I never understood why more manufacturers don’t offer this. Your best option is to try to find something online and hope it’s not a decade old or is relevant to your tire/engine package.
1 Like
OTK does this; most other brands just tell you to “go find the Arrow setup manual”
Where does OTK offer this? Everything I have found is from a Team or Other Organization that has pieced together some semblance of a Working Theory based on their Class Requirements.
Kosmic has an official tuning guide floating around on the internet. I’ll see if I can find it.
1 Like
So a lot of the issue is that tuning isn’t exactly straightforward enough to have an easy guide for it. It relies first on a driver that knows what the kart needs, something which a lot of drivers can’t do (even if a lot, myself included, think they can). After that, you can make the same change in two different environments and get two different results, so there are a lot of factors involved in making sure the right change is made.
Most tuners just know what changes they should make in their head and don’t write it down anywhere, at least that’s how it is for two of the best tuners I know and most others I’ve talked to. Certainly makes things difficult for people tuning on their own. I’ve been thinking about making a tuning guide for the Kart Republic equipment, but I don’t think I have the certification for that. Plus I haven’t actually played with everything on the setup, so I need to take a day to get that figured out as well.
1 Like
206 is the cheapest class. The next-cheapest is one of the 100cc reed-valve classes. Depending on where you live it’ll be either an IAME KA100 or Vortex VLR100. Compared to 206 you’ll roughly double your engine cost, double your tire wear, but everything else will stay the same. Both use pump gas and a bottle of oil a day, both use similar chassis and are easy on them, and both need a 15-minute service after 15 minutes of driving. If you’ve got a good class for it the Yamaha KT100 costs less up front and has similar running costs to the 100cc reeds, but there is a LOT of tribal knowledge to make the clutch and carburetor happy.
1 Like
I figure I should probably answer the original question too. It basically correlates with speed, the faster you go the more you’ll spend.
206 is the cheapest you can get, and also the slowest.
There’s a Tillotson 4 stroke that’s spec chassis mentioned here before. A little faster, a little more expensive, but finding races could be tricky as it’s relatively new and not super established yet.
After that you move into 2-stroke racing. 100cc air cooled will be the cheapest. Yamaha has the cheapest buy in, and is the slowest 100cc still supported in some parts of the US, but requires a lot of mechanical maintenance.
The Vortex Rok VLR is the next cheapest, a good but faster than the Yamaha but reliability compared to the KA100 is sub-par. Starting the engine can be a bit finicky, and they don’t last as long between rebuilds before something blows up.
The KA100 is the biggest 100cc class in the US. Probably the most expensive buy in, but you can find them used for not too much money. The rebuild intervals will vary from 8 hours to 20 or 30 depending on how competitive you get. At the national level I wouldn’t try more than 4 racedays on an engine, but for club racing you can easily go 30+ hours without a problem other than losing a little top end power.
I wouldn’t recommend 125cc watercooled TaG racing or faster, but if you chose to go that way my understanding is that Rotax has the most affordable package out there. X30 is the most widely supported engine package, with USPKS and SKUSA running that engine exclusively in TaG racing, but it’s more expensive to buy into and rebuild intervals are far more frequent.
1 Like
Sorry, missed the opportunity to reply earlier. Yes, I’m talking about our spec T4 class that provides the most economic benefit, but in the US there is also a T225 engine class that uses the T4 engine where you can run the full T4 pakage or just the engine on an open chassis. The T225 engine-only is probably comparable to the L0206, plus or minus a few bucks. The reals savings come with the T4, where we have a CIK grade chassis plus the engine plus the tires for under $4500. The spec class signficantly reduces what you have to spend on upgrades and configurations, and takes alot of the cost of setup complications out of the mix. The chassis is a premium quality chassis made for us by IPK based on the Praga CIK-homologated chassis beefed up in a few places and modified slightly to better suit a 4 stroke engine.
We’re putting together a total-cost-of-ownership sheet. I’ll post it when it’s ready and you can all critique/judge it for yourself.
2 Likes
The Lo206 is $599 but you’ll spend another couple hundred for everything that needs to go on it (exhaust, clutch, etc). All in you’ll be in the $900 range +/-
Not sure with the Tilly if the engine comes will everything and ready to run for the $999 price tag here in the U.S. or if it too will need ancillary parts to get it going like the Lo206. 
The biggest issue I’ve come across is confusion amongst the different Tillotson engine models.
Is the one you’re referring to for the stand alone engine a 225RS? Maybe you could post a link to a reseller.
Am I correct in saying that the spec package also includes a spec clutch?
Want. Looks fun as heck. Also has a fun vibe. 
Here is one from AMP:
1 Like
Our regional Kart Club has a Sealed Spec Clone class, the motors only cost $550 and have everything you need to be race ready except the motor mount. Clutch, Exhaust, Fuel Pump, it’s all included. And it’s sealed. We run a spec gear ratio so the engines don’t turn crazy RPMs. The motors last for multiple seasons. The only issue is the motors have very little resale value unless you are selling to someone else in the club. And, there is not much Clone action anywhere else close to us, so you basically can only race with us. The Briggs 206 has some resale value and you can take it to any track and have good competition.
There’s literally no details but it’s a start 
1 Like
Up here in Ontario we don’t have the variety of engine packages that you guys have down there. Currently Briggs is basically the defacto 4 stroke class for pretty much all of the province. Last year when Briggs was having trouble supplying engines, I saw guys selling used race ready Briggs engines for $1500 CDN, it was insane.
Marketed as the T4 engine, not the 225RS. Seems to be some confusion if the same product is being referenced by two different names.
Yep, I continue to be 100% confused between 196, 212, 225RS, TPP-225RS and the others I’ve seen over the last couple of years.
I thought I’d find “The” spec 225 package on EC’s site, but no joy.
For the US market it’s very confusing and I find it hard to discuss or recommend to folks because of this.
Maybe it should have a specific marketing name like “Tillotsonator” or something.
@TillotsonRacing can we give this thing a name.
I believe the 196 and 212 get their names from the cc’s. My understanding is the 225RS and TPP-225RS are one in the same but that is an assumption on my part. Your right, the whole marketing roll out for this platform is pretty confusing for us here in the U.S. 
My vote for the name (if we’re doing that) is just to call it the Tillinator!
1 Like
Are there any plans for Tillotson to homologate the 225RS engine in Australia, particularly with the LO206 being phased out this year from what is already almost a monopolous engine market?
Or is the engine homologation process commercial unappealing with the process, cost, market size, and established competitor?
Want to know how the 206 class will get killed? This is how. This is the downfall of karting. Another engine choice by Tillotson that is essentially the exact same as the 206. All this will do is create more classes, more confusion and ultimately less racing/smaller class sizes.
I’m no big fan of Briggs or 4 stroke stuff in general but it’s very hard to argue against what they have created.
If you can’t afford a used 206 package (I just sold a nice one for 2,300 bucks) then you probably just can’t afford to go racing yet.
2 Likes