[Ian Krueger]

I’ve learned about over 75mph is where the body starts to work good. But i’m not totally sure that the rules allow for no bodywork.

I checked the WKA manual and it doesnt specify that body is required, it just specifies what the bodies max dimensions are.

Id maybe first call the WKA office and check to make sure its OK to run without a body. Id think you need atleast a plastic nose to deflect possible kart launches, but im not sure

[Ian Krueger]

to answer your question, definitly slower but not that much. maybe 1 second at Roebling and maybe more like 2 sec slower at Daytona. Im not 100% sure at all ive never raced either of those tracks but i do know aerodynamics are pretty important atleast in road races.

[Brian Wilhelm]

At Daytona a few years ago I tried taking the sidepods off my F-125 laydown shifter during one practice session. I lost 21 mph off top end and my lap times were nearly 10 seconds slower. I had tried it many years ago (there used to be a 20lb weight break for no bodywork) on my piston port laydown at a tighter track (Hallett, Ok), and lost 3 seconds a lap. I’ve found aero comes into play at about 55-60mph.

[Jeremy Baldi]

Aero plays huge part.  Along with karting I also do quite a bit of road cycling.  Aerodynamics is a huge part of that industry and bikes only go 20-30mph.  Now your power output is much lower than a kart but still aero is very important.  They say anything over 15mph 80 percentage of your pedaling power is just going to penetrate through the air.  So on a kart I would agree with Brian that anything over 55-60mph aero will play large roll.

On my laydown shifter I have made small changes to body work and found it has changed top speed by 4-5mph and changed lap times by 2-3 secs. Heck one time a gopro placed in a bad place cost 3 mph and 1 sec in lap time.

There was a Jay Leno garage episode were they ran a tag kart on a sprint track with and without body work and I don’t remember exactly but I believe they lost over a second on like a 40 sec lap.

I would except at Daytona in a yamaha laydown you would see a difference of 10 plus mph and 10 plus secs.

 

[William Martin]

It was about .7 seconds, but that was just between old-style & newest TopKart plastic. Gotta try a Jim Hall style sucker fan someday! :-) Where do you put that on a kart?

 

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