|
|
Post by ball80 on Jun 25, 2012 22:28:28 GMT -5
Due to a mountain of things that lead up to it. I have a broken end link on the mini. I have been fortunate to have my mini in the possession of our own Chris Ross who has found every bad thing that could ever be wrong and after MANY MANY hours of sweat and phone calls to every manufacture of parts for my car, he has it weighted about perfect. But as we fixed the sway bar, found out that it was totally busted due to the issue that the sway bar caused. I am going to work super hard to track one down tomorrow. So if anyone has a r53 rear end link at the house. Let me borrow that. Or if someone can let me co drive that be great If I cant get one in time.
|
|
|
|
Post by CoolGuy094 on Jun 25, 2012 22:50:40 GMT -5
The S is open to you if you want/need it.
|
|
|
|
Post by ball80 on Jun 26, 2012 4:52:31 GMT -5
Great Andy. That be a big help. I hope I won't need it. I'm calling everyone, their mama and grandma looking for one. So hope I can find a patch till the good ones get here
|
|
|
|
Post by CoolGuy094 on Jun 26, 2012 8:04:36 GMT -5
I have some random end links laying around, two of which are adjustable. Should I bring them with me in the case that you can't find anything and by some miracle these end links happen to fit? You are talking about the end link that connects the control arm to the sway bar right?
|
|
|
|
Post by Captain Avg. on Jun 26, 2012 10:56:17 GMT -5
You can always drive the Fit - just make sure you don't go around corners too fast or the cooler will fall over  |
|
|
|
Post by SE3P on Jun 26, 2012 10:57:08 GMT -5
You can run without the rear swaybar... It might just be a little pushy.
|
|
|
|
Post by lancer360 on Jun 26, 2012 13:03:40 GMT -5
Dealership on Independence has one in stock. I'm about to head over and pick it up.
|
|
|
|
Post by Frodo on Jun 26, 2012 16:12:54 GMT -5
^Travis' Almighty Savior
|
|
|
|
Post by lancer360 on Jun 26, 2012 17:09:10 GMT -5
Everything is back together and test drive felt good. Car was comfortable on the street unlike before. With the rear sway bar completely locked up it as like being on a skateboard. These shocks were nice to work with as the shock body is fully threaded into the end connection. This allows you to set the preload where it is supposed to be for these shocks (0 preload according to Megan racing) an then adjust the shock body length to set the ride height. This lets you get whatever ride height you want without affecting your ride quality by dialing in lots of preload to lower the car. Travis"s car will probably feel softer to him than before because there was a fair bit of preload on the springs. I'm not sure where he was on his shock settings though.
I had disconnected the right rear end link like your supposed to do when corning weighting so the sway bar doesn't screw with your numbers. I started with the left rear but it kept giving me fits. Every change I made to it was giving wildly different results. I talk with Megan Racing led me to believe something else was screwed up so I moved on to the right rear. The right rear was a piece of cake. The only difference was the sway bar end link was still connected on the left rear so I went to disconnect it too rule it out. That is when I found out how much of a bind it was in. After disconnecting the end links I couldn't move it by hand so I then tried my BFH and it still didn't move! The brackets from Hotchkiss where too short and clamping down hard on the bar. This had to make the car very unpredictable and hard to drive at the limited. We shimmed the brackets up so the sway bay turns freely. Final weight on the car with a 160 lbs driver was 2810 lbs and a corner weight of 50.1%. With these issues addressed, the car should be very predicatble so we can start working on dialing in the sway bar and shock settings to get the handling adjusted to Travis's liking.
|
|
|
|
Post by ball80 on Jun 26, 2012 17:20:53 GMT -5
I would like to announce my new sponsor, Chris Ross Racing. They are a great new up and coming performance supsension shop. They pride them selves on perfection and won't stop in till every issue is addressed. I am giddy as a school girl to get the mini back and see how she runs tomorrow.
|
|
|
|
Post by jprice130 on Jun 26, 2012 20:59:18 GMT -5
Wow, still racing in Novice and you already have a sponsor Travis? Awesome!  Sounds like your Mini is poised to clean up the Novice class once again. I'm glad Chris was able to get your car taken care of so fast. |
|
|
|
Post by ball80 on Jun 27, 2012 5:50:06 GMT -5
Joe. If I do recall you beat me in the brz at mich. So tonight should be eventful. No pax to play with with us. Just pure raw time. But now I have got used to running with a peg leg that running with new feet I'm not going to know what the heck to do.
|
|
|
|
Post by CoolGuy094 on Jun 27, 2012 8:02:18 GMT -5
Excellent news; see you guys tonight.
|
|
|
|
Post by lancer360 on Jun 27, 2012 12:25:17 GMT -5
Looks like my mom is going to arrive in town to watch Jasmine tonight so I will be able to make this event. Street tires on the Elise are shot so I'm going to co-drive Travis's mini. This will give us twice as many runs to work on dialing in the shock settings. Should be interesting though as I think I have only done one run ever in a FWD! See you guys tonight!
|
|
|
|
Post by srduck on Jun 27, 2012 13:07:54 GMT -5
Looks like my mom is going to arrive in town to watch Jasmine tonight so I will be able to make this event. Street tires on the Elise are shot so I'm going to co-drive Travis's mini. This will give us twice as many runs to work on dialing in the shock settings. Should be interesting though as I think I have only done one run ever in a FWD! See you guys tonight! Trail brake, trail brake, trail brake, trail brake, trail brake There... that's about everything you need to know about driving a MINI  |
|
|
|
Post by lancer360 on Jun 27, 2012 13:34:39 GMT -5
LOL! Thanks Duck!
|
|
Sounds like your Mini is poised to clean up the Novice class once again. I'm glad Chris was able to get your car taken care of so fast.
