Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

many

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Good afternoon Billy & Doug and to all,
I couldn't have said that any better myself !
I'm sure we've seen it already to may times.

Respectfully,
Henry Kunz 1534 H/SA

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

cheating in motorsports is nothing new and has been done in every venue probably since the very first time 2 cars or a group of cars lined up. Many of the biggest names in motorsports have won numerous championship and millions by either exploiting the grey rules or outright cheating so say what makes you feel good about yourself on an internet forum but some of your heroes wouldn't be if they didn't cheat. No one who has is going to hell no mind going to prison and/or paying restitution. We all know the Dodge Boys/Wayne County cheated yet nothing was done because of who their sponsor was but Jerry Eckman was ostracized.

Some of the stock guys that say they would never cheat are the same guys that have their heads and manifolds ported(I've seen their heads and manifolds being ported years ago at a big name shop) and then justify it in their mind by saying there's no way racer x is running what he does without porting so I'm going to do it too.;)

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Hey Ed, neither Henry nor I mentioned the word "cheating". You did.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Billy this entire thread is about cheating and when you state...

EVERYONE knows you are implying cheating!

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Ed, you're ASSuming. I was talking about money. ;-)

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Unfortunately cylinder heads and manifolds being ported is not something that will ever go back to the way it used to be. I'm sure if cylinder heads started being policed as strict as the rulebook states, their wouldn't be such a large group of racers lobbying to lower the indexes by 3 tenths. It's sort of like the speed limit. While those going 85mph in a 65 are breaking the law, you don't get a reward for doing 65. There's an interesting story I've heard of someone getting thrown out at Indy when 3 cylinder heads from 3 different cars with supposedly identical castings were inspected at the same time. 2 out of the 3 had ported heads, the other one didn't. Guess who was thrown out....

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

I will NEVER cheat.


Sarge

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Fred, in your almost 83 years on this rock, you've never cheated at anything?

Not playing a game, not at school, not on your taxes not in the workplace?

Even clergy cheat.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Want to see what a good driver in a good car can do with no tricks? Watch the World Footbrake Challenge. We don't need no steenking electronics.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Bill part of the problem is you're the bad guy or girl if you put up money for an inspection. Look at Indy last year. I know it sucked for the guys in the Vette but the person that put up the money was the bad guy. What did he do wrong? Isn't Indy the one race NHRA have the tec guys to do a full inspection. They need to change the schedule, so Stock and Super Stock have that day off like just a few years ago.

Are there anyone that you look at and have some questions about or you know are in the Black area of the rules. Would you put up the money if you just thought someone was not right? I'm not trying to bust your balls but most of us have questions about a few cars. I know a few that I would bet dollars to donuts they won't make it threw a complete inspection. I'll even go further. At Columbus in 2022 at the Sports Nationals there was a guy running a LT1 Camaro in B/SA. Had his hood up in the stagging lanes. Right on top of his throttle body was the BBK name plate. He was running an aftermarket one. I did say something to him. I was in A and I did tell him if I was running B I would let tec know. And that he needed to change it. I really don't think he knew. But he didn't open his hood in the stagging lanes for the rest of the race.

It all comes back to INTEGRITY. Some have it and others don't. BP

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Come on Barry! You can trust "us"! The 21St Century NHRA Tech Dept. does!

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Being the Bad Guy is better that being the whiner
There are rules for you conspiracy theorists
So Nut Up and Buck$$$ up
Because nobody is watching closely
Barry I remember when I was in tear down at Indy 2006
You said James you gonna be ok because you have a Bub motor
The other 2 guys are going way faster than most in there class and are gonna get bounced. Bingo you where correct
Barry knows

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Remember what happened a couple of years back, when NHRA set Wesley Roberson loose to police cylinder heads?




They should turn Wesley Roberson, Travis Miller, and Dave Ley loose, and give them a free hand to fully police Stock and Super Stock, with the necessary staff.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Wasn't NHRA doing random spot checks last year ?

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

What NHRA tech officials were conducting teardown the year the Super Stock LS got bounced for the crankshaft?

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Don, curious by what you meant by this as most late 70's cars and newer were available with a lockup converter.

." Lockup converter permitted if
OEM-equipped with lockup converter and OEM transmission
is used."

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

What’s the purpose of having a cell phone 3 feet behind the rear tail lens every pass? Asking for a friend.

Tim stickles

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

After having just mentored High School FIRST Robotics for well over a decade (both FRC 150 lb robots and FTC 18" cubed approx 40 lb robots), and being an IT Tech w/ more than 2 decades of experience in computer building, repair and diagnosing, and 3 college educated sons who are networking artists (1 -the oldest of which actually travelled the world, not once but twice for Global Crossing helping to actually set up originally the networking backbone worldwide (he installed the switches that the backbone operates over, not once, but twice...the first time to establish the original backbone, then years later to miniaturize those switches when smaller packages were available to save space, reduce wiring, reduce heat, etc, and upgraded it again), why hire new, when you can use the guys that did it originally, nobody knew the true backbone like the original installers.

Anyway, he is now an FTA (Feild Technical Advisor), for FIRST out of New Hampshire, the FRC and FTC Robots are all run on a specially designed and engineered secured wireless network, and all are connected worldwide from field in an event arena, high school gym, or major convention center, etc. (where maybe worldwide up to 25-45 different events), are run over a 3-5 day event period simultaneously from as many locations across the planet with teams that number in the 5,000 teams registered a year, from over 171 countries (the 150 lb FRC robots are playing a task based game, and a different game each year.

The actual whole thing is a technical Engineering Nightmare (disguised as a game only to keep high school students interested), in Steam (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math) and prepare them for careers in corporations and industry properly.

Over that period I have seen and we have used and seen a million electronic items in packages so small and light, both used on and off robot, some wireless, some wired, that you would find most extremely hard to detect if used on a vehicle the size of ours we compete with.

As everything must fit within a much smaller package (Just visit AndyMark.com for proof and imagine the millions of possibilities of crossbreeding usages of many of those robot parts available to the robotics community, then multiply by thousands to millions of worldwide sellers, and available parts suppliers...hey I am not encouraging anyone to actually do anything here, just showing the auto speed parts industry is not the only industry to look to when looking for all the possibilities out there you would need to look for), than those we compete with (much larger vehicles), weight to an FRC robot is usually limited to 150 lbs max, so everything that goes into the design of that specific task bot is weighed, not to the pound but to the Oz or 10th of an Oz or even less, constantly documented, and the scales are more accurate that are used in competitions because they are smaller and easier to calibrate, and you are extremely mindful of everything that goes into it, and the rulebook is in even finer detail, and as lengthy as ours (usually 165-175 pages), with only 1 major difference...Our NHRA Section 11 is specific (paraphrased here only......"if it is listed as allowed you may use it, if it is prohibited you may not, but if it is not listed as allowed...ask first." Wherein the FIRST program inspires and encourages "Thinking Outside The Box" type innovation, thinking and doing...Unless it is specifically prohibited by the rules, you are perfectly free to do whatever you like, own it, share it, hide it, use it! Breaking the rules is prohibited, but if the rules do not prohibit something break the rules of science and phyisics itself if you can, and yes, I have seen some unbelievable, absolutely impossible tasks performed at speeds I never thought were possible by a wireless toy.

However, as in NHRA Drag Racing, and FIRST Robotics alike Cheating is discouraged, and highly frowned upon, and if caught both penalize highly for it. In FIRST just like NHRA, there are always going to be cheaters, just like there is in everything in the world.

But, a simple Wire Shark software program and a laptop to run it on will not only locate every single secured or unsecured wireless and or wired network running on, near, or within miles of a specific location where said laptop running wire shark is being run and constantly logging all the discovered networks and users (even if just used or connected for a millisecond space in time, it would be logged, and discoverable, by someone who knows how to use it properly)...I have witnessed my eldest FTA Son who was noticing momentary glitches in their secured robot arena system, he has a dedicated secure laptop just wire shark that is running hours before (a day plus actually), once we build the arena fields, until after the 3-5 day event is fully over, and was able to not only discover an illegal user tapped into the secure dedicated arena rot system, but knew in a flash the exact gps coordinates to locate the offender and was able to walk right up to an arena seat far up in the rafters and nosebleed section to a lone (very interested, and very suspicious spectator, and say hand it over please, and he secured the offending hack device), he was an active team member who thought really highly of himself, and thought he could never get caught, but he was caught red handed with a device that was intended to glitch the system intentionally, for a competitive advantage. It was super easy to see the pattern as it was only being used for, and against the final top 4 ranked teams in said event. And only to help 1 team, and against 3 others. It only disconnected certain robots by glitching the connection momentarily causing instant but lengthy indiv. rebooting.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Warning: (Don't do it...illegal in Stock and S.S., I looked.) An FRC wheel encoder is about the circumference of a dime or smaller, and a quarter to a half inch thick, the counter ticks in the 360 degree are only separated by hundredths of an inch to a 1/6th of an inch. Forget engine RPM, or a driveshaft sensor, the real key is the wheels that stay hooked up, never leave the ground, never spin, and a sensor that measures the whole quarter mile. From start to finish down to fractions of the last inch (if the track is a full exact 1,320', and you know exactly where that begins and ends, and you can position exactly the start point.

Have I thought about it, sure, so I looked it up...not permitted. Do I have one installed? Absolutely not, but last week I was installing front end parts a 10 pc kit on my neighbors 2004 Toyota Sienna Van, and proudly right there in both front calipers (that I needed to remove to uninstall and hang up next to the caliper were 2 ABS brake sensors, about the circumference of a nickle, and 1" thick, and low and behold, they are simply wired wheel encoder magnet pickups counting the rotor vanes. A simple wheel encoder already installed on that vehicle stock.

I have no idea if that vehicle is even in the guide, but they are a part of the stock ABS brake system and could easily though illegally be used to determine actual track position accurately as long as it does not do wheelies.. lol.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

My last word on the subject...There are a million ways to cheat. And a million and a half ways to get caught..

Every FRC match played begins with a 12 to 45 second pre-programmed autonomous period, drivers behind the start line in a very difficult task based game, cannot touch the controls except the emergency stop button, our cars in a straight line could easily be raced tge same way...AI is a whole lot smarter, and faster learning too, but then we are no longer drivers, we are riders, or they simply remove us (the weak link), from the game altogether.

That is no fun.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

everything you need is right here been in use for decades!

https://moretraction.com/

https://moretraction.com/products/drag-racing/

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

#2...In Robots as in many newer autos these days the CAN system is used, designed & developed by the auto industry, but perfected for the auto industry by extreme experimentation by the FIRST and other organizations by use for over 3 decades before it was actively used in the cars of today. Just plug in to any CAN system network (Star or ladder type setup), and you can in seconds discover every device in the network, or that is connected to any device that is connected to that network, wired or wireless!

But, with all that yes, go watch the Footbrake Challenge, or watch a footbrake artist at work, nothing electronic can beat trip zip green (.000) and dead on the dial. Perfect that, and you have the class racing world by the tail....Or, just go race an electronics are all allowed class, and break out that checkbook and wallet, as you will need it!

Oh yeah, did you know hacking into a secure network is a Federal Crime. Forget about breaking the FIRST Rules, you could have a lot more to worry about than your team is now disqualified, and you have 30 minutes to vacate the facility, your team loses, loses all season points, and ummm, we shall see about the other penalties on Monday!

Behind every pc of software ever written, and every pc of hardware ever built is a fallible human. Now we must fear AI will replace us soon enough. Well ,I don't personally, I am near the end of my lifecycle, so I am going to get back to hammering the tree and improving my car legally to run dead on, otherwise my left leg knows where the brake pedal is and I am watching you from the 1/8th mile marker out to that last inch from my slow moving 3 mirrored fishbowl anyway.

And cheaters never prosper, eventually many if not all will be caught, or karma will catch them. But, it is NHRA's responsibility to catch, police, & punish, & ours by the the book to protest that which we think is wrong and that comes with risks, both financially and personally, which is sometimes necessary, but should not be done (or accepted by NHRA), if done for a competitive advantage.

You could seek for decades for each avail. cheater device, and they are being invented, designed, and improved upon daily. Waste your time improving your own game, it will make you happier and less suspicious of the competitors surrounding you and make all that technology spent on moot.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

There's really a simple solution that has been mentioned on here before, all winners (could be) subject to teardown/inspection. I had to do this 3x at Indy before they'd give me my class win Wally. They could even go a bit further and tag the last 8 cars in the eliminator, subject to inspection. Brian Seaberg 627

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

But you kept going 120 under correct?
They ain’t tearing down ****
Nhra is more worried about you stickers … to not pay you than tech

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

QUOTE=Cglrcng;692317]
"Have I thought about it, sure, so I looked it up...not permitted. Do I have one installed? Absolutely not, but last week I was installing front end parts a 10 pc kit on my neighbors 2004 Toyota Sienna Van, and proudly right there in both front calipers (that I needed to remove to uninstall and hang up next to the caliper were 2 ABS brake sensors, about the circumference of a nickle, and 1" thick, and low and behold, they are simply wired wheel encoder magnet pickups counting the rotor vanes. A simple wheel encoder already installed on that vehicle stock.

I have no idea if that vehicle is even in the guide, but they are a part of the stock ABS brake system and could easily though illegally be used to determine actual track position accurately as long as it does not do wheelies.. lol.[/QUOTE]

I believe Pontiac used the ABS sensor to trip the Low Tire Pressure light on our 2004 Grand Prix. If one wheel was rotating at a different speed than the other 3 the light came on.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

NHRA would only have to threaten to do teardown on winners and RU, they could also just do a thorough technical inspection and look at electronics for the last 8 in the eliminator.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Do any of yeall know how traction control works?

Traction contronl does not make ones car more consistent.

Its a crutch to attempt to stop wheel spin.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Or they could just go back to the old ruling requiring that a "data-logger" be completely disconnected during eliminations. That should be easy enough to check in the staging lanes.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

[QUOTE=Billy Nees;692334]Or they could just go back to the old ruling requiring that a "data-logger" be completely disconnected during eliminations. That should be easy enough to check in the staging lanes.[/QUOTE

How do you separate the data recorder from the EFI on a new car?
I would be more worried about ignition.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

[QUOTE=Barry Polley;692337]You don't need a "data recorder" to run the EFI!

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

But isn’t the data recorder part of Fast and Holley Systems?
Older cars yes I get that .

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

[QUOTE=Billy Nees;692338]As far as I know, all aftermarket ECUs that are accepted by NHRA have built in datalogging capabilities. And, unlike a Racepak which cannot datalog without an SD card, ECUs have integrated memory, and don't need an external storage device for data acquisition. An MSD Grid is an ignition box that can also data log, and you can't tell someone that their ignition box can't be hooked up during eliminations. I know that with a Holley ECU, you can program it to begin data acquisition automatically, whether it be RPM based, TPS value, so no need to even press a button to do so. Unfortunately there is no one true answer to the issue at hand. Should the Grid have been allowed in Stock/Super Stock? IMHO probably not. If they outlaw it, there will probably be an angry mob, so that alone may deter the decision to take it away.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

Ok, point taken but can an "NHRA accepted aftermarket ECU" without a "grid" make elapsed-time altering decisions on it's own?

P.S., this is why Doug won't let me have my laptop!

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

The Grid system is only capable of making "on the fly" changes if it is equipped with an accessory that is explicitly illegal. As a bonus, that accessory will leave a "breadcrumb" in the system to let an inspector know that it has been used somewhat recently.

There are many standalone products that will do traction control that are more easily hidden and do not communicate their presence.

Re: Ways to check on the use of illegal devices
 

just to add to your comments about the grid, they may not apply to all grids as it has been rumored for years, the existence of a "texas" grid which allows you to ride the dots and leaves no breadcrumbs.;)