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Re:Rule books of the past

To: land-speed-digest@autox.team.net
Subject: Re:Rule books of the past
From: john robinson <john@engr.wisc.edu>
Date: Wed, 08 Feb 2006 11:07:11 -0600
Howdy

part of the rule book problem, as I see it anyway, is the current 
rule makers are trying too hard to make the rule book perfect, which 
on one hand is a good thing, some guys in new hampshire who have 
never been to the salt can build a car/bike and it will meet the 
rules, (if anybody is from NH, please excuse me for using your state 
as one of my points, its just pretty far away and the first state I 
thought of, besides, I think the state is cool) and in the 60's and 
70's most everyone who raced was from the left part of the country 
and knew most everybody. As I look at my build diary, I see that I 
tried very hard to build to the edge of the rules, without breaking 
them, following the path that Smokey Yunick made. I also had to make 
numerous phone calls to tech guys asking questions that, once I raced 
on the Salt, were readily apparent, but not to my eyes in 1991 when I 
was reading the rule book then building.  I think that some of the 
motorcycle and car rule redoing now is from the Yunick philosophy 
being followed by racers,and a blurring of the classes was the 
result. So now the rule committee is trying to redo the class 
outlines so there is a clear distinction between them again. I do 
think that the rules could be a little less verbose, but hey, its 
easy to sit here at my computer and criticize, anybody who looks at 
my car/bike will say that they would have done something different 
during the build.... so I apologize if I stepped out of line...

 >Date: Tue, 7 Feb 2006 10:14:40 -0800 (GMT-08:00)
 >From: James Tone <gmc6power@earthlink.net>
 >Subject: Re:Rule books of the past

 >There were no El Mirage Records in the book then. There were very 
few Gas classes. Real race cars ran on fuel. Blowers were integrated 
into >the engine breaks. Very few M/C classes. Everyone knew what an 
engine swap, step pan, belly pan, roadster,  etc: was. Now out of 
work >lawyers are building race cars. Hey that's life....Good Luck...J.D.

 >I wonder why it's so big now?
 >Mike


           John Robinson, Mechanician
   Mechanical Engineering University of Wisconsin
                 1513 University Ave.
                  Madison, Wi. 53706
                     608-262-3606
            Current World Land Speed Record Holder
                  Bonneville Salt Flats
           H/GCC 92 cu.in. 1980 Dodge Colt
                  144.396 MPH set 2000
       MPS-PG 441 c.c. 1967 BSA Victor Motorcycle
                     95.193 MPH set 2001
                 Antarctic Ice Driller Oct02-Jan03




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