Project "Marginal gains..."
Turbo Mini Forums

a work of art, top job!

Team www.sheepspeed.com Racing

Cheers Jimster

I think we crossed paths on the Race Technology forum a while ago when I was looking at one of their loggers, I did some engineering / setup work on the Pyro cars - I think you said you had done some work with Owens?

Getting old, memory and all that

Cheers

As always it's a completely standard steel front end, the bumper mounting channel will go back on

Working on mock up upper and lower wishbones, the coilover is just hanging to check wheel clearance etc...

I will make another mount to move the upper coilover mount further up in order be able to fit longer units with more travel

At the same time I could check cam belt to bonnet / wing clearance, it also shows that the subframe front lower lateral tube doesn't show below the front panel as I want as little as possible to look non standard



The tyre is a 165 width on a 5.5J rim, it has the incorrect offset but I can measure relative to it to hopefully order wheels with the correct offset, the suspension is set correctly for caster, camber ride height and toe

The panels are just held with clamps but should be close enough for the mock up to be useful

Cheers

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 18th Oct, 2017.

It's been a bit tedious but I have spent the last week correlating the mocked up suspension with my simulation model of the Mini and it's suspension - mostly due to an error in the model with regard to the inner track rod end position on the rack...

But it's there now, the computer model and the various measurements I have made on the car now agree... bump steer, wishbone lengths to give the required camber / caster etc...



The most important job has been establishing the maximum positive offset wheel I can package without hitting anything at full lock such as the lower wishbone and the subframe.




Along with my current estimates of where the final overall weight could be I have taken a first stab at the force / velocity front damper curves, I have always used Bilstein I may try Protech for a change rather than any technical reason.

Hopefully it can all be kept under either Mini 'special' or Group 2 type wheel arches but I will use a max wheel width of 6" but ideally 5.5" to do this.

The plan is a standard 70's MK3 Mini look, which is easy to achieve with just changing bolt on bits.

I have owned and let three of them slip through my hands over the last 20 yrs. Through the choices I have made I have to fit 13" wheels and I have never really seen an example of a Mini which looks like a standard 70's MK3 Mini so I will have to see how it pans out

Cheers

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 18th Oct, 2017.

Still doing more mocking up and checking clearances than actually making anything

I have been corresponding with Protech about getting some dampers made to my specification and am starting to get somewhere now.

I basically asked that the nominal force velocity curve fell in the middle of the range of adjustment of the damper which is pretty close to what they have supplied, the only area is the very low speed which is higher than I wanted but I think for a first try they are more than good enough and I can get them revalved if the low speed (especially rebound) proves too high

I am going to try and make sure I can fit the largest tyre I am considering first, these are Dunlop D84J which are basically road legal race series tyres and were only ever made with that intention. I bought them a few years ago now for the Midget but will give them a try on this first.



Weight wise they are quite similar to a road tyre of the same size, but have much stiffer sidewalls



The compound is quite soft and more importantly is soft at room temperature which means they don't have to be raging hot to work on the road



The tread pattern is designed so that once a couple of mm of tread has worn down the three central ribs become just three continuous blocks of rubber without any lateral cuts so increasing the amount tread in contact with the road


Cheers

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 13th Jul, 2017.

Whilst I still haven't finalised the front subframe and suspension clearances I am trying to progress other bits and pieces which can hopefully be done with out the need for getting redone...

Minor but made a wiper motor bracket from ally, not finished yet but so far saves about 40 grammes over the std bracket



Could have been lighter still if I could have found some slightly thinner ally strip



Front subframe tower bolt and adapters are now done, M12 - 12.9



Save about 400 grammes each over the standard huge tower bolts



The 'tower' part of the subframe fits into the Mini bulkhead so these bolts only 'see' tensile loads, the shear load is taken by the subframe where it spigots into the bulkhead

The column and associated wiring is all redone now:



With a QR and a bigger diameter steering wheel







Cheers

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 18th Oct, 2017.

Look great attention to detail and fab skills well done

I run a supercharger and I don't care the TB is on the wrong side.
VEMS + 12 PSI + Liquid Intercooler = Small Bore FUN!

top job.

What software are you using the suspension?

I've played with Suspension Analyzer 2.4.

Team www.sheepspeed.com Racing

Thanks for the comments, cheers

Jimster,

I use a couple of programmes;

ADAMs MBS software which I have used since 2005:

http://www.mscsoftware.com/product/adams

And just started using

SIMPACK Automotive

http://www.simpack.com/add-on_automotive.html

Both can do everything you can think of, both very expensive

Still poncing around with smaller jobs which can be done in isolation whilst waiting for bits of the front suspension to finalise it

A large part of this project has been trying to package things and deciding what compromises to make, keeping the standard length round nose obviously results in lots of compromises and having to grab every mm available for some kind of engine clearance.

The front top wishbone on the LH side wants to occupy the same space as parts of the gearbox casing and the RH side top wishbone is too close for comfort to the rear edge of the oil pump which is a normal XE install problem. Because the engine is so far back I have to remove more than what I think is the norm:

This shows the boss and the blanking plug which have been removed



Instead of just facing the end off and reducing the height of the plug I have just removed both and had a cap welded over the end



All of the original oilway routings inside are preserved as well as the boss on the back for the pressure switch / pressure gauge



Another area where there is no clearance is the rocker cover / cam belt cover to the RH wing channel



You can see here I have already removed part of the 'lip' of the cam cover which is used as the surface the that the side cam belt cover seals to



As you can see here it adds about 10mm to the height of the cam cover

If I could have located a nylon insert type belt guard as per Swindon etc... I would have done this but gave up looking for one and decided to modify the cam cover to give more room but still be a fully enclosed belt guard, so...



All of the vertical lip has been removed and the remaining horizontal lip extended to cover the top of the belt and then down the side



All of this was mocked up with cams, cam pulleys and belt in place to ensure there is clearance plus a bit for any belt movement, there is a straight swage line on the side as it is only 2mm ally to give it a bit more stiffness.



I have still got to tidy it up and modify the side cover to meet up with it

[url=https://flic.kr/p/VsopUU]

The rear breather is a -6 AN fitting



It had to be welded internally as you couldn't get all the way round from the outside

And another AN fitting for the front block breather, being an AN fitting I can now angle it away from the exhaust manifold for a bit more clearance



I plan to start with the standard MPi fuel tank and have a Bosch 044 as an intank pump, because of the strange M18 x 1.5 thread on the inlet it has taken a bit of time to find a suitable filter / strainer but it's about there now:



And the fuel top plate has been modified to take AN type fittings



Slight communication problem as I was expecting them to be welded directly to the top plate but they ended up tigged to the ends of the existing pipes

Cheers

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 15th Jul, 2017.

I may have to stop reading your updates.. The jealousy is becoming unbearable!

I'm having trouble with an inlet for my Jenveys at the moment (reasonable cost) but if I could weld like that it wouldn't be a small fortune!

Great work as always.

Hi Mark,

Thanks for the comments, but... I wish

The TIG stuff gets done by a good friend, he is a Motorsport fabricator and has been for 2 - 3 decades, I give him the stupid requests - he says "you sure?" and then does it :) Looking at your previous shell I would have happily started with that!

More poncing...

Of course when I have no front suspension, no front end on the car, the most important job...

Linishing and polishing the cam cover, sad but I just wanted to see if the outside radii and alignment of the added stuff was OK, so it got linished and polished a bit



I think it looks OK



The main thing was to improve wing clearance but I just want it to look like it was made like this





So I plan to put the subframe, engine and front end back on and see what the wing clearance looks like now

Cheers

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 15th Jul, 2017.

Some great stuff here.

In the 13's at last!.. Just

Wow... Skills on the fab! Loving the build so far!

Top work Spencer, you raise the bar with every post! Keep up the pace:)

//marcus

internationally known as "big" swede

:) ok that makes me feel better, and I can probably keep reading now haha

Keep up the good work

On 3rd May, 2013 Aubrey_Boy said:
Hi Mark,

Thanks for the comments, but... I wish

The TIG stuff gets done by a good friend, he is a Motorsport fabricator and has been for 2 - 3 decades, I give him the stupid requests - he says "you sure?" and then does it :) Looking at your previous shell I would have happily started with that

Cheers

im blown away by your attention to detail!

Thanks for the kind comments

Hey Marcus, thank you, but I would still swap it all for the view from your window

Been doing some real work this weekend, started fitting a new toeboard and the panels associated with it, originally it seemed a shame to disturb what appeared to be good metal work but a bit if digging proved otherwise as once again there is some rust / rot hidden in the seams so the only proper way to deal with it is a new heritage panel

Cheers

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 18th Oct, 2017.

When I first weighed the Mini on some proper corner weight scales it came in at over 730 kg with an unknown amount (but not that much) of fuel in it

After what I would call 'phase 1' which is modifying lots of bolt on bits it was down to 669 kg (Actual weight on corner weight scales) so still pretty heavy weight but as previously mentioned the Redtop (+25kg) + Gearbox (+15kg) carries about a 40kg penalty over the A Series and the K series front corner assemblies add about 6kg overall and the 13" wheel and tyres add about 16 kg

So trying to compare it to a 10" A Series equipped car with std Mini suspension, its about 62 kg added which would mean in the region of 607 kg as a comparison, so still way off compared to a lot of cars on here

After further chopping, weight saving and new parts (according to my spreadsheet tally / estimate) I am currently at an overall weight of around 635 kg but this still has:

All steel front end, bonnet & boot, all standard glass, wind up windows / regulators, std trailing arms and brakes, std heater, std exhaust, std fuel tank + intank pump, bumpers, grille, little or no interior (not decided if / what interior will go back in)

I plan to to keep it all metal bodywork and with wind up windows, a heater and think I can sneak under 600kg depending how deep my pockets are but without going totally mad on carbon or Ti

Included in the 635kg estimate are these new additions:

Aluminium door skins:



I cannot remember where from but I have a std steel door skin weight of 4.0 kg, I have weighed these at 1.4 kg each

Finally got the front coilovers, these save 1.14 kg (as a pair) over what I had

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These are longer travel units with 39mm more travel than what I had, but not sure how much of this I can utilise as I think it will be driveshaft articulation / inner CV plunge which ultimately dictates how much suspension travel I have available. I just want to make sure that coilover travel and ball joint articulation exceed the CV limitations and I can limit suspension travel accordingly

Cheers

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 18th Oct, 2017.

Alu skins and electric plastic windows took at least 5kg a side of my car.

I am pretty certain you have already done this , but have you considered trying to take the front shock off the bottom arm ,maybe this would create a rising rate ?
also , when i was doing all my wheel offset stuff , i found the stock mini wheel was 35mm inset ,metro 45mm inset .just in case its usefull.project looks terrific ,and thanks for sharing so much interesting data.
regards
robert

Edited by robert on 18th Oct, 2017.

Medusa + injection = too much torque for the dyno ..https://youtu.be/qg5o0_tJxYM

Hi APBellamy,

Yes I am at about 3.8 kg saved per door at the moment including the Aluminium door skins but still with glass and regulator, so I think if I went with poly windows it would be another 1.5 kg so say 5.3 kg in total so the same as your quoting.

But this assumes still using standard door trims / handles etc, removing the trim is another 1.3 kg if I went that route

Hi Robert,

Thank you for your comments,

Sticking with the top wishbone I have managed to get what is now near as damn it a nice rate through out the range of wheel travel. I am looking at this currently as I am working on the toeboard / bulkhead area at the moment. If I stick with the better rate I will probably add a very progressive bump rubber.


Cheers

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 3rd Dec, 2014.

or maybe one of those setups where you have a little 1 inch long spring with a low rate and a higher rate one on top of it like on some bikes.

Medusa + injection = too much torque for the dyno ..https://youtu.be/qg5o0_tJxYM

Hi Robert,

Yes I think I will be using a helper / tender spring anyway but one which is fully closed at ride height so it only comes into play when a wheel is below it's static corner weight it just helps when the wheel is at really low load and helps if the main coil spring doesn't extend fully into rebound.

http://www.merlinmotorsport.co.uk/p1034/FA...oduct_info.html

Or do you you mean one which probably still active at static corner weight? i.e. not coil bound, in this case you usually have to get main and secondary springs specially wound to suit your application (they end up quite short) and it starts to get expensive, especially if you need a few iterations to get what you want.

http://www.speedwerxstore.com/index.php?l=...t_detail&p=1569

I have used the 'flat' tender springs (closed at ride height) on plenty of race cars but don't have much experience using the dual springs which are still active under normal conditions, for some reason it tended to be mostly German race teams that used this kind of setup - possibly suited their circuits better?

Edited by Aubrey_Boy on 10th May, 2013.

Yes , i was thinking of the active ones .oh no that puts me in the germans camp !;-0

Edited by robert on 18th Oct, 2017.

Medusa + injection = too much torque for the dyno ..https://youtu.be/qg5o0_tJxYM