E-Crosser LMA Suspension Animation

Who doesn't like a sweet simple technical animation?

In order to make sure there are no physical conflicts between parts, I decided to learn the constraint system in 3D Studio Max.  I'm very proficient in model-making and rendering in the program, but for animation, I actually went to school for Softimage so the functions are quite different.  Also, it has been well over 10 years since I went to school so it was a good refresher.

In order to see the full suspension, I removed the car frame, and left the brackets that the A-arms, steering rack and sway bar connect to it with.

It was fun re-learning the constraint systems so the suspension rotated, compressed and moved properly.  There are still some bugs with the actual movement but I got exactly what I needed from the animation.

Enjoy this short 2 second video.  It is very low resolution (I don't have exactly the fastest computer.  The render time for this 2 second/60 frame video was 10 hours). Enjoy the yumminess of computer animation.

Hope your holidays treated you well and the New Year's brings something super sweet.

Laid Off but Not Laid Up. E-Crosser LMA Refinement, and Times a Tickin'

It has been quite a couple of weeks.  I know I've started of my blogs that way before, but this one takes the cake for a shocking turn of events.

I was laid off 2 weeks ago.  It was pretty surprising, and I had no idea it was coming, but when you see a line of people streaming into your bosses office, with the blinds down, you kind of know something was going on.

The day started like any other, but the craziness started after lunch when one of the designers that had worked there for almost 7 years started to pack up his stuff.  The rumours started flying around like wild fire, and work came to a grinding halt.

People started to congregate at each other's cubicles, wondering what was going on.  And not 20 minutes later, the drizzle turned into a torrential rain storm.

My close colleague was called in, and we all knew then what was happening for sure.  He came out, started to collect his stuff, well, what he could because he was instructed to leave immediately, and basically said that he was gone..

30 minutes later, I got my call.  I will be honest, I was a bit nervous, and shocked because I had been there for a very long time, and was a senior of the department.  I had no idea it was going to be my turn   All of that experience and knowledge meant nothing when the "powers that be" looked at the numbers of the department.

As the meeting progressed and words like, "downsizing", and ,"budgets" were thrown around like shit in a monkey pen, my mind started to change.  This was actually an opportunity for me to find something that I really enjoyed.  I was free to take charge of my life again.

After I got the talking to, I walked out of the office, not upset or scared, but joyous.  Yup, joyous.  I got paid off to leave basically and find something that I am truly passionate about.  I'm also starting to learn HTML5 and CSS.

I can't blame them, as that is what big corporate businesses do.  They look at the numbers, and if they don't add up to what they like, they do what they have to do.  I may be understanding about this situation, but I gladly take sympathy beer, even if it comes with a side of sympathy head tilting, and condolences.

Random scary thoughts of desolation, and homelessness sometimes come to mind, but, I know who I am, and I know that I will be working hard to find a new job.  I'm not one to just sit around and play videogames.  I always need to do something that gets my mind and body active.

So now, let's talk about the E-Crosser LMA(I used to call it LMP but now it's Le Mans Autocrosser-LMA).

The entire frame and shell has been designed, as well as the suspension and steering.

The shell will be using aluminum sheeting and draping it and riveting it to the frame.

The front suspension is complete now, with many alterations and changes from the original design.  As I was designing the suspension in the last revision, I was finding that the dimensions were getting larger and larger. That was something I was not liking because keeping the frame as tight as possible would be advantageous when racing around the cones.  A complete frame change was in order, to get the dimensions back to the Toyota Yaris territory.

A lot of my research has been with the Formula SAE cars that are extremely popular with the university kids these days.  Those damn kids tearing around parking lots with their crash bang music blaring, and leaving tire skid marks all over the asphalt...Cool!

It's a seriously cool concept.  A fictional company has contracted these students to build a race car with a spec type engine, and limited performance rules.  I wish I knew about this when I was in college.

Anyways, these students come up with some genius solutions for things.  Some are a bit too complicated, and some are just not feasible at all in regards to manufacturing.  What they lack in practicality sometimes, they more than make up for it with fly in the face to conventional tactics.  I love it and I learned a tonne.

As for the E-Crosser LMA, my concept is about simplicity of concept.  There's no push rod suspension here. For the E-Crosser LMA, it may look like a protoypre; at least a boxy prototype, but it is all about grassroots mentality.  If something is damaged, it's easily fixed, and doesn't cost a fortune to fabricate a part using CNC, or 3D printing.  It's sort of like the Daytona Prototype concept over the Le Mans Prototype.

The Daytona's are basically a tube frame using some high tech stuff, but it was not about aero.  It was more about mechanical grip and simplicity and cost efficiency.  The Le Mans Prototypes on the other hand, are extremely high technology pieces of jaw-droppingly awesome design.  Nothing is cheap on those, and repairing one...well, let's just say, if you crashed one, you might not be racing in the next race because things take time and money to repair it.

The E-Crosser LMA is all about the steel frame, aluminum skin and rivets, and a lot of off the shelf parts from wrecked out cars (steering rack, and braking components)

Here are the renderings for what I've done so far.  I really like where this is now heading.  It looks cool (to me at least) and it is as simple as I can make it.

The Finalized Shell As Seen in Orange.

The Rear

In Red

Front Suspension

A View from the Cockpit

Steering Wheel Hub

Steering Rack and Column.   Mmmmm Carbon Fiber.

The Braking System

Right Front Suspension, Sway Bar and Braking System.  No braided steel lines yet.

Left Front Suspension Shot

Once I finish up the rear suspension, I will be posting up a supplemental graphic to show what is what.  So right now, you have to just enjoy the pretty pictures without much explanation.

SIDE NOTE: Not Your Grandma's Cuckoo Clock

With having some time off of working an 8-5 job, I thought I would keep busy.  I've had an ongoing log of random thoughts, and I finally got to one of them.

I wanted to build clocks using old used up car parts I had lying around.  So I took a couple of days to design and build a couple of them.  They turned out great, and hey, if need be, I could make a few bucks with these.  I'd buy one, would you?  Just make sure you anchor the hook into the wall...these are not lightweight.

TwinchRacing Disk Brake Clock

Amid all the Controversy...E-Crosser Continues

With all this controversy in Toronto with our mayor and all the internet distraction it's hard for me to stop and work on the E-Crosser.  I mean, come-on, we should have a week off to deal with this.  How is anyone working that lives in the GTA?

With thousands of megs of digital hoopla swimming around the internet it's tough to get through it all, but good thing I'm diligent and I powered through it all, and here I am to say that more of the design has been created.

With the original concept, I started working on the rough 3D frame of the new E-Crosser using 1.25" diameter and 1" diameter steel tubing.  I am working right now on the basic shape and aero of the body and once I finish the concept, I'll be adjusting the frame to accommodate the hardware like steering rack, suspension, pedals, batteries, motor, windows, etc.

The body shell will not be like this exactly as this is only to get the basic shape of the car.  At the end of it all the aluminum sheeting will be riveted to the main frame, and almost none of the tubing will be seen...unless I decide I like the look, because as I see it now, the frame being exposed gives the E-Crosser a unique look.  Hmmm. What to do?  What to do?

Also, as I was designing this I was thinking I may not add doors.  It's actually something I'm not sold on yet, but I'm thinking it's weight I may not want.  Plus then there is no need for ventilation into the cabin.

Front of the E-Crosser.

Rear of the E-Crosser.

Well now it's time to go back to the circus that is Toronto politics.

End of Season Report, and The Anatomy of Nissy.

And so the 2013 PITL"Push It to the Limit" season has come to an end.

It was another stellar year for the series with car numbers getting as high as 110+ cars.  It's nice to see so many people out there thrashing their cars around the cones, but with such a limited size parking lot, it is starting to get quite crowded, and I think that there should be a cap, or even pre-registration to limit the cars to 90.  The organizers have done an amazing job keeping things on track, but days have gotten quite long with the numbers.

Now, because I was away in Virginia during Race #8 I was not able to compete.  The last couple of weeks were a bit nerve racking because I was so close to loosing a podium spot in my class.  All I could do is wait and see.

When the results were made official and uploaded onto the internet, I nervously scrolled through the classes to see if I was able to hold onto my third in class.

Scroll...A-Stock...Scroll, scroll...A Mod...Scroll, scroll, scroll...B-Mod.  That's my class, and low and behold, I was able to hold onto my 3rd place finish!  Unfortunately, I had to share the bottom step as I had 36 points for the season, and a fellow B-Modder driving a Volvo C30 had 36 points as well.

Still I'm not too upset.  I was relieved because I really thought he was going to topple me off.  I gladly shared 3rd spot, he was a great competitor.

The winter is slowly rearing its ugly head now, and I am almost complete converting the car from super-fun-summer-mode, to I-hate-driving-this-car-in-winter-and-I'm-glad-I-don't-drive-to-work-mode.  I have a little bit of time so I wanted to share exactly the tool of my trade, my 2003 Nissan Sentra SE-R SPEC-V.

My car has been a serious work in progress now for I'd say close to from the day I purchased her.  I always knew that I would never sell her, so even when the bank still owned her, the modifications began.

At first I was not very focussed on what I modified, but I knew for sure that the faulty exhaust manifold was going to be one of the first things to go.

Nissan always knew that there was an issue with the pre-cat in the stock manifold, which led to little bits of "cat" to get sucked into the cylinders resulting in a number of engines dying prematurely, so I decided that I would get rid of it altogether and install an exhaust header.

Other than that, I really did not have a proper plan.  I just slowly added bolt-ons aimlessly through the first couple of years.  If the car felt faster, I was content.  It was purely unscientific.  I can't even count how many mufflers I went through because I was not happy with the sound that was coming out of the loud end.

My focus only sharpened when I started to autocross about 8 years ago, and the rules of the series forced me to re-examine what modifications would benefit me most on the track.  Obviously number 1 was me, and I did what I could to improve that through experience, school, and a-ha-lot of research.

Most of the development mechanically has been on the suspension side of things.  I first started with K-Sport Coilovers, which were nothing but a headache.  I was constantly replacing the upper strut bearing because they just could not cope with the constant pounding of the unsmooth pavement in the parking lots I was racing in.  The damping felt all wrong for the spring rates and it felt more like my suspension was nothing more than solid bricks.  Teeth shattering does not describe it fully.

After 3 years of constant stress, with those coilovers I moved up to Adjustable Koni Sport dampers, with Ground Control threaded sleeves, and 325lbs-front/525lbs-rear Eibach Springs.  The new setup was a complete 180 degree turn from the K-Sports and I thought I found the answer to my competitive dilemma.

Unfortunately, even though I was progressing in the right direction, I was still bottoming out the fronts constantly on larger bumps in the pavement.  Even raising the car and adding more damper travel a bit did not help, so the only answer was to increase the spring rates to limit the amount of travel.  I moved up to 525lbs in the front and 600lbs in the rear.

With such high weight springs Koni informed me I was borderline maxing out the dampers and they may not survive.  I decided to take my chances, and with the change came a new sense of speed.  The car felt super planted, and there were no issues with hitting the bump stops.  I could tell that it had some very heavy springs, and yes, driving over train tracks is a bumpy proposition, but generally, the damper/spring combo is very compliant for what it is, and very comfortable in most cases.  I was very happy until I moved up to using very sticky D.O.T. R-Comp tires (Toyo R888, RA1, and Hankook Z214 c71).

The added forces now when I was taking corners was translating into the steering column and I was losing my alignment after every race.  The temporary solution was to add Torrington Bearings on the upper strut perches.  This fix definitely helped, but after 2 seasons of racing the stock steering rack bushing has given up the ghost and my alignment issues are back.

This off season I am going to have a solid bushing lathed out by Wayne Yeates of Way's Performance Services(actually his brother will be doing that) and it will be installed into both my steering racks.  Hopefully from then on, my steering issues will be resolved.

On top of that steering rack bushing, the new bumper splitter that I designed, and vac-formed will be installed.  This splitter has been a 3 year project, with many, many design tweaks, and test vac-forms.  I finalized a design that was functional, and really cool looking.  But it's not just a splitter.  I also have a full undertray designed to smooth out the airflow under the engine compartment all the way back to the half-shaft.

Also, one of the front Koni's did bottom out in New York State entering Pennsylvania, over the worst maintained highway I have ever driven on.  Quebec's roads would be considered the Circuit of the Americas race course compared to this sorry looking excuse of a highway.  Because of this, I am now forced to re-valve all my Koni's to be able to handle the spring rates properly.  I'm sure at the end of the day it will all be worth it, but I was hoping that those dampers would have lasted longer than they had.

Brakes were also an ongoing issue.  Through the first 3 years of autocrossing I went through innumerable brake bleeding sessions with just as many different brake fluids because it kept feeling like I was getting severe brake fade.  I was almost resigned to the fact that I may have had to upgrade to either the 300ZX brake system, or go one step further and get a big brake system from Wilwood.

It only took a passenger who was a race instructor from Ian Law Racing to recognize that my ABS was kicking in prematurely, and constantly.  The solution, pull the ABS fuse.  Now since I have done that seemingly simple thing, the brakes are constantly at peak performance.  They bite so much harder, but, it did take me a few races to adjust my braking style.  I now have to squeeze much more progressively, instead of just stomping on the pedal and let the computer sort things out.

Well the winter is coming and I have a lot of work still to prep around the house.

Virginia and the All New E-Crosser.

I just got back from my vacation in Virginia.  My wife and I are regular virgins.  This state offers so much for something so close.  Yes our trip back was non-stop for 10+ hours, and yes, my right ankle has a blister on it from keeping it on the "Go" pedal for so long, but at the end of all of it, Verinia is always amazing for the views, the beer, the history, the cities, and the spectacular mountain drives.

On the way home I had to drive one of my bucket list roads.  The amazing drive through the Blue Ridge Parkway, with a stop off on one of the most beautiful overlooks ever.  At 3200 feet Raven's Roost Overlook was equal to the magnitude of awesomeness as The Alps were in France.  I have no pictures yet as we just got back, and my Go Pro camera that was on the car was aimed too low and recorded mostly my hood, and the road, but nothing more.

On trhe way home there was something strange and a little scary.  Watch the following video and listen to what the Blue Ridge Ranger was asking us.  This was at about 2400 feet elevation at a non-discript overlook. You Said What?!? Video.  The overlook had no gaurd rails, it was just a drop off from the road, at a very steep angle, and it went down, and down, and down.

NOW FOR E-CROSSER NEWS!

I have had some time to look it over now, and I was never completely satisfied with the design. After finishing the base frame out of balsa wood, I looked at it carefully, and had a thought.  I figured that it was much too heavy.  But more importantly, I was thinking that if I am going to build a car, I want something that looks like a race car, and looks cool.  Not a design that looks like it is made of scaffolding, I am a designer by trade so why not show that?

So, where else do I go for inspiration, but one of my favourite race series ever.  The World Endurance Championships.  You know, the series with multi-million doller factory prototypes from Audi and Toyota (and soon to be Nissan and Porsche), battling it out with privateers like Rebellion Racing.  This series is a platform for many new technologies, including electric vehicles, so I figured what better place for inspiration.

I've sketched out the rough design in 3D now and am about to work out the engineering.  See below.

The original E-Crosser was a good starting point, and I am going to be using many features from it, but I want the E-Crosser to be unique on the race track, something that will turn heads.

I increased the wheelbase to that of a Toyota Yaris, and the width is a smidgen larger.  So, this new E-Crosser will be a bit larger than the old version.  I may still increase the width a bit more for a more aggressive stance, with added cornering ability.

For the time being I'm sticking with light 15" X 7.5" rims with 225/45/15 tires.  They are light, plentiful, and cheap compared to the 245 width 17" tires.

Being a closed cockpit will allow for all weather use, or at least it will be a lot more comfortable in the rain compared to the open cockpit design.

The all new E-Crosser sketches are missing a bunch of things like a frame, doors, cockpit ventilation, and proper aero but the idea is there.

Here is the concept rear for the all new E-Crosser.  You can plainly see the inspiration from Rebellion Racing's LMP1 Car.

Now I need to start building the frame and shell in 3D and hopefully, I can build a 1/6th scale model by the end of the winter.

I'm excited about this new design.

Till next time.

2013 Race Season Update - Race #6

It was another beautiful day for racing, warm and mostly sunny.  We've done pretty good this year not really needing treaded tires, which makes me happy because my rain tires are my street tires (BFG G Force Sports).

There were close to 80 competitors racing Sunday, and the fields were pretty deep, despite the fact that the Provincial Mobil 1 Series races were going on the same weekend up in Barrie.

In my class, BMOD, two of the fastest drivers were there, and they were definately a match for even the top dogs in the series, closing in within a second or so.  And with this sort of competition, I had to work even harder to stand my ground.  I knew that within the field I could realistically see third place, but it was a matter of actually doing it.  Easier said than done.

After the regular morning rituals of registering, setting the car up, walking the course a number of times, and going to the drivers meeting, all 77 drivers were anxious to get ready, especially the ones who had never competed before.

The first run resulted in a good base to start from, placing first in class.  But, as we all know, drivers learn quickly, and first place at this point of the day is no more secure than a Brink's truck with the doors wide open, all the safes unlocked and the security gaurds passed out from drinking a 40 of moonshine in the back alley.

I quickly slipped out of first and dropped down to 6th place.  Mid-course there was a wide smooth curve that led onto the longest straight I have ever seen at a PITL Series race.  The straight ended with a 90 degree right turn that turned into a quick left turn, essentially a backwards 'S'.  If done right, it would look super sweet, and smooth.  If done wrong it would end up with smoky skid marks into a wall of cones(See the animated GIF below).

This shot was taken from 8 frames that photographer Ken Lin took, who was trackside.
This was my second run with a complete lock up at the end of the long straight.

Speeds were ticking three digits, and the Spec-V was pinging off of the rev limiter about half way down the straight in 2nd gear.  I had to think, should I just stop accelerating and leave it in 2nd while the engine bounced off the rev limiter, or should I waste a bit of time shifting, but still get a second or 2 of acceleration, then downshift to 2nd to tackle the 'S'?

This straight ended up being the bane of my day, where experimenting with shift points, and braking zones led to locked brakes, miss-shifts and cones being obliterated.  So much so that a cone got wedged into the underside and stuck between the body and the exhaust.  Thanks to that stray cone, the rest of the day was filled with pungent burned rubber cone smell that must have melted onto my exhaust piping.

I was getting discouraged and all through the day, I was having not one clean run, until my last one.  Even that run was squeezed out with a little drama in itself.

After doing a run where I shifted to third on the straight, perfectly heel-and-toed back to 2nd in the perfect location and weeving nicely into the tight 'S', the rest of the run felt smooth and relaxed.  I felt like it was my best of the day, and it was cone free.

When I was waiting at the stop box to hear my time, the stop box marshal walked up to me and stated that I had to do a do over.  The timer did not register my run.  Gah!

So I went straight into the queue and ran it again.  This time luckily it felt just as strong and it bumped me up to 3rd in class by a mere 0.050 seconds.  I tell you, I'm really getting much too comfortable in 3rd place as this is now my third 3rd place of the season.  I'm at least consistant.

I was happy with the result though because it was a tough fight all day long. I had been working on that one area the entire day, without really concentrating on any of my other areas that needed improvement.  Trust me I had a few more places I wanted to work on, but that damn straight killed me.

So the last race of the season for me is Sept 8th.  I'm hoping for something more than 3rd.  I should have enough points to get me in the running for a podium in the championships, but as I have demonstrated, the course always throws curveballs at you.

As we sit right now I'm fourth in the standings behind 3rd place by 3 points.  I need to get a result of at least 3 places above him next race.  Doable, hard, but not impossible.

Also, for some reason, all of my in car video was recorded as the car sat in the paddock before the race, and my memory card had no more room for actual race video.  I only found that out the day after, when I was going to upload my videos to Youtube (Check out my Youtube Channel: twinchracing).  I got some nice shots of people's ankles walking by, but completely useless other than to see what the current fashion trends are for racing shoes and sock combos.  Ah well, I'll get some video next time...hopefully.

The Drama of the Queue

Crunch and Smoke
Sleeping on the job, and missing the braking zone makes for a smoky DNF.

At my last race, as I was sitting in the queue line waiting to get on track, my mind started to think about how even as I was waiting silently, in my rumbly, rattily cocoon that that moment still had a lot of excitement, even before the race started.

I strap into the 3 point harness, and lock my CG Lock to keep me snug in the belt my heart starts to increase in speed. I put the key into the ignition and bring my four cylinder beast to a violent if not hesitatingly filled life.

The solid motor mounts transmit every vibration and quiver of my Sentra's heart through the chassis and into my butt and up my spine. 

I slip my open faced helmet over my head, and as it covers my ears, I am transported into slight environmental deprivation.  The noise of engine is muffled now, but I now have more of a tactile awareness of the slightly irregular idle.  I can feel through the steering column and into my hands the engine and all of its nuances.

I click the shifter into the gate of first gear, with a satisfying clunk, and slowly I engage the clutch with a small chatter as it engages, and starts to spin the aluminum flywheel.  I creep slowly forward through the paddock, being ultra-aware of all of the biological and mechanical life that swarms around like aimless wasps.  You never can tell what someone might do in these places, especially since many of the people there are there to watch only, and don't fully understand that this place can be dangerous.

Buzzing everywhere around me with a lot of energy, worker bees hover around some cars that have bonnets open checking fluids, or making adjustments.  Air compressors and impact guns are heard through the area, echoing off the walls of the surrounding warehouses. 

In contrast though from the busy-bodies, there are also a tonne of people loafing around, talking and enjoying the greatest sport on Earth. (my opinion of course).  

They talk about the past Le Mans, or some mod that they are trying out that day, or what our goof of a mayor was up to that past week.  Whatever the conversation, and no matter what differences we may all have out in the non-autocross world, we are all there now, at that moment,  autocrossers, and that is all that matters.  We are all friends there.

I can't get distracted though, and keeping my wits about me is very important.  Again, you never know what can happen unexpectedly.

Through my Hankook Z214's stiff sidewall, I can feel the cracks, and pebbles I'm rolling over through the paddock.  I feel connected to my car, much more than I do on my regular summer tires, with all the disruptions of everyday life.  I'm focused.

I arrive at staging, stop and think about what I am about to do.  I take a deep breath, and think of every corner of the course.  I walked the course at least 5 times so I know it pretty well by this time.  Some people draw out the course on a sheet of paper.  "This season I didn't do that, but I'll start next season.", I think to myself.  

My thing is to walk the course alone in the beginning of the day.  Free of the distractions of conversation.  I have an entire day to talk to my friends between runs.

When it's my second, or third run of the day, I'll think about where I can improve from the previous run, but right now, all I have is my morning walk-throughs.

I stare ahead, and go through the entire course in my head.  A perfect run in my brain could just translate to one in reality. 

The car ahead of me roars out from the starting box, spitting smoke and bits of rubber, a Ford Mustang Boss 302.  Man that exhaust sounds viscous. 

I take one more cleansing deep breath.  I shake my hands vigorously to get rid of all the creaks, and stretch out the joints. 

The starter man signals me to move forward into the start box.  I move forward with the direction from the starting man, until I stop inches away from the laser timer's invisible beam.  

In front of me seems like an endless sea of cones.  From this lowered vantage point I scan the parking lot.  The course looks like a jumble of spaced out traffic cones.  It could look extremely confusing to someone who has never done this, but after so many years of racing, I know better, and I know where I'm going.

I watch for a short period of time the Boss 302 that just burst out onto the coarse, tracking it like a sentinel on a watch tower, as it corners around a tight hairpin with a slight twitch in the rear.  A momentary lapse, but I focus back on the job at hand. 

I take one more deep breath and stretch out my fingers one more time, while looking as far forward as possible, because that is where I will be in a few seconds.

"Ready?", the starter yells at me so I can hear him through my helmet and the popping of back fire from the car's on track.

My heart races, my brain is now focused fully on the course.  My eyes are unblinking, and I watch the first important gate where I'll be entering. 

A gentle breeze comes into my windows over my face.  With that movement of air a slight odour of rubber, and burning brakes fills my nose.  I slightly push down the accelerator pedal to increase the engine's RPM's to 1250.  More vibration.  More noise.  More exhilaration.

I depress my SPEC clutch forcefully to the floor, and push the gear lever into first gear.

Rolling my fingers on the shifter knob,  I can hear my breath inside my helmet.  Everything is peaceful.  Everything is quiet.  There is nothing now left to do except blast out of the starting gate.  It seems the world has stopped momentarily...  

"GO!"

Sometimes Things Change.

I have been noticing that during the racing season, I don`t do much in regards to the E-Crosser, because I`m so busy, so I`ve officially decided to change what my blog is all about.

Yes, I will still write about the E-Crosser, because it is my goal to have it complete by the time I turn 45, but I thought I would expand in writing about my life as an Autocrosser, and the things I do in that life.  I will write about things I do to prep the Sentra, or even projects I do that are somewhat related to my racing life.

With this change I also changed my blog`s titlepage to reflect the new direction.

The next blog entry will be this week, and I had an idea on my commute into work on the subway.  I wrote an entire entry on my Ipod as I was listening to some excellent Real Synthetic Audio on my headphones.

I hope that it will be a more entertaining read...I hope, I really, really do.

A Day Complete...

Before I start on the Autocross stuff I have a little story to tell.  So kids, sit around and let me tell you a story about one of your Uncle Travis' days that were fully complete, back in 2013.

I'm sure everyone has had a day that was made complete by something.  A moment that you think to yourself, "Yup, My day can end now, and I would be content."  Whether it's from finishing a marathon, having the greatest night sleep(which in that case your day was over before it started), eating a record number of pickles in one sitting (which might force you to end your day), or in my case talking crap with my all time favourite driver, Randy Pobst.

For anyone who does not know who Randy Pobst is, be ashamed because he is one of the driver's for KPax Racing in the Pirelli World Challenge. 

I've been following Randy for a very long time now.  Before there was a Pirelli World Series, and before he was part of KPax Racing.

Randy started as an Autocrosser.  He wasn't a young gun either.  He started racing later in his life.  This is exactly why I follow him.  He started it all at a completely grassroots level, with not a tonne of money.  He was just a guy who raced for the thrill of racing.  He just so happened to be one kickin' racer.  And what comes through when he speaks still is that he races for the shear thrill of it.  Sure he's got to make money doing it, but really he is still enthusiastic about racing on all levels from autocrossing to pro driving in a GT car.

When I was talking to him, we barely touched on racing.  Granted I was very nervous with him because let's be honest, this is Randy Pobst, the equivalent to my wife having dinner with Blue Rodeo.  My wife adores Blue Rodeo a lot.

Our conversation was more about silly things, like how his girlfriend noticed the sign when they came into Toronto that said, "Welcome to Toronto where our mayor smokes crack".  He asked, "What's up with that?"  We never once touched on the KPax Racing Volvos, how could we when we had all the politics of Toronto to talk about..

What really was the DEFINING MOMENT, was how he was so vigourously and animatedly  talking about some sort of midievel torture device (I'm not going to get in why we were talking about that) and his girlfriend leans into him, slowly puts her mouth closer to Randy's face and quietly said,"Randy, there are kid's over there, be quiet."

That one seemingly small moment really showed me that Randy, even though he may be a racing god to me, and the person who really defines what racing should be about, is after all, just like me.  Saying stupid shit, rambling, and sometimes, doing stuff that may not be completely acceptable.  He is, under all those layers of fire retardant clothing and sponsorship decals...a guy.

Randy Pobst's autograh.  I can't say much about this that has not already been said.  He did mention how much he liked the paint marker I gave him to write on the helmet though.

And the cherry on top was when I walked into Mike Skeen's pit looking at the Nissan GTR that is currently in development.  I noticed he was sitting right behind me, with his girlfriend.  Mike is another one of those guys, I've been followin since the advent of Youtube.  This guy knows how to drive, and a lot of what he drives, is crazy cool loud.  CHECK THIS OUT!

We talked for a short time, about the series, and about how the development was going with the GTR, and about the Grassroots Motorsports Ultimate Street Car Challenge which is a no holds barred time trial event with cars that range from $500 Le Mons cars to ultra exotic Nascar engined Tube framed purpose built racers.

At the end of it all, I reached into my helmet bag and his girlfriend said,"I told you it was a helmet".

When I apologized that he was not the first to sign it, and Randy was the first, his girlfriend and him looked at me with a "How dare you!" kind of look.  Jokingly of course, but there seemed to be a little bit of a beyond cempetitiveness aura that fell on the place and as Mike signed my helmet his girlfriend stated,"We have a love hate relationship with Randy." Hmmmm, what does that mean?

Mike Skeen's smudged autograph.  I put the helmet into my bag before it was completely dry. DAMN!

But really the experience was amazing, and as I walked around a little more waiting for my wife to join up with me, since she had to walk the dog, to watch the Touring Cars, and B-Spec Racers, I was thinking to myself that my day could end then, because, those two moments with Randy and Mike completed my day as everyday I wish could be concluded.

You know what?  I no longer want to talk about my race too much since right now all I hear is race cars going around the CNE grounds for the Indy.  Sounds like USF2000 cars right now, and the sound just reminds me of yesterday, the day that my day was fully complete.

But just to be fair, my last race was a nailbiter.  It was a technical course, with a few very slow 90 degree turns.  Nice for the Sentra's 2.5 engine with a lot of torque.  Bad for the driver who did not have enough runs to work on all the areas that needed improvement.

It wasn't until the 3rd run of the day that I started to improve my times, and from then on I didn't clobber any cones either.  I think my first and second run did enough killing of cones.

After my 4th run I jumped from 8th in class to 2nd, where I stayed until the very last run.  I was not racing that run because I was out marshalling, picking up cones, and waving flags.  So basically my day was done and I still had one competitor in my class that was hot on my heels.  Well, to make a long story short, he eeked out a 0.015 second lead ahead of me to clinch 2nd in class.  It was a fraction of a second but that's autocross for you. 

Here is the video of my last run that improved my times by about a quarter of a second.  I was still 2nd place at this time.  I definitely did not the best line and I can see where I could have made up another second. Run#5 July62013

At the end of that rough day, in blistering heat, and dust blown surroundings, I held onto 3rd in class.  The official results are still not up.  I'm still getting good points for that so hopefully the next few races I can improve my position.

Until next time, try and have one of those days where it's concluded conclusively.

2013 Race Season Update

The 2013 PITL race season has moved into full gear.  After missing the first race because of scheduling conflicts, my first race was actually the second race in the series on May 25.    The results were mediocre. 5th in class, and 37th overall out of 92.

Like all racers, I had copious amounts of excuses.
1. Had to shake of the winter rust off.
2. Trying new R-Comp tires.  Hankook z214's which are much different than the R888 or RA1 which I have been on that last 2 seasons.
3. New suspension setup with the traction spacers.

I was so excited for the first race of the season, I actually forgot to torque down the lugs of one of my wheels so after the first run I heard a very loud clunking.  After driving slowly around the paddock while a number of people were listening trying to narrow down where it was coming from, I jacked up the corner and immediately felt that my rear right wheel was loose.  Slapping my forhead, and calling myself a number of names, I got back into the game, only to find out that I had so much oversteer, it felt like my rear end was on ice.  Literally, I was fighting it the entire second run, drifting the back around like I was on Fast and the Furious, Tokyo Drift.

After adjusting the tire pressures I fixed the oversteer issue, but I was too far behind to really catch up to the leaders, since I had basically thrown away my 2 first runs.  Such is life.

Before my June 23rd race, I ended up fabricating up a new camera mount for my video camera.  I used the Go Pro suction mount, and made an adapter to fit my tiny camera.  I don't have a Go Pro camera so I had to build this adaptor out of 0.063 alluminum sheet.  The camera is friction fit into the holder so it won't go anywhere.

A small cutout was created so I didn't have to take the camera out when I upload video to the computer with the cable.

The June 23rd race would be the test for the new adapter and camera and it worked out really well.  I still have to learn the Youtube interface fully, and I still need to learn the compositer program, but the test video worked out well.  I'll be uploading more videos as the season progresses to my Youtube Channel, Twinchracing.  Hope people enjoy it.

As for the race it was an improvement.  I think I've gotten rid of the winter rust, and I've started to get used to the Z214's.  I'm still having a little bit of oversteer, so I'm going to need to play with tire pressures further.  Here are the results. 3rd in class, and 20th out of 82 overall.  It was definately one of my favourite track setups yet, with a great long sweeping right had turn that really created some g-forces as you accelerated through it. FUUUUUUUUN!

Till next time.

2013 PITL Race Season Prep.

It's been a few months since my last post, but I swear there were legitimate reasons.  No, the dog didn't eat my computer, but I did trip over a cord and knocked it over and killed the hardrive. 

So, basically because of this I lost the last revision of the E-Crosser making it a bit difficult to continue building the model without the digital "blueprint".  I've been working on that since.

Since I don't have much to say about the E-Crosser, I might as well tell you about the preparations for the 2013 PITL race series.

When changing the tires last year I noticed that my front Stainless steel braided brake lines were starting to fray.  I guess after almost ten years of wear and tear it's bound to happen so I changed out my fronts with brand new, shiny brake lines by Goodridge.

I also got to use my Motive Power Bleeder, one of the greatest inventions for fluid transfers, particularly on closed pressurized systems...like brakes.  The system uses a reservoir that is filled with the brake fluid.  In this case,  Stoptech STR-600 High Performance Brake Fluid.  The Power Bleeder reservoir is pressurized to about 15 psi by a manual pump. The reservoir is sealed to the brake fluid reservoir on the car with a tight rubber seal to keep the circuit of the brake system pressurized.  Because of the pressure all you have to do is open up each brake caliper's bleeder valve(in proper order of course) and let the Power Bleeder force the fluid through until you see no bubbles. 

The only thing to really monitor is for any seal leaks, because we all know what brake fluid does to paint, and also to keep the pressure up so the fluid is constantly being forced out while making sure the reservoir in the Power Bleeder does not go empty.  Forcing air into the system is the complete opposite thing you ever want in the braking system. Duh.

Braided Stainless is always the prettiest.

Also, last year on one of the roughest parking lots I've ever been on, I hit a ripple in the concrete that was so deep that it lifted suspension enough to lift the springs away from the lower spring perch of my Ground Control Coilover Sleeves. When the car came back down to Earth, the spring was no longer centered in the perch and it sheared away part of it from the threading of the sleeve. 

I always knew this was a possibility since whenever I jacked the car up the springs came away from the perch, but I had no idea I would hit such a massive rut in the concrete.  This year I decided to pony up a few bones and get some helper springs from Eibach to just keep things in place when the the suspension was at full droop from doing a Dukes of Hazard car jump.

I just took out the car today for a spin and I think I will have to lower the front coilovers about a centimetre. The helper springs have raised it a little less than a centimetre when they are fully compressed, and that rake I had last year to fight weight transfer going to the rear wheels is now gone.

Also, I was a still hungry for a bit more oversteer.  Aren't we all though?  I knew I would like a bit more castor, but the Nissan has zero adjustability in that department, so I took to the World-Wide-Webs and discovered that you can increase positive castor by a simple spacer placed under the rear control arm mounting bracket.  This pushes the rear bracket away from the bottom of the car, which in turn increases the angle of the control arms slightly giving a degree of positive castor.

Positive castor affects steering by helping to keep the wheels straight at speed, but more importantly for me, it adds some more negative camber when the wheels turn.

I traced the rear control arm mounting holes, and created a mount shape exactly to fit with the rear control arm bracket.  I then built a Solidworks model for the new spacer.  It would be cnc'd out of 10mm aluminum.  A friend of mine has access to a cnc machine, so he was kind enough to do his thing, and cut out 4 spacers for me.  Awesome guy.  The spacers cost me a total of  dollars for the raw material, and about an hour total for the design process.

We'll see on May 25th how effective this change is

Another nice and shiny thing to just get all dirty.

Also, I noticed that my almost 10 year old Energy Suspension Motor Mount Inserts were starting to fail.  The front ones were constantly popping out of the OE Motor Mount so on launches I was getting some serious wheel hop again, just like when the car was brand new.

I ended up recruiting the help of my good friend and mechanic Wayne Yeates from Way's Performance Services to make some new solid motor mounts.  I've said it once, I've said it twice, this guy is insane when it comes to the details.  I brought him over some used motor mounts and he pressed out the old ones, cleaned them up, and started to create an alluminum jig to hold the mounts proper and tight keeping the metal centre sleeves in the proper orientation when the liquid urethane is poured into the mount. 

To get even crazier he noticed that Nissan had made the motor mount bushings so the centre sleeve was actually not centred at all but rather offset from the centre slightly.  He took that into account while making his aluminum jig.

The urethane I decided to use for the solid motor mounts was ITW Devcon Flexane 94 Liquid.  This stuff cures hard, but still has some flex.  If vibration annoys you, then do not use the 94, use either the Flexane 80 or Flexane 60.  In the winter I will be changing these mounts out for my old ones because I don't want to risk the solid mounts cracking in the cold.

Front Mount.  It's so solid!

Rear Mount

Next, my wife wanted the moon roof to work again.  About 2 years ago the whole assembly that included the map lights, glasses holder, and moonroof toggle switch fell from the ceiling and it no longer sit proper in the mountings since it's basically attached by a clip.  Because I never use the moonroof (have I ever mentioned how much I hate that 50 lbs of wasted of weight at the highest point of the car), I just detached the whole assembly and left a big gaping whole in the interior liner where it once sat, giving me a satisfying view of mechanisms and engineering stuff that usually are hidden.  It was ghetto, but it meant nothing to me.

Well, with a road trip looming this year to Virginia again, and the fact that it may get a bit hot she wanted the moonroof to work.  I figured it would be easier if I fabricated an aluminum bracket to hold the toggle switch only, and not worry about the glasses holder or the map lights.  Those things were useless anyways. 

I made the bracket out of 0.060" aluminum sheet, riveted the toggle switch to it, and drilled a few holes in the metal that the original assembly clipped to, and voila, open sesame, the moonroof works again.

It is not pretty but it is much more solid than the plastic assembly that Nissan supplied attached by a spring clip. It doesn't look all that complex from the pictures but there were some funny angles to bend in order to properly fit the switch and keep it so it was straight in relation to the bracket.

Finally, I decided to go one step further into the R-Compound tire realm, and try out Hankook's Z214 C71 tire. 

I got in touch with someone who had a set of 225/45/15 with 90% of the tread left.  They were such a steal I could not say no, and drove out an hour to get them.  They've been mounted and they are dying to get abused.

Other than a bunch of garage cleaning and organizing too, this off season was a busy one.

Oh, also, the splitter is still going forward, but I've been a bit too busy to worry about what this blog is actually about.

Till next time.

E-Crosser...The Model

And as promised here is the progress so far on the the scale model.    Nothing really to report other than it is still moving forward.

The next thing to build is the new suspension arms.

The Frame

Woody in the Pilot's Seat

 Till next time.

More Updates and New Suspension

Well it's the Rolex 24 Hours of Daytona weekend, so I figured, since I'm online watching the race(or at least I'm looking for a site to watch the streaming of it) I might as well update my progress with the E-Crosser.

There has been a lot of progress with the suspension these past weeks.  I've done a tonne of research on how the control arms will work.  From the standard Sentra suspension (since I know it so well) to F2000, and Formula Ford.  What I chose as my inspiration was a homenade open wheel car, I believe it was a Formula Ford.  The pictures I saw were exactly what I wanted.

It was basically a double A-Arm configuration, but where I changed it up was I am going to use Koni yellows, with ground control coil-overs instead of specific race shocks and springs.  Cost is alwyas an issue so let's stick with the basics.  I am using these because I know them well from the Sentra, and infact I will be using the Sentra's rear combination for both the rear and front of the E-Crosser.  This will allow me to fabricate the same A-Arms for both the front and rear saving time.

Rear Suspension without the wheel

Front Suspension

The Whole thing

I'm really thinking this thing is really looking awesome.  I'm going to have to figure out a few more things such as steering, and how to cover the electrical, because it sometimes rains.  Also, the I have not decided on what spindle to use.  Should I use a Sentra's or fabricate my own...who can say right now.

As for the 1/6 scale model, the main body is almost complete.  I will upload the photos this coming week  I've only stuck my fingers together once with the glue.  I have 911 on speed dial just in case I glue my eyelids.  You never know with me.

Till next time, I'm going to enjoy the 24 Hours of Daytona, and be back early next week with model photos.

The New and Improved Base Frame...

While looking at the last version of the balsa wood frame...oh, let me first say, Happy Christmas everyone, hope your holidays treated you well, and the New Year's came without a hitch.  Go figure the world didn't end when the Mayan calendar switched from one to another.  Gee, everytime I switch my calendar from the past year to the new year I always wonder, will this be the end of the world?  Go figure nothing ever happens.

Anyways, as I was mentioning, I was looking over the last frame and noticed a few things were just not right.  First, the 1/4" balsa I used just looked too thick.  The scale was accurate as it would have been 1 1/2" tubing but I just didn't like the thickness, and in the actual car I am still debating 1" tubing or 1 1/2" tubing. tubing. So decided to go with 3/16" balsa sticks to be an in between.  I like the the look better.  

Secondly, I was not happy with the triangulation of the frame so I redid it, with a much wider stance now for the batteries.  I can now fit more banks of car batteries in case I need more.

The last frame I built I did without using the technique of pinning.  This time around I pinned the frame as one of my co-workers is an avid model maker of model airplanes and he suggested it.  It was so much easier to accomplish what I wanted.

So you wonder what pinning is.  Well here it is.

Since I built this all digitally it was easy to print up a scaled top view frame on paper.  I just printed off the base frame first at 1:6 scale.  I then basically just traced over the printout with the balsa wood sticks, cutting the lengths directly on the printout.  To keep the pieces steady and tight against each other I pinned down lengths of scrap balsa against the frame lengths and glued the frame pieces in place.  To make sure everything was square I used a small set square just for the added piece of mind, because if something was not perfectly square I would end up with a bent frame.

For a better explanation here is the link I used.to learn how to pin properly.PINNING TECHNIQUES.

Here is the new frame.  It certainly looks prettier than the last version.

To give a sense of proportion, here is the frame in place with the driving position in rough place.

I think I will continue doing this during my lunch hour at work.  It is definately a better place to do it with more room, less pets, and less distractions.

Till my next post.