The Roadster NA Journey Begins

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Sun Oct 30, 2016 2:57 pm

Doing some more general maintenance on the car.

Since before WTAC (53 laps) and including a recent Morgan Park day (69 laps), but excluding in/out laps the rotors have decreased
FL -0.17
RF -0.09
RL -0.12
RR -0.06

Interesting that the left hand side has worn more than the right. However the good news is I still can use the rotors on the front as they still have 0.6mm of wear left, however the rears only have 0.15mm of wear left. However looking at the laps done the rears are good for at least another 100 laps...

Brake pads at the front tell a different story...

FR whilst having the least rotor wear has the most pad wear, and it is uneven (the inside was worn more). The inside pad is almost 2mm thinner than the outside.

FL the pads are worn evenly and are 2mm thicker (generally) than the average of the FR, however this rotor has the most wear.

Will need to swap out the pads, note these were not new before WTAC.

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Sun Oct 30, 2016 5:16 pm

Found a way to save a few kg's by swapping out the OEM fenders (will do this in a few months).

Ordering a few kits to rebuild the front calipers, so fitting the spare set for the moment. May have to seriously look at an alternative.

Have to order some parts on Monday so not sure if it will be ready for QR or Lakeside this month.

Notwithstanding, found the reason why the Cartek coolant alarm had stoped working, wires were 'snapped'.

DSCN3570 by Eipeip, on Flickr

So out with the old in with the new:

DSCN3571 by Eipeip, on Flickr

It mounts the exact same as the Cartek

DSCN3572 by Eipeip, on Flickr

However unlike the Cartek it comes with a control box that has an external LED alarm and an inbuilt alarm. In addition the kit includes wiring to run an external relay if you want to have a separate warning (louder alarm). It is even possible to wire it into the PS1000 and have the alarm show on the dash

DSCN3574 by Eipeip, on Flickr

Also did some bike 'stuff'. The previous fuel pump decided to stop, however it is only a low pressure (1.5psi) and the only pump I could find was a 4psi, so a adjustable fuel pressure regulator was installed. This allows the fuel pressure to be adjusted in 0.5psi increments from 0-5. Will find out tomorrow if it works...

DSCN3568 by Eipeip, on Flickr

Also adjusted the idle air circuit with a handy little tool.

DSCN3569 by Eipeip, on Flickr

sailaholic · Postby **sailaholic** » Sun Oct 30, 2016 10:30 pm

Given the reasonably significant change in spring rates from "stock" BC, have you thought about the dampeners ability to control rebound while maintaining bump compliance?

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

MattR · Postby **MattR** » Sun Oct 30, 2016 10:55 pm

Mark, as Sailaholic asked, did you get the dampers sorted for the different spring rates when you got them fixed?

The revalving will make a big difference in the behaviour of the car and when done right it is much more driveable.

With the coilovers for my S14, that are sitting waiting to be installed, they were revalved to suit the expected weight, tyres used, diff and new spring rates recommended rather than the standard BC rates, I went quite a bit softer also as I want to have a little roll in the car and will be using standard sway bars, I also have a 2 way LSD fitted.

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 7:38 am

When the front dampers were fixed, they were also tested. The advice was they could handle up to 12kg springs without any modifications.

At the moment I'm going to try slightly higher rates in the back. It is more about managing the travel in the rear suspension. The rears have a total of 70mm of movement of which about 35mm is the bumpstop, this does not leave much to 'play' with. Whilst stiff springs will make the handling suffer on a 'bumpy' track as the car will 'skip' over the bumps before the damper can manage I'm confident that the BC's will handle 9kg's in the rear.

At WTAC I continued a conversation face to face that had started over email with Danny Nowlan (ChassisSim Technologies). Danny had a customer running at WTAC and offered to come down and have a chat with me. Danny popped down a few times over the 2 days and we discussed a lot of things that could be done with the car, and much to my enjoyment it involves data collection. Interestingly we both agreed that the Racepak software was not very 'useful'.

The car is not collecting sufficient data to make use of what Danny can offer, at a minimum it will need steering angle, font suspension travel and a yaw sensor as well as obtain actual rear suspension curves, measurements of the chassis and sprung/unsprung weights. I'm unsure about adding the additional sensors at the moment, however the rest of the 'stuff' I can do myself.

On the Racepak software, a contact in the US has provided some of his data files (and software customisation) and I must admit my opinion on the software has changed. The person in the US actually has full suspension logging including suspension speed.

I can hear the groans starting again, however I'm not going to make any changes to the car without first becoming a better driver. Changing the rear spring rates and then testing at QR is smart as I'm confident that I can do consistent laps at QR to make an honest assessment of any change. The question that I want to try and answer is how can I improve on a track I do not get much time on (like SMSP GP). One answer is to at least have the car setup for it and that is my aim and if I can collect the required data Danny can help in this respect.

Other answers are seat time and reviewing the 'data'. I'm working on the seat time

Looking at the data has showed what I'm not doing right, so I will take this knowledge to QR and work on these deficiencies.

On a side note I'm not sure if anybody noticed by I removed the vortex generators from the car on the last session of day 2 and actually went slower... However the slower could be more driver related than anything else. I will mount/unmount them at QR and see what the verdict is.

BC ER's (front) test result

BC Dybo 1 by Eipeip, on Flickr

BC Dybo by Eipeip, on Flickr

MattR · Postby **MattR** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 8:09 am

at your pace at the moment Mark the vortex generators are very much an unknown.

Also get the set up right at QR and it will be fine for everywhere. Get more seat time as your priority.

Also good to know that the dampers were checked, a lot of people wouldn't think to do that. And also don't go too stiff in the springs. Have a chat to the guys racing them at the pointy end of prod sports in 2F to see what rates they are running.

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 9:12 am

MattR

Agreed my pace at SMSP GP is not a good 'test'. QR Sprint on the other hand should be.
Agreed seat time is king. However slight changes on the day to suit conditions need to be made. Notwithstanding, any significant change (like spring rates) will be done one at a time and evaluated.
Still have to have the rears tested and hopefully a local business (not MCA) that was at WTAC can help me out.

Car may not be ready before the QR event on 12/13 October (brakes/'clunk') or the club day on 14/11. I'm targeting 27/11 for the Street Sprints at QR as the next track day and possibly the last track day for 2016. In January 2017 hopefully will get a trip into Victoria.

ManiacLachy · Postby **ManiacLachy** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 9:40 am

MattR wrote:Also get the set up right at QR and it will be fine for everywhere. Get more seat time as your priority.

MattR wrote:Good to see you went quicker Mark, now stop playing with the car and just drive the thing.....

All the data is nice, but all you need to worry about is the stop watch and practice at this stage. Seat time will be the biggest improvement for you, so keep up the practice days and get some more tuition from guys that know, next week will be perfect timing to soak up knowledge transfer like a sponge.

MattR wrote:Don't worry about anything else, just seat time.

That will give you a few seconds alone and once you cannot go any faster, ie, you are lapping consistently withing a tenth or so of your PB every session you do in like conditions, then, and only then worry about playing with the car.

MattR wrote:Personally Mark, don't worry about hanging more sh*t off the car to create drag and what not, just get out there and drive it until YOU can't go any faster and then you can start to play with it to make the most of what you have.

MattR wrote:.. just drive the ring off the thing at Morgan Park and Noosa and then worry about the whys and wherefores when you have plenty of time to sort it and no pressure on yourself to be ready for the next event.

Matt, what are you trying to say exactly? Do you have a specific point your trying to convey to Mark? :mrgreen:

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 9:55 am

I missed the hints as well, I always do. Sometimes I wonder if I post to 'stir' up MattR

MattR · Postby **MattR** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 11:52 am

My dog learnt quicker as a puppy than Mark seems to.......

Only had to tell him three times at most....

Plus I don't think would enjoy me rubbing his nose into all teh data he collects instead of driving

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 12:09 pm

MattR this hurts but I may have to agree with you. However consider that you are now responsible for even more data being collected because of you telling me to drive more...

I will make sure that I credit you with all this collected data

MattR · Postby **MattR** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 12:17 pm

When I am back Mark, we will sit down over a beer and have a chat.

I will go through my typical testing regime and data collection and what I plan to do with all the data I will be collecting with the Motec system the engine builder has specified for my S14.

Basically he will get all the engine data and I will get the GPS, speed and time data. He needs to the engine data to make sure he is happy with how things are running, I need the other data to draw pretty pictures and look cool at the track.....

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 12:40 pm

MattR you will need a paper bag over your upper features to look cool

Happy to have a chat let me know the when/wher.

Motec, this is what I should have gone with in the first place, but that is hindsight.

MattR · Postby **MattR** » Mon Oct 31, 2016 12:54 pm

Nah, I have a cool helmet so all good, just need to lose some weight to fit back into the good driving suit.....

Magpie · Postby **Magpie** » Tue Nov 01, 2016 8:31 pm

Starting to 'play' with the Racepak Datalink II software.

Looking at the EGT's I have made a page that graphs the EGT's depending on the scale of the data being looked at. In the data area you can add additional channels like TPS/RPM to zoom in on areas of interest. In addition have made some graphs to look at the difference in each EGT when compared to the average.

This is from session 2 at SMSP GP. All 4 EGT's have a similar look

EGT_SMSP_S2 by Eipeip, on Flickr

However when looking at the difference the picture is a lot different. However in general the difference is between -20 & +20 and this is good. A bit of dyno time could 'fix' the temperatures however there would be no cost benefit in doing this.

EGT_DIFF_SMSP_S2 by Eipeip, on Flickr