Toyman01 wrote: After reading 6 pages of this, I'm glad I run E-Modified.I have nothing useful to add other than stock should mean just that. Calling it street sounds like another SM or SSM or whatever they are calling it these days.
Yeah. I always thought it was just plain stupid to see a $2500 Civic show up with $6000 worth of Motons and $1500 worth of tires to run 'stock' class.
It's easier and cheaper to run Modified. WHOLE lot fewer rules and less confusion.
Curmudgeon wrote:Toyman01 wrote: After reading 6 pages of this, I'm glad I run E-Modified.Yeah. I always thought it was just plain stupid to see a $2500 Civic show up with $6000 worth of Motons and $1500 worth of tires to run 'stock' class. It's easier and cheaper to run Modified. WHOLE lot fewer rules and less confusion.
I dunno about "cheaper" ASSuming you're wanting to be nationally competitive. 
Dood, I ga-ron-tee you that running at a National level in Stock is every bit as pricey as in Modified, probably more so. Stock's just a lot slower. 
In reply to codrus:
There's already an "OEM equivalent" rule for the SCCA. Keep using it.
In reply to freestyle:
The website says we limit Non-Porsches, one look at our entry list shows we don't stick to that. The first car hit the track at 9AM, the last run was done at 1 PM, everybody got 8 runs. When did you guys finish? You don't have to tell me about autocrossing in Oregon SCCA (see the season championship trophy on the desk...)
Curmudgeon wrote: Dood, I ga-ron-tee you that running at a National level in Stock is every bit as pricey as in Modified, probably more so. Stock's just a lot slower.
Is Modified cheaper to run than Street Modified?
In reply to Swank Force One:
I would say maybe.
The thing I like about modified is if I want to do something to the car I don't have to spend hours in a rule book to find out if I can. I hate reading rule books.
I'm only 250hp and 6" of tire away from having a Nationally competitive car. In modified I don't have to spend cubic dollars to squeeze that out of a specific engine, I just have to choose what I want to use and boost the hell out of it. Then cut the fenders and stuff as much tire as will physically fit. 
Not that it will ever happen. The Nationals don't interest me.
The only thing I have ever run in "Stock" class is the Super Coupe and that's because it is stock
Back to your regularly scheduled SCCA bash fest.
Since it's so easy to build a nationally competitive E-Mod^ car, I'm sure that's why a single driver in a single car has been the reigning national champion in the class for the last 6 years. It's probably just because nobody else has been trying very hard to beat him. And with those cheap shocks^^ and long lasting tires^^^ I've heard he uses, I'm sure it's was a much more affordable car to build and is much lower cost to run than any of the stock class championship winning cars too...LOL!
.
^Lets be specific here, since the references so far are obviously not in relation to any other Mod class.
^^KYB AGX
^^^Fuzion ZRi
fast_eddie_72 wrote: I only have one hang up on the camber plates. I'm not sure I can put them on the MR2 with stock springs. I haven't found an option yet, anyway. I'll probably figure out how to do it, but I have access to a metal lathe. But, then again, I don't think the '91 MR2 is the car they were catering to with the new rules.
you are correct ... truly the SCCA would love it if all us driving old cars would just go away ... well not us go away, but our cars for sure
Toyman01 wrote: After reading 6 pages of this, I'm glad I run E-Modified.
basically it'll become ST (Light)
In reply to wbjones:
I have heard of some regions running vintage classes.
In reply to Driven5:
Yes, he has been reigning national champ for 6 years, with the same car. Can any of the stock guys say the same? Or are they having to buy the latest and greatest, including the car, every year or two? I honestly don't know because I don't follow the Nationals. All I hear from the local guys is what they need to buy to be competitive. Shocks, brakes, wheels, tires, blueprint the engine, new car, the list never seems to end and changes year to year depending on what's on top.
There are three E-Mod cars in my region and a D-Mod. We are all within a couple of seconds of each other. Last event 1st and 2nd were .007 seconds apart. That's fun racing, in a car that Curmudgeon built for the 2006 Challenge. I've got less in my entire car than a lot of the "stock" guys have in their shocks. Hell, I've got less in my rig, truck and trailer included, than they have in their cars. So for me, it's cheaper. I don't worry about the National scene because I will never be an National caliber driver, I don't take it serious enough.
That's why I said, Maybe.
The other thing that drives me batty about stock is this.
At the whims of the board, you can go from competitive to bottom of the stack with the stroke of a pen. All it takes is a re-classing. Guess what, if you want to stay competitive, it's new car time. This new shake up will definitely mix things up a bit. I think it's probably headed in the right direction, but I feel sorry for the guys that just spent money on improvements that are going away. Now they get to start over trying to figure out what tires work with which shocks and bars this year, and then do it again next year as the tire rule changes again. That's going to suck.
E-Mod seems to be fairly stable. I can spend 10 years slowly improving my car and getting more competitive and it will still be legal for E-Mod.
I will also say the Solo Board has a unbelievably tough job. I wouldn't have it for all the tea in China. They have to try to make everyone happy, knowing that they will fail. They have to try to make every car competitive, knowing that they will fail. They have no choice but to try, knowing that they will fail. Big shout out to the guys that volunteer to step into the line of fire. Keep fighting the good fight.
True. There was a glut of MCSs and related Stock parts for sale when the car was moved from GS to DS. Granted, it proved to still be competitive there, but a bunch didn't make the change.
One thing about the change is it's proposed to go into affect next year. So many guys running r-comps have a full season to burn through tires - not hard with most cars. The interestig bit may be Nationals. A lot of guys buy new tires for that, assuming they'll get some use out of them during the following season.
When I first started autocross there was a long discussion/rant on the local MINI forum about R-comps and whatnot. A long time SCCA member attempted to explain the why's and history... but also ended his history lesson basically stating, "all of this is also why I run in F-Mod..." (although autox is secondary to his road racing)
What Toyman said.
In any form of racing, the higher you go the more expensive it gets. Having said that I see a big difference in being able to 'modify' my car (Modified, get it? ) without a very constrictive set of rules. I'd rather make or modify a part than have to drop 30 large (or better) on the current car du jour which I would then have to set up all over again: tires, brakes, alignment, etc etc etc. Two years later, rinse and repeat.
Anothe point which may or may not be of concern to others: with a Modified class car, I can build a cage to allow running hillclimbs etc. IIRC Stock class allows adding a roll BAR but not a roll CAGE, thus there's not much way I could run Solo 1, Solo 2 and hillclimb with the same car. Solo 1 and 2, HPDE's, yeah. But not hillclimb.
About Kiesel's E Mod Bugeye: at one point it was 20B powered. He backed down to a 13B turbo and the car was faster. It's not necessarily all about horsepower.
Nope. Believe it or not, cages are allowed in Stock per section 3.3.2. and constructed to GCR specs. This is part of the gray area where GCR cars are classed in autox. In the case of Stock, respective Showroom Stock cars are allowed, but must be prepped to those rules exclusively. I'm not sure how the change to Touring classes affects this, but I would imagine not much.
I suspect the other reason why cages are allowed in Stock is liability. In the unlikely event of some kind of car-to-car contact or rollover, the SCCA isn't going to want to have answer a plaintiff's question in court about why the rules disallowed the use of standard racing safety equipment. :)
As for cost of prepared/modified classes, the initial buy-in is likely lower than for a brand-new Stock class car, but preparing it to the limit of the Prepared or Modified rules is definitely expensive. DP Miatas use $20K motors, and the only reason they last more than a year is that you're only running them for 10 minutes a weekend. You've got the same uber shocks as Stock does, but the rules allow you to move the suspension pickup points, and taking proper advantage of that means finding someone with a very specialized set of knowledge and experience. Tuning the motor becomes more expensive because the car's not street legal, so you're renting dyno time for all of it. Then there's the tow rig costs, the cost of the extra fuel for driving a truck instead of a car, etc.
The important part of the Solo cage rules (and I should have clarified this):
Roll bars may be added. Roll bars may be welded in. Standard roll-over hoops and covers may be removed if the resulting installation meets Appendix C.A, Basic Design Considerations. The total weight of components added must not be less than that of components removed.
Roll cages may be added. It is strongly recommended that roll cages be constructed according to the Club Racing GCR, though they must be bolted (not welded) into the automobile and be contained within the driver/passenger compartment. A roll cage has more than four attachment points to the body or frame or has bracing both fore and aft of the main hoop.
The thing is (and I ran into this a couple of times in my searching for information): it's up to the scrutineer to ultimately determine the safety of the car and some regions are not allowing the use of bolt in stuff.
wbjones wrote:fast_eddie_72 wrote: I only have one hang up on the camber plates. I'm not sure I can put them on the MR2 with stock springs. I haven't found an option yet, anyway. I'll probably figure out how to do it, but I have access to a metal lathe. But, then again, I don't think the '91 MR2 is the car they were catering to with the new rules.you are correct ... truly the SCCA would love it if all us driving old cars would just go away ... well not us go away, but our cars for sure
Part of why I chose my '84 Celica. I thought they'd be glad to see me take on the '68 BMW in FSP with a more modern car.
Yeah, they really seem fixated on getting the "outdated" cars out of the game. I think I understand why. Even when I was starting out a few years ago, a '93 MR2 hard top was the Unicorn to have for E Stock. I never got serious enough about E Stock to care a lot, but I'll be damned if I didn't spend a fair bit of time looking for one. So I like the idea of making easy to find cars work. But I flippin' HATE the idea of someone building a car, then a couple of years later being shuffled into oblivion.
fast_eddie_72 wrote: Yeah, they really seem fixated on getting the "outdated" cars out of the game. I *think* I understand why. Even when I was starting out a few years ago, a '93 MR2 hard top was the Unicorn to have for E Stock.
Yeah, having a class overdog that's difficult to find makes for poor attendance in a class. Older cars are harder to find, and especially harder to find in unmolested condition such that they're reasonably easy to prepare to "stock" levels.
In reply to codrus:
Yeah. I get that. I do sometimes wonder how much of the legend of the unicorn cars is real and how much is perceived. I know some of them make a big difference. But I really have to wonder if a '91, '92 or '94 MR2 hardtop is really enough different from a '93 to make a difference, even measuring to a thousandth of a second. The only difference in a '94 is a passenger side air bag. That and cooler looking tail lights. If I was going to buy another, I think I'd get a '94. The extra weight of the air bag is in a relatively "good" place, if there's a good place for weight. Unfortunately, the unicorn Miata made the MR2s obsolete in E Stock. Somehow I feel like losing grip is going to make the gap even worse.
Not a huge deal for me. The MR2 has become the "autocross trainer" for my wife and the kids. I'm am going to have to think about where to go with it though. Last night I was thinking it would be fun to make it an STS car, then I remembered how much I need another project.
I don't think the SCCA is trying to weed out older cars as much as it is trying to attract younger members. This might seem counter intuitive, but the majority of 30 and under new drivers I see at events have cars no more than five-years old. Most have post-high school education and good paying jobs. The SCCA has been graying for more than two decades. The club is trying to attract new blood. The first attempt was Street Touring.
At first it went well as a variety of street-driven "tuner" cars would show up to events on high-performance true street tires. The fields were very eclectic. If I am mistaken, an Oldsmobile won the first "STS" championship. However, it wasn't long before it became apparent the the late 80s/early 90s Civic (especially the 89 SI) was the over dog car to have. Suddenly it wasn't young guys with street-driven sport compacts filling the ST fields, but drivers in their 30s and 40s with trailered cars with blueprinted and engines and $2,000+ suspensions packing the grid. In spite of its best intentions, the SCCA did not achieve its goal of attracting younger competitors.
In my region (NEPA) is is not uncommon for the top STC Civics to run similar times as most of the CSP, DSP and FSP fields.
The bottom line is that, unless you leave cars none stock, cubic dollars will always have an advantage. Please no one say "claiming rule."
Curmudgeon wrote: What Toyman said. In any form of racing, the higher you go the more expensive it gets.
Rallycross, man. At the 2012 national championship, Modified AWD was won with the same car that won Prepared AWD. Modified RWD was won with a car that probably cost a tenth to build of what the Stock FWD winner did. I forgot who won Mod FWD but it was probably some old Civic or Golf or something, nothing expensive and fancy, just better driving.
Toyman01 wrote: In reply to Driven5: Yes, he has been reigning national champ for 6 years, with the same car. Can any of the stock guys say the same?
Same driver? No, I doubt it. However, there are a few classes that the same car or couple of cars have been competitive.
SS: C5 Z06, Lotus, and Porsche GT3. Any of them are still competitive and will still be in the trophies, and I'd be somewhat surprised if the top spot isn't taken by one of the 3.
DS: The Integra Type R, while no longer the reigning king, had been at the top for how many years in a row?
ES: R-Package Miata. I think that the current National Champion has 3 in a row, although they might have changed from a 94 to a 97 somewhere in there.
Moparman wrote: The bottom line is that, unless you leave cars none stock, cubic dollars will always have an advantage. Please no one say "claiming rule."
I am going to have to disagree here. The more restrictions, the costs multiply exponentially. How do I know? Ask me why I spent $1800 on a set of unported "stock" Ford 302 E7 casting cylinder heads. Could have I got a decent valve job from the local place? Sure, but when you are restricted, you have to make everything be .0001" perfect, not just whatever JoeSchoe machinist thinks I need. I could have easily went FASTER on the same money in the same part, but rules are restricted down so I can't run them. Even if you say, "as OEM produced", there will someone, like me, that will find way to skirt the rules and still be 100% rule legal.
Claiming rule here won't solve anything. As you will get a buddy to claim it or limp-wristed spineless group that won't enforce the claim rule.
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