Thursday, March 7, 2013

MIND WAIT

Ok, so now the proposal is finished. Did all the home work, came up with what we thought were some very clever ideas.  Got it all put down on paper so the concept has some words and meaning behind it. All the actions we could take are not so overwhelming that it looks impossible. It will take an increndible amount of work for it to perform properly so the outcome is correct, but it is all possible. At that point delegence of perception and execution with keeping your eye on the ball is critical. So it's been handed in so now it's wait. Mind wait - it works the BRAIN ASSET hard.

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

HAMMERFORMING A COUPLE OF PARTS

I’m hammerforming this part to go around the roll bar at so I have a spot to tig weld the body support bar. I will make two, one for each side. They will be held on with the engine mount bolts that are vertically throught the bulk head and go into the aluminum plate that actually bolts to the valve cover. The engine in this chassis is partially stressed, meaning the engine block itself carries some of the load stresses induced into the chassis during competition



To soften or anneal the aluminum (it's a T6 hardness so it's tough) so I can work with it I put a layer of acetylene soot on it. This is .065 6061 aluminum.

Now heat the aluminum very carefully, just enough to remove the soot. This will take it to about 750 -800 deg! The aluminum is very close to melting so be carefull.

Soot is gone the aluminum sagged because it was so close to meltdown!

Now it's relatively easy to shap around the wood block I made for the final shape. The block is exactly the proper dimensions as the area of the rool bar.

Here it's easier to see the shape I made relative to the roll bar. The form has to be exactly the same dimensions, since the aluminum will wrap around it.

Final shape, this will fit exactly.

another view, easier to see.
 
Hammerformed the aluminum using the hard wood tool I made. The wood is a hard maple.
 
 

Thursday, January 24, 2013

CHASSIS TUBE ADDITION & SCCA IDEA

I"ve gotten a couple of emails recently that are very good. The first was from the SCCA technical director confirming that our car has been homologated properly and that the idea of adding a bar to the chassis is within the rules! The other I just got is from the President of the SCCA stating that the idea I sent to him is good and that it has his backing! I would expalin more here but it's way to premature to put names to what I have in mind, but so far so good. Remember this stuff is all behind the scenes manuvering and is time consuming but very necessary. It called "doing what it takes to get it right" . There is pictures of the proposed chassis bar addition on our FB page here http://www.facebook.com/pages/Fastdad/132790816771142?ref=hl

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

QUESTION


So would anybody be interested in the rules SCCA (Sports Car Club of America www.scca.com/ ) has for our Formula Continental car? Rules can be boring to read thru but it is a very import detail to learn no matter what type of competition one is involved with. If your interested go here http://fastdad.net/ and drop an email and let me know, maybe join FASTDAD's club to keep updated on whats happening.