Rules By Comittee a $2014 Thread

stan_d wrote: Every challenge car I have built has ended up being a DD. I build just for the challenge but I also enjoy the car. I don't pearsonally have the funds to attend many other events. This low buck build fits right in my pocket. I enjoy the radical builds and get many ideas. Hence the Toyota Buick combo. I was able to get my brother involved and that is what we came up with. My current build has made a slight turn by " I didn't know you we're into those cars. My buddy has one under a tarp and will sell it cheap". I am picking it up Friday.

I've built one challenge car, and it turned out to be my DD.

Actually it's the other way around. I bought and modified a DD on an extreme cheapass budget and it happened to stay Challenge legal. Closing in on 4 years of daily driving this piece of crap.

Stan can vouch for it being a DD, he saw it in winter mode at Harbor Freight a couple months ago.

Yes I did. My first challanger ended up being my daughters first car. It survived and is in my barn. Right next to my first car. Both run!! I will give it back when she settles down. Or when my grandson needs a car. He turns 5 this year.

I get the sense that some people are just worried about getting tree'd at the auto-x by some guys in a Jeep Cherokee.

Pat wrote: 1- Stop adding various allowances. The further you drive the price of admission up (because these allowances still hit the wallets of the builders). At this point, it's really the $4k challenge which is ridiculous if you expect to get a high volume of quality cars on an annual basis. The further the price goes up, you'll see fewer cars show up, more repeats and less quality fabrication work. Go back to the original if it's on the car, it counts, including safety equipment 2- Have a real tech inspection. Do this to make sure that dummies that show up with a horribly unsafe cars because they didn't want to spend budget money do not get to compete. One year, I didn't realize my seatbelt was still in the bed of my truck and not on the car and I passed the Challenge tech inspection. (yes, the belt went in before we ran). 4- Take away the misc point additions rule that came up this year. Are we racing or are we turning this into a freak show? I fear this, like the tire rule, will back fire on the event. I can tell you I'm much less apt to put the 100's of hours into building a car out of junk, fabricating parts, making sure that they work/perform and spraying rustoleum all over the place if I think that some oddball unfinished car is going to get free points because it's odd. Judge a car on it's merits, not on it's manufacturer or country of origin. 5- Stop changing the rules. Pick a rule set, preferably a very simple one for your simple readers such as myself and stick with it. Changing the rules, making new exceptions, etc. makes it difficult to plan ahead.

I definitely agree with these points. I do think the safety exceptions (including OEM brakes) is a good idea but the Kumhos are IMHO a bit ridiculous. I mean I get the idea. Also I really don't like the misc point addition even though the Sciricco actually might have a coupe Star Wars themed stickers on it (those were planned before that rule) and the Yugo gets a bump. It feels to Lemony for me.

But honestly I am going to be there pretty much no matter what the rules are and have a blast because the Challenge is one of the best events I have ever been to. I think that is why a lot of people who have been are against major rule changes is because we enjoy it so much every year, it is hard to think of ways to improve it.

I also do not like the Misc. point addition rule.

danvan wrote: most of the cars you have shown have wheels and tires worth over half the budget old beat up miatas sell for 3 to 5 grand up here never said my car was faster than anyone elses was just trying to show i have been around racing love to build a car and run this race but i am prety good fabricator on race cars but not on budgets if i did bring the vett down i would have to fabricat it down by about 20.000 [dont know where you ger your tire prices but up here i just recieved my tires for the vett and they prety much blow your budget on there own $1550.00 from tire rack

I've been through it a billion times, but I'll do it once more for E36 M3s & giggles: Granted, we're not talking about a Vette here, but we've run the same Diamond 13 X 9 wheels at every challenge. Picked up locally for $100. "The hell you say!" In 2004, you could pick them up all day on Diamond's website for $50/each NEW. We ran a crusty set of Hoosier throw-aways in 2004 and had fastest raw time in the auto-x.

When we brought the s00p3rturd, we upgraded the fronts to CLOSEOUT Hoosier A3S04's - brand new (old stock) that we purchased directly from Hoosier's website for $90/Each, with the receipt to prove it. We got a bunch of raised eyebrows for showing up with sticker tires up front, and had another team call us out for having "$1000 worth of wheels and tires." HA!!! Strangely, they denied our offer to let them run the same wheels and tires, with the same budget hit the next year.

Anyway, regardless, wheels and tires being half the budget (before the "kumho rule") SHOULD be the plan if you're driving a car with monster-meats. If you show up with brand new tires on big-ass wheels on a light car, you'll damned near destroy 90% of the field in the autocross. Hell, we used those same tires (WHICH WERE STARTING TO SHOW CORD) on a BONE STOCK miata in 2009, and were in the top ten in the autocross.

If you start out with a light, cheap car (a car that you can recoup 100% of the purchase price on is best) slap a turbo, a grand worth of wheels and tires on, and spend 80 gazillion hours doing paint prep, cleaning and painting every_single_berkeleying thing on the car, you WILL be in the top 10. Probably top 5.

Labor is free. The problem is, and it's been said in these threads over and over, the first 80% requires only 20% of the effort. The last 20% requires 80% of the effort. And most folks aren't willing to give that last 80%.

I can't speak for anyone but my team (essentially Me & Wayne, not to diss any of the others who helped; Dave Hardy, Tom Shuman, Kevin Boswell, & George Garcia and all of Hong South, but we have always put in the most hours,) but anyway, all of our efforts have been in either my driveway or Wayne's. We're not mechanics. We're not engineers or fabricators, and we're sure as E36 M3 not wealthy. We have families and 60+ hour a week jobs.

If we can do it, anybody can. It just takes a ton of effort and commitment, not a ton of $$$.

I'm sorry you live in Canada. I can't help you there. I'm assuming people autocross there. If you want a screamin' deal on tires, start shopping your local SCCA forum right before nationals. You can end up with tires with only 20 or 30 runs and PLENTY of meat on them for pennies on the dollar.

They only gotta last 5 runs.

If you want a $1000 C4 vette that you can easily sell $500 worth of E36 M3 off of, c'mon down to Gainesville to spectate, and pick one up on your way back through Atlanta, so you don't have to take the budget hit for travel I'll by the beer and maybe even turn a few wrenches.

...or, like angry said, bring your $xx,xxx cheater car and a stack of fake receipts. Is there a trophy for 15th place?

On the rules. I like them. I can't afford the new tires. How many took advantage ? On the roll cage how many cars are fast enough ? Quit complaining get out there and build something. Bring it

I go for the people and hanging around like minded.

poopshovel wrote: ...or, like angry said, bring your $xx,xxx cheater car and a stack of fake receipts. Is there a trophy for 15th place?

Thank you for saying what we're all thinking.

1984 Chevy corvette... Project car - $1500 (30046)

You know.... come Fall, you could probably buy Bobzilla's Vette for $2013.

Wheels and Tires:
I picked up NEW Aero 15x10 wheels for $30 each from Aero themselves. They ended up being $44 each to my door because I was too lazy to ask the board if someone nearby could pick them up and daisy chain them to me. Combine them with these that I found with 30 seconds of searching and you have a sub $400 wheel/tire package that fits many many cars. Have something bigger? I bought Mustang Cobra wheels right here on this forum with 315 hoosiers rear and 275 hoosiers front for $400. I should have paid less but again I am lazy. Have a GM product or a BMW? Corvette "Wagon Wheel" wheels sell for $150 a set of 4 asking price all day on craigslist. Get on road race/Autox forum and find takeoff tires and you are again set for sub $400. There are far cheaper examples out there, I just used the easy ones.

Cars:

I know you have something similar to craigslist up there. If not-don't people scrap cars for steel? Wait outside the biggest scrap yard you have and make offers on anything interesting people bring in. Here they get sub $500 and have to have a title.

Suspension:

Its an autocross! Plenty of kids buying suspensions these days and never using them. Whatever classified/forum you can find is your friend. If that doesn't sound fun: parts store shocks designed for a heavier chassis work fine if you only have to use them 45 seconds at a time. Springs are in every junked car out there. Measure overall spring diameter and wire diameter and cut to suit. Off the shelf option is a circle track catalog. But half the rate and twice as long and cut it in half.

Apperence:

Clean it and Paint it! It is that simple. Find some cheap paint and either roll/brush/spray it on and put some elbow grease into making it look good.

Tell us where you are and what general type of car you would like to build and we will find you sources.

nocones wrote: Just to be clear I by no means think that a SCCA D/Emod car would win or even place particularly well at the challenge.

Well, mine was 7th overall at $2006. I built it to E Mod rules for a reason: so it could continue to be used as a dedicated race car.

I am eventually going to do this. I just sold my latest challenge car (Merkur XR4Ti) and my previous challenge car idea (1995 Golf) is also for sale.

Let me see if I got this correct in the rules as they stand today. I'm using really rough numbers here.

I'm hoping to parlay my parts car RX-8 into a Challenge Build this time. I picked it up with light body damage, two destroyed rims and damaged suspension links for ~$2600.

Total cost so far: ~$2600.

It has a good drivetrain, leather interior, HID headlights, etc. In other words, parts that people will want to buy on the used market. If I sell the interior ($500) the HIDs ($500) I've substantially cut my investment.

Total cost so far: I'm down to $1600.

Now, to make it work.

Since it was a running car in the first place I could take my sketchy, higher mileage engine and drop it in there without rebuilding it or put a "similar" condition engine (40k miles) in without taking a budget hit. This also extends to the suspension- I could put like "used" items in without a budget hit.

I got a set of free stock 18" RX-8 wheels and tires because all of the winning autocross guys down here have moved to 17x9 rims. No budget hit.

All I have left to do is to pick up junkyard headlights (to make it street legal), a junkyard seat and used suspension components ($400)

I then buy out of pocket some sticky Khumos, which don't take a budget hit at all.

It needs new brakes, but those are "safety items" and don't count.

Question: does the cost of registering the car with DMV and getting plates count towards the budget?

If not, the total cost: $2000

No hope of winning really anything, but I could build a "real" $201x car that is also street legal.

Done.

That seems too simple.

Brett_Murphy wrote: I am eventually going to do this. I just sold my latest challenge car (Merkur XR4Ti) and my previous challenge car idea (1995 Golf) is also for sale. Let me see if I got this correct in the rules as they stand today. I'm using really rough numbers here. I'm hoping to parlay my parts car RX-8 into a Challenge Build this time. I picked it up with light body damage, two destroyed rims and damaged suspension links for ~$2600. Total cost so far: ~$2600.

like that chick said to Meat Loaf, "Stop right there!" i'm pretty sure you can't start with a car that cost more than $20xx.

AngryCorvair wrote:

Brett_Murphy wrote: I am eventually going to do this. I just sold my latest challenge car (Merkur XR4Ti) and my previous challenge car idea (1995 Golf) is also for sale. Let me see if I got this correct in the rules as they stand today. I'm using really rough numbers here. I'm hoping to parlay my parts car RX-8 into a Challenge Build this time. I picked it up with light body damage, two destroyed rims and damaged suspension links for ~$2600. Total cost so far: ~$2600.

like that chick said to Meat Loaf, "Stop right there!" i'm pretty sure you can't start with a car that cost more than $20xx.

What he said.

Mndsm and i talked for about a half hour about how we may make an attempt to bring a $0.00 car in a future year, though.

Swank Force One wrote: Mndsm and i talked for about a half hour about how we may make an attempt to bring a $0.00 car in a future year, though.

I almost did the first year that I brought the Rabbit. I think my official budget was $519, although I didn't realize that I forgot the lugbolts for my auto-x wheels at home, so it actually should have been $289, since if it's not on the car, it's not on the budget. It would have been a negative amount car if you were allowed actual recoup $'s, since I profited from parts sold from the Rabbit and the parts car.

I actually like that rule though. I occasionally buy and part out cars, so it would be pretty easy to put together a free or negative budget car if you just parted out a few cars.

Well there's no way to do a negative budget car, if i'm reading the rules correctly. You can never recoup from the car more than the value of the car, and same goes for parts cars or parts "lots."

This is a question so don't flame me because I haven't particiapated and if you don't participate you don't get to have an opinion and STFU is my only option (see what the responses on here get?)

But what stops someone from buying an old stocker throwing an engine and tranny in it and going for it?

The older ones are only sans lights and DOT tires away from being street legal, and are production based in chassis and body.

Flight Service wrote: This is a question so don't flame me because I haven't particiapated and if you don't participate you don't get to have an opinion and STFU is my only option (see what the responses on here get?) But what stops someone from buying an old stocker throwing an engine and tranny in it and going for it? The older ones are only sans lights and DOT tires away from being street legal, and are production based in chassis and body.

That's what i don't understand. You'd need a body of some sort on it, but current rules would deem that car illegal for "normal" competition.

But i really fail to see the difference between that and some of the other vehicles that have shown up.

That's the reality of the current rules.

In practice however, you'd probably show up, everyone would crowd around it and tell you how awesome you are, and drinks would be on the house Thursday night.

Flight Service wrote: This is a question so don't flame me because I haven't particiapated and if you don't participate you don't get to have an opinion and STFU is my only option (see what the responses on here get?) But what stops someone from buying an old stocker throwing an engine and tranny in it and going for it? The older ones are only sans lights and DOT tires away from being street legal, and are production based in chassis and body.

Nothing. It would, however, be a full on tube frame race car. Under the current rules, that puts it in the "specials" class. It could compete, it could win the "fastest specials" trophy, but the times would not count against the production based cars

http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/events/2013challenge/rules/

A Special class for locosts/race cars/kit cars/etc. will be run for exhibition only. It will be scored independently from the rest of the competitors. The Special-class competitors will only be eligible for the Special-class trophies, unless one of them explodes spectacularly. Then we may reconsider.

In reply to Flight Service:

The HTFU (h for harden) and quit being a Bob Costas quote was aimed at people claiming that everyone is cheating and fabrication is out of the spirit of the event, not for people just making suggestions.

RE your question: I havent read this years rules but the prior stock car DQ would have been the exclusion of tube frame cars.

In reply to MrJoshua:

I have seen evidence to the contrary. I remember the Sucker Vetter Thread from way way back. It really does breed a bad distaste in any passer bys or on the fence competitors. Just bad policy in general for it to be allowed to be stated.
H or S is splitting hairs when it comes to the bad attitude toward others.

In reply to JoeyM and Swank:
No think Older, when it was a cage welded to a real live VIN floor pan with doors that are welded shut and a tubes inside. In my interpretation of the rules that is a real car with a cage and reinforcement. Not a tube frame car.

It doesn't fall in the spirit of the event, which like many, I think has drifted, but it would be tough for the judges to prove it illegal without someone being able to raise a huge stink.

Only production-based passenger cars are allowed in the regular competition. All locosts, race cars, kit cars, Zambonis and the like are allowed only in the Special class (See Rule No. 28).

here is the rule in question, it is a production based car, VIN and all, but it was used as a race car, but we are building race cars. Does this automatically eliminate prior Challenge/Crap-cans/Lemons/Track day cars because they are built for competition?

Now do you see where I conflicted?

Flight Service wrote: In reply to JoeyM and Swank: No think Older, when it was a cage welded to a real live VIN floor pan with doors that are welded shut and a tubes inside. In my interpretation of the rules that is a real car with a cage and reinforcement. Not a tube frame car. It doesn't fall in the spirit of the event, which like many, I think has drifted, but it would be tough for the judges to prove it illegal without someone being able to raise a huge stink.

Got it.....back in the homologation days. Yes, I see you issue. I'd call that a production based vehicle.

Flight Service wrote: Only production-based passenger cars are allowed in the regular competition. All locosts, race cars, kit cars, Zambonis and the like are allowed only in the Special class (See Rule No. 28). here is the rule in question, it is a production based car, VIN and all, but it was used as a race car, but we are building race cars. Does this automatically eliminate prior Challenge/Crap-cans/Lemons/Track day cars because they are built for competition? Now do you see where I conflicted?

No this is completely OK, it fits as it was a production based vehicle when manufactured