1.6 Liter Miata adds 50lbs - why?

[camop]

Hello all:

Had my first ITA race weekend at Sebring (and it was great fun!). I am driving a 1991 1.6L miata that has been an SM up until now. I was wondering why the 1.6 had 50 pounds added to the car for 2007?

Have the 1.6's been winning alot of races? I have been racing in SM where the 1.8's are choked with a restrictor plate, so don't have much experience with the ITA class.

I managed to get close to the 1.8L miatas, but they seem to have just a little more pull out of the corners.

Hope I don't sound like a whiner - I know there are no guarantees, I was just wondering why the weight gain?

Thanks,

Neal Norton

[Greg Amy]

Neal, the Miata was adjusted to 2255 back in the February 2006 Fastrack (and should have been running that weight since then).

It's just being carried forward to the 2007 GCR. - Greg

[lateapex911]

The 1.8s are 2380, IIRC, just for comparisons.

[camop]

Thanks, Greg.

I'm slowly catching up.

Neal

[IPRESS]

The 1.8s are 2380, IIRC, just for comparisons.
[/b]


Yeah and if that dang hotshoe Andy would quit driving the wheels off of his we could get it down by about 50 or 60 to wher it should be. :cavallo:
Come on Andy drive like the rest of us.

[lateapex911]

LOL....that car was widely criticized when the weight was announced as being too light. The process says thats what it should weigh, and I haven;t heard any new info that changes that result.

Remember, Miatas do very well in the hands of certain people at certain tracks, but like any car they can't win on any track at any time. Thats the way it should be, right?

[Andy Bettencourt]

Yeah and if that dang hotshoe Andy would quit driving the wheels off of his we could get it down by about 50 or 60 to wher it should be. :cavallo:
Come on Andy drive like the rest of us. [/b]

HA! One trick (track) pony right now. Driving against the likes of Amy, Benazic, Hunter, Lawton, DiMinno, etc every week, you either go big or you go home! I am predicting a solid 6th at Pocono this year!!! :)

The 1.6 Miata in IT would be even better at LRP than my car...

[tnord]

LOL....that car was widely criticized when the weight was announced as being too light. The process says thats what it should weigh, and I haven;t heard any new info that changes that result.
[/b]

the 1.8 was widely criticized for being too light right? or was it the 1.6 at 2200 was criticized for being classed at a weight it can't get to? my guess is the former, but i just want to clarify.

i was all ready to go :024: crazy when i read the topic, as i thought the 1.6 was now at 23xx lbs.

[Andy Bettencourt]

the 1.8 was widely criticized for being too light right? or was it the 1.6 at 2200 was criticized for being classed at a weight it can't get to? my guess is the former, but i just want to clarify.

i was all ready to go :024: crazy when i read the topic, as i thought the 1.6 was now at 23xx lbs.
[/b]

Jake is referring to the 1.8 at 2380. I was really glad to see Bobby Von-Stretch-in-Stein at the ARRC. All accounts had him driving the wheels off of the car and there is no way it was a contender for the podium. As with most cars, different tracks will suit them...I think the 240SX and the Teg are the best combination of power and handling in ITA...

[IPRESS]

I know, I know Andy explained "The Dreaded Formula" to me over the phone a while back. I am sure there are other cars (or drivers of) that don't like their weight that "the Formula" sets for them. We just are running a car that has a squirrel in a wheel powering it. No matter how many nuts we drop in that squirrel can only run around that wheel about half as fast as those old mean Nissans, Neons and Hondas. Not to mention whatever else blew past us on the back straight (was that a Fiero?) I don't want this to come out wrong (and you guys will figure out if you haven't already that most of my BS is just that) but it takes an almost perfect drive in one of these girly cars to do well against all the other cars HP/TQ. (This is what I have been told as I wouldn't know much about a perfect drive, I might know about a maybe a perfect half assed drive.) I learned a good lesson in my first ITA class race since the 1.8 was classified...... as long as the track is twisting and turning you have a chance to hang around the quick cars, but when you hit the long straights or the oval part get a good look at them early cause it will be your last.
Heck I am a conservative type guy I think 50 or 60 lbs would be close to right, the above mentioned and esteemed Bobby Von Stretchinstein thinks it needs at least 100lbs. :119:

[JLawton]

HA! One trick (track) pony right now. Driving against the likes of Amy, Benazic, Hunter, Lawton, DiMinno, etc every week, you either go big or you go home! I am predicting a solid 6th at Pocono this year!!! :)

[/b]


Shut up!! :rolleyes:

I do recall you battling for the lead at NHIS.........

[attachmentid=694]

You're starting to sound like a whiner!!

<edit> Oops, picture credit to Doug Koza, the16v.com

[Joe Moser]

Heck I am a conservative type guy I think 50 or 60 lbs would be close to right, the above mentioned and esteemed Bobby Von Stretchinstein thinks it needs at least 100lbs. :119:
[/b]

Bob and Andy both said that they think they can get more power out of them! I don&#39;t think it is time for a weight decrease :) They are only in their first year as an ITA car. I won the ARRC in 1999 and was 3 seconds a lap slower at Road Atlanta at that time. 7 years of development on the CRX got us an additional 3 seconds at Road Atlanta (development on an ex-Firehawk car that was already a "10/10ths" effort).

Let&#39;s just wait and see where that car ends up.

[Greg Amy]

Yeah, I wouldn&#39;t be jumping on the high horse quite yet, kids.

I&#39;ve been watching a well-prepared and well-driven Miata do quite well this past year, ASTONISHINGLY well for a first-year prep effort. Andy has been, and will be, knocking on the door of many major track records this upcoming year. I also believe he&#39;ll find that mythical 10 ponies he&#39;s looking for...

As for Bob Stretch, I was the one that told Andy he was driving that car like a madman on a mission, and he was fun to watch. It was not particularly easy to pass him during qualifying, and I saw him in my mirrors for a long while during the race, before he got tied up in battling for position. Further, if rumor is to be trusted, he was not working with a full-up engine effort; note that this "uncompetitive car" at Road Atlanta finished, what, fourth in a very competitive field at a track that it&#39;s not supposed to be competitive at? Can you imagine what could have happened with a full-up effort?

The ITAC weight process actually had this car at a slightly higher weight (25 to 50 pounds?) but we chose to leave it at its current weight due to rollcage rules and Spec Miata crossover. Proponents have countered that this small amount of weight is negligible for performance. Fine. However, let&#39;s not go bonkers and start calling for a weight BREAK simply because one person at one track couldn&#39;t take his car to the front.

I have believed from the beginning - and still do - that the 1.8L Miata is TOO LIGHT and has the potential for consistent winnings at any track. You Miata kids may scream about lack of power, but we all know the potential of that package in the right hands; it&#39;s probably the best combination of power, balance, handling, and braking out there in ITA. Just wait &#39;til it gets fully developed.

Bookmark this page, because history WILL prove me correct on this. I challenge you to come back and prove me wrong in two years...

If there&#39;s any breaks to be given, it&#39;s a break from all the whining...but we&#39;ll see, eh? - GA

[Bill Miller]

This thread is starting to sound like several people want a comp. adjustment for the Miata. :018:

[Andy Bettencourt]

Trust me on this - the 1.8 Miata ain&#39;t gonna lose any weight. Believe dat. The process is the process. If anything, it would gain weight if something was discovered incorrect with the numbers that had it putting out more hp than predicted - and supported by a competitive imbalance.

Lawton - that picture was 200 yards from the START!!! Heck - even YOU are in the picture...so you know it&#39;s early in the race!!!! :) The car is good - no doubt, but it doesn&#39;t race well on certain tracks...as expected. When you get tires that are from the same decade as we are racing in, you can chime in... ;)

I have about 3-5 more whp to find. The motor is done and the ECu is half way there. I expect a legit 135-136 and 122tq at the wheels. Bob Stretch can chime in but IIRC, he did a traditional IT build on his SM and found it was well below his expectations. Many people will find this when they build them. Gains are hard to come by.

The process weight had the 1.8 at TEN pounds higher (2390) but was decide on 2380 due to cage crossover issues. I verified with the CRB that there WAS indeed precident to raise the weight and grandfather the cage size should it need a PCA.

Greg knows his cars but I disagree that this car will become Teg/CRX dominant. On anything but momentum tracks, it will get out-powered. The Mosers may feel like they had no chance at the ARRC, but the CRX and the NX2000 were turning the same lap times...just in different ways. That is the way it is for the Miata everywhere but momentum tracks like Lime Rock.

And in the 8 months we developed this car for ITA, we ran 4 sets of springs, two rear sway bars, two air intakes, 2 final drives, two cylinder heads, and 6 full test days. How does that compare to most efforts? And remember, the knowledge base and available parts for these cars is light years ahead of most stuff. It&#39;s an accellerated effort no doubt - but far from anything to be scared about. My offseason plans include dyno tuning - that is it.

I will challenge you Greg my boy, the 240SX and the Teg are the best combo of power and handling. The 240 is just too hard to keep together for most. But time will tell. Maybe in 2 years we will be talking about the Gen 2 MR-2!

[IPRESS]

Is this a forum or is this a court docket?

If you can&#39;t throw out some BS without folks going nuts then ........... maybe you need Perry Mason to prepare your posts. :rolleyes:
The subject came up about weight and the miata. We&#39;re just talking here not MAKING RULES. There are plenty of myths about the cars potential and abilities. Andy is sort of the resident authority right now as he is ahead of the curve on developing. One question on ARRC, have you folks ever seen Bob show up with a car that wasn&#39;t max prepped? The miata is not starting from an undeveloped starting point. I had the 2nd SM ever built and I can tell you it there has ben a world of development done since she hit the track.
Myself, I am all for waiting and seeing what happens (here comes a jab so you rules makers prepare to deflect :D ) I proposed just that to the SMAC and the CRB for the new national miata class. Rules have been being massaged ever since it went national anyway. I am sure it is for good of the class as a whole, but not so much the wait and see approach. (See that wasn&#39;t so bad, not really a jab, just a friendly goose) What I mean is sometimes you wait and see and you get passed by (mainly on the straights.) :D
Unless Bob has hit upon something new since I talked with him, he wasn&#39;t very optimistic on getting anymore power from the motor. He was thinking suspension was the best place for help (and the 100+ lbs.) I think this conversation was shortly after he drove the wheels off his miata at ARRC (actually cracked an SSR) and didn&#39;t come close. (Wrong car for that track, just happens to be the biggest race of the year.) In my case it really doesn&#39;t matter anyway, but talking (keyboarding) is sort of the longdistance way of paddock BSing and that is fun. If I was really serious on a rules massage I would write some of you guys a letter in your offical capacity. I do think I will send Andy a note requesting consideration to be able to put two squirrels on that wheel! :lol:

[lateapex911]

If I were to judge from the court of public opinion.........

Some say TOO light!!

Some say TOO heavy!

Maybe it&#39;s Just right!

This is a classic case of a class growing and cars are now so close that we&#39;re debating more about WHICH tracks to base the process on.

We&#39;ve come a long way in the past three years, because that&#39;s EXACTLY what this discussion is about.

On a track like Lime Rock, or other short stright, tecnical momentum tracks, the Miata does very well.

On a track like road Atlanta, where the longest straight follows a corner where my data aq showed sppeds 3 or more MPH slower than the downhill at Lime Rock, the Miata gets beat in a drag race.

I think the car is fine right where it is, because:
A- That&#39;s where the process says it should be,
and B- Real world results back that up. Wins here, loses there..what more can we ask for??

;)

(And I think Bob was wishing he&#39;d had more power and better shock tuning, but he&#39;s not a guy who digs coming in 4th anyway. As for him showing up with full prep efforts, I think he can drive the wheels off anything, and IIRC, his winning 240 SX wasn&#39;t at the top of it&#39;s game when he came in 2nd against Serra, but that could be wrong, Bob can correct me on that.)

[JLawton]

Is this a forum or is this a court docket?

If you can&#39;t throw out some BS without folks going nuts then ........... maybe you need Perry Mason to prepare your posts. :rolleyes:
[/b]

I was just giving Andy a hard time. Every once in a while he needs a smack down so he doesn&#39;t have to buy a larger helmet. I should use the smilies more!! :P :lol: :lol:

[camop]

O.K., so besides being wrong about the original question. . . the 1.6L was moved up to 2255 January &#39;06,
and also maybe making a poor choice in car for ITA (1.6 miata) . . . was the 2205 weight for the early 1.6L miata the "right" weight? Was that change made because someone was winning a bunch of races?
Thanks!

Neal Norton

[R2 Racing]

The CRX&#39;s have a good 15 years of development on them. The Integra&#39;s have about 6 (completely during a time of outstanding aftermarket support). Hell, even Greg has something like 12 years into his NX (despite being practically the only one). So a first year car shouldn&#39;t be able to immediately whoop on them, IMO. With that being said, I thought the 1.8&#39;s competed at about where they should&#39;ve been at the ARRC this year. No one&#39;s going to argue that Bob isn&#39;t a fantastic driver who brings a good product to the track, and I think he showed that. But even if you talk to him, he said himself that he didn&#39;t believe he had everything out of the car and wished he had some more tuning and testing with it. Well, yea, it&#39;s a first year car and that&#39;s the way it&#39;s supposed to be, right?

So as for right now, I&#39;m just content with sitting back and watching how they develop. I believe the ones that have been seriously built so far had an accelerated development when compared to other cars because they have such a heritage in their SM brothers and fantastic aftermarket support. Over the next couple of years, they&#39;ll gain a little as they develop further, but I don&#39;t think it&#39;ll be by leaps and bounds. So yea, lets just see what happens. B)

[Andy Bettencourt]

O.K., so besides being wrong about the original question. . . the 1.6L was moved up to 2255 January &#39;06,
and also maybe making a poor choice in car for ITA (1.6 miata) . . . was the 2205 weight for the early 1.6L miata the "right" weight? Was that change made because someone was winning a bunch of races?
Thanks!

Neal Norton [/b]

Actually this is what happened (hope I don&#39;t double post with Jake):

In the winter of 2005, all cars were run through the classification &#39;process&#39;. This process is used to classify new cars to the ITCS as well as cars moving around the classes (like from ITS to ITA or from ITA to ITB). Because there was no documented method for setting weights prior to this new way, the ITAC wanted to &#39;reset&#39; all the cars in the GCR via the process. This was don eso that we could move forward on a (theoretical) level playing field. Some gained weight, most lost weight. On-track results were not used AT ALL as a basis for the change - but in 99% of the cases, those results supported what was happening on paper.

The list was published in the Feb 06 FastTrack addendum located here. (http://www.scca.com/_FileLibrary/File/06-2-fastrack-addendum.pdf) The 1.6 Miata has been 2255 for almost all of 2006.

1.6 ITA cars have had some success. Bret DePedro in the MARRS series and Mike VanSteenburg out of Florida both ran fast cars and won races.

[Greg Amy]

...was the 2205 weight for the early 1.6L miata the "right" weight? Was that change made because someone was winning a bunch of races?
[/b]

Neal, you&#39;re stepping into a pile of cow stuff that&#39;s been years in the making (VERY BIG GRIN!!!). I know you&#39;re "new", so here&#39;s a kinda-quickie explanation (a much longer one can be had be selecting "IT.COM Forums" at the top and start reading from the beginning... :P )

Once upon a time - circa 1983 - a few regions across the country started a class called Improved Touring. It became wildly popular, mostly because it gave a place to play for outdated Showroom Stock cars (back then we had four of them - SSGT, SSA, SSB, SSC). Several of these regions lobbied SCCA National (then in Englewood, CO) to recognize it as a class for National racing. Englewood refused, but compromised by publishing a standard set of rules for IT as a separate GCR book (back then the GCR and all the category specs were separate books).

However, Englewood added in there a couple of sticklers: first, IT was to forever be a Regional-Only class; second, so that they didn&#39;t have to put a lot of priority and time in it, they added the "no guarantee of competitiveness" clause. Bottom line: &#39;we&#39;re giving you some place to run these cars, but really nothing else.&#39;

Well, no one really expected IT to grow as it has over the last 20+ years. It was, has, and probably will continue to be one of the most consistently-popular categories in SCCA history. During that time period cars were dropped into IT upon request, but the weights were never given much priority; it seems they were haphazardly slapped into a class and the weight was done by vote and/or "rule of thumb" (and some say with conflicts of interest, though that has never been proven).

This was the case up until about three years ago or so. Right about 2001-2003 time frame the participants within IT began a truly grassroots effort to put some type of reasonable system in place for approving, categorizing, and setting the weights for Improved Touring cars. Probably due to a major shift in management of SCCA, the Improved Touring Advisory Committee was formed (2004?) and requests for reclassification and weight setting were sent to these guys. They made their recommendations to the Competition Review Board, and the CRB made their suggestions to the BoD for approval.

Their first visible order of business was to get approved a systematic, somewhat-objective-and-formulaic weight-setting process that considered the physical characteristics of the car, such as drive layout, suspension/chassis design, and manufacturer&#39;s reported stock horsepower. This, they were able to get through the CRB and Bod. Once approved, the next move was to reclass obviously mis-classed cars out of ITS and into ITA, such as my Nissan NX2000 and a few other front-wheel-drive four-cylinder cars. These ITS-to-ITA cars were the first ones sent through this formulaic process.

Over the winter of 2005-6 the ITAC set upon grinding all the remaining prior-classed cars through this formulaic weight-setting process; the result was the list of cars with their weights re-set in the February 2006 Fastrack. NONE (zero, zilch, nada, zippo) of those changes were as a result of ANY race results. ZIPPO consideration for how they&#39;ve done in the past. Every one of those changes was as a result of taking the existing fleet and running them through the new process. The fact that you may see some of the dominating cars getting weight added can be (and typically, is) viewed as evidence that the process wasn&#39;t right before. But, given it was rule-of-thumb and wink-wink before, that&#39;s not so surprising...

One other note of significance for the new ITAC process is that the ITS E36 BMW was judged to be so significantly out of proper weight-classing that it was given an intake restrictor instead of adding up to (or more than) 300 pounds of weight. The history of that car in ITS, along with the actions leading up to the intake restrictors, is a whole &#39;nother history lesson, and a painful one at that, best learned by reading through the forum. This, however, set the precedence for other cars in other classes to be possibly reigned in, should their performance potential be found to be significantly better than the formulaic process indicated (such as the ITA 1.8L Miata - bwah, hah, hah...couldn&#39;t resist...JUST KIDDING!!!).

The results are what you see today: reasonable classification of cars within each class of IT, and weights set with a mostly-objective process. As Jake pointed out, the fact that we can reasonably and diametrically disagree is probably evidence in and of itself the process is working...!

Phew! Back to work... - GA

[tnord]

thanks Greg, i love reading through class/SCCA history.

[camop]

Thank You Andy and Greg!

Great explanations and history lesson.

Regards,

Neal

[DavidM]

I will challenge you Greg my boy, the 240SX and the Teg are the best combo of power and handling. The 240 is just too hard to keep together for most. But time will tell. Maybe in 2 years we will be talking about the Gen 2 MR-2!
[/b]

Damn. You make it sound like I should be winning races or something. I haven&#39;t found the 240 all that difficult to maintain or drive. I have 2 seasons on the current motor with nothing more than normal maintenance. It&#39;s getting tired, but I&#39;m going to try and get one more season out of it. It&#39;s just that my driving sucks. Of course, Bob did all the development work on it before I got it.

David

[JeffYoung]

DAvid for some one coming along just 2 years behind me, I&#39;d say you are progressing just fine. You made a good choice in buying a proven winner, and you have been getting faster with it. It truly amazed me how much I had to learn to even sniff the top 5 and it takes a while to get there. You will too.

You&#39;ll also find out how much harder running 10/10ths is on the car vis a vis even 9/10ths. I hadn&#39;t heard anything about 240s not staying together either, but once you get it running REALLY had, who knows what can happen.

You know Tristan Smith in Atlanta? He&#39;d be a good resource for you as well.

[Andy Bettencourt]

I hadn&#39;t heard anything about 240s not staying together either...

[/b]

From what I learned when searching for one in 2004, they are ultra-sensitive to temp. The distributor is in place where it gets super hot as well...working these issues out is critcal...150whp is the goal too!

I LOVE that ex-Stretch car.............
http://nutdriver.org/ARRC06/IMGP2842.jpg
Photo: Nutdriver.org

[IPRESS]

Is the formula written somewhere? I think Andy sort of explained it to me over the phone one night, but I was so worried about spring rates that I forgot most of what he said about it.
Having some sort of starting point is the right way to proceed. Where we are might not be just right, but with time we will find out.
One point to bring up from one of the "history posts" is that if we wait a dozen years to get fully developed we will most likely be running in a vintage class! :happy204:
Bob and I are going to try to get the Atlanta Region to move the ARRC to Motorsport Ranch (Ft. Worth) where a one squirrel car can really shine! :D
Our only problem is finding someone to BBQ some pulled pork in Texas. Beef rules west of the Mississippi River and I am not so sure those GA boys would go for that. Falling down drunk at MSR hurts more then at RAtlanta.....cactus vs. kudzu. :birra:

[lateapex911]

Is the formula written somewhere? I think Andy sort of explained it to me over the phone one night, but I was so worried about spring rates that I forgot most of what he said about it.

[/b]


LOL....you had your chance.....if you forgot it, it&#39;s time to return your secret spy decoder ring. ;)

And it&#39;s more of a formulaic process than it is a pure formula. (Just to be clear, LOL)

[IPRESS]

LOL....you had your chance.....if you forgot it, it&#39;s time to return your secret spy decoder ring. ;)

And it&#39;s more of a formulaic process than it is a pure formula. (Just to be clear, LOL)
[/b]

Well thats a relief.....Since I forgot what he said I guess you guys won&#39;t have to kill me! :P

Maybe Tom Hanks will do a movie on it.

[DavidM]

You know Tristan Smith in Atlanta? He&#39;d be a good resource for you as well.
[/b]

Tristan was actually one of the first people I met when I started (actually before I started) racing. He and Bowie met with me over some beers to tell me what I was getting into.




From what I learned when searching for one in 2004, they are ultra-sensitive to temp. The distributor is in place where it gets super hot as well...working these issues out is critcal...150whp is the goal too!

I LOVE that ex-Stretch car.............
[/b]
I&#39;ve read of people having distributor issues, but I haven&#39;t experienced any. Bob did some work on shoe-horning in a monster radiator along with the oil cooler so temp hasn&#39;t been an issue (other than my intake manifold adventure). Wheel bearings may be the biggest thing to worry about. I&#39;ve replaced all 4 since I&#39;ve had the car and I only do sprint races right now. The spherical bearings get used up over time as well.

That picture doesn&#39;t show the good side of the car. It&#39;s known as the Whee car by the Atlanta workers. It&#39;ll get painted someday.

David

[CaptainWho]

That picture doesn&#39;t show the good side of the car. It&#39;s known as the Whee car by the Atlanta workers. It&#39;ll get painted someday.[/b]

Yeah, I&#39;m sorry I didn&#39;t get any more photos of you, and that one&#39;s pretty ratty, too, but I thought I&#39;d put nearly everything up so everyone I got photos of could see at least a blurry something. Maybe Clark or Jack got some shots of you.