Tassupervees F-Vee Fun and Games

tassupervee That really hurts doesnt it!

1,171 posts · joined Sep 2003 · 14 Mar 2008, 10:25 pm

#636733

Ive not posted much recently about any Formula Vee stuff.

I had a very quiet season last year and only competed in half the seasons events here in Tassie...just because!

Anyway, did a few minor changes to the car this year, mostly with rear suspension.

The car (Kestrel KC-3 F-Vee) has always been reallyexceptional on the frontend.
The steering has always been direct and predictdable with loads of grip along minimal tyre wear since the addition of the B/J front beam, inboard shocks and R&P steering.
I have not touched the front end since fitting it up, not even had it aligned!
I have no idea, nor care what the front end alignment is actually, but i have no plans to alter anything!!
The rear end has always been sensational in tight and slower stuff but a little unpredictable in the really fast stuff which tended to put the shits up me and Id find myself backing out of fast corners rather than attacking them and letting the chassis do its job.

I tried a plethora of suspension settings, ride height and rear toe settings over the course of the season to try and dial out the uneasiness but i never really got a hold of it.

Ive always been a bit concerned about the weight of the rear spring (too hard) and the amount of rebound damping needed to control the hard arse end.

Newhoo, I changed the rear spring for a softer one, I went down 25Lb and reduce the rebound damping to compensate.
Dropped the rideheight by 10mm and added a set of wheels 12mm narrower, (5.5") and 15mm extra negative offset each side.
These changes have turned this car from a potentially good car to a great car!

I usually dont go very well alone and mostly qualify mid-field.
This time, i managed to qual. P2 and shaved a full second of my best time around Baskerville.

The track actually slowed down over the weekend but the sheer driveability of the car made it a pleasure to drive, rather than the chore it had become and i was able to concentrate on where i was actually going, rather than what i was actually doing!!!!
The high speed stability was simply awesome to what I have been used to but there was no change to the slow speed grip and turn-in which the car has always been noted for. Just wind on the wheel and it turns untill you spin it!

All this and running a tad under 30 kilos overweight in the category!

Gotta be happy with that!
Enjoy!
L8tr
E

Heres a really nice pic of the car taken from a direction you rarely see i motorsport pix.
Dummy grid for the first race on Saturday.
Really highlights the beautiful form of this car!
Not to mention those very cool new wheels!

Or this one, wandering back into the pits after the race!

Im not a complete idiot, quite a few parts are missing....

Midlife crisis Nartispuddlejumper, Bureau of Toxicity

2,282 posts · joined May 2003 · 15 Mar 2008, 6:06 am

#636754

Now thats really good news,
So does this mean you will do the whole season this year?, ehich means we get to lots of photo's and reports.

Marc

If you can't laugh at yourself you can't laugh at anyone else! Because life is to short not to LAUGH

dangerous 23 Windows of Awesome

5,901 posts · joined Jan 2005 · 15 Mar 2008, 6:26 am

#636756

That is great stuff E.
Can you tell us ball park what kind of spring rate you use,
and where it is mounted along the swingaxle? (yeah I know top secret!!)

Most drag cars that have the effective force line in line with the tyre patch are 500lbs per inch or more.
If the lower mount is moved inboard to clear the tyre(or other stuff) some use nearly 800lbs/inch!!
This is on cars around 700 to 800 kg wuth driver.

westi wrote:That's mad Alan.

OZ Towdster Keen to finish some projects

1,921 posts · joined Dec 2003 · 15 Mar 2008, 7:57 am

#636772

Sounds good , but i think i would take some measurements of where that front is all set now , as if you damage it at any time you will have no reference points to start with

Don't let body work get in the way of real suspension travel

tassupervee That really hurts doesnt it!

1,171 posts · joined Sep 2003 · 15 Mar 2008, 8:22 am

#636775

Midlife
Yer Im hoping to do the full season this year.
A very good M8 of mine, in exchange for carrying some signage on the car, is going to do a photo collection as well for me.
He takes some really interesting pix from unusual angles like previous.

I had a rather irritating failure after R1. The cars were held up on the dummy grid while a stuck car from the previous event was retrieved. We all shut the engines down for 5 minutes or so.
When I went to restart it, there was a clunk as the starter engaged and then all electrics simply went out - kaput! Tried to clutch it hoping against hope it might just be a dodgey battery connection but all it did was pop and fart a few times.

My very expensive sealed race battery had simply flashed internally and gone open circuit.......arrrrgh! Into the bin.
Borrowed another and fitted it up overnight but I was now buried at the end of the grid.

Dave
Damn thats hard suspension.
My suspension is a single monoshock (zero roll control) which is mounted above the gearbox and operated by pushrods picking up off the original lower shock mounts.
Heres an old pic taken during construction.

1:1 wheel to shock travel on each side with a small measure of rising rate built in (just for the hell of it!).
The spring oiriginally fitted is 250Lb. I went to 225Lb with the revised setup.
The car with driver weighs 500 kilos.

Towdster.
yep your quite right!
However, the beam is mounted flat against the front bulkhead which sets the caster (whatever that might be) and the adjustable balljoints are set with the reference marks innermost and parallel.
I set the camber (12mm differenc from top of rim to bottom of rim) with the ally turkeyleg spacers which replace the dust seals on the lower tubes.
Zero toe with the frontend loaded @ rideheight.

It was just an absolute baseline assembly "give it a go" figure with no funky settings and it happened to work spectacularly well.
L8tr
E

Im not a complete idiot, quite a few parts are missing....

mactaylor Custom Title Time!

1,005 posts · joined Aug 2007 · 15 Mar 2008, 2:36 pm

#636829

hey tas have you got some info and photos of your inboard front coilovers i think cam was looking for some, and where can you buy the bellcranks and control arm links?

EVERLAST CONCRETE TANKS
1800 552 123

tassupervee That really hurts doesnt it!

1,171 posts · joined Sep 2003 · 16 Mar 2008, 8:20 am

#636907

Mac
We are not actually allowed to use coilover fronts.
My shocks are inboard but the torsion spring in the upper tube still does thew job of ride height.

Umm I fabricated all my own stuff from scratch M8. Sadly, its not the sort of stuff you can readily buy really as every different car has a different set of circumstances to get around.

I see no reason that some bellcranks from a Formula car could not be adapted to fit tho. i did look at this but being in Tassie, I dodnt get much opportunity to actually have the stuff in my hand to do some sussing out.
Most of this stuff is pretty exxie as well.

Id suggest contacting some of the Formula Car associations tho. Im sure theyd be able to help you if you want to buy something.

This is what my setup looks like.
I used my original upright shocks because i was simply too tightarsed to go out and buy new short travel shocks. The Konis have a threaded shaft and it was just a matter of winding on the appropriate rose joint on to adapt it to the bellcrank.
I sized my bellcranks to maintain 1:1 wheel to shock travel.
The pushrods are made from about 2.4mm seamless hydraulic tube. The threaded ends are machined from mild bar with a flange on the end and are brazed into the end of the tubes.
In the past, I have simply machined down deep nuts and brazed them in.
The lower pushrod tub pickup point is a commercial F-Vee item from a yank outfit that bolts onto the stock shock mount on the lower turkeyleg.
The top od the shock is bolted in single shear right thru the chassis tube with a crush tube brazed in.
The bellcrank post was machined up, ground and notched to give the correct fit and angle off the tube and simply brazed (nickel bronze) in place. Its base is about 25mm in diameter so it has pretty much no chance of sheering off.

All this clobber is made based on the bearings I used which are a double row ball bearing sitting on a 19mm shaft. In retrospect, its all over engineered to buggery and is a bit heavy.
I machined up a steel bearing carrier from heavy walled steel tubing and the bearing is retained by a circlip.
The rest of the bellcranks are cut out of 1.9mm mild sheet and brazed up to the bearing carrier.
Again, I built in some rising rate into the setup.
Suspension droop is controlled by some simple and lightweight cables which are adjustable for length.

One of these days, I might make a new, lighter set of bellcranks using a 1 piece needle roller bearing. Sitting on the same mount on the chassis, this will considerably reduce the bulk of the whole show and save a lot of unnnecessary weight.

Here ya go:

And this:

L8tr
E

Im not a complete idiot, quite a few parts are missing....

mactaylor Custom Title Time!

1,005 posts · joined Aug 2007 · 16 Mar 2008, 2:19 pm

#636949

thanks tas looks good! so are you still running the 1200? Was toying with the idea of running a similar setup but with inboard coilovers laying flat under the fuel tank like some of the VEE cars ive seen on the web, cant recall were ive seen them thou i think they may have been english

EVERLAST CONCRETE TANKS
1800 552 123

tassupervee That really hurts doesnt it!

1,171 posts · joined Sep 2003 · 16 Mar 2008, 6:31 pm

#636963

Yep still 1200 M8. Not enough people willing to plunge into 1600's down here just yet.

At the thnd of the day, you can mount the shocks wherever and whatever angle you want.

What are your planning to put this kind of suspension into M8?

L8tr
E

Im not a complete idiot, quite a few parts are missing....

mactaylor Custom Title Time!

1,005 posts · joined Aug 2007 · 16 Mar 2008, 8:30 pm

#636984

got a few projects on the go but no time to do anything on them bloody work getting in the way of fun. slowly been collecting parts for a oval circuit car, and a drag car is in the pipeline aswell, but these days got no time for either, when it rains solid for 6 months then i might get some time off

EVERLAST CONCRETE TANKS
1800 552 123

tassupervee That really hurts doesnt it!

1,171 posts · joined Sep 2003 · 16 Mar 2008, 8:54 pm

#636990

Ahh K cewl.
L8tr
E

Im not a complete idiot, quite a few parts are missing....

tassupervee That really hurts doesnt it!

1,171 posts · joined Sep 2003 · 5 Apr 2008, 3:22 pm

#639823

OK
Raaed at Symmons Plains last weekend.
Funny sort of weekend really, the end result of 6th on the day didnt really tell the full story.

This weekend I had no crew and I arrived just in time for drivers briefing.
See, the days schedule had been altered to include an extra race for everybody and so everything was put back by half an hour.
newhoo, bottom line is I missed qualifying and so started from the back of the field............

R1, got an excellent launch and got 2 cars off the line but remained buried in the pack of squabbling cars all jockeying for position!
Id make a place here and there but such is the nature of Formula Vee, id get drafted down the straight and passed by sometimes 3 cars and it would all begin again.
Finished P6....thatll doooh donkey!

R2, 6th off the grid, got another good launch and got another position off the start but same as r1, buried amongst a jostling field of copetitive vees and good drivers!
Absolutely awesome racing but very difficult to make a break and run further up the field!
Floated up as far as 4th. I knew i was significantly faster than these guys but couldnt make enough ground to break the draft........... Also, had a fair old off after the back straight. I got "beached' on the sawtooth kerbs and rather than spin in front of a very tight pack, I opted to take to the mulga.....gawwwwd it was the long way around i can tell you. Didnt make the track until the start finish straight after loosing 4 positions....bah!
happily, a couple of cars fell off the track further around and I eventually got 6th again!!

R3.Bugger bugger bugger, I missed the first call to the grid and by the time I got it all ready the field had left the dummy grid. The grid marshall ditthered around just long enough for the starter to close the pit lane and so I missed gridding up and had to start from pit lane. back of the field again............ Again buried and caught in some of the most exciting F-Vee racing I have ever been involved with. Really tough racing with no quarter given, less than inches apart and 4 wide under brakes off the back straight. Sensational stuff!
A sour note was that a certain driver with a fairly slow car and an inversely proportional ego rode me off the track no less than 3 times in consecutive laps, twice right under race controls nose! I lost 3 laps behind this snoozer while the guys further up were driving away.
Thankfully, he got dragged up to the stewards and reportedly got a fair bollocking for his very unsportsmanlike behaviour and intentional blocking in a straight line.
6th again so not too bad considering!

R4. Another good start and another pack of squabbling cars made heavy going again.
Its very frustrating to line someone up, pick them off and then get re-overtaken but sometimes 3 cars in a train and then left hung out to dry on the outside and have to pick them off one by one again!
I managed to get back to 3rd but got seriously drafted down the back straight and hung out again but this time i let the other car go as he was waaaay too hot to make a clean exit of the last corner and managed to "over and under' him and get him on the line by barely half a car!!!!! 3rd! Woo Hoo!

R5 Final. Got out of the pits with time to spare this time...........Good launch again and I managed to tack onto the 2 really fast guys out front who towed me around to my PB by over a second at Symmons Plains! happy with that thats for sure!
I was just hanging in their draft as they argued for the front but I made 2 blunders, one out of the pit turn and lost a couple of lengths and then missed pullinmg back to 2nd gear at the hairpin which meant i was all out of shape and had to go back to third and lost a good second. By this time the front 2 had got out from me by about 50 meters and any tow i was getting was lost. I had a break of about 75 meters to the cars behind who were still scrambling and arguing with each other (to my relief) and i maintained that gap until about 3 laps from the end. Thos guys sorted themselves out and got down to racing and so picked up speed and I could see them ever so slowly gaining ground but I had enough space (hopefully) to get to the end ahead!
The dude coming second had a suspension failure of some sort and dramatically slowed allowing me thru but the due out front simply went fast enough to keep me about 1.5 seconds behind!!! I ended up finishing 2nd in the final!!! Yay!

However final results are determined by all points and points are awarded for qualifying as well and so had I been on fucking time to begin with, along with missing the grid for R3 as well, I might have finished in 3rd for the day....ahh well!

It was some of the very best racing I have been in involved with in many years of competition on both 2 and 4 wheels and was a pleasure to race with some of these guys!
Heres a quick pix that shows what most of the day was like for me:

L8tr
E

Im not a complete idiot, quite a few parts are missing....

mactaylor Custom Title Time!

1,005 posts · joined Aug 2007 · 7 Apr 2008, 8:19 am

#640095

thanks for the run down i love fvee racing all and sundry get realy stuck in and the age of your car doesnt seem to matter a great deal. a mate has been drawing me up some billet ally bellcranks to have a play with they are looken nice they have 2 X 19mm ID sealed roller bearings as the pivot. should work, went 2 to1 ratio cause there isnt much room for the coilovers, spring rates will be fun!

EVERLAST CONCRETE TANKS
1800 552 123

tassupervee That really hurts doesnt it!

1,171 posts · joined Sep 2003 · 7 Apr 2008, 5:30 pm

#640174

Pretty much the bearings I used in size.
Mine were double row ball bearings but they made the bellcrank a bit bulky.
next time I make some, ill use some 1 piece needle roller bearings which will bring the bulk and weight of the quadrants down nicely.
If you want nice, light and compact coilovers, use motorcycle rear shocks.
L8tr
E

Im not a complete idiot, quite a few parts are missing....