[Bill]

I attended a very good SCCA autocross drivers education event today (more on that later). I just want to brag a little in this post and praise the 3-link set-up.

They had 60 students and 20 instructors. We ran races in the afternoon and guess who had FTD (Fastest Time of the Day)? Yeap! A certain Factory Five roadster with a freshly installed 3-link! I was flying! I actually set the top two fastest times of the day. Each lap I decreased my time and finally ended up beating all 60 of my fellow students and any instructor who dared to bring it on. My times were 43.67, 42.08, 41.60, 40.88, and 40.69. The closest other driver was 41.44. I may have been able to get into the 39's, but I ran out of juice! It was 98 degrees in the Houston sun so after setting FTD... twice... I stopped running. As a comparison, Corvette's were running 42's, Mustang's 47-50's, Suburu WRX's in the low 50's.

The car was very well balanced, even with 250/450 springs. It really hooked up well. I think a sway bar or stiffer springs would have dropped another second off of my times.

We did skid pad tests, braking tests, etc in the morning and I'll write more about that later. For now, I need to go spend some quality time with my wife.

Later!

Bill

 

[Gatorac]

You go girl!

 

[Bill]

Here's a few more details. This was my third autocross in my FFR roadster. Since my last race, I added Kuhmo V700's on Cobra-R wheels. These babies hook-up. The stupid thing that I did was to buy 9" and 8" with 275 and 245's. I should have bought 9" and run 275's. But really, the car was plenty fast and had tons of steering. I'm not sure that 275's would have made me any faster.

I also added the 3-link and rear coil-overs. Even though the new QA1 shocks from FFR make a lot of noise, they seem to work very well. They seem to have the right valving for autocrossing. I think a set of sway bars would allow me to keep the nice riding rear 250 lb springs.

With this new set-up, the car turned in very well. Before this set-up, my car was "pushy-lose" as they say in NASCAR. In other words, it had a lot of push (understeer) and would also get lose (oversteer) with any amount of throttle input. Now the car is much more balanced. So long as I didn't up-set the car by not being smooth or too aggressive, it had a very, very mild push and no over steer. I would call it darn near neutral. That's very cool.

On the skid pad, I recorded a 1.09 going clockwise, and a 1.02 going counter-clockwise.

During my skid pad test I tried a couple of exercises to see how the car would react to different inputs at the limit of adhesion. First I tried to see what the car would do if I was going full blast around the pad and then totally lift the throttle (no brakes). Amazingly, the car did not spin. Of course it was upset, but with some mild steering input, it was controllable and I was able to maintain full control. The second experiment was to get the car going at 99.9% of the limit on the skip pad at a steady speed, then apply FULL throttle at once; not rolling on the gas, instead stomping it! Again, I expected the rear end to step out and spin the car. Instead, the car pushed out of the line. Very safe and very controllable. I also tried this again, but instead of just stomping on the gas, I lifted the throttle to load the front tires a little, then nailed it. I was able to get the rear-end to kick out a little, but it did not spin. I was able to do a controlled slide. The last exercise was to get the car going around the pad at a steady pace and nail the brakes while coming over a small hill. This time, the car became a little unbalanced and it started to spin-out. But getting back on the gas I was able to get it back on track. All-in-all, the skip pad showed me that the 3-link and new tires make this into a fun and controllable car.

- Bill

 

[Nestromo]

Wow. Those are some cool posts. 1.09. Freaking insane.

 

[Wade Chamberlain]

thanks for the update Bill. Sounds like all the installation effort was worth it.

 

[Bill]

Originally posted by Wade Chamberlain:
thanks for the update Bill. Sounds like all the installation effort was worth it.

Absolutely!

 

[David Borden]

Bill, Great news.. Great Job...

You are right, you could probably get away with swaybars front and rear and help it a bit. If you get a chance, get a tire pyrometer and take tire temps. Also, if you get some video of your car on the course, it will tell us what kind of body roll you are getting..

The 600/400 combo we run provides approx 204lbs of roll resistance in front and about 226 in the rear.

Your 450/250 combo provides approx 153lbs of roll resistance in front and about 140 in the rear. The frequecy of those rates are a bit low for competition, but comfortable for the street.

Again, good job and glad you are happy with the car now! I suspect it was worth the work ehh? Jim at FFR did a great job on it

David

 

[Bill]

Originally posted by David Borden:
Bill, Great news.. Great Job...

You are right, you could probably get away with swaybars front and rear and help it a bit. If you get a chance, get a tire pyrometer and take tire temps. Also, if you get some video of your car on the course, it will tell us what kind of body roll you are getting..

The 600/400 combo we run provides approx 204lbs of roll resistance in front and about 226 in the rear.

Your 450/250 combo provides approx 153lbs of roll resistance in front and about 140 in the rear. The frequecy of those rates are a bit low for competition, but comfortable for the street.

Again, good job and glad you are happy with the car now! I suspect it was worth the work ehh? Jim at FFR did a great job on it

David

Yeap! It was worth the headaches! So much that I'm going to help Galt install a 3-link kit.

I hope Mark Johnson with Dali Racing will get off his butt and work on a sway bar kit for us that costs under $350 for both front and rear.

- Bill

 

[bsklein]

Bill,
How do you think the 3 link compares to the IRS on the track? I'm still trying to decide which way to go. I've heard IRS may be less forgiving.

Thanks,

 

[Bill]

Originally posted by bsklein:
Bill,
How do you think the 3 link compares to the IRS on the track? I'm still trying to decide which way to go. I've heard IRS may be less forgiving.

Thanks,

I have not driven an IRS car yet. But I would think IRS would be much better because it can be adjusted for camber, caster, toe, etc. I'm no expert on this, but I would think that you could always set-up an IRS to be safer and less aggresive, but maybe not a quick around the track as it could be. In other words, set it up with more o degrees toe and less camber and the car will be very safe because it will break lose more gradually before inducing a spin. Add in some camber and get more grip! But as grip increases, you have to realize that the limits of your tires and driving ablity is more taxed. When a race car is set-up right, they hold the line all the way up until the last second, then they let go without much warning. When a car is set-up to be more safe, it will give you more warning because it has less grip. Does this all make sense?

I would go for the IRS if you can afford it. I didn't because I was on a budget.

- Bill

 

[David Borden]

Barry,

Depends on your skill with tuning. The IRS will give a better ride on the street, and is probably better overall for handling... and resale.

However, the 3 link is great also and we have a fairly proven combo that works well and requires little tweeking. Because the 3 link uses a solid axle, it will probably be more reliable over time because there are soo fewer parts.

Bill makes some good points about the IRS. Its adjustability if done right, will allow you to tune in the handling. However, if done improperly can make the car a handfull... and the IRS car needs swaybars to be fast. The 3 link does not.

An IRS FFR took 3rd fastest road coures time at 2001 Run and Gun out of all cars including the Pro's on slicks. This car was a registered street car on old and failry dead Kumhos.

If I remember correctly, the 2 faster cars had IRS also and were running on slicks.

The 4th fastest car was Dennis O from SPF and had IRS on Hoosiers.

Do I think a FFR Spec Racer with a warmed up motor, brakes and Slicks could take TTOD at Run and Gun this year??? Yep I do... Wish I had to resources to attempt it

David

 

[Erik W. Treves]

So should we be running the sway bar with the 3-link??

 

[Bill]

Originally posted by Erik W. Treves:
So should we be running the sway bar with the 3-link??

Either that or stiffer springs would help on the track.

 

[bsklein]

Thanks for the info guys. I think the Winston Cup cars use a 3-link, don't they? They have some way of quickly adjusting the height of the panhard bar.

How do you install a sway bar with the 3-link? Will the stock bar still fit with the other hardware in place, or do you need a custom setup?

Regards,

 

[Bill]

Originally posted by bsklein:
Thanks for the info guys. I think the Winston Cup cars use a 3-link, don't they? They have some way of quickly adjusting the height of the panhard bar.

How do you install a sway bar with the 3-link? Will the stock bar still fit with the other hardware in place, or do you need a custom setup?

Regards,

Yes, Cup Cars use a simular set-up, but it's really a 5-link. Technically, ours is a 4-link, but I guess that FFR didn't want to confuse people by calling this set-up a 4-link (stock is also 4-link). You can adjust the height on our Panard bar on the axle. This effectively changes the roll center. I haven't played around with it, but I have mine set pretty low.

- Bill

 

[Paul M.]

I was looking at the FFR website and the information on the 3-link said it can be added on th the MKII and Spec cars. Does anyone know if the 3-link will fit the original FFR frames?

Thanks

 

[[email protected]]

Paul,

The three link fits the older frames just the same as the newer ones.

 

[millinium_al]

If IRS would be considered better than live axle ( in competion), why do Cup cars use live axle?

 

[oldguy668]

Because NASCAR is in a time warp. The good 'ol boys think it's still 1957. When's the last time you saw a rear drive Taurus in the real world?

 

[imported_admin]

Yeah, and when was the last time any of these front drivers had a V-8? Heck, at least the Monte Carlo and Grand Prix HAD a V-8... oh, about 15 years ago. A 2-door Taurus? Yeah right.

NASCAR cracks me up. They should let these guys get with the times and run IRS, multi-valve engines, fuel injection (Yes, it's the year 2002 and someone is still racing carbs), and a one template body. These cars aren't what they claim to be, so just call it what it is... a Ford or a Chevy.