Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

When you decide to field a Lemons car, you have to decide if you want to be competitive and get a car that has a chance of winning but is likely common, or go the completely odd-ball route and realize that your car will not win and likely will not finish.

While I respect and love the latter route, some teams (like ours) are forced to go with the former mindset due to talent/budget/equipment restrictions. It's a lot easier to go with some weird ass car if you have a whole shop, a ton of experience, and lots of tools at your disposal.

We picked an E30 because they have half a chance at finishing and maybe even winning (we lost that gamble at Altamont '08 - I still curse whatever German engineer decided the crank position sensor should run off the flywheel), are easy to find parts for, and have bolt-in roll cages available (we would not trust our lives on our own welding skills). Without these points, we wouldn't have had the chance to build up a race car at all.

I've seen some of the other teams blogs showing their cars being repaired on lifts in shops next to exotics and full blown race cars. If building our E30 in my buddy's navy housing garage (don't tell the HOA) using nothing but hand tools, a floor jack, and a bunch of Tecates is the "easy" way to build a Lemons racer, you might as well call some of the other team La-Z-Boys.

Forgetting the fact that there were only 3-4 E30s in the race before I decided to enter my own team (I had twice raced with another team previously), we knew that our car would be fairly common, so like Murilee said, we decided to go with a cool theme (at least in our opinion) which we have been improving on with every race. It also helps that it's self depreciating humor, and hopefully that'll piss off a few BMW ///nazis, heh.

Bottom line, don't penalize anyone for any car. If Jay and his crew deems the team acceptable, that should be enough.

The Homer: Powerful like a gorilla, yet soft and yielding like a Nerf ball.

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

MurileeMartin wrote:

Keep in mind, all you racers feeling feeling a deep sense of persecution because we're picking on your car, that the vast majority of E30s, Miatas, RX-7s, Mustangs, et al get zero penalty laps during the BS inspection. We do, however, scrutinize such cars much more closely than we would, say, a Kia Sephia or diesel Golf.

As for BMWs... why, we love Lemons BMWs! Think of all those $300 E24s, E23s, and E21s out there!

E24 ....


YEEEEAAAAAHHHHHH

Uberbird!

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

The few E24s we've seen at Lemons have been fast as hell. Plenty of junkyard parts for them, too.

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

LTDScott wrote:

When you decide to field a Lemons car, you have to decide if you want to be competitive and get a car that has a chance of winning but is likely common, or go the completely odd-ball route and realize that your car will not win and likely will not finish.

While I respect and love the latter route, some teams (like ours) are forced to go with the former mindset due to talent/budget/equipment restrictions. It's a lot easier to go with some weird ass car if you have a whole shop, a ton of experience, and lots of tools at your disposal.

Quote for Truth!   

This is the exact issue my upstart team is facing.   My coworker and I both work at jobs that do not afford much in truly disposable income, and I have the bonus of a wife and 2 little girls and a mortgage and non-Lemony payments and all sorts of unimportant stuff.   Neither of us has a garage nor especially fancy tools (beyond dremels, socket sets and a sawzall), NOR access to a shop.   Maybe we'll be able to recruit someone who does.... In the meantime, it's go with what you know and have... so I'm hoping that won't stop us.   

Heck, I'm even willing risk the wrath of the neighborhood association by becoming "that guy" (did I mention we just moved here?)... "that guy" with 3 or 4 cars in the yard... just to get this started, let alone done!

So we currently don't have the means to do something epic.   But I would hope our efforts to convert an otherwise arguably "meh" car into a Lemons racer, on a severely limited budget outdoors in the middle of a field, would be worth something.  Sometimes it's about heart.

For our investment, we have to consider reliability and seat time.   The "$500 rule" is the bait... but the switch comes once you sit and realize that a true, first weekend will incur at least $3,000 in car costs and $1-or-2,000 in travel/prep/weekend incidentals.  It's not cheap.  I'm not going to ask for an average investment of $1,000 per team member just to blow up in a couple hours.  *I* can't even afford that!

Which is a shame, because I found a sweet AMC Concord 4x4 TWO-DOOR half-abandoned not too far from here.  If our budget and resources would allow, I'd snap that up in an instant!   But that would add a ton of potential complexity to our team that at this early stage, we are not ready to handle.

30 (edited by LTDScott 2009-05-05 03:38 PM)

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

goingincirclez wrote:

For our investment, we have to consider reliability and seat time.   The "$500 rule" is the bait... but the switch comes once you sit and realize that a true, first weekend will incur at least $3,000 in car costs and $1-or-2,000 in travel/prep/weekend incidentals.  It's not cheap.  I'm not going to ask for an average investment of $1,000 per team member just to blow up in a couple hours.  *I* can't even afford that!

True that. This is exactly what happened our first time out. Only 3 of our 5 drivers (including myself) got a turn behind the wheel before our car went tits up. I felt incredibly bad that neither of them got any seat time, because they both put in their fair share of money and labor to get the car together. This is why it's important for me as a team captain to have a car which will spend more time on the track than in the pits. And that decision is why we went with a "common" car but with a wacky theme.

Luckily one of the drivers who got shafted made up for it on our 2nd outing, and the other decided to form his own team for which I'll be a pit lackey during the Reno race.

The Homer: Powerful like a gorilla, yet soft and yielding like a Nerf ball.

31 (edited by theallpowerfulme 2009-05-05 04:45 PM)

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Having spent loads of dough/time to only complete 7 laps under green and 2 days of wrenching in the hot/humid SC weather, I know the feeling of disappointment. However, we still had a blast and are doing it again. This is the nature of the race. Just because someone chooses a car that may be more reliable (common sense dictates that many teams could choose the same  reliable and well-performing vehicles), why would they need to be punished?

Bottom line: if you look at the winners of all of the Lemons races thus far, you will see many different and capable cars. It seems to me that though there are many of one type of car in any particular race, that doesn't seem to mean jack when it comes to winner's circle time.

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

theallpowerfulme wrote:

Just because someone chooses a car that may be more reliable (common sense dictates that many teams could choose the same  reliable and well-performing vehicles), why would they need to be punished?

More reliable? You mean reliable in the manner of Herr Doktor Unter-Den-Elektrische-Fritzen, the E30? Or the Shogun Of Blown Head Gaskets, the (enter name of any Honda/Acura product here)? No, the lure of those cars is that they go real fast and make you feel like Superfly, James Bond, and Kung Fu all mixed together. Nothing wrong with that, of course.

Anyway, don't get your panties in a bunch. We're not going to hammer on certain cars just because they're more common. We are, however, going to scrutinize certain cars much more closely than others during the BS Inspection, and we're also going to make common cars with boring themes redecorate on the spot.

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

MurileeMartin wrote:

and we're also going to make common cars with boring themes redecorate on the spot.

Best idea EVER!  Start printing out applications of the "lame" candidates.. and make them follow through with EVERYTHING on the app before they can compete!

A can of Krylon doth not a Lemons car make

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

MurileeMartin wrote:
theallpowerfulme wrote:

Just because someone chooses a car that may be more reliable (common sense dictates that many teams could choose the same  reliable and well-performing vehicles), why would they need to be punished?

More reliable? You mean reliable in the manner of Herr Doktor Unter-Den-Elektrische-Fritzen, the E30? Or the Shogun Of Blown Head Gaskets, the (enter name of any Honda/Acura product here)? No, the lure of those cars is that they go real fast and make you feel like Superfly, James Bond, and Kung Fu all mixed together. Nothing wrong with that, of course.

Good points, I just meant more reliable (probably) than a renault, a citroen, a mitsubishi, anything with a quad-four, etc (in our case a damn subaru). Either way, who cares what other teams bring? I like watching them all go around the track!

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Start printing out applications of the "lame" candidates.. and make them follow through with EVERYTHING on the app before they can compete!

quoted for TRUTH!  We have our application printed and taped to the white board where we organize everything for the car, just to make sure we don't reneg on anything!

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

theallpowerfulme wrote:

Either way, who cares what other teams bring? I like watching them all go around the track!

Right, but a lot of the spectators would become bored if Lemons became the E30-Miata Challenge. This race is for them, too.

37 (edited by SharkBait 2009-05-05 07:31 PM)

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

MurileeMartin wrote:

As for BMWs... why, we love Lemons BMWs! Think of all those $300 E24s, E23s, and E21s out there!

You forgot about E28s, the bigger unsung brother of the E30. Strip it down enough and the extra weight becomes next to nothing. We removed another 50lbs from ours in the past month or so. It has a wider stance as well.

The problem with the E24 is that if I found one for $300, I'd want to actually build it into a street car.

The Sharks
Home of the E28 Turbo Tuner Fish and the Hammered Head 944 Turbo

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

First to Jonny and Phil, I appreciate all your efforts and coverage of Lemons.  I am sorry you guys aren't driving the V8olvo any more.  I thought you guys got a pass on your judicial duties for Arse-Freeze-Apalooza.  You guys really make the race work and I greatly appreciate it.  I don't consider our contributions to you guys as bribes, I consider them tips for doing a great job.

I do like the obscure cars too. 

What I meant about a cheater cage is I figure you guys have enough connections that a whole bunch of people would put a cage in a Citron for you guys for free.  If I could do it, I would.

For the other fledgling dreamers of future Lemons glory:

We used a Jegster kit for the 240Z while my friend and team mate had an Autopower cage out of a wrecked race car.  The Autopower cage was way to valuable to die in my crappy old rust bucket.   

Back to the Jegster, to say some assembly was required is an understatement.  It came with a total of 4 bent tubes, a bunch of straight tube, a couple of notched pieces and a generic 1 page instruction sheet.  It was like $400 shipped for a 12 point cage.  Price was right but there is way to much room for mis-interpretation than I would like.

For those of you thinking about running Lemons, I highly encourage a bolt in cage from Autopower or someone like that.  It eliminates a lot of guess work and welding.  Yes, I think a weld in is probably a bit stronger but a bolt in passes all the tech checks so they most be safe enough.

With our initial impression of Lemons being a go fast derby.  We figured our chassis would be a total loss after the first race.  We were just hoping to salvage the drive train and suspension.  With my concerns about becoming a hood ornament to a 70's vintage full size piece of American iron.  I went a bit nuts over building the cage.  It was the first cage I ever did and most of my friends too.  I bought a tube bender and notcher from Harbor Freight.  We did most of the cage work in our under-construction barn/shop (24x30) or my 2 car garage in suburbia.  I got the main cage tacked together and my friend who is a professional welder did the pretty welds in my garage with a 110 mig.

To do a cage for a car like a Citron yourself would be enough torture for about 6 races.  I'd love to see it but I don't want to build it.

As LTDScott said, an E30 still ain't no picnic either.  Which is my whole point.  Race prepping any car is a LOT of work.  The more rare and obscure the car the more work it's gonna be.  I suggest finding a car with a cage kit from someone like Autpower.  If Autopower doesn't make a cage for a particular car, maybe that's a sign from the racing Gods (don't race this POS).

So even the Judges have chimed in, build whatever car makes you happy.  If it's an E30, make sure your theme is good.

Regarding the Autopower cage my friend has, it's in the second car now.  We had so much fun we are growing.  New Orleans is only weeks away and that car ain't anywhere near race ready.  Yet another race prep right down to the wire. 

LAISSEZ LES CRAPHEAPS ROULEZ

Troy

#35 LRE
1973 Datsun 240Z

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Troy wrote:

I suggest finding a car with a cage kit from someone like Autpower.  If Autopower doesn't make a cage for a particular car, maybe that's a sign from the racing Gods (don't race this POS).

So even the Judges have chimed in, build whatever car makes you happy.  If it's an E30, make sure your theme is good.

Regarding the Autopower cage my friend has, it's in the second car now.  We had so much fun we are growing.  New Orleans is only weeks away and that car ain't anywhere near race ready.  Yet another race prep right down to the wire. 

LAISSEZ LES CRAPHEAPS ROULEZ

I would also say to check S&W racecars (http://www.swracecars.com). It turns out that a cage for a 3rd gen Fbody fits in a SVX with slight modification. Who knew?

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

While our team is bored with all of the BMW's and Miata's, we have nothing against them.  They have an excellent power to weight ratio and they are cheap!  I don't think that penalizing them is really necessary.  The judges are all over them already.  Besides, instead of complaining about them, why not try to beat them?  Call it a challenge in a challenge.

The other crowd shoots for the Index award.  Some say the true meaning of Lemons.  I have to say, after seeing a few of the recent "contenders", these are usually not the cars you have to worry about beating you to the checkered flag.  Heavy Metal was a great IoE winner, but did you see how slow it was???

We believe the process of dragging something weird out of the woods and turning it into a viable, contending race car is the fun part.  While starting with an E30 is no guarantee of victory, it sure gives you a good start.  However, starting with a failed econobox car and then spend countless hours in the garage with the welder and bloody knuckles and come out just in time with a completely unheard of car that is actually fast, now that is unique and fun.

Our own Colt missed the mark pretty bad last time (seems someone forgot to clean the old fuel tank out), but we'll have her back next time and look to be more competitive.  The cool thing about our project was that we discovered that some cars that sucked on the street can excel on the track with a few modifications.  The Colt could fly through corners like it was on rails and all we did was cut the coils.  Light and nimble, just gutless.

I guess you can say "to each his own", and having any car on the track is better than none, but for me and my team we love the unique challenge and excitement that the Colt brings to the track.  I wonder if it would bother the E30 guys to lose to a Colt?

Mike
Lab Rats Motorsports
1988 Mitsubishi/Dodge/Fiat Colt Carpocalypse Edition

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Troy wrote:

I suggest finding a car with a cage kit from someone like Autpower.  If Autopower doesn't make a cage for a particular car, maybe that's a sign from the racing Gods (don't race this POS).

Funny thing about that... we bought our cage from Autopower (they're local and gave us a discount for picking it up) and it turns out it wouldn't quite fit our car. The rear downtubes that attach to the rear wheel wells would not sit anywhere near flush. I'm sure they've sold dozens of E30 cages so they were pretty confused and offered to tow our car over to their shop (about 2 miles away) and fix it. A day later it was done and they towed our car back. Great customer service!

The only thing we could think of is that the coupes and sedans are different (I'm sure more people race coupes), but they were surprised to never have run into this before.

The Homer: Powerful like a gorilla, yet soft and yielding like a Nerf ball.

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

MurileeMartin wrote:

Why not just start out with a Fox Mustang and avoid all those junkyard trips and endless fabrication headaches? Or, given that John "Evil Genius" Pagel- owner of a Miata shop and builder of that so-called "cheater crap" cage- was a team member, why not run a Miata? Well, hell, where's the fun in that?

Meanwhile, we made this:

http://photos-f.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs019.snc1/3031_75001050487_667305487_1772453_8015181_n.jpg

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Since the keys to winning Lemons (if you're shooting for the overall lap win, that is) are reliability and penalty avoidance, getting a fast car isn't going to help all that much. Note that, in the overwhelming majority of races, the winning car's best lap time isn't even in the top ten. Even the Metro Gnome motorcycle-engined Geo that won Thunderhill had only the 12th fastest lap time of the race (in spite of the popular perception that it was by far the quickest thing on the track).

So, what cars have actually taken the checkered flag at the 13 Lemons races so far? It goes like this:
Toyota Corolla
Dodge Neon
BMW E28
Toyota Supra
Mazda Protege
Acura Integra
Mazda RX-7
Mazda Miata
Toyota Supra
Toyota Corolla FX16
Geo Metro
Ford Mustang
BMW E30

Now, Integras are just so damn quick that one was bound to keep its head gasket intact and avoid red-misty penalty visits long enough to make it through a whole race (though that gasket was starting to blow towards the end). Any Miata that gives the impression of being way faster than everyone else (as they so often are)... well, the mob takes care of that. The vast majority of E30s have at least one maddeningly time-consuming breakdown and/or several "it was the other guy's fault" penalties.

But what about the Supra, the Neon, the Protege, and the FX16 Corolla? They're quick, they're reliable, you can get bolt-in cage kits, and the junkyards are bursting at the seams with cheap parts. Why don't more of the teams who "just want to contend on a budget" buy those cars? We don't see them in anywhere near the numbers you'd expect. Then there are cars that have done very well, race after race, but haven't won yet; the four-cylinder Fox Mustang comes to mind (check past race results and you'll see that the four-banger Mustangs- and I'm talking about the non-turbo Pinto-engined cars here- generally do better than their V8 brethren). The couple of Mercedes-Benz W201s we've seen have done well. And don't rule out the Yank Tanks; the Size Matters '67 Plymouth Fury would be a shrewd bet for you Goin' For Broken attendees who feel like taking advantage of legal gambling, and then there's Xarg's always-in-contention (unless it's upside-down) Cavalier wagon.

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Weird because I cant even come close down here in Houston to finding a $500 Miata. I've seen a few RX-7s but none that had a working (even half way) engine. I have a friend who bought a Supra for $300 but the jerk wont sell it to me. I guess I'll stick with my 80 Malibu until something comes around. Like my wife keeps telling me, its reliable, it makes laps without alot of breakage and you can get your Fat gut into it without alot of trouble....LOL

1980 Chevy Malibu Classic

45 (edited by MurileeMartin 2009-05-06 11:25 AM)

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Rumrunner wrote:

I guess I'll stick with my 80 Malibu until something comes around. Like my wife keeps telling me, its reliable, it makes laps without alot of breakage and you can get your Fat gut into it without alot of trouble....LOL

That Malibu is an excellent Lemons car- it's relentless, like an alligator crawling through the swamp. In spite of being possibly the slowest car on the track, it has finished in the 20s (out of 90+ cars) in both its races. Replace those 600-treadwear hard tires with something a bit stickier and you'd probably crack the top 10. Or wreck repeatedly.

http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/jalopnik/2009/03/TopTexans-24.jpg

http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/jalopnik/2008/10/24-66.JPG

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Miata's are out there, just not plentiful. We bought ours wrecked in the front , and sold the top and interior out of it.

Here's one that could work the same way... http://austin.craigslist.org/cto/1115194226.html

Team Lost in the Dark
Winner " I got screwed" and "Jay's dream car"
2012 Gulf region champs

47

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

With all the hate for the E30 and the Miata, I'm surprised they each only won once.  Supremacy?  Not yet, maybe never.  I expected 1/2 the victories to those two cars, but nope.

Jer / Schumacher Taxi Service
2010 Spring CMP I.O.E. winner
2010 Sebring overall winner
1996 Miata, 1991 BMW E30, 1987 coROLLa (retired), 1984 Citation (retired), 1993 Miata (retired)

48 (edited by Jer 2009-05-06 12:40 PM)

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Baron wrote:

Miata's are out there, just not plentiful. We bought ours wrecked in the front , and sold the top and interior out of it.

Here's one that could work the same way... http://austin.craigslist.org/cto/1115194226.html

You could probably get that car for $1,100, maybe $1,000.  That could work.

My Miata was $900, needs clutch and a wheel bearing, but came with a hardtop.  Bingo!  I'm just into positive dollars spent, and the car is streetable---barely.  The list of niggling problems is immense, but none that we care about for Lemons racing.  It will become Lemons fodder at Nelson Ledges.

Jer / Schumacher Taxi Service
2010 Spring CMP I.O.E. winner
2010 Sebring overall winner
1996 Miata, 1991 BMW E30, 1987 coROLLa (retired), 1984 Citation (retired), 1993 Miata (retired)

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

Having started spotting Miatas with some regularity in NorCal junkyards, I can tell that the going rate must be dropping. And, hey, here's a $400 diamond-in-the-rough for you Buttonwillow racers!
http://images.craigslist.org/3k03m23lbZZZZZZZZZ94d5a0b9acb4d0c1bc7.jpg

50 (edited by Ottobon 2009-05-06 08:12 PM)

Re: Lame-o unoriginal car choice penalties?

I have some spare "estate sale" lederhosens you could tape onto the most annoying of BMW drivers cars,  I was going to wear them but, you know, their not socially acceptable just yet, even though snoops down with them big_smile

http://buzzworthy.mtv.com/wp-content/up … /snoop.jpg

Anyways so long as the Judges don't throw them out on the first team they punish them with then I'd be more then happy to forfeit them (i need a real knee-britch chamois pear for paintball anyways.)  For anybody whose Bavarian in nature or knows about pants, their Cowhide suede, so its no big loss, I mean atleast their not buckskin!

Originally i was thinking you could force people to wear them, but then i realized how cruel forcing people to wear lederhosen is, so i think taping them, or hanging them from the car like a solute your shorts flag is the way to go.

Judges/Officials/ and or Scared Swiss Omas who think I'm trying to throw away a good pair of pants can contact me at pc_rally@yahoo.com