nasaforums.com

Daja Vu. If you guys go into building a race car with the "rule of thumb" mindset that "if it isn't explicitly stated in the rules to NOT do, then do it if it'll make you faster," YOU run the risk of it getting called out on and explicitly denied in the rule set. And then they cry when it does....I'm glad most of the guys that regular on here have common sense after reading that.

If it's mostly Vette's and the mods are all the same, maybe National can allow them to cover/weld everything back up and get it reapproved by Greg.

_________________
M'a't't
#463 TT3/TT2/ST2/ST3/WTH/BBQ Evo IX

I came to Nasa ST1 in 2010 with an ex SCCA World Challenge GT C5 Corvette. 2in splitter, wing below roof line & in front of body, 450rwhp 6.5lbs/hp. The side exhaust was mandated for safety "must have exhaust exit before fuel tanks". I didn't complain about them that is how they are clearly spelled out. I couldn't afford to compete at that level. There are a lot of corvettes built this way. If the tube chassis cars do show up the new interpretations & additions to the rules would leave world challenge cars without a class they could be competitive in. I raced with less aero & 70 hp low of class limits my first year. I thought my car was legal & so did my tech center after reading the ST1 rules. I just spent whats left of my life savings to build a Nasa ST1 competittive engine. The combination of changing tire contingency & moving to a class with less or no cars will severly hurt the budget & be less fun.
I have raced Midwest council,IMCA,NCCC,SVRA,SCCA,SCCA Pro I have never had an issue with the rules like this. I understand a line must be drawn somehere. I don't see how we went from Unlimited aero & must retain oem frame rails to the current stock unmodified rocker, unmodified inner fender. It definatley looked to me like the original interpretation of ST rules was to keep tube chassis race cars out of a production car class. Allowing the movement of the contol arms on the frame would leave 1 to believe a hole for brake cooling should be allowed. If Nasa wanted St to be stock unmodified frame & body the previous rules did a poor job of explaining it. Severly frustrated John Boos

THE BIG PROBLEM IS POSTING NEW RULES 30 DAYS BEFORE THE SEASON STARTS. It is inconsiderate and unfair to change rules this close to the beginning of the season. Every NASA customer/ member should be made aware of proposed CHANGES to the rules before adopted and the rule should not be enforceable in the current season.

Greg, please address why this is being sprung on us at this late date.

Case in point: I just completed installation of air jacks on my car which required notching the bottom of my rocker panel to allow the jack to pass. I also had to cut a hole in my inner fender (approx 2 1/2" dia) to pass the remote reservoir of my shock through. To replace these items will cost thousands of dollars. Whatever the answer is there is no acceptable reason for implementing this immediately. It is not enforcing an existing rule, it is creating new rules without properly informing the members.

I do not mean for this post to be disrespectful in any way, I am just having difficulty understanding how a new rule is implemented without giving adequate time for affected parties to make the appropriate modifications to adhere to the rules.

_________________
P McIntosh II
McBen Motorsports

NE Spec Z Dir
NE Driver/ST2 Champ-10,11,12
NE SpecZ Champ-12
RoY-10

Some regions have already started their 2012 season.

I would think you should be able to get a waiver for your air jacks under 1B of the new rule. I seriously doubt anyone would consider that a performance advantage.

1.
b) Frame rails may have maximum diameter 1.25 (1-1/4) inch holes drilled solely for
the purpose of the placement of jacking lugs/plates.

_________________
#27 '99 FRC
TT3/TT2/ST3/ST2

And here I thought I was being polite. And, I stand by my statement that if you or anyone else thinks that the volunteers that run the NASA competition classes are there to be cannon fodder for personal insults and attacks, then NASA would rather have you go somewhere else and attack their Admin's instead. Alex, I got three e-mails from you this month, and all have been answered as far as I know. I have three e-mails sent to you, all after yours, and mine was the last sent. If there was something that was missed, please re-send. And, before these rules came out, I sent you this on Feb 16th: "Moving the firewall has some pretty huge potential for changing the performance of a vehicle. It is still legal, but I know there have been grumblings about it higher up than me. I am just saying that if you do move it, that you should avoid encroaching into the floor or tunnel." The rules never allowed encroachment of either the floor or tunnel, which is why in the past we had to write a rule allowing the trans tunnel to be modified for placement of a racing seat when necessary. I explained above in this thread the 10" relocation wording of firewall movements, which should satisfactorily answer your wisecrack on the Corvette Forums. But after re-reading one of your posts on the Corvette Forums (about your BMW), I was a bit incredulous, because your statements highlight the reason that we were forced into making this rules revision to clarify things better.

Well, it's a 1991 model that ran 195/14 tires all around - inner wells are modified to run a 10 inch wide tire. My front and rear subframes are slightly modified - nothing crazy, but they are 20 year old technology - this might be something Greg would make an exception on, although after these rule changes I'm guessing he's trying to draw a line in the sand.

I just bought an LS motor to swap in and was going to have it moved about 4 inches back - otherwise 80% of it sits forward of the front subframe. We actually figured out a way to do it without touching the floor pan - just firewall and transmission tunnel - clearly that's out the window as well.

You are on there acting like these new rules are the problem, but your statement above shows that your car was never going to be legal for ST (or PT). We have had discussions on these forums in at least two threads that I can think of in the past regarding tubbing of fender wells, and perhaps you missed them, but it has never been considered legal in ST (or PT). I'm guessing that in order to modify that rear inner fender well that you may have encroached on the floor pan sitting on the opposite side of the inner well metal? Then, you state that you have modified subframes. And, lastly, I didn't need these revisions to tell you two weeks ago that you cannot encroach the trans. tunnel and floor pan.

Now, is this the same car that you have been running in PT? You have modified subframes that are stated as not permitted in the PT Rules. You have tubbed fender wells that are not permitted in PT, and clearly fall under the rule there that unless an item is specified in the rules, it is not legal. Great.

_________________
Greg Greenbaum
National TT, PT, & ST Director
Nat. Medical Director
greg@nasa-tt.com

John, sorry that these changes have effected your car. Can you please send me a copy of the WCGT rule page that mandated your exhaust modifications? I looked at the more recent rules a while ago and could not find it. Also, I'm assuming that your exhaust either goes through the frame rail, or floor pan or both to get to the rocker panel, is that correct? There was some talk about a grandfather clause at one point, but it was shot down because the drivers who didn't get to do the same thing would just complain. But, if you can get me the actual documentation, I think that we might be able to open the subject again.

As far as the inner fender well addition, it was essentially there already for most cars by the combination of the requirement to retain the OEM strut tower and floor pan. As well, while not everyone comes on the forums, we have discussed this issue, and it was clearly stated that it was not permitted to tub the fender wells to make more room inboard for larger wheels and tires. The unmodified rocker was another item added by the NASA Executives, along with the roof line Mod Factor. I agree that some of these things were never my intention when I developed the ST Series, came up with the formula, and wrote the Rules. However, we didn't have the STR series then either. I think that the NASA Exec's cannot believe how many of the ST cars were purposely built (unlike yours) ignoring the basic rules, and now they are drawing a line that they believe will be better for the series over the long run. Yes, I've heard that we need it to survive the short run first, but it was not my decision. However, I can see their side as well.

_________________
Greg Greenbaum
National TT, PT, & ST Director
Nat. Medical Director
greg@nasa-tt.com

Pete, the extent of non-compliance with the "simple" rules was not known until we started getting questions about these mods over the past 2 months (after the 2012 rules came out), and then started questioning drivers. Whether you call it a misunderstanding, a mistake, poorly worded rules, it doesn't really matter. This revision was basically forced by some competitors. We had no intention of rewriting rules two months after the release of the 2012 Rules. It was either a matter of writing this revision, or just DQ'ing many cars after they showed up and raced. At least this is now bringing to light those that have issues, instead of finding them at the National Championships.

As far as your specific modifications are concerned, I suggest that you send me an e-mail with photos before spending any money. I'm guessing that both of those can be handled directly in a satisfactory manner. Neither of them seem to be the performance enhancing modifications that these rules were written for.

_________________
Greg Greenbaum
National TT, PT, & ST Director
Nat. Medical Director
greg@nasa-tt.com

Now see Greg, you are posting a response without having all the facts. I only got 2 emails from you. Second email was after 2 attempts to contact you and never addressed the questions in the email.

1. My inner wells are not tubbed. It's not the width of the tire, it's the overall diameter that forced any modification to the front edge of my front wells. They were then sealed back up, so no venting takes place. I imagine that is substantially different from the intent of the new rule as you have explained in this thread, i.e. moving the wells inward.

2. My subframe itself is completely stock. The only thing that was modified was the mounting ends, to make sure it mounts in the STOCK position. I'm not sure whether this violates the letter or intent of the rules, I was simply being upfront about it since they are modified.

3. Firewall - I'm sorry, but that wording is a joke. Just remove the 10 inch wording altogether. And I stand by my wise crack, since I'm not sure what car can have an engine moved 10 inches without modifying floor pan, firewall, or transmission tunnel.

Frankly, I wish instead of taking all this time to post a page long response you would've taken a few more minutes to reach out to me and help correctly build my car. People like me are your best customers - I'm in my 4th year of racing with NASA, trying to build a car to run in one of your classes after racing in another class. Instead you get mad because of my or anybody else's posts and tell us to go spend our money elsewhere.

_________________
Alex
SouthEast & Mid Atlantic GTS4 #312

I still love you Greg...


All kidding aside the series directors in each series have an impossible job controlling tons of us and making everyone happy. I see the point in the rule changes in what they are trying to accomplish and Greg certainly didn't sound door slammed on a few of the gray area mods that aren't performance enhancing.

The best thing about NASA is can't you still run a few other classes even if rule changes bump you out of current class. Good luck on that in SCCA.

I have no dog in this fight as don't race vette's anymore so just some advice of deal issues off-line w Greg and others and be open minded and not attacking and you will usual be happy with the outcome..

_________________
2012 Boss 302s.#37
"Move out of the way racing smurf is coming thru.."

Our 3rd points event is going on right now as I type this!

_________________
#624 TTE/PTE Integra
As seen in Super Street FF Battle 4! (November 2012 issue)