Radical SR8

I`m guessing you only need the jacket whilst warming it up and will remove it when actually driving ?


Or, how about running a separate supply from the battery to the rear of the car, tucked under the bumper or something. Have a standard battery Isolator next to the battery, wired to a 3kw invertor, something like an Anderson SB175 plug from the invertor the the back of the car, then a socket wired to the heaters ?


Not ideal, but if you are driving a few hours, turn on the isolator, which will power the invertor, then connect to the car on the trailer. ?

 

I was going to leave the jacket on all the time, saves having to remove rear bodywork at the track. Plenty of cooling from the oil rad when the car is moving.

 

Exhaust wrap then stuck on with this stuff?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/TEMPERATURE-ALUMINIUM-ADHESIVE-exhaust-isolation/dp/B006UKGJ2M

theory being the exhaust wrap does the keeping the heat in bit...

 

possibility, but would prefer something with a reflective surface

 

I think going looking for something reflective you are going after a heat transfer route that is very minimal for your aluminium finish. You need to worry more about convection in the air around the tank. Exhaust wrap or another kind of insulation will trap a layer of air around the tank reducing convection.

http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/radiation-heat-emissivity-aluminum-d_433.html

 

OK, I buy that. Self adhesive wrap???? or some sort of high temp glue to stick it on?

 

It's an awkward shape, I would probably go with the adhesive wrap as it will stick together well over a wrap. Thinking about it though maybe there is a better insulator for that kind of temperature zone?

You only need something upto 150c? - If you cover whatever you use to insulate with a reflective finish to protect against radiated heat from elsewhere.

 

Went to Aintree yesterday for some practise in the new car. Trackday. Well its one hell of a lot faster than in the Ibiza I can tell you! Car is currently fitted with short (sprint) gearing which is good for 150-155mph. This was fine for Anglesey and Oulton but no where near enough for Aintree. Ran out of revs about 1/3 way down main straight. Beechers bend was almost flat in 5th. Awesome. So need long (Monza) gearing for Aintree and 170-180mph is a real possibilty over the finish line I reckon. We shall see. Also need a helmet spoiler if such a thing exists as it was lifting at the high speed. Had some good runs and then car seemed to miss a couple of changes and then stuck in 6th gear, wouldnt downchange. Got it back into neutral in the pits but think the gear position sensor has failed. No biggie fingers crossed.

 

I like that idea . Typically , with motorhomes , the second battery is charged through a HD 4 pin relay , we use 70a ones , the 30/87 pins take large push on connections. Relay is switched by either ignition or more usually D+ from the alt. If you put a decent Deep Cycle battery in the front of the trailer , could you run the pads from an inverter , and keep the battery topped up while the tow vehicle is running . A newer motorhome could take 20-30 amps into the auxillary battery(s) , plus another 10 going into the fridge to keep it cool on DC operation . And we sometimes have to fit 1000w 220v air-con units to motorhomes , that are powered from the battery through an inverter . Generally motorhome electrics are way ahead of caravan stuff . to make connecting it simple , maybe you could use another 7 pin plug , and use 5 of the pins for +ve , 2 for -ve , and the trailer coupling would give the rest of your ground connection.

Apologies for waffling , just I have to do that kinda stuff every week!



stunning , stunning , stunning car . It looks as good "nude" as with the bodywork on. Thanks for sharing.

 

Fuel fired heater mounted in a box on the trailer - pair of Staubli quick connects on the car, run hoses to them. Couple of kW of heating, job jobbed.

180mph on a trackday seems bonkers- hope the gearbox is okay!

Pete

 

Update time. The issue I had with the gearbox jam turned out to be due to the ratchet shift module which the shift lever comes out of on the side of the gearbox. This shift module is quite a complex thing which changes fore/aft movement on the shift lever into incremental movements in a bevel gear. Clicks if you like as you change gear. The bevel gear then turns the camdrum inside the box, the shift forks running inside the camdrum to select gears. So how did I get to this diagnosis? Drained the oil from the box and removed the small filter trap in the oil line. Opened the filter up and inside was a small spring, broken in half, like from a biro. Hmm....thats not right. Wheres that from? Finally got hold of the exploded gearbox drawings from Radical (turns out there are 2 versions of what looks to be the same box) and could see it was from inside the shift module. How the frig has that come out? Shift module is full of bigger springs and clockwork malarky so decide to send back to Radical for repair. Still couldnt work out how the little spring had come out. So Radical report they have never seen this failure before and it looks to be due to the failure of a small pip that retained this spring, something like 2mm diameter, 4mm long. Jo idea why this snapped off as there is no real load on it. From old part looks to me like its just been fractured since it was machined originally. Anyhow, shift module repaired, cannot see any damage to any if the gears, but still havent found the snapped off pip. Maybe the gears have eaten it as its not that big and wouldnt be hardened steel. So are swapping the gear ratios over while the box is off, and are now considering whether to fetch the bellhousing oil tank off and get it modified for a proper oil heat up system with immersion coils......

Bit of info re CV grease, Radical use Total Multis Complex EP2 on all their race cars. Its a red coloured lithium complex grease and is a lot cheaper to buy than 'motorsport' CV grease......bought 2 tubes delivered for 10

 

Pictures sorted!

 

How can anyone get bored hearing about this?! I love titanium

 

So while the gearbox is having a ratio change and a check over, good opportunity to evaluate the clutch situation. This is a bit more involved than you might imagine since the clutch sits inside the bellhousing / oil tank, and the bellhousing acts as the rear engine mount into the chassis. There's not much sump on this engine and the crank sensor wire comes out of the block exactly where you would position a jack to support the end of the engine to remove the bellhousing. So spent some time to make up a pukka jack adapter to support the engine through the maincap stud points - sorted. Bellhousing off, and clutch now accessible for check over. Photos of clutch and back side of bellhousing. Its all pretty basic stuff really - nothing particularly sophisticated. Engine is cool though with offset banks of 4 cylinders





Clutch is a Sonic Mach II 5.5" twin plate scintered item - made by Tilton. Rated to 500ftlb so well over spec for an engine making 220. Its a bit savage so are going to investigate alternatives - a cerometallic plate would be better for standing starts but I think these are too thick to fit inside the basket I have. A carbon/carbon clutch would be the dogs bits and has lovely engagement characteristics, but they are 3K a pop.....

 

Clutch off today for clean and check. Photo is bottom face of clutch pack that mates with flywheel. Flywheel shown which is a 'step' type where the friction surface is proud of the mating face for the clutch basket. RPE's own (metric) clutch bolts used with Knuts rather than the imperial NAS bolts I expected as usually used with Tilton clutches. Important that multi plate clutches go back together in the same orientation as they come apart. New clutch plates are 0.104" thick (2.6mm) and have a minimum thickness of 0.089" (2.225mm) for a twin plate setup. Mine are 0.099-0.100" and very evenly worn. Plenty of wear left on them but in a couple of places the scintered metal has flaked off so a couple fresh ones can go in while its apart. Pressure plate and floating plate look flat and as I would expect. Plenty of horrible black dust came out on cleaning.

Loads of discussion in the past about holding flywheels onto VW cranks - this little number has what look like custom machined bolts....never seen anything like them before. Says TSMD POW 027-A on the top of them. Any ideas? Look to be evenly spaced also so not entirely sure if the flywheel has to go in a particular orientation or not - I would think so as it looks like the crank sensor uses the rear in some way for a crank signal. Not taking flywheel off though so thats to discover another day.

 

Really enjoying the level of detail you are sharing here Rob

Odd one of the crank bolts isn`t offset slightly, making it a once position fit only.

 

Could be aircraft spec bolts ? Mega spec serious paper chain quality?
Valvemiester is a aircraft engineer see if he knows

Also lovin the right ups almost as good as Niges lol

 

Loving this thread!


The BMW M5 with the V10 engine (can never remember the codes) has the same type of set-up with the bolts being equally spaced and not the usual off-set type. When I worked at BMW one of the 'Senior Techs' didn't realise this and fitted a new clutch / fly-wheel combo and then spent the next week fitting crank sensors, cam sensors and another clutch / flywheel out of another one to try to get it to start! All that happened was the other M5 now wouldn't start either lol Finally the penny dropped and he realised that the holes on the flywheel weren't off-set and sorted it out. He lost about a week on and off working on it just because he didn't mark the old fly wheel position. lol