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Race spridget weight jacking

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Jedi Hopeful
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SO, I know my corner weights were all kitty-wampus (that's a very technical term) this first season back SCCA racing. Great evidence of this was given by right front brake locking up under hard braking. It's a left hand drive Midget. What tools do I have for shifting weight other than raise LF, raise LR ride height? Does anyone make (or know of a set) of the adjustable front spring mounts which WInner's Circle used to make years ago? Any other tips or suggestions in terms of adjustability?
Battery if now mounted mid-ships, right side, can probably stick that up in the footwell without too much difficulty. Have alloy stock to make more lowering shims for RR, and to replace some of the thick shims on LR.
I think I was lucky with my old G car back in the 70's never had this clearly gross imbalance. Left side weight bias did help it stick real well in the hard right hander, though - as always, comments and suggestions gratefully accepted.
 
I think Winner Circle used to sell a front spring bucket you adjust from the bottom, several of us over the years have made them as well, myself included.
 
There was a rusty set of the old WC adjustable spring mounts on ebay about a year ago, I didn't bis high enough. Kicking myself - there's a lot of products out there for circle track racers, but haven't seen anything that would fit our little cars in terms of spring diameter.
 
I would be very curious to see a photo of one of the WC adjustable spring buckets if anyone has one available to take a picture of. Also, Hap, is it possible to detail how you fabricated a similar set-up? I have heard these mentioned before, but don't have much of a concept of how it would be done. Thanks for any help you folks can provide.

Dave
 
Here's goes form memory, I'm sure my buddy Mike Miller will come along and add to this. You modify the spring bucket of the lower control arm to incorparate a nut, it need to be a stout size, atleast 1/2", maybe even 5/8", then the spring would not have flat round of palte steel to rest on, I prefer to center the spring form the ID rather than the OD, the bolt would go thru the plate on the bottom center of the lower control arm thru the bottom, the ne nut the new spring plate, then you would simply adjust ride height by jacking the car up and screwing the bolt in or out. Some of these were done by threading a larger OD of pipe or round stock, kinda like a coil over sleeve, but I think the bolt works better, and easier to fabricate.

At the end of the day, this is not something you will continuely adjust, so using longer bolts and spacers on the front control arms to dial in ride height is more of PITA, but it weighs less than a adjustable spring bucket would, and chances are when you finally get it where you want it, you'll never touch it again. I've done it both ways.

Here's what I would suggest is get the ride height equal with the driver weight in the car, then weight the car, and see where it is light, can you move something to that area, like the battery, or even better, ballast, if ballast is needed. I've known folks who went crazy trying to get a Spridget race car corners equal, and then the car handled no better, get them as close as you can, and they car will probably handle fine, after all Spridget are still good handling cars when they are horribly wrong, so making them micro-adjustable to me is not needed, even on our coil over SCCA car, we just get them close and have at it. The neat thing about a Spridget race, when set up close to good, you can put it places on the race track , larger cars can only dream of.
 
I've contracted these in the past from some of my local sources. Here is a brief description of what was done.

The stock spring pan piece was modified by cutting the cone off the pan about an inch and a half to two inches down. A large internally threaded disk was made, along with a externally threaded hollow tube. The disk was welded to the spring pan bottom. A large diameter washer was made and welded to the top cone from the pan to support the bottom of the spring. This assembly was welded to a short piece (~3") of the threaded tube section. A 1/2" bolt (3/4" head) was welded inside the hollow tube. The hollow tube with its external threads is then screwed into the internally threaded disk that was welded to the pan bottom and appropriate spacers and bolts used to install the modified assembly into the stock A-arm. The coil spring is then placed on top of the adjustable spring pan and assembled back in the car. Adjustments are then made to get ride height and corner weight.

I did it this way because I had access to a full machine shop and a willing (cash starved) machinist. 30 years ago, these adjustable pans were built from the steel coil over sleeves and spring adjusters. Since most of this is aluminum now, it doesn't lend itself as well to amatuer racer fabrication capabilities.

I'll try and get a picture of my spare set of these perches. Maybe HAP can help me with the posting.

Mike Miller
Comptune
 
A picture or drawing would be a definite plus, Mike. You might have to fab one up only for one side - like the right side on a LHD car. I don't have such great fabrication capacities in my home shop, but I have a friend in Michigan, where I'm from, who does. Thanks for everyone's input here. Hoping to have a spridget that next year gives nothing up to the VWs and CRXs - at least build up speed capacity in those areas where the spridget has the built-in advantage anyway. Ballasting is not an option for me, since I'm already at 1690# with driver (ahem - hoping to drop that figure to 1680 or 1675 by working on the driver portion).
 
Thank you to both Hap and Mike for the descriptions. That certainly helps with understanding what would be required. Much appreciated.

Dave
 
I've tried a couple of times to put pictures into my responses-not successfully. So, I sent Hap two pictures taken this morning on the kitchen table. They show a assembled spring pan and the other separated and a piece of the threaded tube. It is threaded 2.125"x12. The picture will give you a good idea of what would be involved to make a set.

HTHs
Mike Miller
 
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