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@Tom Dennin wrote:
Doug,
That is a pretty bold statement. You don’t think that it may be in reaction to the OVERALL dominance of the Rotax at IMI.
At the two CSC races at IMI, the majority of the racers in Tag senior have been Rotaxs. At one, I think it was 9 of 14. Besides Seth and Greg, which one of the other Rotaxes has been dominate? If were just motor, I think one of the other Rotaxs would be up there too.
As was clearly demonstrated to me this past week at Red Bull, even with identically prepared karts, there was almost .9 second difference in the final 16 qualifying times. Many of these kids had extensive national experience and were very accomplished racers and there was still that much disparity.
Yes, I think the decision to add weight to the Rotax is clearly a reaction to two fast kids and most definetly the CSC should not follow suit.
I predict that in a few weeks when we debut our new chassis line with a stock moto and Greg is ripping around IMI in the mid 52s, we are going to hear the exact same crap about cheater motors, unfair advantage 😥 and on and on it goes.
Standard excuses in karting
1. Its the tuners fault.
2. The other guys motor is a cheater.
3. The other guy punted me off.
4. The officals didn’t see it.
5. The tech director is out to get me.Know any more?
Richard
I have always put the sealed Bilands in with the sealed Rotaxes and the sealed Easykarts. None of the sealed engines should be torn down on the local/regional level except in very unsual cricumstances and the protester should be willing to pay the costs to get the engine re-sealed. To do otherwise is penalizing the driver for being good and that’s a crock.
Your comment about Rotaxs getting tossed while valid, makes it look like they are getting tossed for internal engine violations. On the contray, there have been very few (none that I’m aware of) for internal modifications for which there have been dq’s. There have been many for things like fuel filter location, air box dislocations, non-Rotax fasteners, side pod violations and other non-performance related items. There was a rash of squish violations, mostly due to running too close to spec and carbon buildups putting the engines out and all of them in junior ranks. This violation is be found without tearing the engine apart. In fact, it can’t be found by tearing the engine apart.
You are right about one thing, we do not give the driver and set-up enough credit. At the Red Bull driver search this past week, they used exactly the same kart/engine package and a kid named Alex Speed to drive the karts and guys like Mike Speed and Kimball Williams to set up the karts. With young Mr Speed driving, they had all the karts within just a few tenths. Yet when the driver search kids got in them, they varied 6 seconds!
This year we have torn down many engines under protest and not a single one was found out of spec. What does that tell us? To my knowledge, all the dq’s in this year’s CSC were found without tearing the engines apart. It time to stop this foolishness and start learning how to drive and setup the kart.
Its time to start giving the drivers a little credit for being good.
It was way cool that you guys stayed around on Thursday to watch and support the drivers. Chris, Dave, Dale and Cory all hung out on Thursday to watch and support Greg. That was a class act guys and both Greg and I greatly appreciate it.
Thanks to all who called and wished Greg good luck. I will not be able to post results as I’m not taking the laptop. But I will call in and see if I can get someone to post how its going.
@hotwheels1517 wrote:
I am not sure what the solution is for those with a sealed motor. I will put in my own two cents though that I think a sealed motor should be subject to tech internally. I could very easily see someone that does not race RMC having a motor built specifically for CSC and having it sealed by someone that knows it won’t be teched.
It won’t happen. In the case of Rotax, the risks are far too high and the rewards far to low. If you could find a authorized service center to build and seal a special, what is the reward for the sealer? A few hundred bucks? Once the engine leaves his shop, he has no control over it. That means that forever, that motor is out there with his seal on it. If the racer ever sold it and the new guy were to use it in RMax stuff, the potential for it to be torn down is likely.
Contray to popular belief, Rotax engines are reguarly torn down at big deal events. At events like Black Rock, regions cup, or the grand nationals, these engines are usually torn down to the bare crank. The service centers are at huge risk of losing their certification to service Rotax and on top of that, they pay a big fine. Since most karting companies are basically Mom & Pop operations, such a loss would put them out of business.
You point to Stars as an example of quality tech. Who do you think is in charge of Rotax tech, the same man, Scott Evans. That is how they keep a lid on the seal, they tear down and tech the engines. The only place they do not tear down Rotaxs regularly is at local type events, like our CSC. There they respect the seal. But even there, they have a procedure to tech and tear down engines if there is reason to suspect one. It is sent to, you guesed it, Scott Evans. I know of cases where this has been done.
We are lucky here to have a guy like Dennis doing our tech. I’ve known Dennis for years. I first met Dennis when he inspected our motor at the 2000 SuperNationals. He has torn my engines down many times after that. He is fair, honest and he knows the rules. I trust him.
One last comment, if a guy is so egar to cheat on a sealed motor to win a $20 plastic trophy, I say let him have it. Its not worth paying to have my Rotax re-sealed to prove it. At the end of the day, he knows he’s a cheater and so do I.
While none of us will deny that SKUSA or any other sanctioning body has the right to cut the seal, to say its a cost savings to not have a seal is silly and ignors the facts.
First, the Rotax Biland and EasyKart are something most of the other engines are not, they last a long time between services and for the most part, do not require ANY servicing over the course of the season. In Biland’s case, it’s several years. The only maintenance racers are having to do is caused by SKUSA tearing into the motor! I was at a WKA race this weekend and they did an extensive tech but they didn’t go inside any engine. They checked the carbs, head volumn, squish, stroke and pipe. Tearing engines apart is for the most part, punative and rarely uncovers anything non-compliant that couldn’t have been checked by other methods. You can even check exhaust port height using the light method without removing the seal.
Properly maintained, we don’t have to do anything to the motor. I have one that is untouched since new over a year ago.
All cutting the seal does is this, it raises the costs for those racers who want to do both RMax and Tag. Most of those racers are on a budget and don’t have the funds to throw money at their engines, THAT’S WHY THEY OWN A ROTAX!
What you are telling the budget racers is, we don’t want you in our series. In this country, there has NEVER been a single thing found internally non-compliant in a Rotax (or any other of the sealed motors) that required breaking the seal to find. All of the non-compliant infractions could be found by checking the PERFORMANCE items I listed without breaking the seal. There was a non-compliance a few years ago but Rotax admitted they screwed up at the factory and it wasn’t a fault of the sealing program.
Todd, you have the right to break the seal, we have the right not to race at your series. You don’t have squat for customers right now, you want to lose more? I would think you would be trying to find a way to attract more customers, not running off the ones you have. Keep up the arroagant attitude and you won’t have to worry about customers.
@blink wrote:
So what should we do about it?
Very good question. I have been looking over qualifying times of the past two CSC races.
Seth slowed from the first 53.168 to 53.346
Kyle improved a bit, 53.908 to 53.815
Greg ran 53.637 in JuneBut the other runners using basically the same packages can’t get near what these three are doing.
Ben (Leopard)did 55.065 in June and 54.916 last weekend.
Zach (Rotax)was 54.5 and 55.211
Ron Reed (Rotax) was 56.109 and 55.669
Dane ran 54.137 in JuneAt best, the majority of the field is .5 or more back from these three.
If we adjust weight, who will really benifit and who will be hurt. The other Rotax runners are already well off the pace compared to the two quick ones, Seth and Greg. Since neither Greg or Seth show up for IMI club races, only those Rotax guys who do will be hurt and they are already not competitive. Is that fair to them? Kyle, who does do a few IMI club races will just beat the other kids by more than he currently does. How long before they quit or look for other options?
Greg has almost 10 years of running IMI under his butt. You would hope that he has learned just a little bit during that time. When he shows up with a new S3 package this fall and starts cranking low-mid 52 laps, are we going to hear all this crap start again?
@karterdad wrote:
As for Zach being cought up in this BS. …..will give you $50 towards getting your motor resealed. This sports needs more kids that just want to race.
I’ll help too Zach.
@Tom Dennin wrote:
Has a sealed Rotax ever been found to be illegal with regards to what is behind the seal???
Yes, some sealed Rotaxs have been declared illegal. These engines were found in the junior classes (why am I not surprised) and they were for squish non-compliance. It seems some were trying to run squish on the very low limit and carbon buildup on the piston took them under. The seal was not broken to find this non-compliance. To my knowledge, no Rotax with a seal has ever been found to be non-complinate for items under the seal.
For big deal events, like RMax grands and Black Rock this summer, all the top engines were torn completly down, all were good, and they always had a dealer around who would reassemble and re-seal for minimal charge.
A question I have, were non-invasive techniques employed before the seal was broken? Was squish, head volumn, stroke and a bore scope used to check all the PERFORMANCE enhancing items done before the seal was broken?
Jeff did run a 53.7 last year, Greg ran a 53.6 this year. We regularly run in the high 53s with a 2 year old shifter chassis. If we used a newer 100 cc kart, low 53s here we come. It was posted here on this site this spring that if a sealed engine were to be torn down, all measures possible to rembusing the racer for re-sealing costs, including a fee equal to the costs of re-sealing the engine would be assessed. Was this done?
It should not be surprising to anyone who has half a brain that a Rotax will be the fastest TaG package at IMI. When compared to the other engines, the Rotax develops more hp. This is well documented by both Tag USA and WKA on several ocasions. However, the Rotax has a very limited total power band, less than 6,000 rpm. The other engines have at least an 8,000 rpm band with some upwards of 10,000 to 11,000 rpm.
What this means is that if the track has a slow corner relative to the longest straight, those engines with a wide power band will have the advantage. When we were at New Castle, it wan’t even close between the Sonics and the rest of us. They had us (Rotax and Leopard) by over 1 second. We were 1,000 rpm below our power band off the slow corners yet we were out of gear 3/4 down the straights. We lost 20 kart lengths every lap. Greg was able to run very close (.1 and passing him at one point) to the track owner in his Leopard (Mark Dismore Jr, multi time WKA national champion). Give us as much time on that track as the owner has, I think we could run dead even with him. However, all the karts in the front will be Sonics.
IMI is the exact opposite, it has no slow corners relative to the straight. The Rotax uses only 4,000 rpm of its band. At IMI, we can run the Rotax in its sweet spot all the way around. Since we run less weight and have more power, the Rotax is king there. Given the nature of IMI, the Rotax will always be the fastest engine there under the current rules and it will be fastest by a lot.
At Grand Junction, its much closer in that the Rotax has to use all its power band plus a little over rev. That is why the Rotax is still quickest, but its much closer. The other engines are only a few tenths back. This spring, the top 6 were covered by only a few tenths. Of all the tracks we have raced at, GJ is the most fair to the various engine packages.
Bandimere is the exact opposite. It has two very slow corners and two long straights. The Rotax will be .5 a second behind a Leopard there. If a quality Sonic showed up, it would crush us all by a full second.
I was at Badger raceway this past weekend. While completely different from any thing we have around here (but it did remind me a bit of CRE) It was all Sonic. With the light weights WKA runs, the Sonics put on a show. The two Rotaxes were dead last, a full second off the pace and it had nothing to do with driver. There was a Leopard keeping up with them, but it had a really good driver and the two Sonics kept screwing up trying to take the point from each other.
The point of all this is that if a person gets out and does a little investigation, looks at other tracks and other races, they will see not every engine will be competitve at every track. The engines are too different in their basic power delivery characteristics. To come up with a single set of weights that work eveyrwhere is impossible.
I am dissapointed to see SKUSA take such a negative attitude toward its racers. I would have hoped that they would try to work with various sanctioning bodies to help Tag move forward. After all, it has so few members and by far their largest group is right here in Colorado. Since most are recreational type racers working on a very limited budget, I would think they would try to find a way to minimize costs for the racer, not increase them. If they had $350-$500 to stuff in their engines every weekend, they would race ICC shifters. I know we would.
I don’t have a basic problem with them wanting to break a seal, for either Rotax, Biland or EasyKart, it’s just they should make an effort to minimize a racers expense to put it back together. The CSC earlier announced they would this year. Having a certifed dealer on hand to re-seal, or sending it off to a certified center would be appropreate. To do other wise SKUSA is sending a simple message, if you have a sealed motor, don’t race with us.
However, with all the political BS I see going on now, TaG is doomed after this year, if not already. WKA will come out with rules next year to blueprint the engines. That will split the TaG world right down the middle. WKA will become a two engine, high costs class, Sonic and Leopard. SKUSA has yet to give a clear direction of what its going to do and IKF wants to work with TagUSA but that may be tough once WKA breaks off.
Bottom line, RMax will rise again for all the reasons it became the most popular Tag package. Especially since there will be very positive changes in the Rotax challange format next year. Look for the Rotax guys to drop the Tag crap and do Rotax only events. I know thats where we will end up if things go as I think they will.
