Ok, this may seem like a dumb question, and I have put off asking for a while but here goes. What information needs to be recorded and if I run with more than one organization, do I need separate log books for each? I ran my first Champcar race in 2019 and we had to start a log book for the car. They didn't really explain it, guess they figured we knew. I've raced dirt track cars for years and we are not required to keep a log book. We keep records of what we have done and changes we make but, we don't have to show them at the track, and we don't always give them to the new owner if we sell the car. If this has been gone over before, I didn't find it, just point me in the right direction. Thank you.
Can't speak for road racing, but for rally we just have one logbook (issued by any of the organizations), which travels with the car and is filled in/notated at each event's tech inspector, regardless of what organization it is. Of course, this applies because the different rally organizations have essentially the same preparation rules for cars. My logbook has events from four different organizations (NASA, Rally America, ARA, and SCCA).
My roadrace CRX had an SCCA log book when I bought it. When I went racing with NASA, they issued their own.
When our race cars are sold, I'm used to log books going to the purchaser, though the seller of one race car I bought wanted to keep his... The next owner of that car still hopes to track down that log book from that seller (or his heirs).
From my experience the log book is most helpful to a tech inspector when the car is involved in some kind of incident that causes damage to the car or something was found to be unsafe or illegal and a note is made in the log book to get it corrected.
An example of this would be what happen to me nearly 30 years ago.
I raced with MCSCC at the time in IT. Their safety rules required a roll cage but did not require door bars. This was due to the fact that IT was the next step up from "Showroom Stock" and a door bar was not required to race in that class. SCCA had only just upgraded the their rules the year or two before to require at least one door bar per side in IT. I was informed that I could race that weekend but needed to update my car before I could race again with SCCA and a notation was made in the MCSCC log book to that effect. They did this since they would not issue a SCCA log book until the car met their safety rules.
The vintage group I race with just wants a log book of some sort; My Datsun has an SCCA logbook because that's where I raced it first. My F500 has a SCCA logbook but was most recently raced at Waterford Hills and Waterford Hills issues logbooks so I use theirs for the vintage races.
Having a logbook or all of the logbooks for a car is a bonus when selling it.
