Racing in the 450R class

[JPEROG]

There is plenty of drama in all of the classes (main reason I don't have a SS boat) to race with my son. I do love the show and the drama is part of what makes everyone pay attention just like Nascar used to be. That being said, it also keeps me from wanting to be a participant. I have seen several boats touch a marker in the past and unless it was damaged or run over, there were not penalties issued.

This deal with mti and DW is going to become a more increasingly ford vs. chevy type scenario. I was watching the race yesterday at the lake with a bunch of the mti celebration attendees and the comments were pretty flagrant. The DW boats have very little time on them, one was a first time (in the boat crew), and both were in front of the main pack. All I heard was they are cheating again, can't compete with cheaters, etc., etc.--I hope for the sake of the class that people loose the attitude or that everyone gets ECUs issued at each race like the stock class used to.

Joe

[Jim Speros]

There is always some drama and lots of posturing. That's part of racing. I was speaking more to lack of penalties and protests in Super Stock.

Anyway I agree with you on handing out ECU's. What I understand is they are buried in a 450 and not an easy swap like Super Stock engines.

Can't pay attention to fans in general. People blindly love their brands. If you like the same thing great; if not that's fine too.

Kinda funny typical comments, " SO and so is winning a lot, He must be cheating." Or " I got a lot of money in my boat if he beats me he must be cheating."...

I hope most of all the big classes get along and stay big classes for the sake of the sport.

[trbocharge]

Those that say “that team is winning because they are cheating and that all the others are not” are ignorant IMO and have no idea about what it takes to campaign any race vehicle. Is cheating such a bad thing? Go ahead build a completely by the book race boat and see how you make out. You might do ok but the winners are absolutely stretching the rules and will do so until they get caught. Either through mechanical Tom foolery, dimensional hull massaging or weight manipulation are just a few. The idea is to know the rule book intimately and find ways around the words that will give you gains.

At the Marathon race my sources say that after the race inspectors noticed a red light on the DW ecus which indicated it was tampered with. The team refused to hand over the ecus which prompted part of the suspension although the team offered the ecus the next day. Point being they got caught time to pay the piper. To say all other teams are virgin pure, no way brother.

Read up on Nascars Genius Smokey Yunick to get my drift.

[JPEROG]

There is always some drama and lots of posturing. That's part of racing. I was speaking more to lack of penalties and protests in Super Stock.

Anyway I agree with you on handing out ECU's. What I understand is they are buried in a 450 and not an easy swap like Super Stock engines.

Can't pay attention to fans in general. People blindly love their brands. If you like the same thing great; if not that's fine too.


Kinda funny typical comments, " SO and so is winning a lot, He must be cheating." Or " I got a lot of money in my boat if he beats me he must be cheating."...

I hope most of all the big classes get along and stay big classes for the sake of the sport.

The 450s are accessible, the 300R is behind the intake and much more time consuming. Maybe they will come up with a wire harness extension and a remote mounting location to make things easy.

Joe

[Chaz]

Racing is not a democracy. No matter what venue you race under, if you are skip the scales .. (Ohh I forgot, I'll go over there now) Refuse .. fuel check, to be inspected, protested, etc. It will be a long time before the label of cheater wears off.

I was at the 5-day @ Moroso when Richard Matty's mufflered 8 second dragster made a bye run to a dead on 11.50 something. It sounded like it was on hydraulics all the way down. There was a lynch mob waiting at his trailer when he got there. He was informed that he was being protested. He quickly loaded his junk up. He was told he already had $2500.00 in the tower waiting if he passed protest inspection. He said .. keep it .. as he got in his truck and left as fast as he could.
Then when the "Dirty Dozen" got indefinite suspensions .. they cried. "They never caught us with anything illegal". LMAO .. yea .. OK

The boys in the red DW boat, weren't very good at hiding their hand either.

I did axe .. what was with the PCM in that boat .. ???

But as usual, the response was ....

[JPEROG]

The PCM passed inspection. They know what date, time, and rpm the motors were running throughout its entire lifespan. Mercury also has a data link when a dealer downloads run history etc. (big brother Merc. is watching). They are watching for good reason; https://www.epa.gov/enforcement/clea...se-resolutions.

If our government will go after all of these small companies then you know they will go after one that has some real money if they have a reason. They even went after Tesla back in 2010 LOL....must be that "The Big Guy" didn't have enough clout back then to call off the dogs like he would today. I was pulled over in my truck a couple months ago and the trooper did a fuel stick test to make sure I wasn't running "farm diesel" which doesn't have a road tax imposed. I asked him if it looked like a farm truck? and his response was that with fuel being $5.00 a gallon people are going around the system and people are getting prosecuted for selling off/road diesel to consumers.

Pretty amazing that our leaders force a market to start their own with lack of price control and then nail us for doing it. They have never been able to control the drug market so now they are in it as well by making everything legal and taxing it (really sad to watch).

Joe

[Chaz]

The PCM passed inspection.

One day after post-race tech-inspection, don't count. If it did, the infraction would be lifted ... immediately.

Easy for a nerd to build a simple piggy-back system to "adjust" the boost pressure signal .. hard part is removing it in front of prying eyes ..

[hellbents-10]

Well put Joe! The good ol days are behind us all now!

[JPEROG]

One day after post-race tech-inspection, don't count. If it did, the infraction would be lifted ... immediately.

Easy for a nerd to build a simple piggy-back system to "adjust" the boost pressure signal .. hard part is removing it in front of prying eyes ..

The ecu shows a track of what speed, boost, rpm, temp., and water pressure the motor has had its whole life along with any and all guardian infractions. Pretty easy to go to the date and time in question then verify the perimeters of where things were. If there were boxes available to change things, (boost, fuel pressure, rpm), I know several people that would have them and say to hell with a warranty "myself being one of them". The power 450s put down is impressive and only better things are to come in the future.

Joe

[Chaz]

The PCM would never know. Hence the term "piggyback" ..

As long as the sensors are three wire, hot, ground and 0-5v reference, even my non-electronics azz came up with a IAT "diverter" ..

The question is not what Mercury will unveil in the future. The question remains :

"Why did they not allow the PCM to be tested until a day later" ???

[JPEROG]

The PCM would never know. Hence the term "piggyback" ..

As long as the sensors are three wire, hot, ground and 0-5v reference, even my non-electronics azz came up with a IAT "diverter" ..

The question is not what Mercury will unveil in the future. The question remains :

"Why did they not allow the PCM to be tested until a day later" ???

That would have to be asked with "why did they blow up and scream at officials"? my guess is that they were pissed when nobody else was questioned or asked to turn their boxes over. Aside from the fact their are short tempers involved, personality conflicts involved, the real root cause goes back to the last race where several things were discovered on the MTI boats being outside of the rules. When these issues were brought up to the officials, the answer they were given was (we will allow you to make the same modifications). 1. They were in Key West with limited tools and parts, 2. The race was two hours away, and tempers flew off then as well so a lot of this stuff is a carry over. Bottom line is they were almost banned for the season over nothing and you should be selling an ECU mod that people could sign a warranty release waiver on and make yourself a bunch of money-let me know when your "non-electronic azz" has them ready.

Joe

[2thelake]

That would have to be asked with "why did they blow up and scream at officials"? my guess is that they were pissed when nobody else was questioned or asked to turn their boxes over. Aside from the fact their are short tempers involved, personality conflicts involved, the real root cause goes back to the last race where several things were discovered on the MTI boats being outside of the rules. When these issues were brought up to the officials, the answer they were given was (we will allow you to make the same modifications). 1. They were in Key West with limited tools and parts, 2. The race was two hours away and tempers flew off then as well so a lot of this stuff is a carry over. Bottom line is they were almost banned for the season over nothing and you should be selling an ECU mod that people could sign a warranty release waiver on and make yourself a bunch of money-let me know when your "non-electronic azz" has them ready.

Joe

Any mods to those ECUs and there would be Japanese zeros flying over Florida like Pearl Harbor! Cease and desist lawsuits and more lawsuits!!!

[JPEROG]

I agree....

Joe

[Double Rigged]

Great read lol. Over the years of racing making modifications, pushing limits of rules part of it. If class is stock then motors should be stock parts and computers. Mercury needs to supply computers for both 450 and super stock. I think it will happen sooner than later. Plenty of flashed motors putting up big numbers for all brands in pleasure boats as well. Jack Hammer obviously found something too lol or 10 other boats missed set up. Going to be a fun year to watch

[Jim Speros]

Jackhammer is the only Superstock I have seen swinging props in.