Hi, where would be a good place to go to get side mirror for electrathon racing? The mirrors on my car are too small and wouldn't meet the rule requirement for the eight inches square, any suggestions?  Thanks.

Nearly all of Willamette's cars use stick on round spot mirrors. A 2" dia on each side will meet the requirements but is not much viewing area. I don't let my team use less than a 3" and I prefer the 4" as it give a better rear view. There are also some rectangle shaped spot mirrors out there that work. We weld a 1/2" tube with a sheet metal 'circle' attached to our car. The circle has 3/4 tabs that wrap around the mirror to hold it because the self stick will not hold with the rough tracks. To make it more aerodynamic we can add a 'cone' out of plastic/fiberglass/aluminum etc. to the leading edge and even an aerodynamic cover out of VERY clear plastic on the trailing side. As you know building 20 cars a year we get by as cheaply as possible and these cost about $1-2 each. Just be sure that you have them adjusted correctly to begin with as they are very hard to adjust later unless you take the mirror off. Nearly all bike mirrors tend to bounce too much without any suspension and are hard to see out of not to mention that they cost much more.

Thanks Mike.  The ones on my car were hard to see out of, and the car that was about 50 to 100 feet behind you was a speck in the mirror. And if the car was right next to you, you had to actually turn your head to look because the mirrors wouldn't pick up the other car.  I guess its all trial and error, and lots of testing too!

Zaine, I obviously race close ****pit cars outside of running electrathon, and in those cars we actually cannot turn our head side to side. We have found the best thing you can do is mount the mirrors as close to you as you can, while it still being comfortable for you to view them. Sit in the car as you would when racing it, and have someone move your mirror of choice around. When you find a spot you like it, mount it there. Just be careful with mounting it, if you dont brace it enough, hitting a bump or even working on the car in the pits and it can fall off. I also used the 2" mirrors and HATED them. I'd suggest at least 3" mirrors, I will run them on our car from now on.

Thanks for the input Kyle.  I'll keep that in mind when I go to make mounts for my mirrors for my car.

The easiest solution is to use motorcycle mirrors. The cheapest solution is round spot mirrors. They are hard to see and judge distances in. Bike mirrors are to wobbly,in the NW we will make you replace them with stronger mirrors. If you really want to get elaborate, you can mold them into your car for aerodynamics. Bottom line is it really helps to see. The new helmet rules are going to horibly limit your side viewing ability, so mirrors are gonig to be even more important. When you get hit you end up going really slow. Aaron

Thanks for the input Aaron, I'll start looking around.

My dad and I used the three inch. mirrors and they worked perfectly fine, you could see everything! Just make sure you can see more of the back of you, other than the side of your car