Yep!
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OK itās a little harder to blame people playing with the oil then.
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Yes Tilly may be having some problems .. BUT its a new motor that needs input to make it better. And its alot more RPM and H.P. compared to the L206.. Im sure L206 went thru the same problems when it was new.. Takes time to work out bugs..
Heck, watch the coverage. P1 (Ragan) had engine failure during the final. Another kart had an engine ignition system failure earlier in the weekend.
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The Tilly arrived to the market about a decade too late. The 206 has been around since 2009(?), and it looks like Tillotson decided they wanted a slice of the market in 2019.
If their plan is to push arrive and drive packages (at $3,000 - yikes!) while effectively using customers as a form of R&D, thatās pretty surprising. Itās understandable for engines to have issues early on, but now we are now roughly seven years in. Seeing 2 race ending failures in a field of 9, especially from a factory supported arrive and drive program, where you have all the resources in the world, is inexcusable IMHO.
Youād think a company trying to compete seriously with the 206 would prioritize fixing reliability issues, given that the 206 has a reputation for being nearly bulletproof. Apparently not. Iāve read a lot about the T4 and I still have no idea what they are trying to do.
Itās been almost a decade since Tillotson came on to the scene with the engine package. 2017 is when I chatted with the guys from Tillotson about it at the Supernats.
Canāt really call it new.
The 206 started as a ālessons learnedā from the World Formula package. The fact that the 206 makes a lot less power and turns lower RPM than their WF was very intentional. At the time I think most people dismissed it as being so slow that it was pointless.
As things transpired, it turns out the market cares a lot less about speed and power than we all thought.
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I talked to someone from the Orlando track (he was selling his tilly engines) and the 1st gen has heat issues and changing of the restrictor is hurting the 2nd generation. They are all difficult to start regardless of what generation. It will be interesting to see the kart count at my local track, however everyone that I have talked to is Lo206, Ka or Rotax, except for the person who is setting up the Tilly which again I have only seen 4-5 total karts built.
There are to many parallels with the Tilly and the Clone, perhaps there marketing strategy should be with dirt and oval payment to replace the clones and flatheads.
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I think they need to ditch any type of marketing strategy and fix the motor first. Marketing something that is fundamentally broken is dishonest and a disservice to the sport.
That would make sense, but I find it hard to believe they will ever dissolve their sprint racing ādevelopmentā and pivot to oval. It seems they have built a lot of their marketing and distribution around asphalt sprint racing.
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Weāre considering a 6 year old engine to be new and still needing development? Theyāve been running it since at least 2020, thatās plenty of time to get the quirks figured out.
What is the gain for the driver supposed to be? Less parity, less reliable, and more expensive, only to go a couple seconds faster?
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The marketing was based on the issue 6 years ago when the Lo206 were out of stock, but now it seems to be pretty easy to get your hands on a Lo206.
Again Tilly I see the parallels with Clone where the build qualities can range. Not that my opinion matters, and I keep beating the same drum, they should just keep it as a concession kart or rentals, at some point they are going to upgrade the chassis and the engine, what do you do with the old ones scrap them? Or just put a Lo206 on the chassis so you can race it? Just doesnāt seem logical, but again I am not a CEO or a Multi-million dollar company, so donāt take my word for it.
The T4 rental looks sweet. Itās a tough sell tho in that youād need to buy a whole fleet. Not gx270.
I see Tilly as relevant in Europe. I see it as a spec class here like Ignite. I donāt see it as a competitor to lo206. I see it as a package for a facility as opposed to individual racers.
Tilly is a race engine and the issue with gx270 is mfg tolerances, I suppose, the wide variation between engines.
Round 2 at NOLA is coming up this weekend. Total entries sit at 162 with 6 karts entered in T4.
206 Senior is down 2 entries from Round 1 at 27
KA Senior is up 3 entries from Round 1 at 29 entries.
Both of those are well off historical entry numbers. Regardless, T4 is still only at 6.
Other classes are copy/pasted from Race Select below:
Micro Swift (10)|Mini Swift (10)|T4 Senior (6)|Kid Kart (11)|KA100 Junior (20)|206 Senior (27)|206 Cadet (15)|KA100 Masters (11)|206 Junior (23)|KA100 Senior (29)
Rte66 Ran their first event of the year last NCMP last weekend. Strong Senior numbers, 206 and KA both high 30ās. Decent Junior numbers, mid 20ās in both groups. The Swift and sportsman class a bit light, both in the teens.
The lack of younger drivers concerns me. Our sift class at our club was small as well last year.
TSRS Amarillo has a 2, yes 2, Tillotson T4 entries racing this weekend. Zero traction three races into the regional series.
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A tough sell. Hard to get new people excited with those numbers.
I think they have to stick it out for the rest of the year because of the ticket being promised.
No doubt. We arenāt running TSRS this season, but have the last several years. Just wanted to track itās acceptance in the market. Especially in light of a person or two on here that are always touting more options is great and how awesome packages like this are and how awful 206 is.
ā¦
Ok, maybe 1 person in particular I have seen lots of that fromā¦ 
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Lorain this past weekend had 5 miniās, 5 Jrs, 2 Masters, and 6 seniors. Not bad compared to the 206 class had 6 miniās, 7 jrs, 4 sr. and 6 masters. They seem to be able to be on track at the same time, atleast for the pre-finals.
But the real question is why? When you could have double the class size. I would rather run against 12 competitors than have 2 classes of 6 on the trackā¦
I know many of them run 2cycle in the morning and 4 cycle in the afternoon, and I donāt think they own the karts, so itās a bit inflated, but I think more people would be attracted to see classes with more then 10 people then they be divided. They are T4 track so I canāt imagine they will disappear until Tillitson moves on.