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You’re in a German car series racing on Japanese tires most likely burning Middle Eastern Oil, maybe Canadian. Patriotic. :whistle:
Hello pot, this is kettle…
Oh, and the oil is most likely south american these days. :huh:
(sorry, couldn’t resist 
)[/quote]
OK, answer those questions with specific data and I’ll start listening to alternatives to the RA1. [color=#0000ff]Do your own testing. If you want my data, you’re gonna pay for it[/color].
[color=#ff0000]I pay for it every time I have to listen to you :[/color]o
You’re killin’ me Smalls!
You probably were moving around a great deal. We should have stuffed some pillows in there with you.
You’re in a German car series racing on Japanese tires most likely burning Middle Eastern Oil, maybe Canadian. Patriotic. :whistle:
Hello pot, this is kettle…
Oh, and the oil is most likely south american these days. :huh:
(sorry, couldn’t resist )[/quote][/quote]
It will all be made from canola in a few years.
I’m sure someone will suggest that I should have gotten a college degree so I could make more money, but…
The tire issue is probably the single most important one to me. This is the largest part of my racing budget for a year. I understand and accept that racing is an expensive hobby. But, anything that can be done to lower the cost in our series I’m for. With the current wear rate on Toyos I simply cannot do more than a few races per year while trying to maintain 2-3 sets of tires (one rain, two dry). When I first built my car and did HPDE’s with it the Toyos wore wonderfully. They now suck. So I have no love for Toyo. The chances of me getting contingency $$ is about zero unless the front 5 cars end up in some wild, fiery wreck should Grace ever make an actual mistake. So that aspect means little to me. All I want is a reasonably priced tire (I do consider the Toyo’s that, at least) that will last longer than the current one. We know they can exist, because they once did. I don’t give a hoot who makes them, where they’re made or if they come in pretty colors. Help me get to the track more frequently and you’ve got a customer.
Three cars in the midwest would be optimistic for starting next year. We probably need two more to migrate from another region to get that big toyo money. If we get 5 we all get paid.
You’re in a German car series racing on Japanese tires most likely burning Middle Eastern Oil, maybe Canadian. Patriotic. :whistle:
(sorry, couldn’t resist )[/quote]
Did I mention I’m an American Who’s last name is Schmitt. I can probably track down some relatives who built e30’s.
I read it as 3 starters and everyone gets paid. Not much, but it is something over a weekend.
You don’t have to race SE30. You can race PT and use whatever tire you want if money is an issue.
Would you rather race more, or less?
Sure and I completely agree that tires are the largest expense, sans motor failures or crash damage.
Believe me, I want to have a long lasting tire. I don’t even care if they handle like crap, as long as they last.
Suspensions need to be built to the tire and the track conditions if you want it to last. We may possibly want to think about doing that in the future.
“Suspensions need to be built to the tire and the track conditions if you want it to last. We may possibly want to think about doing that in the future.”
Respectfully, I could not disagree more. We DO NOT need to do that for as soon as we start doing that, we begin the slippery slope of going away from a spec class and that means more $ to race.
Furthermore, as soon as you start “building” suspension, you open up the possiblity for someone to perhaps, test the rules, shall we say. That being said, I will agree with the fact that the cars would handle better. But you also get into an area that is over the weekend racer’s head, too.
I think we can all agree that the cheapest adjustment to the car is either made in changes in the tire pressure or the driver. So we just need to stick with minor changes that are beneficial to the group as a whole and keep the costs down.
I agree that you don’t want to change the suspensions. The problem you have is the tire compound from Toyo right now (since it changed) may no longer be suited to our suspension specs.
Get really engineery about it and you could tweak suspension valving or spring rates, I guarantee you I can make tires last a race without issue and last longer overall.
If you want to continue to destroy tires in 5 heat cycles with the new Toyo compound, keep at it. Other tires will be more or less suited to running our spec suspensions. It just needs to be tested. How in-depth you want the testing to be is up to you.
This is what the pro guys do.
Redneck way to do it is by buying a bunch of tires and going out there and testing for a day. Then again, the testing will only be valid for that guy, his suspension, and his alignment. YRMV.
I would still stand behind my statement that the suspension needs to be modified to suit the tire if you aren’t going to change the tire.
Shock valving is beyond me. I could maybe handle a knob that that says hard/soft with arrows but I wouldn’t be happy about it. If there’s any suspension mod that makes sense to me it would be having the option to run stock sway bars or a combination of stock and spec bars.
[quote=“Foglght” post=62012]I agree that you don’t want to change the suspensions. The problem you have is the tire compound from Toyo right now (since it changed) may no longer be suited to our suspension specs.
Get really engineery about it and you could tweak suspension valving or spring rates, I guarantee you I can make tires last a race without issue and last longer overall.
If you want to continue to destroy tires in 5 heat cycles with the new Toyo compound, keep at it. Other tires will be more or less suited to running our spec suspensions. It just needs to be tested. How in-depth you want the testing to be is up to you.
This is what the pro guys do.
Redneck way to do it is by buying a bunch of tires and going out there and testing for a day. Then again, the testing will only be valid for that guy, his suspension, and his alignment. YRMV.
I would still stand behind my statement that the suspension needs to be modified to suit the tire if you aren’t going to change the tire.[/quote]
Oddly enough, we agree on some things…Toyo’s compound needs to be revised and that suspension tweeking would change the way the car handles and tire wear. However, that is right about where it ends.
“That’s what the pro guys do.” - that statement pretty much sums up why it’s a bad idea to even consider allowing open suspension modifications as none of us are pros nor do we have their budgets to work with. Now, if we want to change to a different spec suspension, that I would be open to. However, allowing people to make their own changes on the fly is not the spirit of a spec series.
I think your point looses focus of the nature of the series.
With the current suspension rules, the SM Hosiers would be pretty much a bolt on. You would have to optimize camber and toe just like you did for the Toyos, but other that that, nothing. NOTE: if your car is hard on Toyos, it will be hard on Hosiers. Cars that are set up correctly are easy on tires. I use two sets of R6 Hosiers a year. CB
for 40 more dollars we could just go to a 225 tire and the increase in tire would result in less heat exhaustion of the tires due to being so undersized, as well as make the cars handle and brake better. if were going to talk about re-valving and suspension tuning, why don’t we talk about something that could actually be done while still keeping this a spec class and the current toyo contingencies in place. i am a big advocate of a wider tire!!! its the best bang for the buck and it will keep the most people happy, Nasa gets to keep the sponsor happy and their racers happy, from my perspective its win-win!
[quote=“Fooshe” post=62016][quote=“Foglght” post=62012]I agree that you don’t want to change the suspensions. The problem you have is the tire compound from Toyo right now (since it changed) may no longer be suited to our suspension specs.
Get really engineery about it and you could tweak suspension valving or spring rates, I guarantee you I can make tires last a race without issue and last longer overall.
If you want to continue to destroy tires in 5 heat cycles with the new Toyo compound, keep at it. Other tires will be more or less suited to running our spec suspensions. It just needs to be tested. How in-depth you want the testing to be is up to you.
This is what the pro guys do.
Redneck way to do it is by buying a bunch of tires and going out there and testing for a day. Then again, the testing will only be valid for that guy, his suspension, and his alignment. YRMV.
I would still stand behind my statement that the suspension needs to be modified to suit the tire if you aren’t going to change the tire.[/quote]
Oddly enough, we agree on some things…Toyo’s compound needs to be revised and that suspension tweeking would change the way the car handles and tire wear. However, that is right about where it ends.
“That’s what the pro guys do.” - that statement pretty much sums up why it’s a bad idea to even consider allowing open suspension modifications as none of us are pros nor do we have their budgets to work with. Now, if we want to change to a different spec suspension, that I would be open to. However, allowing people to make their own changes on the fly is not the spirit of a spec series.
I think your point looses focus of the nature of the series.[/quote]
I believe you are not understanding what I am saying.
The most current example I can think of is what SCCA is doing with the “B-spec” cars right now.
There are multiple companies putting together suspension kits. Many of them are using a benchmark tire and developing the suspension kit around that tire. I’m not talking about having adjustable shocks (no way would I want that).
All I am merely saying is that you have really no data to support the idea that moving away from the Toyos would cause the car to handle tires more efficiently. In fact, depending on your suspension settings, corner weighting and driving style it could get worse.
Someone mentioned getting a wider tire. It is possible that this could work. However, just imo, I doubt that will solve the actual problem.
When I said, “It’s what the pros do,” the example is tire life. Many of these teams will have a shock guy on site to take data and revalve the shocks for every track. This amounts to the difference between a guy being able to push his car 10/10’ths and finishing the race, as opposed to a team that can’t quite figure it out and having to drive slower because they can’t get the tires to last a full race. They all use the spec tire. I’m also not suggesting we have shock guys follow us around. There can be a compromise here.