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I know of one pro in Florida who went through three Birel chassis in one weekend of racing. He was very fast though. Brad, perhaps there is an untapped market out there for straightening these.
You guys have a great time at Indy. I know you will. Jesse and I were fortunate enough to take in the Daytona 500 this year and what an experience. And they can only handle half the crowd Indy can! Maybe next year we will go with you. :cheers:
We are also new to the CSC this year and have met a bunch of really high quality people including other competitors in the same class such as yourselves. Again, have fun. We will miss you Sunday but look forward to running at Bandi with you.
“You go!”, Mike. :cheers: While I’m new to the CSC and haven’t met a lot of you yet I would like to say I agree with the sentiment on this post 100%. We live in a great country and get to enjoy great activities (like racing). I’ve met a lot of good people in the CSC so far and hope to meet many more. As for the few who never have anything positive to share, I hope they do go their own way and leave the CSC for those who want good, fun, clean racing.
As we enjoy ourselves this weekend, I hope we all take time to pause and reflect upon those who have given so much so that so many could enjoy so much for so long to come.
There was some great racing at CRE last Sunday. In particular, I thought the Jr Rotax’s put on the best show. 24 laps an no one was lapped. For most of the laps the time difference between the fastest and slowest drivers was less than a second. The race between Pat Rosse and David Chapel was incredible with never more than a kart length between them and the lead chaning about four times. With a lap or two remaining David dropped a wheel off on one of the corners and Pat got by for the final lead change. GREAT RACE GUYS!
The racing at Grand Junction was awesome! The most exciting class was perhaps the Honda 50cc class. Everyone of those engines were dead equal. It was impressive to see those things fly down the straights without one gaining as much as a foot on the others. That left the racing to the drivers in the corners. This is spec racing rasied to the next level.
I ended up buying one of the Honda engines for my youngest son before I realized he was too old for the 50cc class. However, the engine has proven to be a great first package for a young, new driver. The package has been value priced, zero maintenance, regular pump gasoline and no oil, and just the right amount of power for my son. Once my son’s driving skills improve enough to warrant a bigger engine I’ll get the appropriate engine for his age bracket and not regret the investment in the Honda at all.
Whether or not you personally like the Honda engine proposal, you can not argue against the value (zero cost) and quality racing experience (totally equal power) that the CSC Honda 50cc class provides.
If only we could find a cost effective way to do this with the other classes. :argue
You are right on blink! My four decades of working with race engines has proven to me that these engines put a lot of stress on parts that lead to regular maintance. This is no more true at our altitude than it is at sea level. More often than not, however, it is outside factors (dirt, water, improper fuel and/or oil mixture, etc) that lead to premature failures. Thanks for the insight on our altitude.
We’ll be at CRE on Sat running two classes. It looks like the Jr Rotax class might have about a dozen juniors with lots of depth in terms of speed. Rich, I don’t know about a north vs south thing (I’m also from the north) but what about a junior vs master friendly battle. I bet the top five juniors will have better laps times than the top five masters! However, win or lose, the masters get to drink the beer afterwards. The juniors get soft drinks. :cheers:
This proposal seems more problematic than the Honda proposal. It seems like it will be more of a hassle taking an engine to a builder one has never heard of, located who knows where, for a dyno run. Don’t meet spec – find a new engine and come back. Repeat how many times? What if you do finally get a sealed engine then have to do some work on it? Back to the shop for another dyno run. Repeat how many times?
For the life of me, I can’t understand how anyone would not be excited about the Honda proposal. It is low cost, less hassle, zero maintence. The motor is awesome. The only down side I can see is for Brad. The poor guy has to buy, check and maintain the things while everyone else just concern themselves with having fun.
IMI charges about $450 for a complete engine package including a custom built heavy duty clutch, chain guard, throttle cable connection and mounting plate. I suspect this is subsidized by Brad because I can?t believe dealer cost plus the time to build all those parts is less than the amount he charges.
I don?t know about the rules but I can say this is one neat engine. We become more and more pleased with the package as we continue to increase our problem free time with the engine.
Use of a prepared engine is free on race days and only $10 on practice days. I know you will be happy with it. We are.
JB and Brad,
I admire the stance you are taking to make participation in the lowest entry level class easier, more affordable and more fair. My family just got started in karting about a year ago and have enjoyed it immensely. However, it is very expensive. Our family spent over 20K for karting last year and will likely spend more than that this year and following years. It is refreshing to see an effort to bring cost down. Let me see, you are offering to:
– provide a complete engine package for under $500
– provide engines on race day for $0
– reduce maintenance cost
– keep kid racing more equal
Wow! What is there not to like? I?m going to buy one of those engine packages today! Now if only we could do that with all the other classes. :cheers:
Larry TobyAngie,
You stated the Tags will follow the current TAGUSA rules. Does that include Jr’s? I am holding off registering for the CSC events until this question is answered definitely. There have been discussions on this forum about weight changes but I haven’t heard anything official. For the sake of consistency, I hope we are following TAGUSA to the letter. If there are going to be exceptions it would be nice to know them well before the first event!
Thanks,
LarryLike Mike, I also wonder what happened? This was a generous offer that sounded too good to be true. I hope if wasn’t due to criticism and bickering. It seems like everytime someone in this sport tries to do a good thing they end up getting attacked instead of praised. I was watching this post because I have another son I was thinking about getting started in karting. This would have lowered the barriers of entry significantly. Anyway, thanks Brad for all the gruesome testing and preliminary work you did. Keep the faith.
