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Jimmy, i am unsure what sort of class you want.
From what i can gather is that you still want this class to drive the same courses (with slightly wider gates). If that is correct than your full bodied vehicles will still get destroyed, whether they are competing against moon buggies or not.
The thing is that the stages will be a lot harder next year, for anyone that attended the finals you could see that the normal stages were quite doable. It was the bonus lines that were the real challenge. Next year the normal stages will be alot harder (hopefully) and the bonus lines will be harder again. For example the A1 bonus (the big rock with a 14 foot vertical drop off), we will be seeing drop offs like that in the NORMAL stages (i hope).
Now that sort of drop off is not there to roll over BUGGIES, all buggies will drive that (should drive that) it is there to show that some people will do it in one attempt and another team (that is not as confident or as skillful) may take 3 or 4 attempts before they do it, but it will however roll over a full bodied rig and the damage would be mind boggling.
Buggies are built for a reason, they are far more capable. I am not saying that in anyway to disrespect full bodied rigs. Its the fact, if it wasn't then well full bodied rigs would still be winning.
The other thing to is that this class would end up failing for no other reason than the sheer cost of replacing panels after every event. Whether you roll or not there is no way anything with panels on it would survive. So after each comp you could be looking at thousands of dollars just to replace busted panels and of course thats on top of what drive componants and other critical parts were also busted.
It would cost me about $60.00 after every event to fully replace and paint my panels for the buggy (+ $200.00 sinage that is covered by sponsors).
So a class to accomodate full bodied rigs would fail due to sheer fact that they would not be able to complete the courses set. (remember next year the normal stages will be like the bonus stages at the finals). And therefore spectators would not watch it.
The other point to make is that if they did want to compete on the same stages then a full bodied rig is going to need some serious hardware to be able to handle the difficult terrain. The FireTruck is the only Jeep i know of that can get threw most of the stages without breaking and he has some serious shiat in that rig. The buggies can get away with running weaker axles like 60 series and Dana 44's due to the light weight, however many of those are breaking regularly and are upgrading to more expensive hardware. So in other words if someone was going to spend that sort of money on an up grade they would be better of putting it into a dedicated buggy. I believe Shane and Zach are looking at doing this sometime soon. They were very competitive this year but they have seen what the future holds and have realised that even with the best Jeep in Oz (just my opinion) that they will struggle to finish the stages and also i am sure that the costs to repair the Firetruck (panels wise) would be expensive.
If on the other hand you want a class for Full Bodied rigs to run on easier tracks then unfortunatly i think WEROCK shouldn't get involved in this either. It already cost a lot of money to run these events and with more time required to set different stages and things like extra cones, bunting all adds up. All this and to be totally honest no one is going to come and watch vehicles driving easier terrain than what is been driven by the buggies. So spectator wise there would be no increase as the people that want to see the hard stuff are already there and they are not going to watch anything easier.
I also don't see the need for a feeder class, if someone wants to compete for fun they can build a very competitive Legends Class vehicle very cheaply as long as they do it wisely. To be totally honest someone could even build a legends rig for as little as 5 or 6 grand and as long as they get advice and set it up correctly to suit the style of competition in todays enviroment there is no reason it wouldn't be competitive. Hell you can even get into the Unlimiteds for 17 grand. I am selling my moon buggy at the moment for 17 grand, its a lot cheaper than what most would spend doing up there rigs.
I am not in anyway having a go at full bodied rigs, all i am saying is that there was a NEED in Australia for a dedicated full on Rockcrawling Series and as it is growing very quickly it is no place for a full bodied rig.
The two major series in america no longer accomodate full bodied rigs simply due to the fact that they were not competitive and even in a stock class (with different courses) the spectators never watched them and after a while competitors numbers were non exsistant.
If i was starting out and interested in Rockcrawling i would attend every event i could, watch and watch closely, speak to the drivers that are winning or drive well, have a look at there set-ups, watch what they do when they roll or drop of a 14 foot wall, watch the amount of effort they put in when they need to clear an obstacle, find out how many hours before that event they spent rebuilding there buggies, then after all that make a decission on whether or not you could see yourself going to those extreme's and wheteher or not you want to be in it for fun or to win the series. If you choose to compete then contact people that are "in the know" and find out from them what is needed to be competitive. Then you can use you hard earned $$$ to buy or build a rig that will suit a class and be competitive.
I hope i have not offended anyone, these are just my opinions and do not in anyway reflect the opinions of WEROCK organisors. But i hope they make sense.
Cheers Adrian.
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