2024 Discussion Topics - Need some responses before the start of the race season

[rob_slv]

Hi VLR racers,

I know we have been discussing a few items from last year but I wanted to put them down formally.

- Race fuel - do we want to change to the option to have the spec fuel as OPEN or leave the supplemental regs to COOP 91 octane?
- Maximum number of tire sets limited to 4 or 3?

I would appreciate feedback within a couple of weeks to have Bryan implement them into our Supplemental Regulations before the start of the race year.

Thanks,
Rob

[kolsen]

I'm for pump gas and 3 sets of tires - keeps the costs down...

KO

[evannadeau]

I'm with Keith, I'm for keeping the costs low. Pump gas, please.

[dvelpel]

I'm up for 3 sets but having fuel spec as open.

open fuel can allow for pump spec, race, or if you want to remove the ethanol from pump spec if you have the concern, then you have the option to. (*i've never tried to remove ethanol so im unsure on the process/effort etc.. just know it's a topics of discussion.)

[evannadeau]

After some more thought, I would agree with Dan. If an open fuel spec gets more people out racing, maybe we should try it.

If we see a marked difference in times between those using race gas and those who are not, we could even things up by letting those of us on pump gas drop a few pounds of lead.

[Brian Turner]

3 sets of tiers for us in masters that should make it a little interesting as for fuel would like to see if really that much difference not just speed but also on engine repairs wuts the price of race fuel now would it even be worth it or still cheaper to do more engine rebuilds

[Jackmazury]

For information. Race fuel is about $10.50 a litre now for MS109. You can cut half and half to achieve 100 AKI.

This puts you at around $6.20 a litre before oil. Not sure what your fuel burn is like in the VLR volume wise. You would likely have less breakup in the top end and less detonation issues. The trade off is obviously cost.

[Jen and Don]

I see that Shell here in Sundre is selling 93 octane now. Not sure whats on the pumps in Strathmore.

[Mark]

From the VLR manual: "Vortex engine works with commercial gasoline, leaded or unleaded, as well as racing fuel, with minimum 95 Octane"

Pretty sure we aren't meeting that minimum octane rating with co-op pump alone. If we are seeing pre-ignition (detonation) then this is going to impact performance and harm the engine. If this is the case, then the question becomes: "whats the most practical and cost-effective way to get 95+ octane ? 10% race gas ? 15% ? more ?

Now.....if we open the fuel spec to allow people to use a percentage of race gas to bump the octane, are there options -within the rules- that would see a performance gain if someone were to use pure race gas ?? If so, we will immediately become a battle of the wallets class with full-on race gas and blue-printed motors optimized for race gas.

I don't think there's any question that if we either mandate race fuel or simply allow it and it has a performance advantage, the class will suffer due to substantially increased costs. VLR has been around a while now and it's not exactly been taking over the club so we need to be careful how we move forward.

[Gymezee]

Can we try to keep the fuel spec open and evaluate the impact after a few races. If there needs to be a balance of performance discussion then more ideas can be brought forward. The cost of race fuel yes is more, but if it cuts down on engine repairs (and the time to repair) then I am very supportive. In the limited experience we had last year we had engine issues on pump. In the US this year, with race fuel, no issues.

Try the first 2 or 3 race days open fuel spec, then check back in.