Not me. I hadn't even considered the exhaust yet.

 

I think most of the guys have gone the custom exhaust route. One of the former (and very successful) HS guys in our region just had the rear muffler removed and a straight pipe bent up and put in its place, which is something any competent exhaust shop should be able to do easily. It was still pretty quiet and he left it on for street use. Thats what I'm intending to do for this season as well.

 

Are you going to run with the stock endlinks? Can the stock endlinks hold up to a 22 mmm bar. They did fine when I ran with a 19mm last year.

 

That's a good question I had not considered. I'll look into it, and see if Alta has considered it.

Another open question is tires - I am seriously considering the BFG R1S for Regional competition, due to some remarks from the helpful Mr. Strano. These tires are 20% cheaper, have very stiff sidewalls, and wear well. Those latter two characteristics sound good for a camber challenged nose-heavy Mini. I hear Craig Wilcox has found them useful...

Then perhaps I'll set up the A6 for Lincoln.

Cheers,

Charlie

 

OK, so the endlinks are available. Tough call.

Two reasons to do it in theory:
1. prevent breakage of the stock endlinks - but is that likely?
2. allow the bar to be "zero'd" so that there is no bias in the suspension with me in the driver's seat - essentially a corner weighting trick - but would I notice?

I'll give it a think, and perhaps get an opinion or two. Gary knows the longevity of the stock part I would think. Perhaps the NAM community has some experience with 22 mm bars and stock endlinks?

Cheers,

Charlie

 

I ran the stock end links with a 20 mm RSB with no problem. I would give them a chances with your new bar. As for exhaust, why not try the Borla? Form what I hear you will hear it.

 

Thanks for the word on the links.

Eddie I'd love to run a Borla, I just cannot find one for this car - perhaps I'm making a silly mistake on the search?

Cheers,

Charlie

 

There's another thread on the endlinks here I just noticed.

I had a nice chat with my dear Service Manager at Mini of Peabody yesterday, and to my surprise he's agreed to install the Konis and the bar as well as give me the greatest legal measure of negative camber.

Not only do I trust the work, but having a dealer invoice for the chassis would be pretty dissuasive in the unlikely event anyone ever contemplated protesting the car.

Of course I'd have to be a lot faster for THAT to ever happen!

I reckon I'll resist the temptation to depart from the stock specifications in any regard except for the camber. I've never tried the quarter-inch tweaks in toe that some find helpful, and with so many other untried variables in the equation I just don't think another will be constructive.

I hope we get another warm spell in a couple of weeks, because at the moment we've good testing weather. Too much to hope for I suppose.

Cheers,

Charlie

13.8.B -- "Both the front and rear suspension may be adjusted through their designed range of adjustment by use of factory adjustment arrangements
or by taking advantage of inherent manufacturing tolerances"

 

Well even a blind squirrel will get a nut once in a while...

Mr. Blaine Johnston from Turn17.com can supply a racing B-Spec exhaust for Gollum right now (through Mini of Charleston, or Fast Toys Inc) - or I can wait for a street version in a few weeks.

The only difference is the dressing up of the tip, and since I admit a weakness for nice tips I said I would wait cheerfully for the street version.

I am delighted, as although the weight saving and power gains are very modest I should think, I really look forward to being able to hear the car.



Cheers,

Charlie

 

Mmmm..... speed parts!

 

I went over the Konis with a fine toothed comb, and determined a few things:
1. they look like quality stuff - stout and nicely finished (no surprise there)
2. the adjusters have 810 degrees of rotation (2.25 turns) although the documentation states 720 degrees.
3. they ship set to full SOFT - which is fully clockwise to the stop...

So, knowing no better I set all four to the mid-point in their range of adjustment, and will start testing from there.

I've been thinking about how I can find the best settings, given that I've no experience at all with adjustables. So far I am inclined to set out a nice standard slalom, and see if I can optimize the car for that element since that will focus on the transient behavior of the chassis.

The problem is timing, as all my previous testing was aimed at finding optimum tire pressures which I did by using a GTech and comparing the lateral G traces. That might be what I am reduced to here also, but that assumes that more G will translate into faster times on course. That intuitively makes sense to me, but I am wary of assumptions.

Dennis at Far North has this comment on the Koni -- "That being said, the ubiquitous Koni Yellow is actually a decent shock for the price. The off-the-shelf valving is usually pretty good, the **** is rebound-only with very little crosstalk onto compression, and while the **** is SERIOUSLY nonlinear, it can be worked with: a typical Yellow had 2 1/2 turns of adjustment. The last 1/2 turn to full hard is useless (tiny changes make huge force changes) and the last half to full turn to full soft does nothing, but that turn to turn and a half in the middle of the range usually isn't bad. "

I have to admit that absent a shock dyno, and until I get to a test & tune with a proper timing setup, I will most probably not touch the adjusters. We shall see - this is all mid-winter speculation and nothing else!

One more thought -- I have learned from you, and now know how to manage the DSC settings properly. Press and hold to disable all but the ELSD seems to be the best answer. I've tried Sport mode rather extensively and concluded that my original impression doesn't change - I do not find it helpful. The increase in steering effort translates into a loss of feel for me, and I quite like the lightness of the default setting. The re-map on the gas pedal is irrelevant to me, as my foot has learned the stock curve and so I can summon as much power as I need, when I need it.

Cheers,

Charlie

 

When setting up the bar, I have to ensure that the car is forgiving - in the sense that with street tires inflated to normal range (35-38) there is no tendency to snap oversteer.

The final exam for the setup in this regard is a test area consisting of a 240' radius turn, which just happens to put 1g lateral at 60 mph (63 indicated, due to the speedometer optimism).

Having plenty of width and a good smooth surface makes this site ideal, as the speed is high enough to be relevant to highway maneuvers, but not scary fast.

Moving up the chart below in small steps, and cautiously exploring the effect of throttle on and throttle off conditions, allows some real world data to be gathered.

Even in the test area, sliding is bad form - so I reserve that for test & tune hooning!

Cheers,

Charlie

240' Radius Circle Testing

Indicated -- Lateral
Speed ----- G
54 -------- 0.7
57 -------- 0.8
60 -------- 0.9
63 -------- 1.0

 

Since I am garrulous today (trying to stay away from work on a Sunday) I'll report my thoughts to date on tires.

Gollum comes with the holies, wrapped in Continentals.

So the baseline is rubber with a diameter of 24", and a weight of 16 lbs.

I need to pick two tires to start the season - one for daily driving AND for a good rain setup, and the other for dry competition.

The rain setup is 15" of course, as I'll tuck the all-seasons away for next winter, they are good but not good enough to race on. The dry setup is 16" due to the rules for H Stock and my desire NOT to run slicks on a 5.5" rim.

The current choices in each category are:

Dry: The Hoosier A6 at 205/45-16, with 19 lbs of weight and 22.8" of diameter. That tire is going to add 5% to acceleration and braking because of the shorter distance from axle center to contact patch, but it will also trim 3 mph off the top speed at redline in 2nd.

Wet: The Toyo R1R at 195/55-15, with 20 lbs of weight and the same 22.8" diameter. Here too I'm trading thrust at the contact patch for shorter gearing (which is less of a worry for rainy courses and daily use).

On further investigation, the BFG is only available at 225/50-16 which weighs 21 lbs and is actually taller than the OEM setup. This tire would cost me 2% thrust at the contact patch, in exchange for an extra 1.2 mph of top end. Finally the section width could easily pose a clearance problem.

It remains to be seen what the pros and cons will be between top speed in 2nd and acceleration/braking. The Getrag in my R53 ran 7.181 (crank to axle) gears since it was an '04. That's a long 2nd gear and I only ran out of top end a few times in years of competition.

The '05 and later R53 used a 7.793 which is 8.5% taller, which is one reason the early R53 has some advantage on a fast course.

The current Getrag seems to run a 7.785 - almost identical to the later Gen 1, so whereas I could run 65 mph in 2nd in Gollum I using the Hoosier, this incarnation may well hit the limiter at 60. I am not inclined to verify this calculation just yet, although with 3,800 miles on the odometer the engine is most certainly fully broken in.

Does this data look correct folks? I found it on the Internet, so I assume it's factual! GRM had some notes on this phenomena also...

Cheers,

Charlie

 

Charlie, glad to hear your assessment about the Koni shocks.

As for setting them up, do a "Google" search for how to how to do that. I know that I have come across a detailed instruction/procedure on one of the major shock/coil over manufacturer web pages. If I remember right, their procedure was to pick a mid setting (maybe, softer side of mid) and then make the front firmer until oversteer sets in. You will need access to a skid pad (as you seem to have). I tried looking for that information not too long ago, but seemed to have lost it.

It is a shame that you don't have access to a shock dyno; I have read that it is a "must" to dyno the shocks. Likely you will find each of the shocks will be a few clicks off from each other. But maybe that will play out in the test and tune.

I like your skid pad discussion and nice planning on the size/speed relationship. One other thing to look for is when the inside rear wheel comes off the ground. My experience with the 20mm RSB, on the softest setting, with the stock suspension was that the dynamics of the car changed when the car went "3-wheeling"; it became looser. I also found that the car would snap-oversteer quite easily with an abrupt lift of the throttle. But, I will say that tendency was probably more due to the shocks I went to (FSDs - really didn't like them for autoX or track) than the RSB. So, you might be able to dial some of that out with setting up the shocks. Also, having the sports suspension with the larger front bar, the tendency to 3-wheel in your car will likely be less than mine was.

I am very interested in hearing what you find when you get these installed.

Question on Tires...What about the Toyo R888 for the wet? They come in a 195-50x15. These are a touch lighter than the R1R, 22.6" dia and the same tread wear.

As for gearing...don't know on the numbers (why doesn't MINI put that in the owners' manual) but I do know it is never right for any course I have been on...

 

I may be wrong here (not up on my street tires) but I thought the ST guys switched off the R1R when it rained.

Also, don't set your Konis full stiff, its possible to damage them doing so.

The fronts we usually run a 1/4 turn off of full soft, and the rears are 1/4 turn off full stiff.

 

Your Highness,

Thanks for the tip on the Konis.

The R1R is a good enough rain tire to earn me the one and only top PAX I've ever won - in the rain up at Devens. At the time it was like bringing a gun to a knife fight.

Cheers,

Charlie

 

I'll say this the Cotinental DW I've run in the rain is VERY good. As good as the R1R is...I am running the DW per Andy Hollis' testing. As for size, the 205/50-16 fits great on the 16x6.5s and is right around $100 a tire from tire rack.

Can we see a pic of the b-spec exhaust? And how much $$$ are we talking for it? Under $400? SS pipe? Mild Steel? 2.25" I assume?

 

I'll look again at the DW, thanks David. Since I was not planning to buy TWO sets of wheels in addition to the holies I'd be looking at 15" diameter tires for the wet setup. Your post over on the RTF thread is a great recommendation for the Contis (but of course it was the driver...).

I've no details yet on the B Spec - I expect it will be a few weeks until that is fully sorted out, and I will most certainly share what I learn.

 

Eddie - thanks for your post, and the caution on "full stiff". I share your curiosity about the "dog peeing on hydrant" stance, and what factors will contribute to that, and finally what the driver feels when the car does (or does not) turn into a tripod.

The STX setup did not do that, but I expect this one will to some degree.

Cheers,

Charlie

 

Charlie,
I am too am curious as to your findings about the tripoded MINI. I really suspect that in my case it was the shocks. If you don't find it or if it is not very noticeable, then it seems that the shocks were the culprit.

And a little more help...found this article about setting up shocks that might be useful:
http://www.vorshlag.com/documents/Tuning_AST_Shocks.pdf

I know, its for AST shocks and you have Konis but I'm sure the Konis won't hold that against you if it works for you

 

Thanks for that link. There is another here (Pp 17) that offers some suggestions on how to set adjustments. Both are for double-adjustable shocks, and the latter of course also permits separate adjustment of high and low speed dampening.

The number of variables and the rather empirical nature of the feedback makes this whole process look a bit challenging.

There are some principles however - first of which is that stiffening the dampening accelerates weight transfer, both in pitch and in roll. The difference between rear and front wheel drive seems important to me in this context, as in a BMW weight transfer to the rear axle for corner exit is a GOOD thing, but in the Mini is is probably a BAD thing.

Another theme that turns up (in Dennis' narrative and elsewhere) is the notion that I could easily wind up with settings that make the car feel very precise to me, but which are actually stiffer than would be optimal for the car. It seems that conventional wisdom dictates starting at the soft end, and then moving towards a stiffer setting based on the results.

Fortunately I've a bit of time to devise a test program. I'd be kidding myself however if I thought the loose nut behind the wheel was not an uncontrolled variable!

Sam offered this advice as a starting point: "Because of the rear bar, I'd recommend the rears at 1/2 turn from full soft, fronts @ 1 from soft to start and see how that works". I do believe I will take that advice to heart, because it's Sam, and secondarily because there is substantially more weight and force to control out front than there is out back.

Cheers,

Charlie

 

Charlie, An entertaining post. I have a set of Koni yellows waiting to go on my car, a daily driver. I took it to a track day at a small kart track last year, and discovered the biggest problem is the (overweight) loose nut behind the wheel.

The reason for a lack of exhaust is that the Justa has a couple of extra bends in it to make room for the spare. My S has a straight run from the cat to a single rear muffler. I don't know how important your spare tire is to you (I have an inflator kit and non-runflat tires). If it is not important, i would have a muffler shop cut your pipes where it splits ahead of the rear axle, and install a piece of straight pipe and a muffler like an S (peek under the rear of an S next time you see one). If you have a spare for your DD, then maybe you can put a flange on that area to put a single muffler on at the track when you drop the spare.

I'm suprised that you didn't look more at the hollow 1" Hotchkis bar, (oops, metric car, I mean 25.5 mm), which supposedly behaves like a 22mm bar with less weight.

Enjoy your adventures,

Mike

 

Hi Mike - thanks for your post. Fact is the spare will not be traveling with the car starting in another month or two. I am accustomed to the R53, where AAA and an aerosol can are all there is...

I wonder if the Spec B exhaust assumes no spare, that hadn't occurred to me but would make sense.

Cheers,

Charlie

 

Well the day has come, and I have given Gollum back to the tender ministrations of the Mini of Peabody team.

When I get him back, he shall have the Konis and Alta bar, and the alignment... and also shall have passed through the SPA for a detailing...

I asked that whomever does the magic deed call me when the car is on the alignment machine, so that I can record the baseline numbers from the factory, and also take a judgement call on camber for both axles.

The front axle is easy - the requirement is the maximum possible negative camber with the pins pulled, but with both left and right identical.

The rear is interesting - I haven't measured it but from my semi-educated eyeballs Gollum shipped with far less negative camber out back that my Works S had. At present I'm thinking that -.5 should be the target, as that turned out to be optimal for the original Gollum.

There are several factors at play in determining the balance of the chassis though, so it's pretty much guesswork. The rear bar setting, the pressures in the rear tires, and the camber will all interact to produce more or less stick, and therefore affect the neutrality of the whole car.

In the mean time I am sporting a new Cooper S loaner which is bright red and has a slush pump and paddles! Now that I am used to the Cooper, the "S" feels like a V8!

But as I said in the first post in this thread -- this is about not needing the "stinkin' powah" so I will not fall in love with that turbo......

Cheers,

Charlie

 

For what you are doing, you may want to ask that they have some ballast in the drivers seat when doing the alignment. I don't know how much that would affect the suspension travel, but 175/200 lbs in a 2600 lb car could be significant.

You should also record what fuel level you have in the car for reference. That is a much smaller variable (only about 75/100 lbs) compared to the driver.

Have fun,
Mike