Sam's build thread

[sambb]

Oh man he got me by a 1/10th at the Esses but a second at Mountain Straight. I was neck a neck with him on the bottom half of the mountain but he creamed me across the top. He's in over 3000cc - is he turbo?

[simon k]

I want that 1200 Ute ............ I'll have to have a good squiz at your mates 1200 next time I see it.

the 1200 ute is a very neat bit of gear, it's really really quick and you can see how well it turns and they're brilliant at throwing it around. Bob and his son are both pretty heavy, the ute will lift it's left front wheel 6" off the ground when turning left, but somehow stays very flat when turning right... something about weight distribution....

And yes, the 1200 Coupe has an FJ20 turbo - it's exhaust manifold fell to pieces today, I didn't look, but Bob's son came up to him after a session and said 'it lost all power and now smoke is coming out from cracks all over the manifold, the turbo looks OK, but the manifold is falling to bits'. Bob said it was a $300 ebay job and has lasted 4 years so he's actually pretty happy with it.

Love it!! that looks unreal. That's how I learnt to drive in my RS2000 escort. As soon as it'd rain (cos everyone has 500hp in the wet) me and a mate would descend on the nearest industrial estate that would be empty on the weekend and get all Ken Block. I bet you've got a good handbrake.

Yes, hydraulic handbrake - I've just made a new one that will sit up beside the steering wheel instead of between the seats and with a lot more mechanical advantage - but otherwise a bit of adjustability in the suspension, quaife diff, I adapted power steering from a Barina last year.. I had a blower (+ megasquirt injection & LS1 coils) on it for a few years but it was too hard for the kids to drive and to maintain reliability, so I took it off and went back to a carb, but I've kept the MS & big coils.

Reading your notes about suspension setup, a lot of it applies to the mini so I'm going to do something about pulling the bum down and adding a rear sway bar. My mini has 'hydrolastic' suspension which is rubber springs with fluid damping that is linked front to rear on each side. Most people doing competition with a model like mine (Cooper S) remove it in favour of the alternative 'rubber cone' suspension which is fully independent rubber springs, I won't do that, so need to engineer my way around it

The sprint today was fun, but as I expected the understeer is diabolical - standard suspension setup and very cheap tyres. One guy who was following me for a few corners said afterwards 'you need to get some tyres on that thing!' - no matter what I did I couldn't get it to oversteer even the tiniest bit.

plenty of people with cameras, I'll post some pictures in my own thread instead of hijacking yours

[sambb]

so that was the Polo that you ran today that you couldn't get to turn in?

[simon k]

so that was the Polo that you ran today that you couldn't get to turn in?

yep - other than tyres, it seems like the first place to start is making a stiffening beam for the back-end, and I suppose some poly control arm bushes, maybe make a strut brace for the front too? As I said, I nearly made a rear stiffening beam - I wish I had, I didn't think it'd be as bad as it was...

I like your TT ball joint modification, except that the strut top bearings collapse (right?) can you replace the tops of the standard struts with something that can handle the change in angle? maybe machine an angled plate to sit on top to correct the angle?

oh - and I think I want some 15" wheels - since it's my daily, it might be smarter in the long run for me to get some 15" wheels and cheap-ish track tyres (even 2nd hand race tyres) rather than put expensive tyres on the 16" wheels for the ~25,000km I do each year plus trying to compete. I've always had separate competition and road tyres for the mini

if you were on a (very) limited budget, where adapting or fabricating stuff is easier than buying, where would you start?
yell out when you want me to start my own thread

[sambb]

You can pick up VR6 wheels 15x6.5 et43 for 200 a set. They are pretty light. Put semis on the front and baldies on the rear. You could put 185 or 195/55/15 on ths back and 205,s on the front. There are some 15mm spacers on the parts forum so id grab them too to get thectrack width up. Id pull the esp fuse because i found it grabs opposire front brakes and funny things like that with the esp active and mucks up handbrake turns. Definitely get the hardest rear bar you can or use an internal bar like gary was talking about. The eibach shims transformed my car so for khanacross youd want a touch of toe out and thst only costs 40 bucks but is a bit of effort. Since you daily your xar you could use spring rubbers or sometimes called blockers. They insert between the coils in the springs, just say 1 full turn, and effectively coil bind them. Tbis will crank up your rear spring rate and then you just pull them out at the end of the day. Summit racing sells them. They sound dodgy but the supercars use them. Yeah the ball joint mod did stress the top mounts a bit, but you don't have to extend the existing slots in the ball joints like i did for extra camber. You can just throw the ball joints in and get the roll centre correction alone.

[sambb]

For a good street car it might be a bit different. Id just get some koni yellows cos they atleast have some rebound adjustment keep the front springs but throw h and r rears in. Front bar optional without an lsd but definitely a rear bar. The ball joint mod helped. Id rebush everything literally everything. Brakes sre fine if you have good pads so 15,s are perfect. Fexeral rsr are only like 130 a tyre in that size. And i wish id shimmed the rear long ago. One of the best bang for bucks ive done.

[sambb]

Hey is anyone near noble park/sandown coming to dub nats in sydney this year?

[sambb]

I should clarify - and wants to cart a pair of gumtree semis up with them.

[sambb]

official site report:

http://hillclimbnsw.com/report-2018-rd-1-mantic-clutch-esses-hillclimb/
CAMS NSW Hillclimb Championship >> REPORT: 2018 Rd 2 Mantic Clutch “Mountain Straight”

Simon I think your mates car is in the pic gallery for the mountain straight report in case he wants a pic.

[Sydneykid]

Hi Simon, if you want a priority list for FWD suspension;
#1 Rear swaybar (or beam stiffener) nothing else comes close, bang for buck
#2 Front positive caster, the more the better
#3 Front negative camber for obvious reasons
#4 Rear toe out, ask Sam
#5 Lower the rear roll centre
#6 Dampers, buy the best you can afford
#7 Front roll centre correction and bump steer elimination
#8 LSD
#9 Front swaybar
#10 Rear springs, at least triple the standard rate
#11 Front springs, ~1.5 times the standard rate

Most people are surprised that I put springs so low on the list as it's often the first thing people reach for, when there are things that make far more difference.


Cheers
Gary