with the sedan cars nats comming up I have a question about something. I was told that the current batch of engines comming into the US has the exhaust ports to tall Has anyone else heard about this?? this will make them illegal under current ROAR rules. HAYWYRE

On O'Donnell race it was already allowed to use increased exhaust timing from 4.5 mm to 4.8 ( from 154.41 degrees to 159.73 degrees) I heard yesterday that on nationals it will be lifted too. But haven't seen yet written so far.

The exhaust port limit has been waived for this race for that reason. As long as the rest of the engine is ROAR legal, you'll be ok. There is a discussion about it on the Starting Grid.

Edit: Rick Wilson (ROAR Pres) has stated it on the Grid, so it's official.

I spoke with the Mike Queller (ROAR VP) just this last week end about this.

I think he said it won't be official/ legal until next year. I would contact the race orgainzers and see what they say.

waiver for the nats is now posted on the roar site. this covers the nats only but with the proliferation of engine exhaust port heights it is pointless to continue enforcing it as it is a crapshoot as to wether you are getting 4.5 or not. there are alot of different types of novarossi's entering the USA with exhausts higher than 4.5 now. If you buy a recent replacement sleeve for a nova 3 port 12 it is higher than 4.5 in many cases. so it became a moot point unless you plan to teardown every sedan motor at your club races til;l the end of the year. as this is now tyhe case expect all the manufacturers to follow suit so realistically the days of the 4.5 rule are done (the manufacturers forced it because of ifmar) even though offically within roar it does not plan to discuss a change untill 2005.