ITE RULES

[Joe Harlan]

Originally posted by Bill Miller@Dec 14 2005, 11:30 AM
Matt R.

Point of fact is, our tech inspectors should be determining if welded cages meet minimum safety requirements (from both a design and an installation perspective) before they issue a logbook for the car. I've also got an issue where it's deemed thta a welded in cage is required for one car, in the interest of safety, but not in another. Case in point, as off 1/1/08, all Touring cars will be required to have welded cages, and any car registered after 1/1/03 has to have one. IF SSC doesn't become T4, and nothing is changed w.r.t. the cage rules for SS, you'll have a case where ex-SSB cars (now in T3) will have welded cages, but the SSC cars will continue to be allowed to use bolt-in cages. How can you mandate it for one (T3) and not the other (SSC)? Would you want a bolt-in cage in an ITS E36 BMW that was capable of 130+ mph?

Matt M.

Yep, Rich passed me on plenty of occasions at Bridgehampton too (damn I miss that place!). I remember thinking how honkin' fast and cool that car was. His wife, Linda, had the other hot Mustang that she ran Time Trials with. Sadly, Linda lost her battle w/ cancer earlier this year. They used to live ~ 5 min. from me. Rich sold the house earlier this year, and I'm not sure where he moved to.

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Bill, the only time I take issue with the differences in safety is when we start mixing safety levels in run groups.....Mix a trans-am car with an ITC 510...Now does the IT510 have enough cage ,fuel cell, firesystem,nascar bar requirement to be mixed with the car? 165mph compared to 105 mph at portland? Or as we do mixing a boltin cage 944T/ite car with same 510....944 likely gets to at least 148mph? If you take it from the prod page it should be the drivers own choice on safety?

[Bill Miller]

Originally posted by Joe Harlan@Dec 14 2005, 05:19 PM
Bill, the only time I take issue with the differences in safety is when we start mixing safety levels in run groups.....Mix a trans-am car with an ITC 510...Now does the IT510 have enough cage ,fuel cell, firesystem,nascar bar requirement to be mixed with the car? 165mph compared to 105 mph at portland? Or as we do mixing a boltin cage 944T/ite car with same 510....944 likely gets to at least 148mph? If you take it from the prod page it should be the drivers own choice on safety?

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Yeah Joe, but if you look at what's going on w/ cages in some of the older Prod cars, it seems that they're taking the choice away from the driver. And if you look at most of the endurance races, you've got GT3-Cup Porsches (running in ITE) out there w/ ITC 510s and Rabbits. Gets REALLY interesting at 3AM in the rain!

[Joe Harlan]

Originally posted by Bill Miller@Dec 14 2005, 02:51 PM
Yeah Joe, but if you look at what's going on w/ cages in some of the older Prod cars, it seems that they're taking the choice away from the driver. And if you look at most of the endurance races, you've got GT3-Cup Porsches (running in ITE) out there w/ ITC 510s and Rabbits. Gets REALLY interesting at 3AM in the rain!

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Matt, as a tech inspector if you don't have enough experience to inspect cage welds and contruction then you should request someone that does. I don't expect every Tech official to know everything but, collectively the region should have enough people with the experience combined to cover all of our techical needs. The problem with our current system is that once a LB is issued and the cage is stamped it is very rarely ever looked at again. onc eyou have a number you could basicly cutout half the tubes and rebuild it without reinspection. Our rules require a little to much honor among thieves to self polic some issues.

Bill, I agree it happens way to much so what to do? 120% rule play here? Make so of the slowest car on the grid is 120% off the pace of the fastest car the whole class gets moved to a different rungroup for the weekend?

[Matt Rowe]

Originally posted by Joe Harlan@Dec 14 2005, 05:03 PM
Matt, as a tech inspector if you don't have enough experience to inspect cage welds and contruction then you should request someone that does. I don't expect every Tech official to know everything but, collectively the region should have enough people with the experience combined to cover all of our techical needs. The problem with our current system is that once a LB is issued and the cage is stamped it is very rarely ever looked at again. onc eyou have a number you could basicly cutout half the tubes and rebuild it without reinspection. Our rules require a little to much honor among thieves to self polic some issues.

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Inspecting weld quality and how it meets the minimum GCR requirements are one thing. Making a decision about the placement of reinforcing bars outside of the GCR spec is another. You didn't include anything about my statements of liability of the Tech inspector in your response. Maybe you haven't considered it but I can see a lawyer taking a tech inspector to the cleaners for requiring changes based on his personal judgements outside of the scope of the GCR. If that driver is then injured in a crash I don't think the family would have to look too far to find a lawyer willing to say "Driver X would have been fine if you hadn't made him move this bar, your rulebook doesn't even require it". And really the original statement was about the idea that bolt in cages are far inferior to a minimal weld in cage. Would you agree with that and if so has someone done the analysis to prove it?

As far as the LB being issued and the cage never re-examined, it does vary some region to region and official to official. One series I participate in does continuously review each car at each event to ensure nothing has been altered. But in general no, not much attention is given to it but at the same time is this really a problem? How many people are doing it and who are they really hurting? Not many and themself. We have bigger fish to fry before you start asking Tech to do complete cage reinspections at annual tech.