Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
Moderators: dirtonly  /  dmantx  /  hosehead

What about claim rules? I've heard of them and saw a rule take place. Most of you live will your ear closer to the heartbeat of racing. Would Tony Stewart spend the same amount of money if Sye Lynch could buy his wingless set up for $45,000?

Even though I may not know you, I 
care what most of you think!

They are SBC or LS motors running on Methanol making around 420 HP. You probably couldn't get Sammy Swindell as your driver but the competition is close and the series is growning. We had a 24 car field this past Saturday for the Jerry Richert Memorial at Cedar Lake Speedway. Big thanks to Ron B of the UMSS for starting something that actually works up here in our neck of the woods.

That's a big question that doesn't have a definite answer. Short answer, it's going to vary by car. The teams I'm familar with have different rates depending on the part of the car. For example getting on the wing is going to cost more than the hood. Both sides of the wing will cost more than a single side. If you break it down to two wing sides, the grandstand side is more than the infield side. You get the idea. More exposure, more $$. Do you have a particular driver you are looking at? If so, all you can do is talk to him and explain your situation and they can help guide you from there. If not, you have a lot of questions to ask yourself. Do you want someone you think will generally run in the front all the time and will hopefully get you more exposure? If that's the case, you're going to have to narrow down your list and do some leg work to determine costs for each because they all won't be the same.  If a prominent placement on a front running car is determined to be out of reach, another option is a midpack car. Depending on your investment, you might make someone who is currently a midpack car more competitive and really get some bang for your buck. They may be able to offer you a more prominent place on the car that you might not be able to afford with another driver. Do you care if it's a one night a week car or must it be two nights?  If it's two nights, is the locale of the second track important to you and your organization or can it be either?  Some other things to consider. Are you expecting any more of this driver/team other than putting your name out there such as making appearances?  What is your organization promoting and does that align with personality/image of the driver/team?  I think I've probably given you more questions than answers but I hope I've give you things to consider. You're going to have to do some inquiring to get some hard numbers. 

Makes sense to me... downward spiral. Less demand, higher price, leads to EVEN less demand

     Doesn't work like that. Lower demand means people are not willing to buy your product now at the current price. Sure, you can try to raise your price, but if the demand is down now, just wait until you try raising your price. If demand is up, you can get away with raising your prices.

Thanks for the info. Looks like there is a lot of cost just in raw materials alone, then you add in the machines, and intellectual knowledge, probably already a high price item. Then you add in profit margin, which it seems that builders, manufacturers, tracks, owners/driver is minimal depending on the type of year you have. Way to bridge the gap seems to be through sponsorship. Almost all need some form of it in order to keep the lights on. 

Seems all have a hand in the rising costs just because of the nature. Drivers/owners want to win so the will pay higher price for equipment that "should" make them faster, builders need money for materials & time to make that happen, tracks have to payout a purse but not too much to stay open

I think you're oversimplifying again. You said, " Lower demand means people are not willing to buy your product now at the current price".... "people" is too general a term. Some teams have no problem paying for the best stuff, weekly racers don't. Thus it becomes a smaller, more exclusive & expensive market.

There are less teams now... do you see prices going down? hell no

Depends on the Demand & Supply as well. We maybe underestimate the supply factor. Basic Economics has been proven time & time again that is your demand is low but your supply is high then you need to lower the price. However if you keep your supply (say chassis parts & engine parts,etc) low & the demand is high for your product then you can charge a higher price. 

Say an engine builder has 10 new engines but he knows there are 20 guys that would want to purchase them (based on their credibility & results). The engine builder can charge a higher price because the demand is there. There are companies out there that produce less products on purpose because they can have a higher profit margin because they know the demand will far exceed their supply. Because of that, people that want it bad enough are willing to pay extra when something first comes out.

Supply & demand don't always work the way they're supposed to, as in textbooks. Demand is measured in $$$, by ability to pay, not necessarily by need. For example, there are millions of people in Somalia who want food, but have no $$ to pay for it. Kids in the USA want video games & have $$$. Guess who gets what they want?

So with sprint cars, lots of people would like to race, but can't afford it. Does the price come down? No, cause engine builders are not gonna build engines at a loss.... check somebody's previous post breaking down all the details that go into engine building

Correct supply & demand don't always work which case in point would be Somalia which would not be what I would call a developed, advanced, free market economy with a lot of money flowing through it. It does work in the U.S free market.

Yes the a lot of people want to race but only a small amount can afford to do so and even a smaller amount of people know how to build an engine. Factor in that it is a speciality that isn't based on mass production but based on ability, know-how, and results which is probably where the price is set to begin with. Some of your best engine builders know that they can get X amount of teams to pay Y price because of their proven track record. Now most likely the initial price for anything is not going to come down becuase as you said the builder is not going to build an engine at a loss which no one should do a profession that will lose money. Given the breakout of raw materials for an engine the cost is already high. It would come down to is the money that a builder is making worth the time for a builder to continue to do so. I would guess if a well known builder dropped his price by $10 or $15K they might get more business but would they make more money to cancel out for the drop in price, plus the increase in workload.

When it comes to 410 sprint cars and dirt super lates, TSR, Clint Bowyer Racing, KKR and all the Nascar money teams drive the motor costs through the roof. They set the market price on competitive motors now. When Kistler would sell TSR 20 motors a year a few years back, for at that time 60k a piece.... when we went there, I am sure they wouldnt sell us the same motor for 50k because we were on a budget.

Tell me how in 2019, with all the advances in CNC and manufacturing, it costs 25-30k MORE now 20 years later, with only a 100 hp gain. What doesnt help is the overhead at all these builders facilities now. They all have in house CNC and machine shops, Chassis Dynos and other big dollar equipment they used to contract before. Someone has to cover all that overhead, and it is usually passed on to the buyer. The industry lets itself get out of control but as long as the Nascar money is there to support it, it will continue. Either that or go to a mid level builder and be down 30-50 hp and 2 tenths off pace at the big tracks. I dont see it getting any better.

Now you're WAY off base, never gonna happen. That kind of thing is only for hobby classes

No professional team would ever accept that

     No thanks. Claim rules are the quickest and easiest way to start fistfights, grudge claims, on-track alterations, sandbagging, rule bending and racers taking out other cars on the track.

We charge as much as we can and still be friends!!

    If I use a coupon, can I get a discount on a motor that would let me be competitive  in the 7th to 10th place position in the feature at my local track?

This has been an interesting topic, besides the economics debate lol.  My thought on that is, whoever builds the highest horsepower engine can charge whatever they want because there are a few teams out there that will pay whatever it takes to get an advantage no matter what the cost is and they might pay a premium to make sure other teams can't get that same motor.  

There's no denying that rising costs are slowly killing racing.  This should concern anyone who is a fan of racing.  The WOO and all stars have good numbers but they still rely a lot on the local racers for their show, a 15 car race isn't going to be much fun to watch at a lot of tracks.  My personal opinion is it's up to the WOO and the all stars to reduce the costs, since so many tracks use outlaw rules, in fact I think it's in their best interest.  A lot of people think the NASCAR drivers bring a never ending supply of money, I think at one point I read that Tony Stewart $30-$35 million a year but an article I read recently said that Jimmie Johnson was the only driver making more than $10 million a year today with most of the majority of them making less than a million a year.  The only reason I bring this up is, in 20 years will former NASCAR drivers be able to fund WOO teams?

I think the biggest reason for the rising costs for all racing are due to all the specialty parts on all the different kinds of race cars.  For instance, is a 410 block used in any other type of racecar?  Other than nuts and bolts is there anything used on a sprint car that can be used on another type of racecar?  I'm thinking maybe late models have some parts that can be swapped but is there anything else?  It seems to me there's a lot of old technology in sprint cars that is designed only for sprint cars.  If a new 410 engine is $60 or $65 thousand (which I believe), and you can buy a brand new Challenger hellcat which has over 700 hp and a 60,000 mile warranty for $60,000, I'm thinking it would be a cheaper way to build motors using mass produced engines like they did 50-60 years ago.  This is just an idea but I think if they could get back to using more mass produced parts would drastically lower prices.

Big difference between 700 vs 900 hp particularly when we are talking naturally aspirated.  

There isn’t much that transfers from a 410 sprinter to a super late.  Weight is king (or lack of) in all motorsports but the sprint car world takes it to another extreme. Just google around and look at some the the block lightening videos on YouTube. There is one from Donovan blocks where they were super excited about pulling 8 more lbs off the block via their new lightening program. 

Sprints on Dirt type tire and engine rules. SOD is unlimited CID like late models. Smaller diameter Big Block modified tire on RR, late model tire on LR.

Doty type wing angle/placement rule. No cockpit adjuster and wickerbill. ~20 degrees max angle and plumb bob in front of rear axle crossing scales.

ASCS 1475 lb weight rule. Bonus $ for top finishing 360/358. They could win at a lot of tracks.

Simple, cheap, easy to police and most of all would absolutely work, which is why it will never happen.

World of Outlaws would never let it happen. They like things status quo like Columbian drug lords, Middle East arms dealers and Wall St high frequency traders...lol. 

 
 
 
They don't even know how to spell sprint car 
much less chromoly...http://www.ycmco.com