We have seen multiple failures of the engine wiring harness in the SoCal region. I just recently had a failure on my own car. The wiring between the engine temp sensor and the DME broke. In this situation the engine management goes to a full rich mode.
On Atteberry's car we had an intermittent problem with the engine cutting out. This turned out to be the wires at the fuel injector connectors. Everything looked perfect externally but the wire insulation had failed under the injector boot and was shorting to the other wire.

Allowing an aftermarket replacement engine harness would be a benefit to the class and would not be a performance advantage.

I will see Jon Milledge this week and talk to him about sleaving blocks. For those of you not familiar with Jon. He is an engine builder and ex racers who raced the 944 from its beginnings in the USA in SCCA Regional and National events as well as in IMSA Firehawk series. He still drives his personal 1989 944 Turbo at AX events as well as DE events with the PCA.

Hi all,
Been buried in shoulder surgery and house stuff, so finally had a chance to read through this. A few thoughts:

While I do know a fair amount about cars, I am definitely not a mechanic and I don't know much about our engines and what it takes to keep them healthy. We have been running the same engine since we got the car, and other than belts and some new rod bearings and occasionally remembering to change the oil, plugs and clean the air filter, it has run just fine. Should it go "poof", then I will have more to say about replacement options. I just want to caution that what we don't want to happen is tell a new racer that the 944 they just built is now going to need to have the engine pulled so higher compression pistons and sleeving has to occur just to be competitive. Yes, we have a hp and tq cap, but HOW the power is delivered is more important than how much is delivered when you have a Dyno cap. We start tinkering with compression ratios and deck heights, and it could end up being a slippery and expensive slope. Again, 700 bucks here, 800 there, and people park their cars. I know I speak as someone who isn't replacing motors regularly, so I am not as sensitive to this issue, but money is money and there seems to be a camp on here that believes there are enough parts out there to repair engines without additional aftermarket expenses.

Regarding the battery, we ran the last 4 years with a big, heavy Bosch battery living in the stock location, and it didn't seem to matter on our results. Finally, on a whim, I decided to replace it with a 15lb UHV battery over the summer, again in the stock location. Wasn't needed, but thought I would save some weight I gained with the fire system install as my usual post-race weight was hovering around 2660. My point is the stock battery location works fine and my passenger floor is already filled with a fire suppression system, a data collection module and a cool suit cooler. There isn't room for a battery and I don't think it would add any advantage. So my vote is to keep it as is. BTW, my UTV battery was cheaper than a group 24.

As for camber/caster plates, I agree with Tom A that, in itself, having the plates similar or exactly as he runs, doesn't guarantee anything. I think there needs to be a standard, but again mandating a certain plate means added cost to racers that translates to less money to actually go racing. We don't use camber/caster combination plates, some people do. It hasn't seem to had a dramatic impact on the results either way.

I use stock phone dials with a late offset, and I can still find wheels at a decent price no problem, and they are more rare than cookies. As much as I love fancy wheels, again it's an added cost.

If you sense a theme here, I am very sensitive to anything that will increase the cost of running these cars. They are already expensive enough to run (ask my wife), and the best thing I love about this series besides the great people who are associated with it is the tight,fun, competitive and clean nature of it. So I think we need to ask ourselves with every rule change we contemplate that involves additional cost for the racer in our series: Will what we change IMPROVE the nature of our racing environment and actually make it better, more competitive, and more satisfying for ALL that are on track? If so, then go for it. If not, I say leave it as is and let people use the money they would have spent on these adds or mandated changes and instead use it for entry fees so we actually have decent fields at every race weekend.

Just my 2 cents.

BTW, how many pints of blood does one need to give to afford the fuel bill to go the 2000 miles one-way to Mid Ohio next Fall? Asking for a friend.

My primary role in this discussion is to listen and moderate suggestions and concerns for our ruleset.
Some things everyone needs to remember. Each rule change will effect 145 cars immediately. That’s how many cars run in NASA 944 Spec right now. So all changes must be considered in a way that every competitor must be able to take advantage of, but also must not be rendered uncompetitive by not adapting new rules- especially ones that are costly.
I’ve made some changes over the past few years. Most have been in the name of reliability. Like adding F9Tech as legal NEW DMEs. And Only944s shifter components.
I have also made changes for safety reasons. I allowed for Lindsey billet fuel rails since stock rails are notorious for cracking and are potential fire hazards. I allowed for pedal and shifter extensions because some people don’t feel sliders are a safe option.
The engine problem is becoming more evident. Although I don’t agree that everything under the sun should be allowed “so long as it makes the power cap”, I am concerned with the time and recourses
Being required to find a good block. But this isn’t a simple problem to solve. Once we allow non stock internal items, inspections will become much more invasive. Ask yourself this. Are you willing to tear down your engine at nationals? I can tell you it takes a hell of a lot less time to reconstruct a Spec Miata engine than it does a 944 engine. Do we need to address this block shortage issue? Yeah we do- sooner than later. But this is Spec Racing.
Things like adding weight to compensate for power is not what Spec Racing is about. Those are formulas for series with different cars.
Also I agree this series shouldn’t make anyone spend more money to be competitive than another. Which is why I find it ironic that this is the argument FOR these caster camber plates that were seen at nationals. At $550 that’s $110 MORE than the best mass produced camber plate ground control offers. Also, let’s not kid ourselves. These plates offered more than twice the caster than any off the shelf plate on the market. I suspect this is why they required custom machined caster blocks and bushings. And if these offer no benefit over off-the-shelf components, why would someone go through the trouble to fabricate them or pay $550 for them? I’m betting there’s a GTS or ST 944 out there that’ll buy them off the people that have them.

It would seem that a simple measurement from the top of the shock shaft to the firewall could give us the info we need to measure caster, or at least limit the max caster.

I have never measured caster in any of my 944 cars. I just set it to the max and leave it alone. I have no clue if it is equal side to side.

I have driven Tom Attaberry's car multiple times and I personally think it has too much caster but that is likely because it just has a different feel than my cars.

Guess it’s more of a question: Are there any NASA 944SPEC folks running with PCA 944CUP SP1?

How do changes to one effect the other OR is that not a concern?

Vintagercr wrote:


We do have a few on here that run SP1 but the discussion that happens on this forum is more typically tied to NASA than PCA. There has been a loose agreement for PCA to adopt whatever NASA rule changes are made, aside from the dyno rule, but PCA actually has their own rule change process which is why sleeving of blocks is now allowed in 2019 for PCA SP1. This hasnt been a very good process since both organizations run rule changes completely differently.