Glenn,
Speaking from the racing side of things, I agree that the big 3 suppliers have
not focused on the performance side of things. There are some people out
there who do focus on the performance side of things. Ted Schumacher has a
few performance goodies, ReK racing, PRI, Rick Cline are the ones I can think
of off hand. The thing is, the market for the performance side is so small,
probably less than 10%, with 8% being racers and some of the stuff from
suppliers mentioned above is not legal for some sanctioning bodies.
It sucks...I know...but things like alloy water pump housings, inboard rear
disc brakes and things like that are what float my boat..$$$$
Aaron Johnson
#38 F-Prod Spit MkIV Oregon Region SCCA
----- Original Message -----
From: Glenn Trunnell
To: spitfires@autox.team.net
Sent: Tuesday, June 10, 2003 5:42 PM
Subject: Where's the innovation?
The following is a tirade, quit reading now if you don't want to bother
with it!
I just got my new Roadster Factory summer flyer, I 've also received
several LBC magazines and catalogs from other sources. In every case as
I looked through them I asked myself "where's the new stuff?". I
realize that a lot of our cars are approaching their 30th birthday, and
there's not millions of them on the road like the Hondas and Toyotas,
but couldn't one of the big 3 or a smaller company come up with
something new! There are literally hundreds of companies making things
for the import tuner market, couldn't we support even one? I'm talking
about real innovation here though, sure everybody can sell you a weber
or a header or a gas flowed head, but why can't you get a smog legal
performance carb for a British car or aftermarket fuel injection for
less than a down payment on a house? Pierce manifolds is selling a
cross flow head for MGs now, but it doesn't have the air injection ports
so it's illegal on the streets anywhere there are smog laws (and that's
going to be the entire U.S. very soon), would it have been that hard to
make it legal? Maybe I'm crazy, but it seems to me that there is a
market for street legal performance parts out there for our cars, I just
wish that the manufacturers would realize and put a little money into
developing them.
End of Rant, Thanks for your patience,
Glenn Trunnell
/// spitfires@autox.team.net mailing list
/// or try http://www.team.net/cgi-bin/majorcool
/// Archives at http://www.team.net/archive
|