Ring Question

[Kemlo]

Heading off to the ring on the 10th.

Touristenfahrten day, my mate is taking a car he built for the PBMWW but never entered. As such it has bonnet pins, full cage, fire extinguisher etc...

It will be a ball-ache to drive over there anyway, but what would be worse is driving it all the way there to be be told 'Nein' you cannot drive it here.

How picky are they over what goes out on track these days? I heard tell that 'race' cars aren't allowed on tourist days.

Thanks in advance.

Rich.

[agtlaw]

Do a trackday.

[SpeedyDave]

Exposed bonnet pins will definitely get you stopped. They usually accept taping over, same can apply to sharp exposed edges on wings etc.

New driving regulations were announced and emphasised early in the year. A lot of it was same as always (and includes stuff that seemed to be let slide in the past) but worth noting that it now includes a ban on;

Removable steering wheels
Roll cage door bars that restrict entry/exit (forward part of door bar can't be up at steering wheel hight)
Seats with 'ears' that wrap around the sides

You can read the regs here;

http://www.nuerburgring.de/fileadmin/Touristenfahr...


The new regs were apparantely not to be strictly enforced until May 1st so this is the first day we have a chance to see how they will be applied.

[roboxm3]

From what we saw the other weekend (21st April), I'd be very surprised if you were turned away. I read somewhere recently that bonnet pins should be the flush type or covered (taped) but there were definitely many many caged cars lapping and I never once saw a car checked / pulled-up by a marshal on the barriers (other than me on the bike for a noise test...99.9DB ) and there was a lot of 'track-focussed' looking cars.

If you can, get your laps in before 11am and again after 4pm, the track is much quieter although we did our (car) laps at 13:30ish and it still awesome.

[SpeedyDave]

Rob, the moratorium on the new regs ends today, we don't yet know how vigorously they will be applied.

The management aren't anti-racecar per se, and its normal to see heaps of stripped / caged track cars circulating but I'd be a bit concerned about going all the way over there with stuff that can't be tweaked to comply on-site before we get a feel for how strict they will be. Taping some bonnet pins is no problem but if they object to the cage/seats/wheel you're kinda stuffed.

[drakart]

I was there in October and we just had to tape up the bonnet pins.

Edited to apologise for small pic, but you can make out the yellow tape on the bonnet.

[SpeedyDave]

drakart said:

I was there in October and we just had to tape up the bonnet pins.

Again - that was then, this is now. Last year not really relevant, in fact yesterday not that relevant either. We need to see how the marshals handle things from today onwards.

A PBMW is the sort of car thats pretty likely to fall foul of some of those new regs. Would be good if the OP could indicate if this particular car has any of those features.

[Porkie]

agtlaw said:

Do a trackday.

10000000000% agree

For me now Public days = Renting Cars from Rent4Ring

Only drive my own cars on Darrens Destination Nurburgring Trackdays now.

Make sure your mate is aware of what happens if the car he had built drops some fluids and a biker gets splattered...

Edited by Porkie on Wednesday 1st May 14:17

[drakart]

I know about the changes and there will no doubt be some guinea pigs. What I meant was that if it looks like you have made an effort with bonnet pins, there is a better chance of them letting you through.

[Kemlo]

The car conforms to the PBMW regs - so whatever that entails.

I know it has a removable steering wheel, full cage, fire extinguisher and bonnet pins.

I'm thinking he may need to rent.

Just out of interest - I sent a couple of booking queries from the website and got nothing back - are you generally okay to turn up and rent on the day?

[roboxm3]

Kemlo said:

The car conforms to the PBMW regs - so whatever that entails.

I know it has a removable steering wheel, full cage, fire extinguisher and bonnet pins.

I'm thinking he may need to rent.

Just out of interest - I sent a couple of booking queries from the website and got nothing back - are you generally okay to turn up and rent on the day?

We used Rent4Ring and always got responses from Dale ([e-mail]) but usually the following day (I should think they only get time for 'admin' in the evening).

I'd definitely recommend one of their Stage 2 Suzuki Swifts - amazing handling things and plenty fast enough to have massive amounts of fun with relatively low risk i.e. you'd have to be driving like a bit of a helmet to bin it they way those things grip!

[SpeedyDave]

Second vote for Rent4Ring. Of course they have faster cars but the Stg2 Swifts are better than you're probably thinking - proper suspension & setup so good firm & neutral handling. Not only the cheapest rentals out there but also the lowest excess if the worst happens (about half the excess on Swifts from elsewhere).

Definitely book ahead. The time you are going is part of 4 day open stretch for the ring so likely to be very busy and its common for the rental companies to be booked out even on less busy occasions.

I'll be there myself, see you on track!

[SpeedyDave]

Kemlo said:

The car conforms to the PBMW regs - so whatever that entails.

I know it has a removable steering wheel, full cage, fire extinguisher and bonnet pins.

I'm thinking he may need to rent.

Just out of interest - I sent a couple of booking queries from the website and got nothing back - are you generally okay to turn up and rent on the day?

I don't know the PBMW regs, but regardless of those you should check the specifics of the car as even if PBMW doesn't specify, for example, an "X" door bar tubing the car might have it anyway. Similarly headrest ears on seats may not be required by PBMW but might have been fitted just on owner preference.

Removable steering wheel is definitely on the "no" list, but as I said, it wasn't in the past and we don't know how aggressivly these things will be enforced.

Bonnet pins are no bother just tape them up well.

[andye30m3]

I'm sure PBMW regs allow for single door bars so you might not fall foul of that, but they are supposed to have seats with head restraints.

As others have said if you have issues rent from rent4ring, alternatively if they're are busy go to hotel Burgstube at the base of the castle he has 2 renault twingo 133's which he rents out for the same price as rent4ring charge for the swifts.

http://www.burgstube.com/rentals.html

[SpeedyDave]

Just to update, a friend told me that on the 9th he saw the marshals inspecting and turning away cars with removable steering wheels or wrap around headrests. I was there 9th - 12th & while I didn't personally see that it might explain a couple of cars I saw being turned away at the barriers. I drove a car with a removable steering wheel for several laps on each of those 4 days with no bother but I did take a fixed steering boss with me as an emergency replacement just in case.

Hope the OP got on ok.