Check back often. Our next series will be on Racecar Suspensions.
Showing posts with label Cosworth. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cosworth. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Engine Build Part 3 Now Up in the Tech Corner
Check back often. Our next series will be on Racecar Suspensions.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Cosworth Modern Art
Just posted in the Technical Corner of www.fontananissanracing.com, Engine Build Part 2, the Cosworth Improvements. Check out the meticulously crafted VQ35 crank, rods, pistons, bearings, and gaskets that the best in the business offer.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Check out the Engine Build !
The Technical Corner on the www.fontananissanracing.com website has just posted the first of three articles on the VQ35 DE based race engine that is powering the Fontana Nissan 350Z in the Red Line Time Attack series. We have begun with the bottom end and will be adding articles on the top end components and Cosworth upgrades to the engine.
Scroll down to find past articles on the Chassis Build, Body Build, and Car Build. We are planning upcoming articles on the Xtrac transmission, JRZ shock package and suspension set-ups, wheel and tire choices, among many other topics.
Check back often!!
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Development!!
When a new race car is built, especially a car that no one has raced before, you expect that some development will be required to make the car successful. When we originally built the GT 350Z the unusual circumstances surrounding the Rolex season meant that virtually no development was accomplished during the season.
Testing and development began when we ran the car at Willow Springs Raceway prior to the Red Line Time Attack event at Buttonwillow. During that first run several shortcomings of the car reappeared. The first was stock axles that we had improved enough to be reliable previously in Grand Am GS proved immediately unreliable. Secondly, the new Pirelli tires which we had never run before were definitely different than the Hoosiers the car ran before in Grand Am. The car went well in the test but we decided to change tire sizes to the larger Pirellis that are now allowed in Grand Am.
We arrived at Buttonwillow full of confidence but as soon as we started running we knew things were not quite right. All of Saturday was spent chasing the handling. At the end of the day we found a broken shock. With the shock fixed things were better on Sunday but still not quite right and then the engine blew.
After the weekend we identified the following areas that needed to be improved prior to the next event.
We then went to work developing solutions for the known problems.
1. We took a carefull look at the entire oil system. Aviaid built new pumps and we worked with Goodridge to improve the oil plumbing throughout the chassis. Cosworth came on board as a sponsor / technology partner so we built a new 3.8 liter variant of the VQ35 using a Cosworth crank, rods, pistons, bearings, and head gaskets.
2. Moving the seat is fairly straight foward but does require a bit of fabrication as the seat is very solidly mounted.
3. Working with JRZ is easy and they built a custom set of shocks right to our specifications.
4. A thorough study of the suspension revealed a need for stiffer springs. We ordered new Hypercoils front and rear. Additionally the JRZ shocks provide an increase in support from rod pressure. The front anti roll bar diameter was also increased. The bar is driver adjustable over a wide range but we needed more control in the upper end of adjustment.
5. With the new larger tires we had some rubbing issues and not quite enough compression travel. We cut away all the material that rubbed or limited travel and seam welded the newly trimmed areas.
6. Since building the car we knew we needed to remove all rubber from the suspension. We acquired new links for the rear from Megan Racing. We reworked the Megan Racing parts to improve their reliability and we made custom monoball bushing replacements. The front lower control arms were modified to use rod ends to allow additional adjustment to the front suspension.
7. We worked with The Drive Shaft Shop to build custom axles using Lobro 108mm CV joints and 36 spline axles. Nobody else had really addressed the requirements that an endurance car has for drive axles so we had to go down a new path to come up with an acceptable solution.
After spending a few hundred hours in the shop and several days on the dyno we believe we have now completed this phase of development. This weekends testing and Sunday's Red Line Time Attack event will prove our efforts and probably create a new list of things to further develop before the next event.
Check out the Gallery page of the website to view photos of the changes that were made.
Testing and development began when we ran the car at Willow Springs Raceway prior to the Red Line Time Attack event at Buttonwillow. During that first run several shortcomings of the car reappeared. The first was stock axles that we had improved enough to be reliable previously in Grand Am GS proved immediately unreliable. Secondly, the new Pirelli tires which we had never run before were definitely different than the Hoosiers the car ran before in Grand Am. The car went well in the test but we decided to change tire sizes to the larger Pirellis that are now allowed in Grand Am.
We arrived at Buttonwillow full of confidence but as soon as we started running we knew things were not quite right. All of Saturday was spent chasing the handling. At the end of the day we found a broken shock. With the shock fixed things were better on Sunday but still not quite right and then the engine blew.
After the weekend we identified the following areas that needed to be improved prior to the next event.
- Build new engine / fix oiling problem
- Change seat position for better driver comfort
- Install new JRZ shocks
- Decrease roll
- Increase front compression travel
- Remove all compliance from suspension
- Improve half shafts
We then went to work developing solutions for the known problems.
1. We took a carefull look at the entire oil system. Aviaid built new pumps and we worked with Goodridge to improve the oil plumbing throughout the chassis. Cosworth came on board as a sponsor / technology partner so we built a new 3.8 liter variant of the VQ35 using a Cosworth crank, rods, pistons, bearings, and head gaskets.
2. Moving the seat is fairly straight foward but does require a bit of fabrication as the seat is very solidly mounted.
3. Working with JRZ is easy and they built a custom set of shocks right to our specifications.
4. A thorough study of the suspension revealed a need for stiffer springs. We ordered new Hypercoils front and rear. Additionally the JRZ shocks provide an increase in support from rod pressure. The front anti roll bar diameter was also increased. The bar is driver adjustable over a wide range but we needed more control in the upper end of adjustment.
5. With the new larger tires we had some rubbing issues and not quite enough compression travel. We cut away all the material that rubbed or limited travel and seam welded the newly trimmed areas.
6. Since building the car we knew we needed to remove all rubber from the suspension. We acquired new links for the rear from Megan Racing. We reworked the Megan Racing parts to improve their reliability and we made custom monoball bushing replacements. The front lower control arms were modified to use rod ends to allow additional adjustment to the front suspension.
7. We worked with The Drive Shaft Shop to build custom axles using Lobro 108mm CV joints and 36 spline axles. Nobody else had really addressed the requirements that an endurance car has for drive axles so we had to go down a new path to come up with an acceptable solution.
After spending a few hundred hours in the shop and several days on the dyno we believe we have now completed this phase of development. This weekends testing and Sunday's Red Line Time Attack event will prove our efforts and probably create a new list of things to further develop before the next event.
Check out the Gallery page of the website to view photos of the changes that were made.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Fontana Nissan Racing Engine Dept. Visits Cosworth
On April 9th Chris Schroeder, my engine builder, and I visited Cosworth in Torrance CA. A few weeks before that my wife and I were spending some time on the coast in central California. During that time we toured Hearst Castle. The tour guide mentioned several times that "it is nice to be a Hearst! ". Well, touring Cosworth I said several times "it is nice to be Cosworth!"
When we arrived we waited at the reception area for about 15 minutes. Apparently Eric Hsu is a very busy guy as he is as hard to see in person as he is to get on the phone. When Eric finally appeared he escorted us to the conference room and then went off to find Ken Anderson. Both Chris and I have considerable experience with Cosworth produced engines so the 10 minutes we waited for Eric and Ken was well spent perusing the display engines that ring the conference room. I love history and museums so looking at those 20 or so engines would have been worth an admission price.
When Ken and Eric returned they were carrying the sample internal components of their new 3.8 liter VQ kit. These pieces were pure automotive art. It is clear that when Cosworth decides to do a project they produce parts that are simply the best in existance.
Chris and I studied the parts, asked a few questions, and both knew right away that using Cosworth components was in our immediate future. We spent a few more minutes discussing the business side of things. It is interesting to note how much Cosworth has embraced the Time Attack model as a place to showcase and sell their performance line of parts.
Ken had a meeting so Eric gave us a tour of the facility. As I said before, it is nice to be Cosworth. The 23,500 sq ft. facility contains everything a proper engine shop should contain. In fact, it contains several of everything a proper engine shop should contain. During the tour it became obvious that the resources that Cosworth has and the experience that Cosworth has enable them to simply be the "best".
It will be strange to be using a "kit" from a supplier. I have not built an engine in years that did not contain parts, especially pistons, of our own design.
We finished our tour, asked a few more questions that would be answered by the "UK", and left the facility a little starstruck by our experience. We then set off to meet with Jason from Mine's to start on the GTR project. More on that later.
Jackson
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