Loshak did it in 2013: https://cdn.connectsites.net/user_fi...pdf?1439220741Originally Posted by Thomas Copeland
Plenty of guys in the 2:05-08 range. 2:12 is back of the pack in a full field.
Loshak did it in 2013: https://cdn.connectsites.net/user_fi...pdf?1439220741
Plenty of guys in the 2:05-08 range. 2:12 is back of the pack in a full field.
Mike Beauchamp
RF95 Prototype 2
Get your FIA rain lights here:
www.gyrodynamics.net/product/cartek-fia-rain-light/
Thanks. Couldn't find it for some reason. May have to set the Rev Limited further down than 11K. I would imagine 2:04 around RA in a FB would hanging it out there pretty good.
Firman F1000
Thomas, the times I cited are not FA times. They are FB times at Runoffs races. Here's my spreadsheet.
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
FB in FA
Our cars are illegal in this class anyway. This is a RESTRICTED class
2. Engines
a. Engines shall be derived from automobiles and prepared for competition in accordance with SCCA GT preparation rules unless otherwise specified in the Tables below. OEM blocks and heads must be used unless otherwise noted in the Tables below.
3. Transmission
a. For all types of transmissions, no more than five forward speeds and an operational reverse gear shall be used unless otherwise noted in Table 2 below.
We do not meet these rules. Our cars are motorcycle based and have 6 speeds.
Not really sure what you mean by that - it is pretty clear that both of those lines say they must be automotive-derived or maximum five gears unless in the tables below. The motorcycle powerplants are in the table below, and therefore meet the rules.
-Mark
Mark Uhlmann
Vancouver, Canada
'12 Stohr WF1
I was looking at the times for 2017 Runoffs. Pole times for the following:
FA: 1:29.957
FB: 1:33.746
Yeah, F1000 doesn't stand a chance at the runoffs next year. They take one baseline time from one track and consider that at the norm for all tracks to justify sticking F1000 in FA. Looks like there needs to be more data.
We can always go slower. F1000 going faster is the problem (it's too dangerous). If FA really wants to use F1000 to help their numbers then they are the ones that need to compromise (go slower to match F1000).
I have sent this to the BOD:
In reference to my letter : Suggest Allowing F1000 in FX with a rev limiter set at 11,000 RPM.
To give more clarity. What I'm looking for is a safe and sane solution to allowing F1000 to compete in SCCA club racing. Right now that solution is not available. Which is why you see a limited number of F1000 in club racing today. While I can't speak for every F1000 competitor the ones I have spoken to consider the current rules for F1000 to be too dangerous. We are simply pushing the design envelope of these cars too far. An alternative would be to slow purpose built FA cars down to minimize the destructive force that will happen to an F1000 car in the case of a collision.
F1000 competitors, including myself, would like to compete again in SCCA club racing. But only if we are talking about a safe environment for competition.
Last edited by Thomas Copeland; 12.20.20 at 3:01 PM.
Firman F1000
For 2020, there was a big change in the engine rules for FA. First, you should use data from this years runoffs for FA times and you can get data from Elkhart Lake when there was a strong F1000 field for comparison. Second, F1000 is totally incompatible with FX because FX is for spec formula cars and F1000 is not a spec formula car class.
The best solution for F1000 is to get your numbers back up to where the class can stand on its own. I happen to think that the future of high performance formula cars is with F1000 because it is the only class that I see where the cost of the chassis and power train are reasonable and that new cars can be brought to market and give the best cost to performance ratio of any of the current formula car classes. The one thing I think needs to be addressed is how we can get back to an engine supply that comes from current production bikes and where new engines or very low mileage engines are available at low prices. That was the case when the class was first introduced. Neither FF or FC can be produced for the cost that is possible for a F1000.
The only practical way this works is if they take take F1000 out of FA amd make it a regional class. We can not get our numbers up if we are being counted as FA class. I think I'd actually prefer this than being part of FA.
Firman F1000
Then ask for that rule change.
I've written an email to the BOD requesting just that. But going to ask my fellow F1000 competitors what they think about that idea before sending it.
Firman F1000
Fb to fx
Hello Thomas
I sent my request letter in OCT 2020 and was told that my answer would be in
DEC 2020 Sportscar, found the answer from SCCA they said NO.
Last edited by david oleary; 12.20.20 at 6:34 PM.
[QUOTE=Thomas Copeland;617416]I've written an email to the BOD requesting just that. But going to ask my fellow F1000 competitors what they think about that idea before sending it.[/QUOTE
What happens if the BOD makes F1000 a part of FS? I don't see a lot of hope for a poorly subscribed class getting special treatment. Also as a regional class, you only get to run regional s only. Right now you get to run at any SCCA event.
I don't see any car manufacturer being interested in introducing a new F1000 for FS or F1000 as a regional only class. Right now I am working on a new model FF and many of the features of that car will translate very well to a new Citation F1000. If I had a capable driver who wanted to take on the challenge of a new model of the Citation, I could see investing in such a project. As a part of FA, F1000 is visible to that largest audience of potential customers. That is where the future of F1000 should be.
True Tom you went right to the crb but they were not interested in your letter however if you can get the FSRAC on your side this a very big help IMO! Making the engines equal in performance is not that Hard and once parity is achieved your home free. I am pretty sure that if rpm limits or flat plate restrictors are properly implemented then the class will grow very quickly imo! I bet that the SCCA would love to see a consistent 10 or more Fx field of course then you could always have your own pro series too! I can guarantee you that Brian will be there with crew!
Last edited by Jnovak; 12.20.20 at 7:08 PM.
Thanks ... Jay Novak
313-445-4047
On my 54th year as an SCCA member
with a special thanks to every SCCA worker (NONE OF US WOULD RACE WITHOUT THE WORKERS)
The FX rules don't say anything like that, Steve.
Rather, the rules state, "The Formula X class is intended for winged, open-wheel formula cars of
modest power and performance (sub FA/F3/F1000). The class is to include cars which a) are built in
significant numbers, but not sufficient enough to populate their own class; and b) may not have been
constructed to existing class formulas within the GCR. The class may also include cars which have
been built to a recognized SCCA formula but are not running in sufficient numbers to warrant their
own class."
RPM/Inlet-restricted F1000 cars exactly fit that last FX example criteria...they were built to a recognized SCCA formula but are not running in sufficient numbers to have their own class. SCCA decided they needed to be folded into an existing class, so the only question is ... which class?
Since being folded into FA, F1000 drivers have voted with their feet by declining to run in FA. That isn't working...we've had exactly ONE F1000 car show up at the Runoffs over the past two years, so I agree with Thomas we should look at changing classes. FX is the obvious alternative to FA.
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
Stan, yea! Write a letter. F1000 into FX.
I want anything that makes sense and works. The current status quo ain't working. I'm open to any suggestions that make sense. Moving F1000 into a regional class would be last resort. Here's what options I have:
F1000 in FA: Slow down purpose built FA cars. Match current F1000 speeds, Ditch that F1000 engine change.
F1000 in FX: Slow down F1000 to match speed of current FX cars. Use rev limiters. On for FX. Off for Pro racing. This is so easy. Definitely my preference.
F1000 in Regional Class. Definitely last thing I want to see. But has some upside if we can actually get numbers up to get a Major status again. I think that is a reach.
Firman F1000
The BoD and CRB already tossed F1000 one big bone by merging them into FA. IMO to get them to do another is going to take more than asking for a "quick disconnect" RPM limiter.
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
I don't think the dog got that bone. I think it missed and fell into the trash.
Whatya suggest?
Firman F1000
In a word, if I were king for a day, which I'm not, I'd make moves to make the cars cheaper and slower. Specifically, I'd...
1. Set up a season-long test program to set the weight and inlet restrictor size to balance the F1000s with the current dominant car in FX ... FM.
2. Retain a trusted engine shop to do the inlet restrictor testing. (I'll personally pledge a $1000 towards the dyno time.)
3. Set a 3-years (negotiable) and older engine rule to reduce the engine-of-the-year issue.
4. Prohibit assisted shifting systems.
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
The 2nd and last FB ad hoc committee was very very close to having a well defined very low cost inlet restrictor plan that would have worked on nearly every 1000cc 4 cylinder motorcycle engine but the committee decided to stop the testing i still believe that this methodology has a ton of merit for Instance i suggest that you watch the last f500 race at the road America runoffs if you want to see some very serious competition with simple restricted engines that work and the motors live and are very low cost and reliable too! This solution is very low cost and the engìne are super reliable
PS: i sti?l have the 1000cc dyno data if anyone wants to see it! We were very close to a viable solution!
Last edited by Jnovak; 12.21.20 at 1:23 AM.
Thanks ... Jay Novak
313-445-4047
On my 54th year as an SCCA member
with a special thanks to every SCCA worker (NONE OF US WOULD RACE WITHOUT THE WORKERS)
The 2nd and last FB ad hoc committee was very very close to having a well defined very low cost inlet restrictor plan that would have worked on nearly every 1000cc 4 cylinder motorcycle engine but the committee decided to stop the testing i still believe that this methodology has a ton of merit I suggest that you watch the last f500 race at road America if you want to see some very serious competition with restricted engines that work and the motors live too and are very low cost and cost-effective too!
Thanks ... Jay Novak
313-445-4047
On my 54th year as an SCCA member
with a special thanks to every SCCA worker (NONE OF US WOULD RACE WITHOUT THE WORKERS)
I'd love to read it, Jay. Please email me a copy. Thanks, Stan
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
rules
At this point I really do not want to see the cars to be a regional class only, I have seen SCCA do that in the pass
and that really kills the value of our cars that we ALL have to much money in!!! So I will run my car as either a FA or P2 for 2021
Luckily I purchased a P2 kit when I built it so I have someplace to race. But I would like to race in FA again if we could get the rules straight so that we would be competitive at the runoffs in that class!!!! If not then we should be FM or FC IMHO.
I agree. With 20-20 hindsight, those last three bullet points could have saved the class and made it thrive.
Racer Russ
Palm Coast, FL
Why a complicated restrictor plate over a very simple rev limiter? I don't get this. This makes things way too complicated. There is no one inlet restrictor plate fits all solution. Going in this direction takes too long and too much effort, money, and time. Maybe if there was one engine type this would make sense. But there are too many different ones. That's why rev limiters make more sense.
I guess I'm struggling to understand why inlet restrictors are a better than solution rev limiters. There is someone working on a rev limiter now. I think this is the direction we should go in. Whatever we do should be a simple solution everyone can understand and implement. If we go with rev limiters then we probably won't need a engine of the year rule.
What is this thing with assisted shifting? I'm always baffled by it. You mean air shifters? Geartronics? Everyone says it gives no advantage. I driven both. So I can tell ya first hand it gives no advantage. I'm the same speed with or without it. They're fun to use (when they work!). That's about all I can say about it. And if most of all the F1000 guys are ok with it then I just don't get why this is such a big damn deal to so many people who aren't even involved in F1000. The fastest guy's in F1000 don't even use them. I think there was one track where it was useful in getting one gear (Road America) way back at the runoffs in 2010 but that was the only time I've ever heard it was ever really helpful. The rest is all mental (and that one time might have been all mental too for all I know).
It's just one method of shifting. I don't have an air shifter on my car. I own a Geartronics but decided not to put it in. In fact, I'm trying to sell it. How's that for so called advantage? Besides its a headache to maintain and support is flaky when it goes bad. I do have a mechanical paddle shifter just installed in the car which I've never used yet. Those have been around since the very beginning of F1000. Nobody ever complained about those. I prefer it because I can't pull my arm far enough back to get top gear sometimes. Always a problem when I drove FC. My FC in-car videos are full of miss shifts going into top gear. But there is no advantage between one system or the other. In fact, I prefer the lever sometimes because I can feel what gear I'm in by what position it's in. With the paddle shifter I have to look at what gear I'm in and that can cost me time. A second here, a second there. That is, providing the gear indicator is working properly. Otherwise, I have to listen for engine sound. It makes me laugh to hear people make such a deal over assisted shifters. These people obviously don't know what they are talking about. Drive a car with both systems you'll know what I mean. I swear I think the advantage if there is any, is all mental. These aren't full bore F1 systems. They're pretty dumbed down.
Firman F1000
Turn the question around...what's so complicated about a flat piece of aluminum with a hole in it? Seems pretty simple to me. You'll need a unique Rev Limiter for each different wiring harness out there, which sounds pretty complicated to me. And then there is the problem of spoofing. Twenty years ago in Pro Atlantics there was a cheating scandal over teams spoofing the then-spec TRD ECU. Nobody wants a repeat of that drama.
Finally, everyone in SCCA knows flat plate restrictors. There's no mystery and no drama; they just work.
If they have no advantage why do you object to getting rid of them?What is this thing with assisted shifting? I'm always baffled by it. You mean air shifters? Geartronics? Everyone says it gives no advantage. I driven both. So I can tell ya first hand it gives no advantage. I'm the same speed with or without it.
As long as they're allowed there will be at least a whiff of perception you need one to reach your maximum potential. The objective of my list is to remove a few of the biggest factors that drive up the cost to race F1000, and the Geartronics and the like drive up the cost sharply. Since you claim they don't have any advantage why not get rid of them and the perception one needs to spend whatever they cost (several thousand dollars, right?).
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
I do not want my car to be dumbed down to the level of an FM, just my 2 cents...
Jeremy Hill
Fair enough, Jeremy. What DO you want? No sarcasm...I'm genuinely interested.
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
You'll need a flat plate and dyno runs on every motor. More complicated, time consuming, and costly than putting in a rev limiter.
Jeremy you planning to run SCCA club any time soon?
I've heard some people suggest a FA2 class for F1000 in SCCA club. But hows that different from having an FB class?
Firman F1000
For motorcycle engines, there seem to be to widely varying ways of defining restrictor usage -- F600 and P2. F600 is a restrictor between the head and throttle body. Throttle remains stock with both primary and secondary butterflies and no throttle body adapters. P2 puts the restrictor on top of the throttle body, secondary butterfly can be removed, and one can use the venturi style throttle body adapters. The venturi throttle body adapters do a lot to reverse the effects of the restrictor.
Before one starts talking about restrictors, the specifications surrounding them and the throttle bodies needs to defined.
Engine builders like George Dean can already tell you the effects of restrictors on the 1L engines.
Craig Farr
Stohr WF1 P2
Good question Stan, I don't think the CRB would ever do it but IMO the class should have stayed part of FC where it started, with suitable restrictors,
FC aero rules and no assisted shifters.
Jeremy
Jeremy you planning to run SCCA club any time soon?
Thomas,
I might run Club if I can get across the border!!
btw is see you posted some pictures from Laguna, do you have a pic of my car?
Jeremy
I certainly agree that SCCA will not agree to moving FB back into FC. It was the Pinto-powered FC competitors who ran off the m/c powered FC cars in 2005.
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
Yes, the CRB was already trying to figure out how to equalize the Pintos and Zetecs, the concept of adding motorcycle engines sent them into a tailspin. They chose the easy solution...
Last edited by JEREMY HILL; 12.21.20 at 5:50 PM.
Those are all from the old F1000 Pro Series (pre USF1000). I took a lot of those myself. I don't think you did any of those races. I do have a photo of you from the 2014 Runoffs at Laguna Seca. Can send to you if you like.
I'll be the first to admit I don't have all the answers for F1000 in SCCA club. I just don't see it surviving in SCCA club under the current rules. Not as FA anyway. Very few F1000 drivers want to compete under those rules. I've talked to several of them. You are one of those I haven't. But I'm open to suggestions. Reasonable suggestions. Also I'm not the one thats ultimately going to decide this anyway. I'm just trying to come up with some ideas people can support so we can get out of this bind. As Stan points out most of us aren't coming to SCCA club events because the current rules just don't work. So why don't we make some that do? We need to stop trying to one up each other (which I've been guilty of too) and come up with some workable solutions. I wish there was an solution I could just point and say there that one. Do that. Everythings fixed. Yea!!!
Right now there is something going on where a few of us are talking about putting something together like the old F1000 Pro Series where we do the series piggyback on SCCA club events. We would just ignore the FA's and just race together aganist ourselves. But we're not there yet. Not even sure its even happening or even possible. It could be. We're trying to make it happen. Would like to see it happen. If it did we might be using rev limiters. We've certainly talked about it. We want to make the competition fair for everyone. As for making it work to get us into FX, maybe that's a bridge too far. Don't know. All do know is we don't fit into FA now. Let's be real. We don't.
Last edited by Thomas Copeland; 12.21.20 at 5:18 PM.
Firman F1000
Nah, just pick a size and everyone runs that size, like the F600 guys do.
Of course, it'll take some dyno work to figure out the correct size and probably some adjustments to fit them in with the FMs, but your worst case scenario need not happen.
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
The solution is not a one size fits all engine model restrictor any more than it would be a one rpm limit for all engine models, unless the group is okay with it becoming a de facto one engine model class.
It's going to require a significant restriction to achieve any semblance of parity with the FM cars. Whether that's a stated goal or not, the FM numbers are much larger and they aren't likely to take to becoming grid fodder without a fight.
Are the FM guys open to an increased rpm limit on their cars? How much more can their gearboxes reliably handle?
I may be the lone sheep here but I vote keeping everything as is. I like my revs and I like my Geartronics. I'm not interested in downgrading my car to run with a slower run group. Remove the 25 lb penalty, or heck drop the min to below 1000 lbs. With the eventual graduation to newer moto engines, the disparity to FAs will diminish.
Note - I'm not racing for trophies; just enjoying club racing for what it is.
Sent from my Pixel 4 using Tapatalk
Thanks Arax. You are not the only one who wishes to stay in FA. I have heard offline from others who want to stay where they are and are upgrading their engine programs to close the gap with FAs.
Stan Clayton
Stohr Cars
Yes there a couple or so that want this. But appears just as many (and apparently more) it seems that don't want to go in that direction. To me, going in that direction is just dangerous. Stupid dangerous. I don't know what people think is going to happen in a high speed accident with a purpose built FA (and I honestly don't want to know) but that's their life they are playing with, not mine, and I'm not doing it under any circumstances.
As you stated earlier the F1000 group are voting with their feet. There are not showing up in numbers. That should tell you something about how many want to go in that direction.
Is there a way to accommodate both?
Last edited by Thomas Copeland; 12.21.20 at 9:07 PM.
Firman F1000
The answer imo Stan, are inlet restrictirs that knock 3 to 5 secons a lap off the unrestricted lap time !this is technically easy and the last FB ad hoc committee had just about got there but decided not to slow the cars down. We had nearly completed the test plan to get this done when the ad hoc committee decided not to slow the class down an the result is what we now have, a dying class. May i suggest reforming an ad hoc committee to help make this happei?
IMO Saving Fb will not happen by trying to fit these cars into FA. I would be happy to collaborate with a committee from a technical perspective, i am certain that the proper level of performance can be achieved and save this potentially great class. If you think that restricted race car engines are no fun i suggest that you watch the F500 race from the 2020 Runoffs race at Road America. A great runoffs race. That use the same type of restrictors as proposed by the FB AD HOC ÇOMMTTEE! They are very low cost and they work!
My emai is jaynovak@comcast.net. you might guess that i want FB to survive!
Thanks ... Jay Novak
313-445-4047
On my 54th year as an SCCA member
with a special thanks to every SCCA worker (NONE OF US WOULD RACE WITHOUT THE WORKERS)
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