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Currently running redline. Unfortunately, I think the syncro got damaged at the track day where my clutch pedal failed. It may have been on its way out, but it got bad after that for sure. I'm hoping I can get some decent money out of it while still disclosing that it's damaged.
So a little bit of an update. I'm starting to finally collect parts for my overpriced HPDE car. No pictures, sorry.
I've been really struggling with the gear ratio problem for the last 6 months. Basically, as I think I mentioned, I could run third as a lower than 1:1 gear and get the top speed the car needs. But that option kinda bugged me because obviously you want your gear where the engine needs every bit of power possible to be the most efficient gear which is 4th. But I needed a 2.73 or so at the RPMs I'm turning and the tire size.
So there were a couple of other options I saw.
Switch to an 8.8. This would open up more gear ratios and lsd options but I would have to buy new axles, get a cobra all-aluminum diff which isn't super cheap, and fabricate new mounts. Also slightly heavier, but probably the best place to add weight if needed, so that's not much of a worry. Good option overall, we'll call it $$.
The next option is increase RPMs. I'd need like 7700rpm. That'd be sweet, but waaay out of my price range at $$$$$.
Until last week I wasn't aware of a Getrag diff with a 2.73. And there certainly wasn't one with an lsd. But the auto sts and cts for a couple years did come with one. So if this works, I could just swap in an lsd center and I would have my 2.73 ratio without having to spend gobs of money. Because I need to save as much as I can so I can buy the damn trans.
I'm pretty sure the diff will bolt up, but I'm not 100% sure the diff will actually work in the housing. If so, I blew $250 and I'm back at my old three options. I'll bring it in to work and take measurements on everything to determine whether it'll work or not. The open diff/carrier should be here in the next week or so.
Nascar is switching to a 6 speed sequential at the end of this year. At that point, there will hopefully be many teams dumping their 4 speeds. I plan to pick one up during that time. I'll probably be picking up some other used stock car **** over the course of the year like a bell housing, possibly a clutch set up, and a dry-sump tank.
I need to sell the t56. I started to pull it a couple of months back and just got super depressed and went inside. But socialism bucks are coming in, so people will have extra cash to spend on stupid **** like t56s.
Maybe I'll throw together an update on the BMW later too. Car is almost ready to race, the plan was May 30-31. We had it really well planned out until Covid-19 hit and my teammate hasn't been able to come over for a month. We were actually on track for a shakedown day last weekend until everything stopped. Fabrication is still on track for the race, but he's got some catching up to do with the rest of the car. I think we're still planning on making the May race though. Exciting stuff
As promised, here’s an update on the bmw that no one really cares about. But I’m bored and running tests on the 3d printer behind me.
So I just took a look back and apparently all I ever really mentioned was that we bought the bmw. So a lot has gone down since that time. We were originally planning on getting it racing last June, maybe July? We started out as a group of 5. Around maybe Feb or so, we lost one of them. Things got delayed and I got frustrated by the lack of enthusiasm. Seemed like no one actually wanted to put in the time or money to make it a legit car and as everyone knows, time and money are two of the main ingredients in a race car. I got maybe a third of the cage finished and then people were only showing up to work on the car once a month so I pretty much stopped working on it. In the past I’ve ended up doing a large portion of the work and many times felt like I should just leave the team, I started feeling like that again at this time despite everything seeming like it was going to be different early on that year.
Maybe end of summer or so, we lost another teammate. Now we were down to three, but we were all more willing to spend the money and time. In the fall, work started to really pick back up again on the car and we started buying more stuff. In winter, we lost the last guy. Over the past four years, things have been decided as a team, but in the background, one other guy and I have kinda run things. So now it’s just us, and to be honest, it’s way better. We’re much more on the same page and things are much more streamlined. We each have our jobs to do and our own strengths that I think work pretty well together. So that’s the team situation.
As for the car, we’ve really been trying to just make it a solid platform this year that we can build off of in the future. I’ve put a lot of work into the cage and while there are a couple things I’d change if I started over, I’m largely happy with it. Subframes have been reinforced, shock towers have been reinforced, pretty much all the bushings have been replaced with solids, sphericals, or Delrin. New cooling system, new power steering system, all fluids flushed. Once all the safety stuff is done in the next month or so, I think we can finally start looking at buying fun stuff in the next year. Currently, it’s sitting on lowering springs (that are lifting it higher than stock lol) and stock shocks and likely will for the remainder of the race season. But that’s alright, because if we can just get out to a few races and start getting better at the other aspects, we'll be moving forward.
I guess I’ll just dump some pictures and explain as I go. But yeah, that’s the update. Still hoping that we can bust *** enough to get the car to the first race, although it really sucks if we don’t get a shakedown day for the car. At least we’re more organized this year and paint penning every bolt we torque?
I did lose a lot of pictures in my phone crash but here’s some.
Work from last year, note how dark it is in the shop vs the later pictures. That's the difference between 3 shitty lights and 22 4' LED fixtures.
Tied front shock towers in. Depending on how high the strut shaft comes out of the top, this may need to be trimmed a little for correct camber/caster setting. But that shouldn't be a problem.
Made a piece that can be removed. Not being able to remove the intake manifold without dropping the engine seemed inconvenient in an endurance car, so no x brace here.
I wish lol, ARB got deemed essential. On the other hand, money has continued to come in and I have a job, so I'm not too salty. If I was staying at home, the bmw would already be done
600hp S65 with Samsonas sequential in a 1995 M3 lightweight. I recently (Jan 15th) purchased the car as an unfinished project. Was going to partout now I don’t know WTF to do.
Hey figured out that you can't swap a posi into the 2.73 Getrag diff. The differential uses a different offset for the 2.73 gears..... So i've got a 2.73 diff here that's useless. Also killed syncros on my CD009 when I boiled the clutch fluid on track, it's good time for sure.
Unfortunately if you need lower than 3.23's you'll have to go to a 7.5/8.8 ford diff.
Do you know if it's just the ring gear that's offset? If so, could a ring gear spacer work? (If it's in the correct direction)
Surprisingly it's the opposite direction, I thought about machining the difference off the ring gear but the bolts wouldn't have much thread engagement.
12-09-2019, 08:09 AM
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So i've got a 2.73 diff here that's useless. Also killed syncros on my CD009 when I boiled the clutch fluid on track, it's good time for sure. 
