[James McMahon]

Definately plan running a Blackhawk event with CES. Being so close of the chicago metro, there’s always good a 125cc shifter grid, usually 30+. I think we peaked at 47 at one point. Theres a good mix of motors (Stock Honda, Mod, KZ) and driver abilities, so you’ll always find yourself having a race with someone.

Also, the first Blackhawk Race on May 30-31 will be televised on MavTV on a show called Motorsports Road trip, so I think we’ll see bumper grids for that one.

Grattan, although a haul for you is worth the trip. One of the best road courses around.

[James McMahon]

You can get a rough idea of the TAG motors from the past from the TAGUSA rulebook….

http://tagracing.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/2014_TAG_Rules-Final-2_14_14.pdf

 

Keep in mind that if you plan racing, your exact motor choices will be dictated by the chosen ruleset for your club or track

 

[James McMahon]

That’s the plan. Working on a promo video to spread the word……

[James McMahon]

A czar needs to be able to execute the ideas based on what’s best for the sport’s ecosystem as a whole. Someone who’s objective and data driven but at the same time balanced with good instincts for the industry. Someone else could do the “sales” part. In fact, that might be best.

So we’ve had suggestions of top-down and bottom-up approaches… To me, that says the real problem, is a communication one.

[James McMahon]

Nice matthew!

[James McMahon]

You could say a lot of it it happening (fragmented as it may be) on facebook, even at that I dont think it lends itself to much deep discussion.

The other factor I think is that people are desensitized to these changes with so many happening.

Probably not a bad thing, we need to build our local tracks up.

Nice pics on the blog BTW :)

[James McMahon]

<span style=”color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 21px; background-color: #efefef;”>The solution we use is the LO206.  When someone with no experience comes in and wants to go racing – they get an LO206.  We don’t bombard them with: 2-cycle or 4-cycle? Yamaha, TaG or Shifter? Do you want to race nationally?  Give them an easy, fun, affordable package that they can grow with.  After all, isn’t that what club level racing should be?  That formula has brought 30 new people into the sport at just our local track over the winter.  If every track implemented a similar philosophy, you’d start to see growth in the sport at the base, then the middle and eventually the top.  It is much easier to market a completely new LO206 kart for $3,995 than the $9,500 TaG counterpart.</span>

+1
LO206, or for those what want something a little faster WF is a great introductary package.  KT100 has no place in the entry level market IMO. Too much to learn for a newcomer. More experienced karters often underestimate how much they have learned about these kind of setups, to most newcomers it’s too much to take on. They get frustrated, burnout and quit.

The other factor with KT100 is that racers budgets will tend to have more of their annual budget directed to engine work, rather than race entry fees which is what actually make the grids. Keep it simple and low maintenance and people will keep coming back.

What does “national” mean anyway? I see so many races and orgs offering it it’s lost any meaning with me.

It’s all well saying vote with your wallet, but if the result of that vote is people not racing karts, because  for example, good grids for their equipment is too far we have a problem, and we do have a problem.

[James McMahon]

Dont think such a record was attempted with a CR125, karts have been banned from the flats for a while too. CIK bodywork is about as aerodynamic as a house gable so to be honest, the top speed would prettymuch be the same at the salt flats or Daytona, power to drag ratio is pretty poor. Start laying back and down though and things change significantly.

It’s all about aero, I believe there was an 80 cc (maybe even 50cc) two stroke turbocharged bike that topped 140 some time ago on the salt flats. Ive also seen a picture of a kart that the driver was laying completely flat on stomach, facing forward. Get a CR125 on that and you should be humming along at 140ish.

But otherwise, I don’t believe such an attempt was made before karts were excluded from the salt flats.

[James McMahon]

I agree with David Hosie for the most part. The top down approach isn’t working. As a community we need to come together. By community I mean not just karters, but kart businesses, tracks and clubs too. That is, the ones that can conduct themselves professionally. Having only karter’s input by itself is a dangerous approach. Drivers for the most part only think of themselves in a first person narrative. The approach needs balance and perspective from people who are in it for the long haul and have vision. Right now too many orgs and kart businesses are in a scarcity mindset and that’s making things worse.

I see the future of karting as very bright, but there won’t be growth without some transitional pain, some of which we are already going through.

[James McMahon]

Road races usually 105-110 with CIK bodywork. Maybe 115 is your in a serious draft pack and geared appropriately.

[James McMahon]

Here’s an example, WF vs 125 Shifter. It should skip to 16:50

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BR7x6QTngas#t=1009

[James McMahon]

Top speed will vary a lot with aero. No animal is going to make same power as a typical 125cc shifter without block bracing I think.

I have heard that WF’s can hit 100mph on road courses, drafting in a pack with a near laydown driver setup, narrow track, nice aero nosecone etc. But thats barely breaking 100 at the end of a straight and they are not too hot in the turns with the narrow track.
On the same straight your typical CIK shifter will be humming along at 105-108 for most of it and likely running 10 second/lap faster. Put a 125cc shifter motor on that laydown type body and you are looking 120ish.

Practical example, Blackhawk Farms this year
Briggs Animal 360 Fastest lap: 1:26.9
CIK125 Shifter:  1:13.5

The briggs animals in this example make more power than a WF and yes these are dry times, same day same track.

On a sprint track, the times will be closer, but neither a shifter or an Animal are likely to hit 100MPH

[James McMahon]

Regular type karts with a frock…They are goofy looking alright…

 

[James McMahon]

Rotax dont have a graph for a motor that’s on the old rod/crank/piston with the newer upgrades.
My guess is that an 09 spec with upgrades would be on par with a “full” evo. The difference you see in the curves is mostly down to ignition, a little carb and a little powervalve.

Maxspeed (gorotax.com) and their distributors will be stocking the kits starting in Janurary.
http://gorotax.com/news/187-maxspeed-group-announces-special-pricing-for-rotax-125-max-evo-engine-upgrade-kits-for-existing-rotax-engine-owners.html

 

[James McMahon]

Rotax’s own numbers. Plotted on a graph. Draw your own conclusion. Looks like the Evo’s will be better to drive but I can’t see the older models holding a candle to them, at the same weight.

 

 

[James McMahon]

I would say the the electronic powervalve will still need to be cleaned, just like the regular one. It will get gunked up in the same spots, instead of being adjusted/forced down by the spring, it’s controlled pneumatically by a solenoid with two modes to select from.
The ignitions have different curves, jr for example is getting 2000 more RPM on the top than before.

Everything i’ve seen so far shows the “testarossa” kits having the potential to be measurably faster than their existing siblings. That by itself is a good thing, but how are Rotax are going to handle the transition……

[James McMahon]

Comparing the dyno curves (from Rotax) for evo and non evo senior Max packages, the evo should have the upper hand on any track at any given time if it’s performing correctly. It’s not just 1.5HP more at the peak, its across the entire rev range from 7500.

For sure it was a PR nightmare.  With the leak of the document in Australia things started off pretty bad.

X30 is a threat, its got some momentum behind it, aside from SKUSA running it. Not sure about the X125 though, time will tell.

[James McMahon]

I’m remoting the timing laptop and putting up MyLaps today.
Had hoped to have RaceHero running over the weekend (I had Race Monitor setup too) but I guess they had internet issues at the track…

[James McMahon]

That’s quite a workflow you have there! I think DC is thinking of the HD formats. You can actually get HD video (AVC\Blu ray quality) on a DVD disc if the video is short enough. Of course the player has to support the format that you have chosen too. It’s a good cheap way of distributing HD videos on a disc to people that have blu ray players.

Anyway, a regular DVD resolution is 720×480. Even though mathematically, this is not 16:9 it is is resolution you need to use for output. A flag is added to the video that makes it display in a widescreen (16:9) format.

Are you adding menus so forth, or do you just want a DVD playable disk with the footage?
If you have enough space, have RaceRender make you a near lossless file (huffyUV is a good example) so you get minimum degradation of quality by the time your DVD video is rendered.

[James McMahon]

Are you sure it’s not just falling out of the powerband? What RPMs is it faltering at? It’s normal for these motors to feel like someone cut the ignition at lower RPM, they dont make anything until 9000ish. You can kinda guess your main jetting by the top RPM that the motor stops pulling at, but that actual RPM depends on your setup.

Tuning wise….

Run 24:1. Do not pass go, do not collect $200.  Nobody is jetting these on 32:1, so get that variable out of the way.

Change nothing else until you are running with that. Many 80’s are fairly highly strung so proceed with caution when lowering octane. To be honest,  stick with a leaded racing fuel if you can. 91, even with stock ports and head is going to be sketchy if you have a kart racing pipe on it. Lead is verykind to the bearing surfaces in the motor. Run a racing oil too, not some random road motorcycle stuff.  Motul 2T is a popular synth, Maxima 927 is a popular castor.

If you have a pumparound carb, ensure both sides of the fuel pump are clean. A weak return side will cause it to run rich.

B10 is fine, again those motors are small but tend to have high specific output.

[James McMahon]

You mean static advance then? I dont have a number for you but will say that I think thats going to be hard for anyone to give you a solid number. It will depend on your compression,  squish (area and shape), fuel, pipe etc etc.

Plus on such a short run you could maybe get even MORE aggressive. Test 0.1mm increments at a sprint track for a single lap (or two) and see how it goes. Even include your launch. Thats the only way to really find out I think. Start with wherever a SKUSA timing plate fixes it and advance from there.

Buy a couple pistons :)

[James McMahon]

Great vid, exactly what karting needs more of.  If I get to blackhawk we need to talk more :)

[James McMahon]

Separate ’01 and ’99 timing plates then?

[James McMahon]

The 01 was allowed when the 99’s had a shortage some time ago. What’s refueled the already fiery debate recently was a temporal shortage of ’01’s this year.

If the fuel change was made for 110 (107 MON?) I wonder how long before builders come up with clever ways to make the most of it?

[James McMahon]

Always good to see crowdsourcing like this in action…

Here is the BT Owen list I was talking about:  https://mapsengine.google.com/map/u/0/edit?mid=zMYmCYAjlQSA.kWpbh8CbWetw

It’s mostly dirt ovals I think, but still we are slowly beginning to capture the tracks that are out there as well as null the ones that are defunct.

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