Side by Sides and Rally?

weird. If it were some sort of college or company backed program I could see it working. At this level, I don't see it increasing participation at all.

I like it in theory just because it could produce some interesting designs. I think over time you would see some optimization with track/height to dial in what works best with the given components. It would be a ton of fun to build a car for this, I'm just not picturing more than a couple of people giinge it a shot.

I think a 42" wheelbase 38" height car could work, but it may not be the fastest way around the track. I'm picturing a tweaked formula SAE car in my head. I imagine with the seat rake required it would push the (automotive) engine way back and stretch the wheelbase a lot more than necessary.

ojannen wrote: Narrowness wins in autocross so I assumed it would win in rallycross. Building to the limit of the class puts you in a weird place where you have to be really short to fit in the car.

Building to the limit of the class rarely works in rallycross. Mostly the rules are really lenient. I like it as it gives people more rope to hang themselves with

It reads like a spec class for a car that doesn't exist. What the berkeley is the point of it? Who wrote this, did they get paid, and does someone want to pay me less to do a far better job?

Knurled wrote: to the limit of the class rarely works in rallycross. Mostly the rules are really lenient. I like it as it gives people more rope to hang themselves with

Agreed. I've seen way too many built cars get stomped by bone stock cars you'd never expect to see on a rallycross course with seemingly wrong tires and a good driver. Heck, one day a guy showed up in a late 2000s Avalon on all seasons. And he not very far behind the pointy end of the field.

Don't they have Formula Baja already?

Seems to me like those SCCA rules were almost intentionally created to NOT allow sidebysides

Jaynen wrote: Don't they have Formula Baja already?

SAE Mini Baja? Yeah, they are tall, tippy, and have like 5hp with a CVT. They would easily be the slowest car on any rallyx course, unless you included clearing a 10" log at full speed.

This all goes back to my theory that these rules were written in a particular way specifically so that SCCA industries will be able to introduce a "spec" type of racer for rallycross and sell it (just like they do with the Ford Spec Racers).

In any case, I won't shed a tear if this class "fails" and is axed after the demo year. Rallycross is already growing with the existing rules. Adding a bunch of UTVs and SXSs, and stuff just means everyone will get less runs. It'll be autocross......

Our rally-X up here is already overbooked. They quite often get 60+ car fields.

We just went to the inaugeral Alleghany region rallycross and had like 40 cars show up (with a 40 car cap). The day before I think there were 30-40 at the Susquehanna event. DC events regularly do 40-50 (with a 50-60 car cap). Maybe rally-x clubs someplace are struggling to attract people, but certainly not here on the East Coast, it doesn't seem.

51 cars at yesterday's OVR regional. We broke it up into three groups in a run/work/off format, and even with a third of the competitors not running or working we still had more competitors and workers per group than we used to get.

I remember that 20 was our break-even for a while and we often didn't make it, and nearing 30 was cause for celebration, and a 40-car event in 2012 was considered legendary.... and now we hit 51???

The interesting thing is that there were only like two or three first-timers. The event was almost all people who had done it before and by some awesome confluence were able to make it on the same weekend.

~30 is the norm here and I have drive 5 hours to hit the next closest event. And its not 30 national level competitors... its mostly locals who just come out to have a good time :(

51 is cool. I'd be happy to see 100-200.

ProDarwin wrote: 51 is cool. I'd be happy to see 100-200.

I would not want to see that many. We just can't find a site large enough to support that much damage for a full season. Each event would need as much manpower as a national level event to keep things running safely and there just aren't enough people willing to volunteer to run things.

EvanB wrote:

ProDarwin wrote: 51 is cool. I'd be happy to see 100-200.

I would not want to see that many. We just can't find a site large enough to support that much damage for a full season. Each event would need as much manpower as a national level event to keep things running safely and there just aren't enough people willing to volunteer to run things.

Understandable. We have events split across 3 sites, so it seems pretty feasible. VIR is huge and can have quite a few different route possibilities to mitigate damage.

Are volunteers an issue? IMO, having less people at an event is a big safety issue. Not even remotely enough workers to spread across the course.

Zoom zoom

In reply to Jaynen :

Careful now, those things are dangerous and will kill you. 

Yeah motorsport is inherently dangerous yada yada

Jaynen said:

Zoom zoom

 

I'm picturing what happens when it hits a rut when sideways at 40mph.

In reply to Knurled :

He could crash!  Oh My!! We should outlaw them for the good of humanity. Oh never mind, the SCCA already did. 

That's enough sarcasm for this thread, I'll be moving on now. 

In reply to Toyman01 :

Rollovers are Very Bad Juju when it comes to rallycross.   That's one of the things that makes insurance skyrocket.  That is assuming that nobody gets hurt in the rollover, or that it doesn't roll over a corner worker or two.

The SCCA is quite right to not allow these things in an area where stock ride height WRXs can roll over in low speed corners when conditions are "right".

In reply to Knurled :

In case you haven't noticed, I disagree.

And if your corner workers are in any danger of getting rolled over, you might want to reconsider where you put your worker stations. I usually place ours on the insides of the corners, it's much less hazardous there. 

If SCCA doesn't want to sanction them that's fine, I still think they look like a blast and are cool, BMWCCA won't allow miatas even with rollbars and hardtops run at HPDE events. Do I agree? no? Is that what their insurance says? yes. Do I hate BMWCCA because of it?no

Toyman01 said:

In reply to Knurled :

In case you haven't noticed, I disagree.

And if your corner workers are in any danger of getting rolled over, you might want to reconsider where you put your worker stations. I usually place ours on the insides of the corners, it's much less hazardous there. 

I don't disagree.  But I have been to plenty events where you've got a car coming one way and a car going the other and you can only look in one direction.

In any other form of motorsport, any track officials are behind barriers or in safety cars.  In rallycross (and autocross) we have corner workers standing maybe 5-10 feet from the cars going by.

I don't take the somewhat flippant attitude of "eh, if you roll you roll"...

Toyman01 said:

The SCCA specifically doesn't allow them in rallycross. They also don't allow a bunch of other really cool stuff I'd love to see.

The following types of vehicles are currently not eligible to compete: ATVs, UTVs, side-by-sides, Trophy Trucks, Cross karts, Formula Cross, Legend cars and tube‐frame vehicles.

I have no idea about stage rally.

Doesnt say no zambonies or fork-lifts!

In reply to Knurled :

Personally, I've never seen a case of needing to put a worker station within 10 feet of moving cars.  Occasionally they do have to go on the outside of a turn or something, but that's usually avoidable.  And even then, it's often possible to find a spot that would take a berkeleyup of extreme magnitude (and a slow-moving corner worker) to lead to a corner worker meets car incident.