Author |
Message |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4090 Reg: 04-2006
| Oil temps have been a bit high for my liking. I used to have guard vents on an earlier version of the car. I decided to refit a vent to try and get oil temps lower. The current setup has two rubber hoses dumping into the guard. I decided to try and reuse this idea, but incorporate a vent above the guard. This was done with some stormwater fittings from the local hardware cut and bonded to some MDF.
Vent louvres were formed from MDF cut on a 45.
The two halves were bonded together with sikaflex.
A suitable sized hole was cut in the guard, and the vent bonded in from underneath.
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Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4091 Reg: 04-2006
| Whilst I was in the carbon fibre sort of mood, I set about reinforcing the prototype door I have been running for a couple of years. This was the door with a Soric core mat and the frame that did not come out right. Over time the door has become a little floppy and sags (some would argue this makes it a perfect copy of the original). The door striker has also copped a beating as a result. Hindsight tells me two layers of carbon and some soric were never going to handle being smashed into a metal post repeatedly, but experience makes us wise. Here is the damage that was revealed after the door mech was removed. Almost nothing left.
A spare door was used as a template to make an aluminium striker plate.
This was then bonded into the carbon door with Kevlar and carbon (Pic shows it sitting inplace on the door not bonded in)
The hinge end of the door received some kevlar and carbon reinforcement
The end result is a door that is one helluva lot stiffer, and closes first time, every time again. Interestingly the passenger door which is carbon and kevlar has shown no signs of the wear and tear or sagging. |
Mike Beck
Goo Roo New Zealand 3UZ-FE V8 4.3 UZZ32
Posts: 6232 Reg: 11-2005
| Interest work, so the top air dam is for the intercooler and lower for the radiator? It would have been interesting to get some before and after cooling temperatures with temperature probes at either end of the radiator and intercooler to see what sort of differences such ducting changes made. |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4092 Reg: 04-2006
| It has been tested at the track. Water temp is about 87 degrees, and dropped as low as 78 in the wet! Perhaps a little low to be honest. When idling in the pits it climbs to 93 but drops as soon as moving. Completely solved engine cooling issues. As for the intercooler it is about 40degrees on the hot side and 30 on the cold side after a 15 minute session and a cool down lap. I havent looked about the logs for intake temps, but I dont expect much change from previous - the intercooler still has good clean airflow like before and probably a better pressure drop across the core. Cooler piping is much shorter too. |
Peter Nitschke
Junk Filterer South Australia UZZ30 UZZ31
Posts: 12958 Reg: 11-2004
| Gee, you have been busy, I hope you had Xmas day off! |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4093 Reg: 04-2006
| Yeah, spent the day with the family. Back into it today though. Hot as hell in the shed...busy working on a new front bar and undertray. |
Tai Johnsen
Goo Roo QLD JZZ30 Pov Manual LSD & black! + 89 Z20 Aerocabin
Posts: 1808 Reg: 04-2006
| Love the composite work |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4094 Reg: 04-2006
| Following on from the change to the cooling setup, I decided to create a new front bar from scratch. The front bar design had been in my sketch book for some time in various forms. The goal was a cleaner front end drag wise, single opening (good for aero and drag), and no loss of down force with the potential for an increase. I made a jig from a nose cut and an engine stand. It was the same jig I used to figure out the cooler setup. I setup headlights and a stock front bar with guards on the nose cut and decided what I wanted to keep. Everything else got cut away and replaced with MDF and body filler in the new shape. Once I was happy with it, the whole thing got a few coats of polyurethane clear and then wax. I took a seven-piece mould of the bar using fibreglass and polyester resin. I then laid up carbon and carbon/Kevlar cloth to make the front bar.
The undertray was initially formed from Kevlar over a polyurethane foam sheet as a core. Once the front bar had fully cured, it was pulled from the mould and bonded to the undertray.
I hand made winglets for each side and created end plates from carbon over balsawood. The ducting piece for the radiator and intercooler etc had to be bonded inside the front bar as well.
The whole lot was assembled, and I was pretty happy with the results. It looked good.
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Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4095 Reg: 04-2006
| Seeing as I was entered in the SA Time Attack in February, I needed to test the car and myself at The Bend. I took the car out there and ran it. The splitter lasted less than one lap before I got a vibration.
It turned out the foam core was not strong enough, and it failed. This meant the top and bottom skins were able to 'slide' over each other and the splitter lost all its stiffness. Taking a deep breath, I cut the lower half of the splitter out and made a new core from a balsawood skeleton covered in carbon and epoxy. The Kevlar skin was sat in the mould and the skeleton placed on top. the whole thing was vac bagged and infused with epoxy to form a single piece. The repaired splitter is heavier, but immensely stiff. Both me and my son can stand on it...so I know this version holds 150kg.
I am currently making new end plates and changing the way the winglets are mounted. Once that is done the car will be ready to test again. Unfortunately, SA Time Attack has been postponed. I now have no event to run the car at. |
Tai Johnsen
Goo Roo QLD JZZ30 Pov Manual LSD & black! + 89 Z20 Aerocabin
Posts: 1809 Reg: 04-2006
| Holy Batmobile! Love all of your composite work! |
Peter Nitschke
Junk Filterer South Australia UZZ30 UZZ31
Posts: 12962 Reg: 11-2004
| How is the track at Tailem Bend? |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4096 Reg: 04-2006
| Tailem Bend is pretty good. If you have driven Mallala...actually there is no comparison. The Bend is a purpose built racetrack with good facilities. Very pricey, but in a completely different league to Mallala. The track itself is probably up there with Phillip Island in terms of driving, but obviously not as picturesque. |
Andrew McKellar
DieHard NSW Mustang GT
Posts: 928 Reg: 06-2008
| Awesome work once again Ben. You should really see someone about all that pent up energy... |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4097 Reg: 04-2006
| Don't worry, work is doing their best to use it all up. Taking Friday off to go to Mallala to test again. I hope to break my glass ceiling of second session, and actually make it to lunch with a running car. Just running on old tyres to check the splitter is strong enough and the car can handle being leant on for a few hard laps. |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4098 Reg: 04-2006
| Yesterday I had the Soarer out at Mallala for some testing. The major changes were the re-cored front splitter and obviously I had not yet really leant on the engine combo with the new tune. I took the decision to run on very old rubber on the SSR Gartmaier wheels as there was no point ruining good rubber. Being a practice day preceding a race weekend it was very busy. My normal group had 22 Excels in it, plus some IPRA, 86s and a couple of Porsches. Absolutely packed. I asked to go into the ‘mixed’ group which has street cars and track cars on a combination of licences. This proved to be a good call…until it wasn’t. The front splitter held up extremely well, holding its shape and generating noticeable downforce. The rear of the car needed a bit more wing to try and balance it out, and is now maxxed out. Bigger wing or a second element may be on the cards. The skid plates did their job, but the one on the left edge copped a hammering through the kink at 200+ and needs to be replaced with something more substantial. The engine combo produces so much torque I really need to modulate the throttle in areas I used to take with the foot flat to the floor, and anywhere that needs second gear will end up in wheelspin if I am not careful. The power steering failed in the first session, which made the day really, really hard work. Regardless, I matched my PB in the first shakedown with a 1:16.7. The second session with no power steering at all I ran a new PB of 1:16.2. Third session was better again at 1:15.8 because I now had a better idea of how to drive the car with no power steering. This sounds funny, but you cant catch oversteer when you can’t turn the steering wheel fast enough, so you either anticipate it or avoid it. And going through the really high-speed sections it takes a monumental effort to add more steering input due to the loads. I sat out session four to try and get some power steering back. I went out in the fifth session to find I still had no assistance and the session got red flagged after 3 laps for some infraction or other. The last session of the day I was hopeful of lowering the mark even further (the data told me I should be running 1:14.1) with less cars on the track. Unfortunately a Ferrari went off early followed by some breakdowns which meant every lap had a yellow flag somewhere you had to slow down for as cars made their way back to the pits under safety escort. At the end of the day, 1:15 on very old (3 and 7 years old!) tyres with no power steering and the data providing an optimal lap of low 1:14 is very encouraging. Time to sort the steering out and swap to the good wheels and tyres and see what she can do next time. |
Tai Johnsen
Goo Roo QLD JZZ30 Pov Manual LSD & black! + 89 Z20 Aerocabin
Posts: 1810 Reg: 04-2006
| Excellent progress! Almost 2 seconds is a huge difference |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4100 Reg: 04-2006
| It is very promising looking at the data. The fastest lap of the day had only 3 of 9 sectors as the fastest of the session. The last session of the day where I could not get a clean lap had many sectors that were significantly faster again. I am keen to get out on the track at a proper 'track day' with less cars than an open practice day. |
Geoff Quinn
Tinkerer SA Kluger
Posts: 11 Reg: 12-2011
| "I am keen to get out on the track at a proper 'track day' with less cars than an open practice day." Hi Ben - come to the MSCASA Supersprint on March 17 - much better than a track day. You'd be put in a group doing between 1:14 & 1:20ish, depending on who is there. Cars are gridded by lap time, so theoretically the car in front of you is faster, and the car behind is slower. It ia also cheap - $115 for a non MSCASA member. You'll get 4 sessions of 5 laps, all timed electronically to 3 decimal places if you can beg, borrow or steal a Dorian transponder. Details & supp regs are at www.mscasa.com, or hit me up if you want more info. |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4101 Reg: 04-2006
| Sounds pretty interesting Geoff. I'll have a look at the work calendar tomorrow and see if the 17th is doable. |
Andrew McKellar
DieHard NSW Mustang GT
Posts: 930 Reg: 06-2008
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Ben Lipman wrote on Wednesday, February 20, 2019 - 09:21 pm:I'll have a look at the work calendar tomorrow and see if the 17th is doable.
Impossible! St Patrick's Day is reserved for consuming Guinness, not race fuel... |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4102 Reg: 04-2006
| Tomorrow is out of the question, got to drive the boys to sport halfway across the city. It would have been tight anyway as the car is up on stands and grease plates doing a wheel alignment at the moment. I forgot how tedious string alignments are. No part of the process is particularly hard. Making the adjustments is reasonably simple, but every change in one aspect such as camber requires re-measuring of all specs and changes to toe adjustment etc. Deciding on what specs to run is also more difficult than the physical changes. I used to run toe out when the car was mostly stock to get it to turn in and rotate. Once I started adding decent power and lots of adjustable suspension components I have been running a very neutral setup with almost zero toe and 2.5 degree camber up front, 1mm toe in and 1 degree of camber down the back. Now I have plenty of power I am struggling to get the rear to hook coming off corners. I am not 100% on what I want the rear setup to be. Tyre temps are relatively even across the tyre face (eg: Outside 79, middle 81, and inside 84)which means the setup is pretty much right. I could take a small amount of camber out shooting for a perfect temps across the face, but I am not sure it is worth the effort. I have adjustable traction rods, but I actually have never understood what their effect on rear traction is. They barely rate a mention in books and forums. |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4103 Reg: 04-2006
| Carrying on from the previous post, in order to get an understanding of the impact of the rear traction rod, I decided to 'map' the toe in and camber over the suspension movement. I removed the coilover and disconnected the anti roll bar and used a jack to move the suspension through a range of movement. The zero value in the data below is normal ride height or the static alignment. I went 30mm in droop and 100mm in bump to get an idea of the changes over travel.
The next step will be adjusting the traction rod and seeing what the impacts are of both lengthening and shortening. I have no idea what I will find, but my only concern is the potential to create a bind in a joint somewhere. It is worth noting Toyota OEM equipment has no adjustment in the rod, so they may have decided there is nothing to be gained from an adjustment here. |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4104 Reg: 04-2006
| I had a play with the traction rod length. I tired 10mm longer, 10mm shorter and then, based on the findings and a hunch, I tired 5mm shorter than the OEM length. The results are tabled below. The first is the 10mm longer.
Below is the results from 10mm shorter. I found this interesting especially compared to the OEM length in the previous post.
Finally I tried 5mm shorter than OEM based off a hunch that the toe change curve would straddle my static ride height, giving relatively stable toe settings around this point.
I am going to try running the traction rods at the 5mm shorter length for my next track event. Hopefully this combined with now fully functional power steering (hopefully) and a refreshed wheel alignment should see a further improvement in lap times. |
Andrew McKellar
DieHard NSW Mustang GT
Posts: 931 Reg: 06-2008
| Wow Ben, you are turning this into a real science! Hopefully you'll see that 1:14 on the next outing... |
Ben Lipman
Goo Roo SA Soarer TT manual, plus TT track car, plus a spare shell
Posts: 4105 Reg: 04-2006
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Andrew McKellar wrote on Sunday, March 24, 2019 - 02:51 am:Wow Ben, you are turning this into a real science! Hopefully you'll see that 1:14 on the next outing...
It had more to do with curiosity. I stopped counting at 15 different companies manufacture or sell under their own label adjustable traction arms. Not one of them indicates how they would be used to tune the rear handling. Asking facebook resulted in the usual ignorance with some 'experts' who obviously did a quick google search and cut/pasted the first explanation they could find, usually off an Nissan forum - Nissan 'traction rods' are located and orientated very differently on their strut suspension to Toyota Soarer/SUpra double wishbone ones and would be used more like our toe rods. "10mm longer than factory" or "1/2 inch longer than factory" was what people had suggested. I would say this was based off a US Supra Forum post from a few years back as the text quoted several times was exactly a match for his post. My data shows 10mm longer would transition from 1mm toe in to 1mm toe out in the first 30mm of suspension bump - just what you want, a rear end that changes it's setup dynamically! SO, I decided to do some data collection myself. Now I can make an educated guess and save hours of messing around in really expensive track pits. The ignorant experts will no doubt be quoting "5mm shorted than factory" for the next 5 years now because this post may come up in a google search. |