The eternal rebuild

[modnrod]

This is a cool story Pete, I sometimes wish I'd kept a couple of my favourites and kept at it rather than get bored and move onto the next hotrod. 

Just as a curiosity for myself, high-11s and 1500lbs through the "Moroso slide" gives up 158HP, which then transferred into a stock weight heavy 1303 at 2250lbs the Moroso then spits out a possible low-13s.
That's a stout little motor!

Thanks for sharing the road.

[Peter Shattock]

Love it. Nothing too fancy there, just good old fashioned hot rodding.

How much compression? What was your shift RPM? Must have been screaming through the traps. I'm amazed the Cima/Mahle's could cope!

What was your reasoning behind the light flywheel with heavy pulley?

Thanks for sharing!

Hi Zach,

Like you say nothing fancy just nicely put together well matched parts. Static CR was 11.75 and I ran the car on super unleaded Shell V Power which is about 98/99 Ron, no problem with the big duration cam (FK87). Peak power was at 7,300rpm. I think the Mahle's are under estimated for n/a use particularly 90.5 as I never had any bother with them and they are not heavy so the crank and case don't mind them either. They are not perfect, but a good value decent product for a n/a car.

The heavy pulley was a cheap fix to get the car off the line a little better without having to change the flywheel or clutch as I didn't have any spares balanced for this engine. It was a bit of a unsophisticated fix and a bit marginal as I still needed to rely on judging tire grip to tune the launch, which has proved to be a bit of a challenge in terms of consistency. Its not something I've got to the bottom of yet and its a big part of the plan for this year to see if I can find a more constant set up and way of adjusting the launch.   

[Peter Shattock]

This is a cool story Pete, I sometimes wish I'd kept a couple of my favourites and kept at it rather than get bored and move onto the next hotrod. 

Just as a curiosity for myself, high-11s and 1500lbs through the "Moroso slide" gives up 158HP, which then transferred into a stock weight heavy 1303 at 2250lbs the Moroso then spits out a possible low-13s.
That's a stout little motor!

Thanks for sharing the road.

I've never managed to get the simulator / calculators to work out for my car to be honest, so I've given up bothering as at the end of the day it either does or doesn't do it at the track. I've certainly enjoyed sort of staying within some self set rules, but ultimately its obviously not the best way to just go fast but its been good fun none the less.

[Pas]

It's great to read about the evolution of your car and power plants Pete and, from a personal point of view, to fill in a few details on the 1776.

It just goes to show how much power and speed can be wrung out of these little mouse motors when you have a talented bunch of guys put their heads together. Needless to say, as a major benefactor, I'm very grateful for all your development work over the years. And who knows, there may still be a few more ponies to be liberated from the little 1776 yet.

Hopefully we can get both cars together soon for a little side by side mouse bashing

Can't wait for the next instalment.

[Peter Shattock]

Part 4

The 1795cc engine.

So the first thing to say is its obviously a bit big! The original intention was that this motor would be another 1776, but as with Johannes's 1603 the problem was finding a round cylinder hence the need to over bore the 90.5 cylinder to 91.

This was actually a compromise for me but necessary in the circumstances. I convinced myself it would be OK as at least it was still under 1800cc but it still niggles me to this day that its not a 1776, but given it performs so well I didn't have anything to complain about.

The plan for this engine actually dates back to 2007 when I started to collect parts for an 11 second 1776 motor too replace the 2nd 1776, "the shopper".
Needless to say the old Shopper over delivered and ran the 11's that this new motor was intended to do, which was a nice problem to have.

It was around this time that Mat Sanchez mentioned a thing called the cal-look lounge and suggested I took a look as I might find it interesting. I signed up in August 2007 and generally snooped about reading and looking at what others were up to. Mat was right though it was interesting. Then BeetleBug started the small motor thread which of course was right up my street.
 
When Johannes went and posted his plans to build the 1603 for his red car and all the information it really caught my eye, so I followed this thread and the build up with great interest.

I can still remember hearing that video clip of the 1603 motor for the first time revving on the engine stand. I knew I was ruined in that moment and had to have an engine that sounded like that. I still have to listen to that clip every now and then as I just love the sound!

So of course I sent Johannes a PM and organised to speak on the phone one day soon after. Its fair to say that having spoken to Johannes for the first time, if the sound of the motor on the stand had not sealed my fate that phone call certainly did!

For those of you that know him this will come as no surprise, but if you have never spoken to him I'll warn you that the combination of his friendly enthusiasm and engine knowledge makes him very difficult not to like.

So there I was with my head full of numbers to contemplate and the first steps towards the inevitable.

The first thing I did was to talk to Ian and Peter and of course neither of them did anything to dampen my enthusiasm in fact quite the opposite!

So in what seamed like a short space of time Johannes had finished all the simulations and there was a plan in place. This was March 2008.

I still had plenty to do to sort out my current plans with “the shopper” for 2008 so I knuckled down to that and continued to collect parts for the new engine.

It wasn’t until January 2009 that I was wrapping up all the engine parts I'd collected and was posting them to Sweden. There were some nice parts in these parcels including a new mag case with sleeved lifter bores by John Maher, a new forged Scat crank with Chevy rod journals which Richie sorted out, some Jet Ti rods from Mat Keene, and some ceramic lifters from Peter and a few other niceties like a mag sump, 26mm berg oil pump, and a Ti case stud kit amongst numerous other bits.

In Feb 2009 Peter, Ian and I made a plan to go and see Johannes for a shop tour and to firm up the details of the plan for the motor check through all the parts I sent and to bring a few more. Needless to say we had a great time with lots of high octane talk and some good fun too. It’s really impressive to me when someone understands humor in their second language, so we had a great laugh and some great technical chat too. Not to mention seeing and more importantly hearing the single cylinder development engine run, which is a mad thing and you certainly take a few steps back when it gets up in the rev range!

I needed to get back to sorting the car out for the upcoming season after the trip. I only did the two races in 2009, but it was a great year with the 1st 11's some street driving and the new motor excitement in the background.

At the end of 2009 Volksworld did a feature on the car which was published in Spring 2010 which was another nice milestone for the car.

So at the end of the race season the new motor was coming along nicely and plans were made to take the car to Sweden to dyno the old engine and fit and dyno the new one back to back.

So in October 2009 Peter, John Maher and I set off for Sweden. Its a long drive but with a very early start we made it from Dunkirk to Helsingborg in about 15 hours non stop, but for nature breaks and some fuel.
 
Needless to say it was an adrenaline fueled journey, but the time passed quite quickly with plenty of high octane talk with John accompanied by the tune of Peter snoring in the back (that boy can sleep!).

Having dropped the car and trailer off with Johannes and having had a bit of a chat and poured over the new motor we headed for the hotel for some sleep.

We arrived early the next day and got the car on the dyno and "the shopper" made 186hp at 7,300 rpm breaking the 100bhp/litre target by some margin. So we had a good base line. Peter, John and I took the motor out of the car whilst Johannes finished the exhaust for the new one.

The initial fire up of the new motor on the engine stand that evening was a great moment as it was much like the 1603 video clip that got me hooked in the first place.

http://vid384.photobucket.com/albums/oo284/petershattock/RaptorMouseedit2.mp4
 
I remember being knackered that night, but not being able to sleep with all the thoughts and excitement of the day and the day to come.

So the next day we fitted the new motor and having sorted a few gremlins we started with the calibration and some power runs.

Again I was knackered at the end of the day, but not able to sleep. I forget the exact numbers made that day, but it was more than the simulated figure which was 215hp so it was a great day and we were not done as we were still running the small vents at this point.
 
After the final set up the next day it made 228,3hp/7990rpm and 231Nm (166.9lbs) 6200rpm corrected (Din), 127hp/l. This was on pump gas through the muffler.

We all like numbers, but an interesting point of note is that it actually made a peak of 231hp with one jetting and ignition set up, but there was more area under the curve with the lower peak figure above. So less is more!
 
So that was it. All the exciting bit was over, we just had to pack up and deal with the long drive home which was dull and seamed twice as long as the journey in the opposite direction.

Once I got the car home there were two main jobs to do, make the tinware fit and fit the silencer, which was previously just on the end of straight pipe for the dyno.

I had the car all sorted and road legal in May 2010 and started to put some miles on the new engine. It was great to drive the car again and all was looking promising for the 1st race of the year.

It was a great start to the 1st race weekend as I turned up at the gate moments before Andy Marriott did in his hot 1914cc n/a street car so we drove into the Outlaw pits for the weekend in formation.

Given the gearbox in the car was designed to suit my old engine I was a little paranoid about breaking it, so I ran for the first day on MH street tires which netted me a best of 11.87 at just over 113mph which I was very pleased with as it beat my previous PB on slicks and all I did when I arrived was change the oil check the valve clearances.

Day 2 of racing I ran with the slicks and ran a number of 11.6* second passes with a best of 11.60 again just over 113mph. That was over 3 10ths of my best previous ET. I had a number of problems with the car, and my driving over the weekend, so I had a list of things to do now before I raced again in July.

Bugjam was the next race and this was the first with the right gearbox ratios which was the big change from the last race. Unfortunately it was clear after the 1st run that the clutch was not up to the job, so it was only a matter of time before it gave out. Worse still it was also clear that I had not resolved my suspension problems either. Fortunately I had enough options at the track with the parts I'd taken to resolve the suspension issues, which gave me the chance to see what difference the new gearbox ratios had made, whilst I still had a clutch!

With sorted suspension and the new gearbox ratios the car ran 3 consecutive 11.3…. with a best of 11.315 @116mph.

http://s384.photobucket.com/user/petershattock/media/bugjam2010008.mp4.html

Pulling up on the drive at home and clicking the motor off was a great feeling after a weekend of racing I won’t forget for a while!

The next race did not go to plan, as I was still struggling with clutch issues, but did run a couple of 11.50's, the best being a 50 flat, so there was no et improvement. The clutch center plate let go on the 3rd pass on Saturday, but thanks to Ian WPS for an express road trip to Cogbox and Peter's help to make up a new center plate we made it back to the track with the bits to fix the car on Sunday.

Adele and I ran on the Sunday as the first pair after the rain in the morning, and I'm sure most of you know what happened next, but as the others have said the main thing was that Adele was OK.

The last race of the year for me was DDD8 and it was a great weekend. As had become the norm the clutch gave up on Sat afternoon, but thanks to Ian (WPS) we got the motor out, clutch sorted, and back in, just in time to catch the last of the DAS barbeque hospitality that evening. After chasing a good set up for a few runs, the car ran from 11.8 something to an 11.52 last run.

So the car ended the year with a best et of 11.315 at 116mph (no fan belt on slicks, with a muffler on super unleaded pump fuel) from around 25 passes and just over 1000 street miles. Needless to say 1000 miles is not much for a street car, but unfortunately my time for regular street miles is limited.

The only problems I had, were clutch related (one center disc per meeting), but the last set up we tried for Sunday at DDD held up well.

So the 11.3* spec

The long block is based around a new Magnesium case with a wedge mated Scat Chevy journal crank and flywheel. The flywheel is the JPM “window” style. The pulley is an aluminum Gene Berg power pulley size. I ran a 180mm clutch with an aluminum stage one Kennedy with an organic disc. The rods were 5.4 Jet Ti, the cam is a JPM 01005(10mm cam lift 271deg at 0.05" 105 lobe center), ceramic lifters, GB 160000psi pr, JPM 1.55:1 rockers two stud, ti valves, JPM alumec retainers, OTEVA75 valve springs and single grove 7deg keepers. Heads are JPM modified 043’s with 42mm x 37.5mm Titanium valves and cut down Scat big beef manifolds for tuned inlet length. 26mm Shadek plugged oil pump with JPM prime cover, Mahle 90.5 barrels bored to 91mm with JPM / JE pistons and DLC coated wrist pins. Ignition a Bosch 050 with Pertronics module and coil and 8mm Moroso leads. Modified Webber 48 IDA’s with a Unique Industries Ti cross bar linkage. The exhaust header is a one off JPM tuned length steeped header with muffler. Welded Gene Berg fan, Gene Berg magnesium deep sump, external oil filter and cooler with fans. CR 12.7:1

The gearbox was fitted with various lightened parts but was based around a stock case with a 4.375 r&p with an aluminum spool, 3.75 1st, 2.54 2nd, 1.78 3rd and a 1.35 4th and the usual HD side plate and axles.

The great thing about the car to this point was that it was really simple. The benefits of a simple reliable fast car are not to be under estimated as it was a lot of fun, easy to maintain and drive.

So no need to change it right? Sadly what happened next was for me to take apart (again) a perfectly good car with a view to making it a little bit quicker…..

This is the motor in the car and I loved the subtlety of it. No fuss just fast!

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[ianmac]

Great story Pete, that motor looks fantastic, so clean and simple. I love the small diameter dynamo, completes the look. 

[modnrod]

Great story Pete, that motor looks fantastic, so clean and simple. I love the small diameter dynamo, completes the look. 

+1, it looks great!

But yeah, that dynamo does look tiny! Is it a Pete-special lightweight generator off something else, or is it the heavy stock genie that just looks smaller in the pic?

Great story too, thanks, I'm still listening.

[Peter Shattock]

Hi Modnrod,

Its just a 6v size 12v style generator which is obviously a little lighter than the normal 100mm diameter 12v size one. I have lightened a few other parts for it as I made some aluminium end caps, Ti through bolts and made some Ali nuts for it too. Every little helps!

This 12v generator is only rated at 25A/hr but was fine as the cars power requirement was small. I actually ran the car constant loss at the track of a 15 A/hr gel battery and it was fine as long as you charged it up once a day.

I've got what I hope is a better and lighter solution for the new engine which I will be running once I have all the tin ware modified to fit. I hope this is a solution which will cope with the additional load on the electrical system as there is a load more spaghetti in the car now its fuelling and ignition amongst other things is now ECU based.

I've finally found some photos of the 1795 motor during the build which I had thought I had lost on an old dead laptop, so I hope to post these up soon, but I need to shrink them first.

Peter

[nicolas]

yes really cool engine bay.

it seems that wrinkle paint was a bit 'in vogue' during that time (my own and fabs did his 1600 as well, among others). i recently made some pics of my own 2276 with all the cooling back on it has also a wrinkle paint fan housing. yours when i saw it was truly better done, with all the tinware painted and nothing too shouty, just plain and simple. the details are are well done, but the technique underneath is what impressed me most. i liked that combo a lot and if i am correct you ran this engine at DDD and had some issues with the clutch that was still being sorted (because of the smaller 180mm flywheel and a disc that wasn't maybe not 100% up to par, if i remember that correctly).

[speedwell]

my kind of engine bay 

[Peter Shattock]

Hi Nicholas,

I still really like the wrinkle finish and that simple looking engine bay. More of that to come with new engine, just not quite so subtle!

Your right it was the 1795 motor in the car at DDD when the clutch was at best marginal! I've actually stuck with the 180mm clutch with the new engine too, but hopefully I've learnt enough from the 1795 in 2013 to make it work in the car now. I'll soon find out!

As you say though what goes on underneath was the key to that engine the fact it just looked simple was just the icing on the cake.

The plan is to be back at DDD this year if all goes to plan, as I really enjoyed that weekend which was far to long ago now, so hopefully I'll see you and Speedwell there!

Peter

[Peter Shattock]

So some more interesting photos of the 1795.

Inlet port before and after

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Welded chamber before work started

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[Peter Shattock]

The parts department before assembly.

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A case shot with the Scat crank, JPM cam, Magnum cam gears and Jet Ti rods

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[Peter Shattock]

Pistons notched

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Pistons DLC wrist pins and aluminium buttons, with the JPM 1.55 2 stud rockers hiding in the background.

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Pistons on the rods

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[Peter Shattock]

Short block assembled mag sump aluminium sump studs ready for the mag sump plate

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The infamous monster front pulley to help keep the motor cool!

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[Peter Shattock]

The long block completed and tuned length header in progress keeping number 3 short enough was the challenge. Short tuned length manifolds, difficult to see, but they do lean out a little, but not quite as obviously as the new engine!

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Ready for the clutch disc and pressure plate before fitting to the car thought we should weigh it trouble is I cant remember what it weighed now!

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Car ready for a shot in the arse!

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[nicolas]

69 kg

no doubt  


speaking of weight, do you know how much the crank, flywheel, clutch, disc, cam gear and so on weighed? i would like to know as i have a very light flywheel as well on my engine and even so with the counterweighted crank it was still heavier then stock. so maybe yours was lighter, but did it affect anything. on my engine so far it doesn't seem to change anything for the worse, but like i said it is still heavier compared to stock parts.

[Peter Shattock]

Hi Nicholas,

Sorry I don't know the weights although as you say the normal CW cranks certainly weigh a bit!

Although I'm always weight conscious I don't weigh stuff that often just so long as I know what I'm putting on the car is either lighter than what it replaces or that what ever it is heavier for a good reason.

I certainly never had any drivability issues with that set up but it is a light and short geared car. As I've said somewhere on here before there must come a point where the weight loss is relevant and the car would become less drivable but I suspect it would take something fairly extreme. The set up in the new engine is lighter (the counterweighted 64mm crank was lighter than a stock 69mm crank) and other parts are lighter too so perhaps it will be more noticeable. Hopefully I'll know soon.....

Peter 

69 kg

no doubt  


speaking of weight, do you know how much the crank, flywheel, clutch, disc, cam gear and so on weighed? i would like to know as i have a very light flywheel as well on my engine and even so with the counterweighted crank it was still heavier then stock. so maybe yours was lighter, but did it affect anything. on my engine so far it doesn't seem to change anything for the worse, but like i said it is still heavier compared to stock parts.

[Peter Shattock]

Part 5

On the drive home after DDD Ian and I had plenty of time to chat about plans going forward. One of the things we discussed was Ian buying my share of the Fiat 850 spider we bought and were rebuilding together. I had thought originally that a half share in a race car would be great for me so I could ease up on the Beetle. Sadly the reality was that I had un finished business with the Beetle and insufficient time or money to do either car justice. Also Ian was planning to move house so instead of being half an hour apart we would be 3 hours apart so the logistics would be difficult.
 
We agreed to try and sort something out which ultimately resulted in Ian buying my half of the car to complete it and race it himself. This was not all sorted until 2011 and we continued to work on the car together for the next year and a bit.

What this deal did ultimately do though was to pay for the new gearbox but I'll get to that later.

What happened next was all because the 1795cc motor ran those low 11's. As I've said before in this tale that the temptation of being close to the next second is like a drag racers curse! My mind was inevitably wondering if it would be possible to run a 10 with a n/a 1776cc street car.

This is where it all went wrong! Having surrounded myself with people who know what they are doing over all these years I had had my eyes opened to all sorts of possibilities and of course the obvious answer is that it should be possible (to run the 10), but it would mean making some changes.

So that was it I had now decided that I "just" need to run 10's to be happy. Simple!

As with all these things its never simple and certainly not as easy as my mind would have you believe.

Step 1 in this simple plan was to make some more power. I had been well aware that the 1795 was compromised with the bore to stroke ratio, but that was done intentionally as I wanted to keep stock style heads and originally a 90.5 bore (to be 91 as it turned out) and just keep it simple to the untrained eye when you look at the engine in the car.

By a happy coincidence the popular and obvious 94mm bore just happens to work out with a stock size 64mm crank at 1776cc. This to me made it the obvious thing to do. It meant all the 94mm bore parts are readily available and I could get a suitable crank made. Other than the obvious bore benefits it would mean a narrow more stable engine with smaller reciprocating parts which was all good.

The challenge was always going to be the valve train as with the bigger bore and shorter stroke the peak power rpm would rise and need to rise to make the power needed for that 10.

As ever there was plenty of discussion with Ian and Peter regarding my options, but it was not until Peter and I went back to see Johannes that the new motor plan really got underway.

I had previously posted the 1795 back to Johannes and the plan was for us all to take it apart to see how it was looking first hand. Once we had the motor apart we found that the rod bearings looked like they has been suffering from oil starvation. Fortunately we caught them in time so there was no actual damage other than needing to change the bearings. We made a plan to improve the oil supply for the rebuild, but basically that was it as everything else was OK.

This is when we sat down to discuss the new 64 x 94 motor with Johannes. Johannes was unaware of this plan until this point. I've said before that I love his enthusiasm in general, but this motor was clearly something he wanted to do! The pen and paper and calculator were out in a flash and after some frantic button pressing and scribbling we had some potential rough power numbers. But the amazing thing was that peak power was looking like it would be at around 10,000 rpm! To me that sounded mad peak power at 10,000 meant it would have to be rev at at least 10,500!

It was on the drive home to the airport when Peter and I agreed it had to be done as we both knew we needed to know what it would sound like as much as anything. The trouble was that when I had convinced myself this was a good idea, in that moment I had no idea what it would take to bring this project in to reality.
 
In fairness Peter did casually say we need to check what gear ratios are available, but I just thought that we would be able to sort something suitable.

So as with all plans I got home made a list and started to try and sort out what my options were with a view to getting on with it.

As it turned out the gear ratios were proving to be a bit problematic. This lead to us looking at Hewland mark 5-9 and VW type 1 and 2 5 speeds. Peter had already built a type 1 5 Speed which was due to be fitted in the beetle with the 1795 but that engine made much better torque figures than expected so we didn't use it (it actually lives in Ian's 850 now).

With all these options we were still struggling with ratios and it was then Peter suggested talking to a friend of his that specialises in Hewland boxes. Peter introduced us and put a good word in for me. I agreed to call in and see them one afternoon to explain what I was trying to achieve. As it turned out they could not have been more helpful thanks to Peter's introduction.

It was immediately obvious that they were a serious outfit with masses of high end motorsport experience and in all honesty I felt well out of my depth. That said they were great, they listened to my plan and made some great suggestions. There was a clear message to forget the old Hewland stuff unless I had to use them and just go for a modern Hewland box.

As it happens they had a JFR case and nose cone on the shelf which immediately looked like it would fit in terms of its size. We then checked the input shaft and axle centerline locations relative to a standard box and as luck would have it they were broadly the same. I say broadly the same this was with the box upside down and back to front. This I thought had a certain amount of humor given Hewland originally pinched VW gearboxes to modify and now I was doing the reverse.

The axel shaft locations were actually only 13mm and 18mm different relative to a VW case which I thought I could deal with whilst keeping the engine in the same place. The plan was that outwardly the car would not look any different. I could have raised the gearbox at this point and this could have given me a performance advantage, but ultimately I decided not to as I wanted to retain the look of a standard car as much as I could.

The next issue was that I had a swing axle car and was now looking at an IRS gearbox. I did seriously look at a swing axle conversion for the IRS box both in terms of simplicity of installation and the lack of modification of the car. The problem would have been the engine moving up and back which is obviously not a good thing and I would miss out on an opportunity to improve the car's street / corner handling. That said I would still have a swing axle drag car over an IRS car given its simplicity and efficiency, but my longer term plans went beyond drag racing.

So IRS it was to be then. The obvious conversion was to go with a type 1 IRS conversion and if it was a later long axle car I think this is what I would have done. When I looked at the modifications of the trailing arms required to get the wheel location in the standard position I was not that keen and then when I picked one up I decided it was not for me. I briefly looked into other trailing arms but ended up drawing a line under this idea and looking at other options. This is what brought me to a double wishbone layout. Initially I thought it would be too much work, but then when I looked at the frame horn locations it did look feasible in terms of a bottom wishbone mount which got me started. It also looked possible to create top wishbone mount locations with a tube off the roll cage (top hoop to frame horns) supported on something round the bell housing which in its self was potentially beneficial.

This was all very well, but there was the small matter of the actual suspension design, which I knew next to nothing about. So I got some books and started reading. The trouble was there was not enough detail in the books and it was clear I needed some help. Fortunately the gearbox guys did not just know about gearboxes and it turned out they had plenty of suspension design knowledge too. It was this which gave me the confidence to at least have a go at a design.

So I set about drawing the car and the key fixed points at the back to see what could and would fit where without having to rip the car apart. I was given some old suspension design software and made a start too try and work out some possible suspension points. I can remember vividly having got the car drawn and having a rough idea of what I wanted the suspension to do and being sat in front of the computer to input the suspension points I thought would work. I excitedly entered all the pickup points and upright design and track arm location etc and pressed enter!

I was naively sat there expecting to revel in my new found wisdom, but that was a big bubble that was about to be burst in spectacular fashion. What actually happened next was that the screen and many others after it simply filled up with numbers, lots and lots of numbers. To be more accurate lots and lots of numbers that I had no idea what to do with, or what they meant.

Over the comming months I learnt that like most things suspension design is not as simple as it might first appear. Having got some advice about what I should be shooting for in terms of the numbers I sat down in front of the computer again and then the car and then the computer...... Eventually I came up with a design that worked and fitted in the car, but its fair to say this would not have happened if it were not for a lot of help from people who know a lot more about this than I ever will.

The final spanner in the works in terms of the design was understanding the front suspension in relation to the rear given their inter relationship. The problem here was that the front suspension was not what I wanted in the long term so I had to do a rough front suspension design to to see that in theory they would work together and the roll center at the back of the car would work with what I could do at the front.

So that was it the simple bit was done. As we all know having a plan on paper is one thing but getting it to actually happen is another altogether. I had already been speaking to Andy Robinson at Robinson Racecars about my plans. I've know Andy for many years and he lives close by so was an obvious choice to do the work. Convenience is not everything though, but Andy and Luke (his son) were really keen from the off and actually ended up providing all sorts of advice all through the design process. Also the quality of their work is fantastic. So basically it was a no brainer, they were the guys for the job.

One key thing I had learnt in my time in front of the computer was that small changes made a big difference so this all needed to be done accurately. Andy and Luke understood this entirely and had the skills and equipment to make it happen.

When the design was complete I sat down with Andy and Luke one last time to discuss everything before getting the car in and making a start. It would be fair to say that there was an awful lot of work that would not be obvious when you look at the end result as the beauty is that it does all look quite simple now its done. The reality of course is completely different as there were all sorts of jigs made for the uprights, wishbones, connection points to the car not to mention mounting the car on the surface plate, as well as translating my drawings and the software output to something buildable all before you can make a realistic start on the actual parts so this was not a quick process!

The photo's tell the story of the months of work on the suspension better than words, but it was a big job and once started there was no going back. I did seriously question if it was a good idea as up until this point the car was so simple, but the thought of 10,000rpm clutch less flat gearshifts was enough to make it happen! I did come to question this decision many times over the next 18 months though!

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The upright jig

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The upright under construction

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The completed upright

[Peter Shattock]

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The car on the surface plate.

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The gearbox mounted with the bell housing made

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The jig for the uprights to place the wheel locations under the car

[Peter Shattock]

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The first lower wishbone and jig

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Wishbones completed

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1st lower wishbone on the car

[karl h]

WOW!

[dive!dive!]

Excellent thread ! I also have the '1776 Disease' and this isn't helping my therapy!
I have this mental map of where I think my car will go, and a few steps into the future was the idea of a Hewland.....however, having just read the above, I think that may be a pipedream, it looks like the work is a)too much and b)beyond me. Astonishing stuff though.
A gearbox is next on the list though so I think I'll stick to researching 4 or 5 speeds for now....
Cheers
Steve

[kever65]

Hello Peter,

i see in the 11,3 spec of the car that you installed a spool, did you do some street miles with it, if yes, how does it feel?

btw, love what you do with the car!

[Eddie DVK]

Love how you incoperate the original framehorns into your new suspension
Top notch

[Peter Shattock]

Steve, there is nothing wrong with a 4 or 5 speed if you have a power band wide enough to pull the next gear after the shift as I did with the old 4 speed. Don't forget it went quicker with the 4 speed although admittedly the 6 speed ratios were just a compromise so I could run it with the old engine with peak power just shy of 8k. Always nice to know there are others suffering from the same disease we can start therapy group 1776 anonymous! The dog gears sets Kuplapjla sell have to be the hot tick it for a type one box these days if you want to go fast!

Kever65 the spool was fine on the street to be honest in terms of general driving it was just parking and any slow speed sharp turns that you notice anything.

Thanks for the props glad you like it. More pictures of the gearbox install and suspension on their way.

Peter

[Peter Shattock]

Top wishbone and jig

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Top wishbone mount jig

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Top wishbone bracket tube

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Link tube off the two wishbone mount tubes

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[Peter Shattock]

Upper wishbone mount tubes

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Upper wishbone jig in place with the mount tubes now all tacked

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Upper wishbone and brackets in place

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Tubes and wishbone mounts fitted

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[Peter Shattock]

Top shock mount

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Track control arm mount. Nice detail I thought Luke's idea for a threaded insert welded in to the cage tube.

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Getting ready for paint was the worst bit

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This is the extent of the modification inside the car the small ali cover panel gives access to the nose cone mounts.

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[Peter Shattock]

The shifter I made whilst Luke worked on the rear suspension

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Wheels on was a really good moment!

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