[James McMahon]

Swedetech

PSL (Canada)

Joe White

Depending on what you need exactly other brand parts may work too.

[James McMahon]

Jeff the way I see it, if an event is losing 50 entries, cancel the damn race. I know we don’t all have a crystal ball but sometimes you can tell that an event is going to be a fail. Cut the cord.

IMO, having one annual, “national” road race event that is reasonably organization agnostic is a great thing to have for road racing.
To be fair, the tentative date for this COTA event was set WELL before any of the regional series’ had their dates locked-in. They had opportunity to work around it if needed.

In any case, as far as ’14 in concerned it’s all moot clearly this event isnt happening. I would guess it will be a while before the interest diminishes in this venue a little and COTA will then be less selective about their customers.

[James McMahon]

Theres a big difference between what was allowed for a GP125 and what is currently allowed for KZ. I think its misleading to follow the peak HP numbers too much. Thats without even talking about the difference between a kart and motorcycle application

KZ restrictions….. (numbers may not be 100% accurate)
Exhaust port timing 190Deg max
Venturi size 30mm max
Inlet type reed only
Head volume cannot be under 11.5cc
Analogic ignition only (so no CDI and no programmable curves),
No Powervalves.

A driveable 50HP under these conditions seems optimistic to me, regardless of who claims it. The 53HP quote from Jan Thiel I’ve been trying to find the source for because its without context about what configuration was and under what circumstances. I would hazard a guess that this motor may not fair to great on a kart, but I could be wrong.

If Riley thinks 55HP is possible then I have some faith, but I can’t see it being done with existing KZ specs. 125open now that’s another matter.

How did the RS’ fair back in promoto days?

[James McMahon]

Jumped in the deep end with a Formula A. Not the way I’d recommend as there’s not many driving experiences that compare.

[James McMahon]

Welcome to karting.

Keep in mind, assuming tire pressure remains the same, tire/wheel width actually has no affect on contact patch size, only shape. If you significantly change the circumference then that’s different, but otherwise, the adage that a wider wheel = bigger contact patch is incorrect.

What class are you running?

[James McMahon]

I think my question might be how are you going to capture the data that you might use for the load curve?

For aero…. I read a study a while ago that used a combo of CFD and other testing to quantify the effects of it. In short, a typical CIK bodied kart has a CoD of .8 and a frontal area of .570 sq/M (6.1 sq ft)
So you could use that as a base to see how much, if any aero you want to factor in for your testing/simulation. I guess it would depend on the average speed around the track, more-or-less.

[James McMahon]

55HP? Not buying it.
No way it’s making a legitimate 55HP in any way that’s useful or reliable on the track. TBH I think the 50HP number thrown around for KZ motors is a trophy pull anyway. With a 30mm carb, compression and exhaust timing limits I’m doubtful.
<span style=”line-height: 1.5em;”>One thing to add…if you think EFI on a  racing two stroke means the end of motor </span>carburetor<span style=”line-height: 1.5em;”> tuning you are going to be very disappointed. It depends on the exact EFI you are looking at, and how its implemented, but on any kind of racing application it’s not going to be balls to the wall AND autotuning at the same time.</span>

[James McMahon]

I think I’d go this route over megasquirt on a two stroke…
http://www.ecotrons.com/products/2_stroke_small_engine_fuel_injection_kit/

[James McMahon]

Just posted on Tom’s FaceBook in the last hour by his son Daniel..

“Hi everybody. We were able to bring grandpa home from the hospital for a few hours yesterday to have Christmas dinner with the family. Things went smoothly and he really enjoyed himself. He wanted me to thank everyone for the well wishes. He has some more therapy to do, and still a long road to recovery, but he’s doing well. Thanks for the prayers and well wishes.”

[James McMahon]

I sent you a PM to clarify what you are looking for. I dont think brakes from something OTK thats 02 and 08 vintage would be interchangeable.

[James McMahon]

Unless I had a 206 knocking around, I dont think I’d buy one for the purposes of a kid kart. Even a clone from boxstockproject might be a better way to go if you are OK with something that heavy/big.

The GX50 is gathering steam and in terms of parity it’s not hard to beat the comer!

[James McMahon]

I’d be happy to help organize the tech behind such a “cyber” summit if others are willing to work with the participants.
That said, I think the clubs need to be “convinced” which way to go by way of driver feedback, organization and plain old voting with their wallets. We need to work as a group and reach consensus both on a national and regional scale.

Once that’s accomplished there will be two type of clubs\orgs..
1) They ones that embrace the proposals by such a group and prosper.
2) The ones that oppose it and fade away.

I can help with the data, surveying, discussion and so on with KartPulse when we go live but we still need to identify some key “political” individuals.

 

I really like Brian’s idea of having “core” set of classes that could be run at most RR events.

[James McMahon]

OK now that I’ve calmed down. The irony is that with a good clutch setup you wont have to spin those RPM’s on the top, rather you will be slipping the clutch at the bottom end. It might even be worth changing your pipe to suit. It goes against the direct drive mantra, but overall it will be faster.

Go to the two stroke section on 4cycle.com and ask about jackshafts and clutches. You could probably pickup a suitable combo under the classifieds, used for about $300.

Nice motor by the way :)

[James McMahon]

They put in a ***kin’ what rule!?!

[James McMahon]

I would say so. From memory I think there has been TaG as well as Stock Leopard. If there’s a demand, Bernie will find a way to get them racing.

[James McMahon]

Not everyone buys new tires for their racing. Not everyone runs the same oil, or wants to run a spec fuel. Its not a wash for everyone.

Best I know is that this race’s fate is in the hands of the COTA board.

[James McMahon]

Jeff, personally I love your idea of combining groups by time, it makes total sense. Especially when you have very similar motors, say Honda GX and clone for example.

My impression is that is that we have morphed into a bunch of whiners. A group of people who would rather claim they finished third out of three entries, than claim 10th out of 50. Everyone seems to want a trophy, I think that’s what’s really killing things.
How we change that mentality I don’t know.

[James McMahon]

I wonder would it be worth having someone fab up a spacer/collar of some sort to use 50mm gears? Could be cheaper in the long run.

[James McMahon]

I wonder how much of the DD2 participation was related to the closeness of the Rotax Worlds at NOLA?
Can’t deny the DD2 competition was impressive.
As for G1, I can’t see it coming back. Just run KZ haha.

No matter what the class is, you are battling with “the wolves” at the Supernats, thats what makes the event so great.

I guess one approach would be to move the event to a larger and or wider track to accomodate more karts simultaneously, but the event seems to be so popular at the Rio I think I’d be hesitant to change that.
Otherwise, perhaps the junior and senior classes need to be different events et-all?

[James McMahon]

FWT starting up soon too!

[James McMahon]

You don’t need to be a “pachydemologist” to know what an elephant is.
No I wasnt at the soggynats.
Yes I have run my own business with inventory that sinks in value a lot faster than the precious spec MG tire.
Going forward, if it rains an entire event you better have two sets maybe even three depending on conditions and the number of days you run, if you plan on being up front that is.

Chris, I never mentioned a 20% being “my requirement” of fulfillment for a spec tire, it was simply a reference figure.

[James McMahon]

Rob what you quoted re customer and suppliers is true, however I still feel if you sign up to be a spec tire supplier, certain expectations should hold up.

Chris, no matter what the percentage, we are still only talking about one event across the nation. Granted its the big kahuna, but it’s a single event nonetheless.

Clearly the current setup and strategy between SKUSA, MG and the teams/drivers didn’t work, there was misunderstanding and miscommunication of expectations on both end.
Hopefully a compromise can be met that won’t involve drivers carrying around 2-3 sets of wets, nor MG having to sit on $250,000 of inventory.

 

 

[James McMahon]

I don’t consider axles consumables like tires, but I’ll bite anyway as I know some do.

Unless you are talking about a spec axle that everyone is required to use with a designated and contracted supplier your analogy doesn’t apply.
That’s my main gripe with this. MG (or distributor etc) signed up as the supplier of tires for this event. Yet they didn’t have enough, across the entire country in inventory to cover this single big event, not even a fraction of it. I think its fair to say it would be difficult for them to cover all of the drivers, but they didn’t event get close!

From a business POV, its hardly prudent for drivers and teams to hold $800 of tires without a commitment of some sort that the spec’d tire will not change.

[James McMahon]

I was referring to MG and or their distributor where “salutes” were concerned, I apologize I  wasn’t clear. I’m actually sympathetic towards SKUSA on this, they were stuck in the middle between the drivers/teams and supply issues.
The bottom line is that there wasn’t anywhere near enough enough MG wets in the entire country to cover this single event.

That’s a supply issue. Period.

[James McMahon]

David,  one can state what ever they like to the drivers about their responsibility but if a tire is spec’d, the supplier should be able to meet 20% of the demand of ONE of the races don’t you think.

Re CES……I think its worth noting CES do not have a contracted spec tire that you MUST buy and MUST use to even practice. Big difference there. They are also not required stamped or controlled in any way and are free to be used across drivers and classes. Would I expect a scramble for wets at a CES race if I don’t have any? Sure!
Plus, CES while great ain’t the supernats now is it?
The supernats event and SKUSA has publically been MG this, MG that, MG “For the driver”. But now it seems like they have a caveat, if you don’t pre order wets, and it rains, you can suck it. Its a crap attitude to have IMO.

Now lets be clear, I dont expect 100% fulfillment for the kind the demand that came up in Vegas this year event, but the supply was so far off the mark that I think its should be named and identified as a key issue. This is a high profile event.

Its clear that drivers could have pre-ordered wets, given the extreme lack of them for this makes me wonder if they could have even met pre-orders!

Sure you can come back with responses like “champions come prepared”, “responsibility is on drivers” and they are valid to a good extent. However, I feel if one wants to adopt that policy as a whole and ignore the supply issues, you can expect entries to decline. Like it or not, most drivers are not going to stock $800+ in wet tires in case it “might” rain in the desert. At the very least, since wets are used so infrequently over here, I think if you are going to expect that from drivers, you should guarantee that the spec of the tire will not change for three years.

So, in short the way I see it is at least acknowledge there was a supply issue and begin some brainstorming to resolve it (yes including teams and driver’s role too), or expect entries to decline because you basically gave your customer base a one-fingered salute because they didn’t pre-order.

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