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My first racing experience was in Quarter Midgets back in the 50's. It took several hours to tec a box stock continental and 5 minutes to tec a AA motor. The first cam doctor was probably invented 40 years ago to tec the Continental 216 camshaft for stock dimensions. Before ISO there was quite a large deviation in specifications. People spent large sums buying stock cams that they felt had the largest allowable out of spec. Discard broke out all the time over .005' AND .01 degree. An old guy out on the West Coast named Ernie Bose experimented with valve springs and found that installing springs with a little lower tension he could float the valves a controlled amount and increase performance, so much for cam specs.
Having inspected in 4 cycle Briggs class you must know all about how +- .005 can determine wining and DQ"s. Remember checking the heads for being ground and then people pressing the center of the combustion down in a press to achieve a supposed advantage, and then finding out they pressed too far in a tec inspecton. The little Briggs was probably the ultimate in over teched Motors.
Yet there always seemed to be someone that was the fastest, that always seemed to tec within specs. Motor builders were Wizards and commanded very high numbers for their engines. Was it the Engine Builder or something else that made so and so soo darned fast??? Do you remember people selling hones to Karter's to hone their tail pipes out with to achieve that last .001 Horsepower out of their engines. Then they came out with the pipe of the month club to offer the racer even more advantage over the competition.
Point being that even in a very highly teched class there were still racers with a very big advantage over the competition. There was also racers spending a lot of good money looking for that secret when really the secret was that "NUT" sitting behind the steering wheel.
In any entry level racing division there will always be people placing more faith in the Motive Power rather than in the power of that "NUT" just behind the steering wheel. We all know that the engine builder knows the secret on how to make me win and heck I know that I am as good of driver as AJ could ever hope to be.
The quickest way to end the tec is to allow what ever you brung, the down side of this is with human nature being what it is, there will always be somebody willing to out spend the competition.
As far as MoTec and ECU's. A world leader in aftermarket units. I think the 8000 is the top of the line unit that even includes Data Acquisition ability. A bit over kill but there are guys that will roll up in a quarter million dollar hauler with one on their D2 midget to win a $500.00 race. I can guarantee it. A very good workable unit can be bought for around $1000.00, and it will last a lifetime and can be moved from engine platform to engine platform.
NOW the real secret Kiddo's. These cars perform best and put on the best racing on tracks in the 1/5th to 1/4 mile in size. The racers in Illinois have a distinct advantage here. On tracks of these sizes even a pretty much stock D2 can hang with a full blown TRO, HOW COME??? Or even better yet spend $10,000.00 with American Racer and have a mold made for a 10" wide Right rear tire, Now Horsepower has been taken out of the equation all together and a premium on set up and driving skills will have replaced Horse Power.
Honest Dad himself
