[openwheel44]

Don.........I hope you realize none of this is aimed specifically at you. Your talent and knowledge speaks for itself. We all know you could turn a turd into a missile if given the opportunity. Or at least take it to the front with your driving skills.. This is about what all of the attending racing organizations decided to put on the table for the general membership to decide given today's existing information. That is why nothing has been decided until all groups get a chance to talk to their respective participants. We have been communicating by emails during the interim on small details and updates of info so all attendees are in the loop and exchanging ideas. No one is assuming a dictatorship role. At this point.....this has been a totally joint effort. I feel confident if you asked anyone that attended that meeting they would agree. Some of the discussions on this and other boards is beneficial to educate us all. Some of it is an absolute waste of energy. And yes, I am including some of my ramblings.

On another subject......We are all looking for that better mouse trap. Old Phil thought he might be on the right track with the 08 ZX-10r. Trust me, it's been a battle. Has it been worth it. No. But like you Don, I am at the point I can't give up right now. Not because I think I'm smarter.....because I am stupid. Is it faster than my competition? Not really. I don't out pull anyone but yet, no one out pulls me. We all know ZX-10's tend to consume themselves. I believe it is because of oiling issues. At least that has been my experience. Did I freak out and decide to tackle the issue with fancy remedies like dry sumps or aftermarket rods? No. My motor might puke the next time I fire it up but I now have 19 races on it, the oil filter has always been clean, I turn it about 13,200 max. It runs as good as the day I first fired it up with only routine maintenance. I have run this motor on small bull rings up to big 3/8ths miles. Other than a Rosson alky system and oil pan, it is straight out of a bike. No blueprinting, no internal modifications, NOTHING. The main thing....I have got to this point with $42 dollars worth of hoses and fittings and reworking the Rosson/Hench oil pan with a bolt-in baffle system to improve the oil system that is on the motor. NOT a $1600-$1800 dry sump system. Something tells me these motors some say require a dry sump to make them live......there might be an easier and cheaper solution. IF not........is that particular motor worth it? But obviously I don't make a living reworking motors, rebuilding motors or selling aftermarket components.

[DAD]

Phil

The zx10r is like my prostrate. It doesn't have an oiling problem, It has a piston to cylinder blow by problem. The Dry sump is used to address the problem of "puking oil" whenever you keep them at high RPM for a long period of time. I used to vent the breather to my ex pipe to try and pull a vacuum on the crank case. Well after about 10 laps of racing the smoke would just start rolling out of the exhaust. At first it worked pretty good because the guys in back would back off to try to be able to dodge the up coming explosion. They finally figured out that wasn't going to happen,and all that smoke became embarrassing to Doug and myself. If they would throw a yellow flag for a couple of laps the smoke would go away and everything would be fine for the rest of the race.

Next we tried several dozen different breathers some worked better than the others but none were very successful. I can remember Mark coming over to Bloomington and saying he had found the secret, only to throw oil all over the place and drop out.

Zx10r's have been a challenge to me and many other racers. While doing the dry sump thing I also did some testing, to try to find out what my problem was. I installed an electronic vacuum sensor and noted the crank case vacuum in the old Kaw. I used an ultra high tec Roots type scavenger pump mostly found on NASCAR and INDY cars. Up to 10,000 RPM that thing would pull the crankcase down to 10 to 12 inches of mercury. At 11,000 the crank case was at 0 by 12,000 the crankcase was on the positive side and rising. By using the dry sump and larger oil tank (more weight) we could eliminate the blow by problem and keep my drivers feet dry.

The Gen 4 Kawasaki has supposedly addressed this problem by paying particular attention to boring the block by installing bore plates and offsetting the bore to the thrust side of the piston, (what Chevrolet did in their old 327 ci engines) many years ago. We will only be able to tell if it works by racing it.

When Kawasaki did all this improvement on their engine they also designed the engine to work better in a race bike. They stacked the engine on top of the transmission to raise it in the bike to improve handling. The oil pan on the Gen 4 is a good 12" tall. the oil pick up is in a deep well to the left of center, great for a race bike. They went so far as to put the oil filter in the pan itself separate from the crank case. They cast oil galleys into the oil pan and send the oil around and around until it finally gets to the crankshaft. Talk about a mess. They weren't thinking about being dominate in mini sprint racing just motorcycles. If we want to use them we are going to have to do some development work on them to make them work in our cars.

If the other makers decide to follow Kawasaki idea and stand their engines up Mini Sprint racers and several other classes racers are going to have some real problems with motor placement.

Remember the post I did on your board once.

"Cutting off you nose to spite your face" If you guys aren't careful that is exactly what you are going to do.

Andy I hope in jest brought up the Kawasaki 300x jet ski motor. I couldn't find any for sale but they are out there I am sure, other manufactures have similar motors, but that would require a drive shaft. Don't limit your options with rules. "I love competition" it bring out the best in all of us. If crazy guys like Mini and me want to experiment how is it going to hurt you or your racing group. These motors don't live for ever, the best 2010 motor you find on Ebay is going to have 10,000+ very hard miles on it, and you will spend $4000.00 dollars having somebody rebuilding it for you and it will still be a grenade.

Did I tell you about the used engines I bought off Ebay this summer. After blowing them up I did a little closer inspection. What I found was the left #1 main bearing was way out of round. They probably hit something very hard crushed, the gen cover, bent the flywheel and twisted the block out of square. The sellers replaced the cover and flywheel and probably did not even suspect engine damage. I SURE DIDN'T.

After the fact and after buying some expensive small hole bore gauges and doing a much closer inspection did the problem show up. If you used plastigauge to check the main bearing clearence it was dead on but checking the bore front to back they were as much as .003" too large. That is where my oil pressure was going after the engine warmed up.

Honest Dad himself

[openwheel44]

My little hose system eliminated all my oil puking issues also. Cheap fix.

[DAD]

Originally Posted by openwheel44 My little hose system eliminated all my oil puking issues also. Cheap fix.

Phil

Tell us about it, What did you do.

Honest Dad himself

[jjones752]

[QUOTE=DAD;359111]Phil

"Andy I hope in jest brought up the Kawasaki 300x jet ski motor. I couldn't find any for sale but they are out there I am sure, other manufactures have similar motors, but that would require a drive shaft."

The same search where I found the pic, there's a blog about 300x motors, brand new from the factory $4199 less throttle bodies.
Another site sells 15F long-blocks (1500cc, nomally-aspirated) for $1995 with a rebuildable core ($3695 new from Kawi). I'm not trying to send this thread off on another tangent (Andy started it anyway ) but has anyone ever explored plugging one of these into a Midget chassis? They almost look tailor-made for that application...
I guess stirring the pot is a Jones thing; I plead guilty, and will now back away from the stove...

[openwheel44]

Unless you ran that jet ski motor in an outlaw midget class, don't most organizations have rules about turbos and supercharging?

Dad..........First, I fabricated some bolt-in baffles that were placed in the Rosson/Hench oil pan. Keep the oil from sloshing so much and closer to the pickup. I then removed the valve cover emission control reeds and drilled a series of holes in the cover below them to vent the top of the motor better. Experience showed me that these motor place all the oil in the top end at high RPM with only the timing chain galley as a way to drain back to the pan. I then came up with a 1/2 hose system to tie the emission control outlet together, then tie them to a single 5/8" hose and route it to the rear right side of the oil pan so the excess top end oil would be forced through that system directly to the oil pickup area. You should see the different of oil levels through the site glass when I ran the motor just at 3500 rpm (on the stand) with this system versus without it. Before the oil would basically disappear with any appreciable rpm. Imagine the difference at 12,000 rpm. At least now, I am pretty sure I know where my oil is at high rpm's.......where it should be and not filling every cavity of the head or top end or even the tranny breather. I figured at best, when the motor was above 12,000 rpm there might be 3/4"-1" deep oil in the oil pan and a pickup that was about 1/2" off the bottom. So with a little slosh (bouncing, cornering, etc.).......sucking air. I tried various means of venting the motor but ended up with a pretty simple system. On the left side of the motor (alternator cover), I fabricated a 1" bolt-on stub to put a hose on it and run it up to my oil breather tank mounted on the fire wall. That tank lets any oil that should go up that far drain back to the vent on top of the tranny. My breather tank has a small K&N filter on it and is baffled inside. If it were full, it might hold a half of a quart of oil. At this point, no oil gets up there to speak of.....just oil fumes. Shane Rosson sent me a little tube that extends out of the motor case down into the oil pan that was overlooked when they manufactured the oil pans. This little vent/orifice is evidently cast into the original pan. I went ahead and put it in on my motor. I didn't on my son's motor. His motor incorporates the above described system minus that tube and he doesn't puke any oil either. Shane seems to think I could start pulling some of my concoctions off and not do some of the trivial stuff I have done. He might be right, but I don't have the guts yet. I will run with what I have. It may be crude. Definitely not Hi_Tech. So far it works and it's cheap.

[minisprintracing]

Hey Phil,

I know it was not aimed torward me. Hell I'm sure no one even knew I was working on a BMW at the time. Everyone is using the excuse that its the cost and availability for the purpose of the ban. The availability is there if you look hard enough. Now lets look at the cost aspect... I would like to know how many 08 ZX10 engines are laying around on the floor of guys garages with little windows built in the front of them! How much has that specific engine COST everyone! I had 2 blow in 4 races and had to buy a 3rd to stick in the car just to sell it to a poor guy in Austrailia! My calculator says that cost me about $7,500 in engines for 4 races. So theres a lot of ways of looking a cost of a engine. The way I look at it if we should have put a ban on that engine 4 years ago and we would all have a lot more money. Maybe this thing will be just like the zx10 and have the same issues. Then again maybe you can race it for 3 seasons and throw it away. You won't know if you ban it. If it does end up being like a ZX10 then please do ban it! My wife would even thank you! But hell lets give it a try first!

[openwheel44]

I appreciate everything you are saying Don. Really I do. But it's not going to be up to me, it's going to be a group decision. Hopefully, they are reading and considering. I will say this, from watching AMA superbike racing, I don't see BMW's kicking anyone's a$$. I have to admit, I think it would be interesting to see one run in our class just for comparison. To put this deal to rest. But let's face it Don, you ain't the best salesman to push the product. With you it's 80%-90% driver/setup man and maybe 10%-20% motor/equipment. It would be much better test using a guy that is competitive and but not a consistent winner to run one and see if it really "ups" his game. There is no way in Hell any of us want to give you a chance to up your game.........LOL

Banning the 08 ZX-10 would have saved me a bundle also. LOL Where were all these guys a couple of years ago?

[minisprintracing]

Hi Phil, Well if nothing comes of this debate at least we can look back on it and have a good Laugh! You shouldn't talk much about how much it is driver and how much it is engine! LOL! Hell when I see you finish any where other then first I just say to myself he must have had a mechanical failure! I think all are luck comes from the great car number we have chosen! LOL!

[DAD]

Phil

I bought up the hose deal a couple of years ago with the return hose to the pump to Shane and Marc Salvisberg the guy over at Factory Pro in a post on Apex speed. Didn't really help me. Breathing any place but the trans hump does seem to help a bit. The inlet for the factory breather is over inside the clutch cover on the back side. Since we only turn left a lot of oil get over into the egg beater clutch and pumped up into the trans engine breather. The return line is the one that runs to the pump pick up from the back of the motor and when these things start building up crankcase pressure the oil can't get back to the oil pan and that is when they start puking.

Let me know when all the smoke clears and they haul away all that fertilizer you guys are spreading. I forgot what I was going to say.

Honest Dad himself