BigMike's Forum

24 Hours of LeMons (Now Open To The Public!) => General LeMons Talk => Topic started by: BigMike on April 15, 2010, 05:56:51 PM

Title: BS Tech Inspection Videos
Post by: BigMike on April 15, 2010, 05:56:51 PM
Bribing gets a "Bribed" decal painted on the car. They sure looked over the engine & car real quick like. This is how we need our inspection to go
http://www.youtube.com/v/NoAb6qupm4M&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x006699&color2=0x54abd6


This one is pretty funny. The camera man is all over the place, maybe because he was trying to hide the camera, but the guys speech is hilarious hahaha
http://www.youtube.com/v/8ZPASH_vFbo&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x006699&color2=0x54abd6

Cool time elapsed video of a tech inspection. Watch that table fill up with booooooze!!
http://www.youtube.com/v/Y--Kqmbgtpg&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x006699&color2=0x54abd6

Check out these guys. I don't think they were required to do this, I think they put on this show just to give the judges a good time. There car doesn't have much of a theme though...
http://www.youtube.com/v/81-AH5uD1CA&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x006699&color2=0x54abd6

Okay, these guys got penalized and had to do a Macho Man dance behind a Judgemobile car:
http://www.youtube.com/v/v_slPbqHx_I&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x006699&color2=0x54abd6
Title: Re: BS Tech Inspection Videos
Post by: BigMike on April 15, 2010, 06:05:04 PM
There is a rule where if the car seems to valuable, then they will require the team to  "devalue it"

http://www.youtube.com/v/SLRh7OE1rkk&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x006699&color2=0x54abd6
Title: Re: BS Tech Inspection Videos
Post by: Sirdeuce on April 29, 2010, 03:46:34 PM
To help with the inspection read the forum on the LeMons site. Lemons tech- Common tech failures.
Title: Re: BS Tech Inspection Videos
Post by: BigMike on April 29, 2010, 09:56:22 PM
Quote from: Sirdeuce on April 29, 2010, 03:46:34 PM
To help with the inspection read the forum on the LeMons site. Lemons tech- Common tech failures.

Here is the thread Bill is referring to: Common Tech Failures (http://forums.24hoursoflemons.com/viewtopic.php?id=3334)


Here is the opening post:

Quote from: Evil GeniusI figured I'd post some of the most common tech failures we've seen, at least on the west coast.  These are in no particular order.

1.  360 degree welds on the cage.   Often on the main hoop to halo or down bars and the door bars to the main hoop, two very difficult places to get a complete weld.  One car at Phoenix had only tack welds on the door bars....

1a. Please read the roll cage rules- We are seeing a bunch of cars without backstays and main hoop diagonals.  At Pointless there was quite a few teams struggling to get their cages fixed before the race started.  Also, two of the recent rollovers were cages that were found lacking  and were fixed the night before the race.  Re-read the cage rules and get it right.

2.  Poorly installed harnesses.    Mostly the belts aren't wrapped correctly, look at a diagram, when finished the loose end of the belt should be pointed away from the driver and only one bar of the 3 bar clip should be visible, again,  look at a diagram online or the one that comes with your harness set.   On clip-in belts, you need to install a locking cotter-pin or safety wire.  All bolts/eyebolts must have strong mounting points, either the stock,welded in and reinforced seatbelt mounts  or backed up with washers as per the rules.   Lap belts must be at the right angle to restrain the driver, we've seen quite a few belts that were mounted too far forward to do any good, the belts must lay on the drivers hip-bones and pull both down and back to be effective.   Same with sub-belts, the belt must pull down and back, we will fail a sub-belt that runs over the front of the bottom seat cushion and back to the lap belts.    All parts of the harness should be away from sharp protrusions that will fray the belt and cannot be mounted so that the webbing of the harness is clamped between the metal of the car and the belt bracket, that will also cause fraying.    If you have HANS-specific belts then everybody on your team MUST use a HANS, these belts are not safe without the use of a HANS.   

3. Poorly installed seats. Loose, sloppy seats will fail tech.   The seat must not be able to fail in a rear-end impact.  That means that there has to be something structural within 6" of the back of the seat, that includes your shortest driver.  A back brace is highly recommended.  This rule also includes in-date FIA seats, there is no difference in the rules by type of seat, all must not be able to fail rearward.

4.  Disconnect Switch.  The switch must cut off all power to the engine, that usually means that the alternator circuit has to be cut as well as battery power.  The switch also has to be reachable and marked.

5. Electrical clean up.  Most of you have managed to cover the + terminal on your battery, but not on the back of your disconnect switch or elsewhere there is 12 volt power.   If I see an uncovered terminal or bare wire, I will make you cover it.   

6.  Loose stuff.  Zip-ties are you friends, get everything tied down.  This falls under the de-scuzzification part of the rules.   

7.  Fire extinguisher, geez, you'd think that the rules are written in Sanskrit.   Metal brackets that are through-bolted, done.  Why do we still see so many plastic brackets held on with one screw?   

8. Windshields:  We've seen a bunch of totally spider-webbed broken windshields lately. We failed them and the teams had to scramble for a windshield Friday night.  A few small cracks/ chips are ok, beyond that, get it fixed.

9.  Oil leaks- we cannot let the track get oiled down and a car that leaves a trail of oil through tech is going to be told to fix it.

These are what I've seen most often: there are, of course, many others, from missing bars in the roll cage to
fuel tanks and lines being very poorly done..
Title: Re: BS Tech Inspection Videos
Post by: BigMike on April 29, 2010, 10:19:04 PM
We won't have any trouble with the safety aspect of tech inspection. We had to build our Formula Toyota to a very strict set of rules for all the Rock Crawling competitions we entered. Regarding this gentleman's advice on seats, I think it is fair to say that we can use a stock MR2 seat without it being attached to the roll cage because the back wall is right there.

BigMike
Title: Re: BS Tech Inspection Videos
Post by: Sirdeuce on April 30, 2010, 10:35:41 AM
That was the main reason for the suggestion to read this bit. the question of the seatback support came up several times.
Title: Re: BS Tech Inspection Videos
Post by: BigMike on April 30, 2010, 10:58:08 AM
That is a great find Bill, It's great to read that.

When we go to the event in August we will have to hang out at the tech inspection all morning and see what ppl are doing wrong :) I think we will be very surprised at how crappy the cars are out there, well at least I know I've not experienced anything like this so it will be a shock to me ;)
Title: Re: BS Tech Inspection Videos
Post by: Sirdeuce on April 30, 2010, 11:32:00 AM
I've dragged before, but this seems like it will be waayyy different.