Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
Moderators: dirtonly  /  dmantx  /  hosehead

I know this is always a hot debate, and being from PA I obviously support 410s. My question to everyone is this: Why can't 410s adopt the rules of 360s (injection/heads/etc) to reduce cost?

My complaint about 360s was never anything but the fact that they only make 700hp and I think 900hp does a better job of separating the good from the great. I think increasing displacement to 430-440 to offset the air flow reduction(How many great engines have the number 427, 428, 429, & 440?) and adopting similar rules to ascs wouldn't be the end of the world, and would continue to give sprint car racing a platform to show the elite. I'm interested in other people's opinions.

... don't have the technological expertise... but i would love to see something to reunify sprint car

racing....

fuel / tire / wing / compression rules - throw the rest away.

there are less expensive ways to make 900 hp if the 410 rule is dropped

Lincoln 1845 ft/.35 mile T1=118MPH 
Eldora 2287 ft/.43mile T3=135MPH
Port 2716 ft/.51 mile T3=TBD
Grove 2792 ft/.53 mile T3=135MPH
Selinsgrove 2847 ft/.54 mile T1=136MPH
"I didn't move to PA from El Paso in search of better 
weather." Van May

You missed it in the title of your post. 360's are NOT the answer, never has been and never will be. Cost cutting in the ASCS, you've got to be joking.

You misinterpreted the title of my post, I'm looking for opinions and ideas. Like I said, I'm in PA, and 360's are maxed out about half way down the straightaways here, they certainly aren't the answer. I'd just like to see ONE big unified series, instead of All-Stars, ASCS, WoO, and every regional version of each. You still would have local track championships, etc..., but unless there are common rules and a common belief that one version or another of sprint cars IS the top, the sport will continue to suffer.

MY idea is a compression rule and a C.I. rule, and that's it for motors. I take a lot of heat on this board for that opinion....

Latsh, the 410's could very well do something along the lines of what ASCS is doing to reduce costs.

What has ASCS done to reduce cost? 360's have gone up more in price then 410's have in the last 5 years. It seems funny that Ascs has the same rules for motors since day one yet there price keeps climbing, close to what 410's was about 5 years ago.

There is no need to unify. All Stars & ASCS provide a feeder series for the WoO... sort of like the Nationwide, Truck or ARCA series. Plus, drivers who can only afford to run 30 or 40 races per year, these regional series also provide a great home.

i know this is a bit off subject but i just find it funny how everyone from PA thinks that every car on the track has over 900 hp. You guys in the stands act as if you just cant stand how slow those ASCS 700+ hp motors are compared to your maybe 800 hp weekly racers. Your "rescticted" 358's are not the same animal.

BTW I think what Donny has been working on with the crate LS motor is the answer to ONE engine for all of sprint car racing.

The whole system is ass backwards.What we have are the many catering to the few.We have local working man weekend warriors having to buy hi priced 360 motors to cater to a series of what,a dozen or so national ASCS teams with big sponsors.Same with the WoO.How long do you think either series would last if the cars these series bring were the only cars on the track.When the race tracks wisen up,and I think many are starting to,and use rules that will benefit the majority,which are the local racers,things will change.I would bet money that an iron headed,iron block ,13 to 1 comp.,400 small block would run right with these hi dollar ASCS motors,and could be built for a fraction of the cost,why not run them together?Same with the WoO,quit catering to them on wings,engine rules,and tires.Make them mold to accomodate rules of local tracks,or they will find they have no place to race.The majority should be calling the shots,not the other way around,and spec parts and tires don't keep cost down,they just make for hi priced spec parts.

Money talks. That is a fact of life. Racing, Stick and Ball sports, Government. It is really all the same. I find it funny that the big $$$$$ guys spend and spend and spend and then one day they wake up and have no one to race with. I am beginning to think that there is not an answer. I do not think that the 360's are the answer because the cost to race one is out of sight. The 305 cars do not draw the crowds, so there is no front gate. Promoters usually do not like that. The 410's, who are the bread and butter of the sport are vanishing to the belief that they are to expensive. (Although you can run one locally pretty successfully for what you have in a ASCS 360.) There needs to be a niche for every level of competition. And those rules need to be consistant and cost effective for each class. Killing off classes to lump everyone together is going to reduce car count, not build it. The instant someone tells me that I have to race with a bigger class of cars to unify the sport is the day that we buy go-karts.

Although, a tire that is as hard as a diamond would help curb a whole lot these problems as you would pay hell to really hood it up and it would last. That was, and is the success of the Sportsman Midgets. Cars with high horsepower get clobbered weekly by less powerful engines because they can not put the power down, even on new rubber. In that class if a guy wants to run a new RR every night, let him, it does him no good!

Jim

Never hit stationary objects!

Reading these responses only drives home my thought that 360s aren't, won't be, and never were the answer. The more you strain an engine, the more it costs to build, so I do NOT see how making the engine smaller could ever reduce costs. The only thing it reduces is speed and making it easier for the good drivers to compete with the great since, as a racer, I learned a long time ago that it gets a lot harder when your going a lot faster.

I would agree with some of this statement, however, you need a place for beginning drivers to start, a place for lower budgeted teams to race, and a place for people who do not wish to be as dedicated to the racing as everyone else to compete. Our track has several cars that only run an extremely limited schedule. And we need them, just as we need everyone that loads up and comes to the races, regardless of how often they do. I am sure that some of those teams, much like ours, would fold up and race elsewhere were it not for the smaller engine classes. There is absolutely no way, at all, that I could afford a larger engine. I have less than $4000. in my engine. You can not buy a used 410 for that. Most of the classified listings that I have viewed for used 360's are in the $5000 plus range. The cost of Sprint Car racing is ludicrous. I have a very close friends who started with an ASCS car the very first year that they started that form of racing, and he says that the idea was awesome. Then the money rolled in and his wet sump 360 with it's older parts struggles to keep up. If the ASCS had been a little more strict and stuck to it's guns it might have been the answer, but somehow it got away. An idea that never really saw itself to it's successful end. It is a shame, but it is true.

And as for good drivers vrs. great drivers. Do you really want to be on the track with someone who has never driven a Sprinter before and have him or her behind the wheel of an 800 or 900hp beast? Entry level classes are needed. We do not want to live through the days of weekly driver deaths again, do we?

Jim

Never hit stationary objects!

Jim,I don't think anyone is referring to the 305 class.It is an important class that so far hasn't gotten out of hand,hope it stays that way.But on the other hand,I don't think a bigger mistake can be made than to keep a young driver in the 305's too long.A driver needs to learn to drive with the rear wheels and not the front.The problem is the expense of going to the larger engine classes.Tracks are forcing local drivers to buy and build motors to suit rules packages of series that may only frequent their tracks once or twice a year,and in some cases not at all.Good,fast,powerplants can be made a lot cheaper than they are now.

Yup ASCS engines aren't cheap but the first set of heads I ever had (1999) are still in use today and that engine makes competitive horsepower. I don't see a way to go back to the days of running a 350 LT1 long block with a roller cam, hilborn and a vertex for 30 nights in a non-wing, 1900 pound car. If you think the 360s are slow compared to the 410s, wait til you see one of those cars! Racing has always cost a bunch. Are we really that much more expensive? Figure in inflation, value of the dollar, etc and what would that $290 long block plus a roller cam/lifters, injector and magneto cost today? Bet it wouldn't be far off what we're spending.

Just did a bit of research. If that LT1 with mods was worth $800 in 1966, it would cost from $5000 to $14000 today - depending upon which indicator you use. BUT, I'd say today's sprint engine is a pure race engine and more the equivelant of the Offy of the 1950s. So, if an Offy was $4000 in 1955 it would go for somewhere between $32,000 and $136,000 today. And it made 325 hp. What would 700 to "900" hp have cost in 1955???

How about doing a little more research and see how much the purse has went up at the local level from say 20 yrs. ago,or even 25 to 30, and adjudt that for inflation.If a $10,000 or less motor can be made to run the same speed or more than an ASCS motor,that is wrong how?