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ST4 Rules Proposal Thread--give your input here


Greg G.

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Where are you getting 6 classes? My count is 4.
Did you not see this thread? ST 5/6 (PT 5/6) Rules Proposal Thread--give your input here

 

As I understand that class is looking to restructure current PT classes using a power to weight ruleset, but still have heavy restrictions. That is why it will likely be called "PT" then a number, not ST. It will be a different philosophy in that class.

 

So, ST has 4 classes .

What I think the end goal is would be to deprecate PT, and move to ST 1-6, the higher number ST classes would have very different rule sets from ST 1-2 for example, which is where David gets the 6 classes. Let's not split hairs shall we....

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What I think the end goal is would be to deprecate PT, and move to ST 1-6, the higher number ST classes would have very different rule sets from ST 1-2 for example, which is where David gets the 6 classes. Let's not split hairs shall we....

 

Not trying to split hairs. Just pointing out that its not like we are looking to add 6 new classes of ST. There are 3 existing classes of ST, all with good and justifiable cost and speed splits. Then 3 new proposed classes, one more in the ST mindset, and 2 in the PT mind set.

 

I would actually propose that ST4 be called PT1 since hopefully it will have certain cost control rules that don't exist in ST1-3. I think ST1-3 and PT1-3 is a nice clean break up, and distinguishes the philosophies of the two classes.

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ST4 will be way closer to ST3, and the 5/6 classes will be way closer to PT.

 

Since there will be no base model Modification Factor table for ST4, it is an ST class, and really, I doubt there will ultimately be much difference from ST3. The other two classes would be significantly different, which would be why they will likely retain the PT name. (Now for TT, it will be TT1-6).

 

And, for the above question, ultimately, these changes would mean we go from 8 total ST/PT classes down to 6--a consolidation of classing, not a dilution of car fields.

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I've been toying with the idea of selling my M3 and getting a Spec Miata or Spec E30, but TT4/ST4 would allow me to keep the car around. I'll definitely race in this class in 2017 if you don't ban fender flares - I can go back down to a narrower wheel/tire but I can't un-cut my rear quarter panels

 

edited after reading all 8 pages of context:

 

I think a little more specificity will go a long way in keeping people from building monster TT4 cars - differentiating between 3-way adjustable external res shocks & single-adjustable off-the-shelf shocks would be an example.. Allowing people to spend $5000+ on shocks without being penalized, then insisting on hitting them with penalities for putting a set of $400 fender flares on the car is completely asinine.

 

Also, I'm definitely in favor of a more detailed breakdown in tire widths and compounds.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Allowing people to spend $5000+ on shocks without being penalized, then insisting on hitting them with penalities for putting a set of $400 fender flares on the car is completely asinine.

 

 

 

This is exactly down the path that I see this thing going.

 

If cost control is your focus, then you have to specify where you can spend money and how.

 

The number one cost is tires, yer nobody wants to entertain the idea of X amount of sets per weekend.

 

When I raced shifters with SKUSA, the first thing they did was mark tires at the start of the weekend.

 

Thats a great way to control costs.

 

The other thing that I see as a huge question mark is the average HP calculation.

500rpm data points are too narrow.

You are doing nothing to seperate the big V8's from the 4 cylinders.

That calculation should be every 1000rm, not500.

 

This would give the 4 bangers at least some advantage afainst the V8s.

 

A Vette at BW13 shifts 10 times over a lap.

An S2000 shifts 21-23.

Thats close to 3.5 sconds MORE not transmitting power per lap.

 

There are so many huge variables left unattnded and a big deal made about mods that account to .001 seconds per lap.

 

It just doesnt make sense.

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I'm not sure where the concept of limiting sets of tires as being a benefit comes from. In GTS with no limit most guys aren't using more than 2 sets in a weekend. Usually the older tires for practice/qualy and then a low HC set for races. So unless you plan to limit people to 1 set I don't see the benefit. If someone in GTS2 wants to pull out a fresh set every session I'll find it amusing but I certainly wouldn't feel threatened by it. I spent most of the season on 5+ HC tires and had no issue remaining competitive. I think I used 2 new sets of tires the entire season last year and I'm in MA which is a pretty competitive region.

 

I can assure you that going to a 1000rpm range instead of 500rpm is not to the benefit of smaller motors. It just makes the calculation easier to manipulate. If you use 3 or 4 data points with a 1000rpm gap it's extremely easy to game the system. Let's say you look at data for 6k, 7k, and 8k. Someone can run a custom transmission to keep useable range from 6100-7900rpm. Then they can completely dump power at 6k and 8k. Even with using 500rpm some of the ST guys are coming up with some "clever" solutions so no need to give them more room to play with.

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So let me get this straight. If I want to get into NASA as a new comer and spend little money with my super charged Miata per this rule I will be making 182whp with a weight of 2185lbs, but I will have to go against Corvettes making 300whp with a weight of 3360lbs?

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So let me get this straight. If I want to get into NASA as a new comer and spend little money with my super charged Miata per this rule I will be making 182whp with a weight of 2185lbs, but I will have to go against Corvettes making 300whp with a weight of 3360lbs?

If you mean the same Corvettes that are currently participating in PTC, then the answer is likely yes.

 

BTW, did you look at the track records from the last Western States TT Championships, where there is a PTD Miata that beat the PTC Corvette by 2 seconds, with less HP than you would have above?

 

At the same Wt/HP Ratio (using Avg HP), the car that can handle better and brake better has the advantage if the aero profiles are similar. It is fine to come and compete without spending much money, many of us do it on a regional basis monthly, but one cannot expect to have a top performing car on a National basis without spending some money on it--whether competing against Miatas, S2000's, FR-S/BRZ's, 350Z's, Corvettes, M3's, etc.

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People are always so scared of the big bad corvettes.lol If they want to play in ST4 at the proper power to weight and a substantial penalty for 305 tires .... The more the merrier! The penalty just needs to be higher than the ST3 scale which treats 285's the same as a 315. If 245's are the baseline:

+.3 for below 245

- .3 for 255-275

- .6 for 285-295

- 1 for 305+

 

If a Vette beats me with that much less power then I blame myself.lol

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If you mean the same Corvettes that are currently participating in PTC, then the answer is likely yes.

 

BTW, did you look at the track records from the last Western States TT Championships, where there is a PTD Miata that beat the PTC Corvette by 2 seconds, with less HP than you would have above?

 

At the same Wt/HP Ratio (using Avg HP), the car that can handle better and brake better has the advantage if the aero profiles are similar. It is fine to come and compete without spending much money, many of us do it on a regional basis monthly, but one cannot expect to have a top performing car on a National basis without spending some money on it--whether competing against Miatas, S2000's, FR-S/BRZ's, 350Z's, Corvettes, M3's, etc.

 

I didn't see that, if you can provide a link to the information I would be very interested in having a look Pretty cool to know they can still be competitive and that definitely changes my outlook on things. Of course money and racing go hand in hand, but after seeing some figures people were bringing up to run in ST2 and 3 it had me a bit worried.

 

People are always so scared of the big bad corvettes.lol If they want to play in ST4 at the proper power to weight and a substantial penalty for 305 tires .... The more the merrier!

- 1 for 305+

 

If a Vette beats me with that much less power then I blame myself.lol

 

Didn't mean to come off like that, just very aware of what they can do having driven several Z06 in the past. NASA is a new field to me so I'm just trying to get my bearings straight. Currently running a Z at various tracks and have seen 1:35s at WSIR with a power to weight ratio of ~12.5 / 1 on 200TW street tires.

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FWIW, I like the idea of TT4/ST4 quite a bit at 12:1.

 

It's OK as-is, I think, using existing TT3/ST3 rules, but if anything was to be restricted or penalized, I'd keep it simple. What have been the maxims in TT for so long? "Build around your tires" and "Compound>width". You need do nothing more really than to make that equitable. Nothing else you would do could have such an impact as tire compound restrictions or forced adjustments. Making the tire choice not be an automatic with meaningful trade-offs could make things interesting indeed.

 

I should be very excited to participate in such a class.

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  • 1 month later...

IMO the shock adjustment should be anything with 3-way adjustment or more and/or anything with an external reservoir.

 

Limiting tire to x sets per weekend is a non starter. The reality is anyone with cubic dollars and cubic experience and resources behind them can come into any of these series and blow everyone out of the water. Heck even someone on a limited budget with lots of racing setup and/or driving experience and skill will likely beat you. A few obvious adjustment factors works great. Limiting logistical items at any given weekend just adds another layer of necessary enforcement and the whole idea of the move to ST is to make enforcement manageable.

 

As for TT/ST4 I think it should exactly follow TT/ST3 with a different P:W as proposed. Continue to tune the adjustments for the two and they will be even better classes.

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New guy here. I just did comp school and raced ST4 over the weekend and was a lot of fun. I am awaiting ST4 rules and class for the future and here are a few of my thoughts as a bran new guy to racing NASA and my perspective. We all want more car counts and to get that we need to see what new drivers want and need. The entire process to get a license felt overwhelming enough with all the forms, physical, more forms, paying for a license, race fees and having to buy stickers.

 

1- ST- I am attacked to ST for the keep it simple and straight forward approach. Dyno HP, average of 3 and I like that, Weight of the car with someone in and then just a few factors, such as tire width, etc. It is very simple. My car could fit into PTB as is with street tires, but not hoosiers, so the need for ST3-4 is there.

 

2- I would have raced PTB, but there is no one to race, no one, not a single car or anything and there has not been one for a long long time. The reason I went for ST3 was the simplicity, but also a car to race against until ST4 comes out. When looking at the rules and all for PT there seems to be so many little tiny things that add up it makes people not want to race. Hence the need for ST4 as I see it. Now saying that if we make ST4 and put in a bunch of other rules to limit this or that then in reality it is just a renamed PT and what the heck is the point in that. I am not interested in that.

 

3- ST4 should be kept the same as ST1-2-3 as it is now. The formula works so go with it. Right now you fill out the HP to Weight on the excel spreadsheet and you determine your class. Why the heck would we not just keep it simple and keep everything the same and just say ST4 is 12:1. It just makes sense. We would have 5.5, 8, 10 and 12. That seems like a perfect spread to me. Keep the tires rules the same and the rest. It works so do not change it.

 

4- Did I say please keep it simple. To me it should be a 3 minute rules committee conversions that would go like this.

-Person A- Hey all, we do not have really have anyone in PT anymore but those guys that used to race in that class still want to race.

- Person B- Yup, sure looks like that and what I have been hearing for a long time.

- Person A- They have been asking for ST4 and want 12:1 hp to weight and the same other rules they have now.

- Person B- Yup, sure looks like that.

- Person A- They want to race, but are not right now and car counts are down.

- Person B- Yup, they are not racing right now, but would like to be out there in a good battle.

- Person A- I put forth ST4 at 12:1 power to weight ratio and all other ST rules the same.

- Person B- Sounds very logical and reasonable.

- Person A- All approved

- all people- YES

- Person A- Now should we wait until 2017 to add this amendment to the rules and class?

- Person A- UMMMM- People want to race it now, it is super simple to just add 12:1 ratio and all other rules the same. Why in the heck we would make drivers wait more than half a race season to get a class that they are asking and begging for now? Now that just does not make sense as we should do it now.

- Person B- We should do the new class effective immediately. Put forth a vote to get the ST4 class approved now so racers can come back and race.

- all people- All approved.

- The crowd cheers in applause, flowers are thrown onto the stage, reviews come out in the New Yorks times as best meeting in the history of meetings. The world is a more peaceful place, plants are green, air is more airy, clouds or more fluffy, dogs and cats get along. The world is now a better place.

 

Thanks

Troy

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New guy here. I just did comp school and raced ST4 over the weekend and was a lot of fun. I am awaiting ST4 rules and class for the future and here are a few of my thoughts as a bran new guy to racing NASA and my perspective. We all want more car counts and to get that we need to see what new drivers want and need. The entire process to get a license felt overwhelming enough with all the forms, physical, more forms, paying for a license, race fees and having to buy stickers.

 

1- ST- I am attacked to ST for the keep it simple and straight forward approach. Dyno HP, average of 3 and I like that, Weight of the car with someone in and then just a few factors, such as tire width, etc. It is very simple. My car could fit into PTB as is with street tires, but not hoosiers, so the need for ST3-4 is there.

 

2- I would have raced PTB, but there is no one to race, no one, not a single car or anything and there has not been one for a long long time. The reason I went for ST3 was the simplicity, but also a car to race against until ST4 comes out. When looking at the rules and all for PT there seems to be so many little tiny things that add up it makes people not want to race. Hence the need for ST4 as I see it. Now saying that if we make ST4 and put in a bunch of other rules to limit this or that then in reality it is just a renamed PT and what the heck is the point in that. I am not interested in that.

 

3- ST4 should be kept the same as ST1-2-3 as it is now. The formula works so go with it. Right now you fill out the HP to Weight on the excel spreadsheet and you determine your class. Why the heck would we not just keep it simple and keep everything the same and just say ST4 is 12:1. It just makes sense. We would have 5.5, 8, 10 and 12. That seems like a perfect spread to me. Keep the tires rules the same and the rest. It works so do not change it.

 

4- Did I say please keep it simple. To me it should be a 3 minute rules committee conversions that would go like this.

-Person A- Hey all, we do not have really have anyone in PT anymore but those guys that used to race in that class still want to race.

- Person B- Yup, sure looks like that and what I have been hearing for a long time.

- Person A- They have been asking for ST4 and want 12:1 hp to weight and the same other rules they have now.

- Person B- Yup, sure looks like that.

- Person A- They want to race, but are not right now and car counts are down.

- Person B- Yup, they are not racing right now, but would like to be out there in a good battle.

- Person A- I put forth ST4 at 12:1 power to weight ratio and all other ST rules the same.

- Person B- Sounds very logical and reasonable.

- Person A- All approved

- all people- YES

- Person A- Now should we wait until 2017 to add this amendment to the rules and class?

- Person A- UMMMM- People want to race it now, it is super simple to just add 12:1 ratio and all other rules the same. Why in the heck we would make drivers wait more than half a race season to get a class that they are asking and begging for now? Now that just does not make sense as we should do it now.

- Person B- We should do the new class effective immediately. Put forth a vote to get the ST4 class approved now so racers can come back and race.

- all people- All approved.

- The crowd cheers in applause, flowers are thrown onto the stage, reviews come out in the New Yorks times as best meeting in the history of meetings. The world is a more peaceful place, plants are green, air is more airy, clouds or more fluffy, dogs and cats get along. The world is now a better place.

 

Thanks

Troy

 

I think there might be a chance you are over simplifying the situation

 

First, the "its working now do don't change it" mentality needs to be thought through a little more. Lets just leave alone ST1 and 2 for the sake of this conversation, since they have not changed recently, and focus on the average HP experiment in ST3. You can certainly say so far so good, but we haven't even race a full season under the current rules, with growing car counts and builds, it remains to be seen if it is 100% perfect. And my personal opinion is it isn't yet.

 

We have had two examples of cars either running in, or proposed to run in ST3, that are way outside the box compared to the majority of the cars built for the series. Both are tube frame purpose built cars with amazing aero, both downforce and drag, perfect geometry, sequential transmissions, etc. Lap times prove that this type of car isn't affected in the same way by the weight and tire adjustments as a sedan, and they have the potential to destroy the competition, and potentially the class.

 

Do you want this type of car in ST4? The class that is supposed to be cheaper and more approachable than ST3? If you don't, then time needs to be taken to analyze this type of scenario, and write a ruleset that will be successful long term. You don't want to rush a ruleset, have people build cars, then realize you've made a mistake and have to go back and make changes. That will turn way more people off than just having to wait a few months for the class to be official.

 

There is a fine line to be walked for ST4 to make the builds cheaper, still somewhat easy to upgrade to ST3 later, but not make things so complicated that it looses the "simple" feel of the ST rules. I appreciate the time the powers that be are taking to get this right, and I am anxiously awaiting ST4 as a place to build cheaper cars for clients.

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Brian is correct. It is a big mistake to start a new class or series without taking the time to at least try and determine what the future problems may be BEFORE they become reality. It is much easier to fix a problem or change a potential rule (that hasn't been released) than to change one after competitors have built a vehicle based on the published rules. One of the benefits of having competitors (like myself) write the rules, is that we have been through (or may go through) the exact same frustration as other competitors when rules get changed, whether from one year to the next or even mid-season when we see a potential serious issue coming. So, regardless of what some may think, we don't just change rules for the sake of change, and every time we consider changing a rule, we consider how many folks that it will affect versus how many are affected if we don't change the rule. The "right" answer is not always the popular one initially, as sometimes short-term gains need to be sacrificed for the long-term success of a class/series.

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I like the idea of ST4/TT4. I am all for simply extending ST3/TT3 to lower power/weight. (12:1 is what it looks like it would be). I think the class will do fairly decent as well. In GL region we usually have a pretty decent TT3 turn out. Last year at the June Mid Ohio we had 15 cars in TT3. I run in 3 and am pretty under powered, even with the new rules. I would fit in well into 4 with a little bit of detune, but I could run two tunes and/or add/remove weight to run either class easily on a given weekend. I can also see introducing lower power/weight "unlimited" classes, the tire mods might need tweaked a little, but probably not much else.

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  • 4 weeks later...
Should be seeing the first draft of the St4 rules soon yes?

 

That would be great! I could actually day-dream over ST4/TT4 miata build ideas

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  • 2 weeks later...
Should be seeing the first draft of the St4 rules soon yes?

 

That would be great! I could actually day-dream over ST4/TT4 miata build ideas

 

Looking forward to seeing the updated rules as this is what I have been doing. Almost ready to get my new motor in the car and will be building her in 2017. The sooner the rules are out the more I can see where I need to be focusing my budget. Greg has been very good about replying to emails and very helpful during the down time. Headed to Texas to race a Datsun at COTA in a few weeks to get my racing fix while I wait.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Poked around a little and didn't see anything - ETA on rules being released? Trying to firm up off-season plans for the car.

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Same here... have a slightly wrecked car waiting on the rules release to put the real work into, to make sure I don't order "illegal" parts... Hoping to see something soon!

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