Change costs the racers money. Karting has battled its entire existence with the “new engine of the month” issue, where someone comes in and wants to split up the pie into smaller pieces, resulting in smaller grids, more money spent by the racer, and constantly changing regulations.
Tilly is welcome to do whatever they want in the free market, but their product doesn’t really offer much different than what the already very successful 206 package offers. Other than having more power.
Have you or your grandson driven anything other than electric rentals lately? Not sure exactly what your grandson is driving, but a proper race kart with a 206 on it will handle better and outpace a heavy electric rental kart.
Funny enough for those of us that have been around awhile, the Tilly is more or less filling the spot that used to be taken by the World Formula. Many moons ago I used to race one and they are certainly more fun than a 206, but 206 took over eventually. If we could go back and change the 206 from the get I would’ve liked to have seen some aspects of the WF incorporated into the 206 package, along with more hp. However, as we know hindsight is always 20/20.
I can only think of maybe one track in the Northeast that picked up the WF which was Batiavia before it closed, everyone was running animal and then clone. Clone disappeared because sprint/RR, because of the cheating and there really wasn’t a true manufacturer other then china (different then tilly that is putting up money). Briggs lo206 fulfilled the need because it wasn’t about HP. So now people want to go faster but don’t want $2500+ engine for a Ka100, tag, ect 2 cycle engine. Tilly has seal, is 15hp, supposed to be reliable 30 hours, Tilly has money for marketing, I am still not sure what to think about this engine package. It is a different package then the WF that was blueprinted and the Superstock that was built, I haven’t seen a WF on track for 10+ plus years and haven’t seen superstock on track.
Here is my take on the Tilly T4 setup… I think there is room for a different series of kart for those who just come off of rentals. And dont have the expertise’s or the money to buy all different kinds of axles and all the spare parts to change all the different setups . And want to get into a turnkey kart in a series that has a level field and get a chance to win. Kind of like Iroc series that cars had ?? My grandson will be attending Lorain Ohio Kartplex 1st in Electric Rental which he is very familiar with . He is in all of K1 Speeds Leagues. And 2nd get into the Tilly T4 rentals . And we will see how many others buy T4s for the series at LOK. And then buy a T4 225cc race kart. And if that works out 3rd put a KA100 motor in it. 2 cycles is were my expertises are. Since I raced a similar motor in the 70s and have built many 2 cycle high powered snowmobiles over the years… To me L206 is a great series . But its kind of like buying a Ford and not allowed to buy anything else. Great to have choices… The sport needs to grow with different offerings … To evolve and update to get more people interested that are coming from rentals. People need to give electric karts a chance too. They are very torquey and fast when turned up to pro level like my grandson races at K1 Speed league events are !!! My grandson doesn’t travel well so LOK and K1 Speed will be our tracks. Hope people give Tilly Karts a chance. And we will be supporting LOK and Kris and his team as they build a great track with great events… Hope more are built electric / Gas rental and Pro kart tracks all in one…
We can agree with most of what’s being said here, but what sets us apart is that our goal is to grow the karting market as a whole, not take away from existing categories. Most of our customers are folks who have never raced karting before and the rest are those who were likely to leave karting because they weren’t being challenged (mostly 206 racers) or because they could no longer afford the time or cost to continue (mostly 2 stroke racers).
We think the market potential is huge, certainly big enough to handle our class without diminishing the others in a material way, and we continue to support all other classes of racing by supplying them with key components and providing technical support around the world in their classes. I don’t think the folks who make the 206 can say the same thing.
Man he is so fast. He’s going a half second quicker in this vid that the winning pace at the cup race a few weeks ago. My son had a 54.8 in the race and came from 7th to 3rd. Ryan runs a casual 54.1
Yes, correct, the new coil has a 7500 rpm limiter, which makes it a second or two faster than the older 6500 rpm limiter. It’s makes driving the karts that much more fun…and challenging!
The Clone, Animal, and WF ran similar RPM’s 10-14 hours would be my guess. However these are sealed so I would imagine that replacing the long blocks would likely be the path. Probably won’t know until the competition heats up and the engines are pushed to the limits.
If there is one change I’d like to make to the LO206 it’s a forged rod and up the revs to 7000.
Someone I know now has a viewing port into his crank case thanks to a broken cast rod. So to me this is the only part I would change for insurance purposes.
