24 & 48 FAIL INSPECTION

[JohnMickish]

They where talking about it during the prerace show and the concensus there was that if they take the gray area's away from the crewchiefs you will have an IROC series. The difference between the fast cars and the slow cars is the gray area's in the engines and bodies. It's not illegal to work in an area that has no rule. It's not like trying to slip a carburator that is to big or different gear ratio, those have hard and fast rules. The fenders are made by hand and they did fit the template. If you take the engineering away from the teams you might as well do what ASA did and have spec bodies and spec motors. By the way, didn't ASA go out of business??

[harvey lee]

I agree with that 100% except, you have some crew chiefs that are always past the line and running illegal cars. The 48 car seems to fit that bill. All I'm saying is when one gets penalized for a rule infraction, someone must have done something wrong. Grey area or not. Some crew chiefs will use the grey area as a excuse to do what they do. That is not right.

Bottom line, they cheated no matter how you look at it or they would not have been penalized.

[JohnMickish]

The best crewchiefs have worked in the gray areas forever. The only time I am aware of a Hendrick crewchief cheating was the rear window deal on the 48 a year and a half ago. The shocks where legal, the T-Rex car was legal and so on. Sure, rule changes came about because of such things but until someone pushes the issue it's fair game.

Cheating and working in the gray are different things. Should a team be penalized for working in an area that is legal at that time even if it's outside the intent of the rules? When I was involved in racing it was the impression if the rulebook dosen't say you can't then you can.

If they do take away all the gray it will really set a precidence for how teams will work in the future, and pretty much dictate the outcome. If they do succeed in making all the cars that equal it will be like F1, the guy that comes out of turn one on the opening lap in the lead will pretty much win the race.

[harvey lee]

I do believe Johnson had an issue at Daytonna, at least that what they said on a Racing show yesterday.

For the 15 years we have been racing, we have always checked if there was a grey area in the rules. I have seen many get racers get DQed for doing things in the grey area that they assumed was legal and was not. I personally have never met a racer that thought you could do what you want if its not in the rules.

No sense of beating this to death anymore as far as I'm concerned.

[JohnMickish]

It will be fun watching Gordon come up through the pack.

[lawdog]

I have a question, with all this talk about the following the precedent with Jr. at Darlington, did NASCAR take his car away, not let him practice and make him start 41st? I don't recall them giving him ANY penalty at the track, so if they gave the Hendrick cars 100 points and 100,000 and suspended their crew chiefs for 6 races, that would be MORE penalty than Earnhardt got wouldn't it???

[LMITOUT]

Earnhardt's infraction was found after qualifying I believe. It went through the previous inspections and it wasn't found then, so apparently it wasn't very obvious or meaningful, which it wasn't.

[lawdog]

That's even worse, they let him keep his starting spot that he got with the illegal parts on and yet they don't let these guys qualify with it right???

[LMITOUT]

Apparently they decided Jr's infraction wasn't something that was giving him a competitive advantage, while tweedle dee and tweedle dum's did.

[JohnMickish]

Jr.s car was a major infraction. The parts in question are where the entire template skeleton get their anchor point. A little off there changes the entire shape of the car.

If history holds true, NASCAR has been much harsher if the penalty is found after qualifying than before.

[LMITOUT]

I don't believe that the template anchors to the wing. If it did they would have noticed something wrong with the part in question right away, but they didn't until sometime later at a later inspection. We went through this before, but it was determined that the change in the angle of the wing on Jrs car was equivalent to something like an extra 15 pounds of downforce which is a whole lot of nothing and everyone agreed that it was minor and not a competitive advantage whatsoever.

It appeared major due to the severity of the fine and punishment, but those levels were set before the season ever started when Nascar warned everyone that any tampering would not be tolerated and that was the minimum fine.

[JohnMickish]

I can't find where I read that, does anybody else remember?

This can drag on forever and ever but I believe this is the difference between the 8 deal and what the 24 and 48 did. Part of an article cut and pasted from the sporting news.

The car initially passed a pre-qualifying inspection, and when the wing did not pass the next day, it was removed for further examination. Once off the car, NASCAR discovered the brackets had been intentionally modified, Pemberton said.

"There is no doubt whatsoever," it was intentional, Pemberton said. "We are very surprised and disappointed in Tony."

[TNFL]

Quote:

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We went through this before, but it was determined that the change in the angle of the wing on Jrs car was equivalent to something like an extra 15 pounds of downforce which is a whole lot of nothing and everyone agreed that it was minor and not a competitive advantage whatsoever.

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I think you agreed in your own mind that it was no big deal, that it was an accident and not intentional, and that DEI never cheats(even though they have been caught several times).

It will be interesting to see the response after NASCAR makes thier ruling.

[LMITOUT]

Wrong. Everyone in the press and other media also said it wasn't a big deal..those who have been in the sport.

..and if Nascar thought it was, they would have probably lost their starting spot and who knows what else, but they didn't, so apparently Nascar also agreed.

[JohnMickish]

Your right, no big deal.