preferably with factory trained Mazda support.  

 

Can we please get back to the good old days of arguing endlessly about NA/NB parity?

 

CNJ

 

I fixed it for you!

 

#3 above has me about 90/10...90% throw them all out. 

 

#4 becomes subjective and leads me back to #3...because of the potential for a difference in castings, you could get into a situation in which 2 heads look the same(illegal tooling/grind marks)at the STR but in reality one was barely touched(modest blend?)and one had 1.5mm of material taken off. But having never seen either of these heads prior to a "blend", a tech person will never know how much material was removed? If you cant quantify it(potential casting differences)it would seem hard to determine modest? But I wouldn't yell if for one year these heads received a punitive weight...after that, get back to the rules as they read now!

 

And back down on the stock head plan...in theory great...in the real world hurts all especially the budget racers! Spec Miata is to far along to start over...

[Alberto]

 

And back down on the stock head plan...in theory great...in the real world hurts all especially the budget racers! Spec Miata is to far along to start over...

 

 

Wouldn't hurt me.  I have stock head.

[Brandon]

A few points (uncertain as to the final number) that I think will clear things up:

1. The first/original/preliminary notice from SCCA/NASA/Mazda (the "Working Group") were primarily aimed at (though not stated) those groups who had events to run immediately following the Runoffs.  It was this working group's intent to provide some roadmap of action which fit both organization's operational structures without necessarily getting into the nitty-gritty of adjudicating what the course of action for 2015 was.  Again, it could have been more-clearly stated what this initial memo was attempting to resolve but it appears to have launched the initial knees into jerking.
2. Immediately after this notice was sent, they began working out the details of how to proceed and satisfy all participants (entrants, sanctioning bodies, Mazda...)  I believe this is what the pow-wow in Topeka was all about.  This was where they devised a plan to perform a series of data-gathering exercises involving an independent 3rd party testing facility.  A second notice was sent that tangentially reinforced their idea of shifting to stock heads for 2015 (the "stock head rule") but noted "more data was being gathered & analyzed" and it was being done outside of any SMAC involvement.
3. As they've progressed, and as we near the deadline for the finalization of rules for 2015 (CRB meets on 12/11, BOD on 12/12 I believe), a third notice was sent, while still retaining comments about 'stock heads', appeared to be backing away from an insistence on this idea for 2015.  Again, they're continuing to gather & analyze data but wanted to provide an update to everyone.

All in all, I can't fault them for attempting to be forthcoming about the process going forward for 2015, however it does feel as though we (entrants) have been left in the dark on how our thoughts/opinions on the matter can be constructively shared with the Board/CRB.  It's rather difficult to write a coherent letter when you're basing the contents thereof on hearsay and conjecture.  

 

In conjunction with this Working Group activity, the Board itself has to still finalize everything from the Runoffs per GCR operating procedures (races ran, protests filed, CSA's acted upon, protests heard, appeals heard, decisions made...) and those final pieces of paperwork had 'just been' returned/filed early last week.  This statement doesn't mean I'm giving them a free pass on the lack of Runoffs details but it also begs the question of the Board on how much detail associated with the protests, appeals, & decisions to release.  IMO, this lack of detail is an effort to not re-litigate the decisions (and potentially excoriate the perpetrators in public) and to keep the organization as a whole looking forward on what we can do to keep it from happening again.

 

 

At this point I think your best option to influence any decision that's to be made (absent any other public information regarding the "STR modification") is to write to the CRB indicating your acceptance/non-acceptance of the 'stock head rule' suggestion.  If the testing determines there is no performance difference when heads are machined (per the rules) then anticipate no weight changes.  However if a performance difference is found, those who have had engine work done within the past 3-4 years might find it best to invest in a gasket set so they can remove their own head and confirm whether theirs has been machined and if so, whether it's to the rules or not.

[wheel]

The SMAC met in a conference call on Wed night, 19 Nov.  After a lengthly discussion, the CRB liaisons asked the SMAC to review all of the letters posted to date.  Most of the letters were sent in before the last SM Group release on the 14th, which dropped the time limitation on the plunge cut heads. Accordingly, many of the letters did not deal with the latest release.  The SMAC was asked to prepare a recommendation for the CRB.  

 

The CRB has a conference call on 2 DEC that will be dedicated totally to this issue.  At the conclusion of that call, the CRB will have a recommendation to (officially) present to the BoD for their face-to-face meeting on 13 DEC.  We will publish some type of Advisory as soon as we can after the meeting - probably the next day, and we will give our recommendation to our BoD liaisons at the end of the meeting.  Obviously, this is all compressed way beyond the usual time frame to which we try to adhere.  It is always tough to work through issues, before the end of the year, that show up at the Runoffs.   This is certainly no exception to that problem.

Normally the CRB would send up a REC for 2015, which would be voted on by the BoD, accepting or rejecting the specific proposal as recommended.  I do not expect this to be handled in any other manner.

The only real difference, between this and the normal process, will be that you will have a shorter window to make your comments to the www.crbscca letter system.  Review the CRB recommendation and post a SHORT response to the letter system.  

The CRB has a one day face-to-face meeting on 11 DEC and we will review all of your input.  I will then take that, and the CRB comments, to the BoD when I present all the proposed rule changes on Sat, 13 Dec.

[Johnny D]

The SMAC met in a conference call on Wed night, 19 Nov. After a lengthly discussion, the CRB liaisons asked the SMAC to review all of the letters posted to date. Most of the letters were sent in before the last SM Group release on the 14th, which dropped the time limitation on the plunge cut heads. Accordingly, many of the letters did not deal with the latest release. The SMAC was asked to prepare a recommendation for the CRB.

 

This may be the left hand talking to the right but...

Do you guys now have data showing what the plunge cut does ??

 

Which leads to..

Your looking for feedback dealing with the latest release which is the dropping of the time limit on the plunge cut ?? or something else ?

 

It will save a lot of time if you just ask the question, sorry if I missed it.

If in deed, you still looking for feedback?

J~