yes, racerT, MSNZ should not have anything to do with noise regulation. it is already covered by helf and safty ( spelling is deliberate)Originally Posted by RacerT
yes, racerT, MSNZ should not have anything to do with noise regulation. it is already covered by helf and safty ( spelling is deliberate)
Good post Carlo and thanks for the background.
When a few years ago, Pukekohe was in strife, (unpaid bill regarding resurfacing I think) I was certainly one of those who attended a meeting to try and resolve it. The only others I can remember were Racing Ray Williams and Warwick Chandler from Lotus and the late Bob White from NSCC.
The fact that Franklin Racing Club owns the site and whether we like it or not, means that horses take preference and always will, purchasing Pukekohe is never going to be a possibility. The costs of doing so, even it it was available, would be prohibitive and there is no car club in the country or even the southern hemisphere who would be able to afford it.
I'm not sure when you last went Carlo, but there are now commercial buildings built adjacent to the track at the esses and you don't need to be Einstein to know where some of the noise complaints might be coming from.
We bought into Hampton Downs on the strict understanding that there were no grounds for complaint regarding either noise, the tip or the prison. As Tony points out, all locals had been consulted and there were no objections from locals when the track was being proposed. The only objections (just in case you have forgotten) were from Corrections and what was Transit NZ - both effectively government departments under the previous labour Government. They lost their case at a huge cost to the developers (and the taxpayers).
I totally understand where you are coming from, trying to preserve your track for the future, but much of the noise issue is driven by emotion rather more than elf and sanity. Play opera at 95db and some will open their windows to hear it better. Play traditional jazz at 95db and different windows will open, whilst the opera lovers complain to noise control.
The fact is that to some people, hearing the BRM V16 on full song whilst shopping in Towcester in 1951 would have them rushing to Silverstone several miles away, hoping to see the car running (it didn't usually last long!), other shoppers wouldn't even be aware of it. So it is around Pukekohe. Apart from that brand new shopping area, from outside the track, you'd hardly be aware of the cars running.
We live several miles away from Western Springs Speedway, but even with their 85db limit, we can still hear them when the wind is blowing our way - but only because they are always bunched and you cannot say any individual car is loud, it is the cumulative effect. Is it intrusive just because we can hear it? No. Ditto speedboats racing on Aucklands upper harbour. Much noisier than the speedway anyway, but we can still hear them - for a few days each year.
The local school's PA system is far more intrusive.
Back in the UK, we could hear the soccer crowds several miles away when Forest were playing at home. Notts County rarely had a big enough crowd(!) yet the grounds are only a few hundred metres apart. The significant thing is that one man on his own yelling, even if if it was a loudmouthed Chelsea supporter, couldn't be heard several miles away.
So I don't see cars as any different. A close grid of 45 BMW E30's can be louder than one 2 litre Ford Escort that fails the flawed Pukekohe test.
Last edited by ERC; 10-24-2013 at 01:54 AM.
I agree with you Ray on this one. To me the track was built in 1963, and where were the commercial buildings and housing then...? Sadly by the lack of planning skills the council has allowed development right up to the edge of the race track over the years and its been a few since I was last there.....like 20 years ago. I was taken back recently and shocked that the buildings are right on the boundary. No wonder there are complaints.
They call it progress but by the sounds of what your are all saying our beloved Puke is no more....ruined by people who just are not interested in motorsport.
I live not more than 1 km from Manfeild Park and yes we hear the cars and bikes but it doesn't bother us as our economy is dependent on that facility and long may it last.
I know this is not about motor racing but it is the same issue - people buying property near something that is inherently noisy and then complaining about it.
Some years ago in another life I worked for the New Zealand Dairy Group and for my sins part of my job was dealing with the media.
At Waitoa there was a huge dairy factory. The houses that immediately surrounded the factory had been built years ago by the company so there was somewhere for workers to live. As the population throughout the region grew, things changed and the company sold off most of the houses.
They were cheap then, and they still are, because there is a sodding great factory next door and it operates 24/7. Trucks come and go, so do other vehicles. They are noisy too.
But inevitably there have been complaints about noise and light at night. Not initially because people back then knew the score and that living next door to a big dairy factory would be noisy.
One complaint that fell on my desk involved Fair Go - the reporter contacted me and put the complainant's side of the story. I pointed out that the Waitoa dairy factory was one of the oldest in the world and had been a major production facility for decades and decades. Responsible for the town being there in the first place.
"Why would anyone want to buy a house next door to it and then complain about the noise?" I asked, pointing out that anyone who put a little bit of thought into it would realise that noise levels would be high and the factory was not going to vanish any time soon, if ever.
The Fair Go reporter saw sense and that was the last we heard of them - although I suspect the problem will be on-going. Someone looking to buy a cheap home will snap up a bargain in Waitoa and the first night they try to get some sleep the reality will hit hard.
Last edited by Shano; 10-24-2013 at 01:35 AM.
This 95dba thing is not just a New Zealand requirement, it is common throughout the world and came from the FIA, Aussie as an example enforce it with a passion, remember the issues with the B&H BMW's of Longhurst & Morris being black flagged off the circuit on live TV, Uncle Frank certainly did not like that. The world exception of course granted by the FIA is Formula One
We just have to live with it same as we live with capacity classes, weight limits, valve lift measurements etc. It is just part of the sport. For sure if we had not have had the FIA MSNZ limits to use as a tool in our favour then I am quite confident that both Timaru and Manfeild would have lost out when we had to go through that resource consent process all those years ago and that it is the work of those two clubs that is now recognised as the standard by the District Councils.
In all of the arguments that I have heard or read about in recent times there are no new ones and none that I have either not heard or used myself.
I guess that the thing that turned my thinking around was one day when I was looking after a test day and a car started close by, I had our two boys with us and they both quickly put their hands over their ears and started crying. Those same two boys were quite happy in our workshop when I had my RX3 or BDA running. Such was the noise of those particular V8's at the time.
Does anyone remember Don Grindley's OSCA RX3. At Wigram where there was wide open spaces, we all used to drop down behind the concrete pit wall and block our ears when he came by as none of the so called half deaf battle hardened pit crews could remain above the wall height such was the effect of the noise on your brain and your body.
As for familiarity with Puke, yeah I was having a bit of a nose around there a few weeks ago, I have family & quite a few motorsport mates up that way
And for buying Puke, well if you look at the facts that Auckland has 40 time the population of Timaru than you should be able to replicate the Sth Canterbury Car Club but with a club membership of 6000 people rather than our 150 and then when you ran your bigger meetings you would be getting somewhere between 200,000 and 260,000 individual paying spectators in attendance.
However I do appreciate that one ever said that it was going to be that easy.
Not sure where you get 260,000 from! That is 1 in 4 of the whole of greater Auckland. Apart from the Aussie V8s, I don't think anyone has even cracked the 20,000 barrier in recent times. You'd have to be at the Le Mans 24 Hours or the Indy 500 to get anywhere near that. Goodwood festival has a 50,000 a day maximum and I think that Silverstone gets around 100,000 for the British GP.
Remember that Pukekohe as it is now and has been since I first clapped eyes on it, has had a covered grandstand and buying in now is not even the same as the buy in of Hampton Downs on virgin North Waikato farmland.
I can't see Franklin Racing Club letting it go at any price as it is the motorsport track hire that currently probably pays the majority of the bills. If track hire falls off, who knows, but until it does fall off, there is probaby no urgency to change, as they get their track hire fee regardless of whether or not the promoting club makes money.
There are all sorts of cars that can hurt your unprotected ears and it is not confined to V8s either. In the past I have come across Minis and even Vauxhalls that I consider painfully loud. There are also some cars where the resonance is a pain rather than the outright noise.
Currently, it appears that a couple of 2 litre Ford Escorts have been pinged and neither have been noted as excessively loud in the past.
PS: Just had a decibel test at the exhaust on my silenced road going V8 at 3000rpm. 95db...
Last edited by ERC; 10-24-2013 at 02:17 AM.
Sorry Carlo, can't buy into your thought's on Puke. Even you would have had your tongue in your check writing that. (like the figures, wish you made my wages up)
Timaru is still Timaru, limited in what is available to do. Sorry but Puke is not as it was when it all started.
As stated above, take the car money away and the horse outfit will go tits up. Maybe this could be an omen in the end.
They have lived off motorsport for years.
Just take the Timaru attendance figures and multiple them by the 40 time more population that Auckland has than Timaru. Yes we probably do get 1 in 4 of the local population when you look at it that way mind you we do have a few outlying towns to call on such as Temula, Geraldine, Waimate, Ashburton & Oamaru etc much in the same way that you can draw on Hamilton up your way
Review the test requirements and test correctly for that figure is far to high for the engine on full load acceleration for a road car. Our race ones used to come in around 92.5 to 93dba with headers, large bore, Coby mufflers twin pipes and a tail pipe expansion chamber before we went to a better type of muffler and dropped it to around 88dba and an increase in performance.
Vauxhall noise was probably piston slap, gudgeon knock and tappets just before the bearings failed
At 95dba you would fail both an Entry Level and a WOF inspection.
The Avondale Racecourse fell over when they put the lights in and did not generate enough extra income to cover it. They had to sell off a huge parcel of land. The Sunday market is their money earner.
Next to me , the Ellerslie Racecourse also got neck deep in the brown stuff. Over the past 20 years they have only survived by a consistant selling of land . Soon they will have about half of what they had in 1975.
So, Rod, you are correct, it is shown that horse racing itself only barely covers. Pukekohe horse outfit could easily go, although i am sure the horsey set have plenty if needed.
Last edited by John McKechnie; 10-24-2013 at 06:18 AM.
Horse racing has been for quite sometime in the brown...excuse the pun but Len might have to swallow some of it or maybe the land could be used for high density housing.....
Sorry Carlo, your logic is somewhat flawed. Sure, Auckland has 40 times your population base, but it also has 50 times as many events and - even more options for the leisure dollar running at the same time as the Timaru area - and these do not have to be large events to suck away the potential either.
Pukekohe took over from Ardmore where they used to have massive crowds. Pre war Donington and Brooklands also had massive crowds, but in those days, the average family was starved of entertainment. Look at the programme for the late 1930's Donington meetings and it was pathetic - other than the silver Arrows, but there were coachloads and coachloads of spectators. Heck, we had no family car and used to catch an excursion coach to a bank holiday Mallory Park meeting and the crowds were huge in the late 1950s early 1960s.
Over the years, the crowds have dropped and dropped from tier one down, as families became more mobile and now mum has her own car, she no longer gets dragged to a race meeting. Unless something pretty drastic happens, attendances will continue to drop and one of the reasons is the tiny grids of Tier 1 cars, televised, as the supposed pinnacle of NZ racing. As I have posted on here many times before, race meetings now have to be self supporting from race entries.
If you'd care to provide attendance figures (if they are known - and I don't see turnstiles at NZ meetings doing a count) for say the top 10 meetings of the year at Timaru, maybe we can see how that stacks up, because I know for a fact that the majority of meetings at Pukekohe would have less than 1,000 paying spectators and at many, it isn't even worth putting anyone on the gate.
Last edited by ERC; 10-24-2013 at 07:23 AM.
think about this.... should a race track or organiser get taken to court on a noise issue they can stand up and say the they complied with MSNZ regulation (insert number) and the FIA regulation (insert another number) but this will not help as that the case will be heard on local laws as they stand. This is the reason that I say forget MSNZ. the regs that they have are nor worth a pinch of (insert or extract you know what) by all means do your home work and monitor noise in the direction of any potential complaints. note weather conditions (photos) and any other relivant things and keep them all together in a big file. forewarned is forearmed
Just to get this one back on the subject, the meeting this Saturday was the first time I have had a chance to race at the revised Puke in the dry and I have to say the place has not lost its magic. The new infield, (in my humble opinion) adds another dimension and a potential passing opportunity and the existing quick corners, Turn 1 (still Champion to me) and over the Hill (ditto Rothmans) are as challenging as ever.
Yes there are marks on the walls where people have hit them but don't forget plenty of people went into the earth bank at Rothmans that used to be there too. Those corners have always required some respect.
Unfortunately, quite possibly due to potential entrants being daunted by the place and certainly because of the perceived risk of being pinged for excessive noise, the number of entries was well down meaning the meeting became a one day only and I don't mind betting the organisers still took a bath.
The noise issue may be stupid but it is there and not going away anytime soon. Making a car comply isn't too difficult, often a simple down turn on the exhaust outlet will do the trick. As for the walls, in the dry they need respect, yes but that's all, possibly a little more in the wet I agree.
If collectively we don't support meetings at Puke, nobody will risk running a classic meeting there and the opportunity to race there will be lost. To my mind that will be a great loss and the history of the place deserves more than that.
Last edited by Howard Wood; 10-27-2013 at 07:31 AM.
Several drivers seem to have overcome their trepidation and settled down.
Just one of our cars was pinged yesterday and he managed to put deflectors on the exhaust pipes.
At least two drivers have stated that they believe it is induction as much as exhaust noise!
The extended garaging area appears to be fine for those who want to pay out an extra $100 for a garage, but the area behind appears to be a bit cramped and if there had been 12 classes rather than 6, (normal for a two day meeting) then half the cars would have been located on the outside of the circuit, which can be a pain if a car is entered in two classes and one is located on the outside and one on the inside. A nightmare for dummy grid marshals.
Oh, and just one gents WC now for the whole paddock?
I wonder how the noise monitors would go out at the Meremere drag strip? Probably explode along with the operator!!
To go back to the concrete jungle again for just a moment. I have just watched the aussie v8s at Winton and the lack of barriers puzzles me. Can anyone explain why Winton has little or no barriers or wire catch fences and a gum tree in the middle of one of the corners and Pukekohe is like it is?
I think because v8 supercars had to purchase the barriers from the Hamilton race so they had them. Installing them at the track was to create a street circuit feel and with its bumps still in place they feel that was achieved.
Mike L
You are quite right Allan, neither has Philip Island, Symmons Plains, Barbogello and the list goes on. Hamilton CC wanted out of the contract early so in order to make the deal sweeter they offered all the barrier gear to Cochrane and his cronies for $1.8 million instead of the $9million they paid for it. Bargain time, so they took it but left it in Frankton for almost a year with council paying the storage bill! How good is that. I bet HD could have somehow come up with the cash to buy at that price for future track expansion. And we look to our politicians to lead us. Another Tui ad I think.
Rather than some of the answers posted... I was told by someone on the inside of the deal that either our friend Mr Cochrane or the V8 Supercar organisation bought the barriers from Hamilton at a very low price, then passed them on to Auckland City/Pukekohe for a substantial profit and insisted on their use. This has never been officially confirmed nor denied. I would be interested to know the real truth though
Oldfart, you got more chance of being told lotto numbers than truth about that lot.
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