914 GT 3.6 Ferrari Build, - Mechanicals coming along, electronics soon! Options

[Shivers]

Nice work. Great table!

[horizontally-opposed]

So there it is. After a ton of head scratching and numerous design changes, the car has its first "Ferrari specific" mod all but completed. There are a couple inches of welding left to do on the underside of the cross bars at the chassis but things are plenty strong to safely work on the car.
Major milestone, for sure.

Ok, this looks FANTASTIC. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wub.gif) Nice work, Chris!

Saw some hinges recently that had me thinking of you (lol...), but this pic has me thinking about the reverse-hinge, one-piece trunk we were talking about—and it would be a shame to remove this viewing angle from the car. One of the best parts of looking at a Pantera is this angle.

So I am wondering…what about finding a way to attach a CF trunk to the factory engine lid? Suspect it would need bigger hinges at the firewall, and struts to make it nice to open and safe in wind, but could be a lovely thing…as could the nicer hinges so long as you're on the case. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/idea.gif)

[rgalla9146]

Very clean. Will the truncated trunk hide this handiwork?

'truncated trunk'...... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[rgalla9146]

So there it is. After a ton of head scratching and numerous design changes, the car has its first "Ferrari specific" mod all but completed. There are a couple inches of welding left to do on the underside of the cross bars at the chassis but things are plenty strong to safely work on the car.
Major milestone, for sure.

Phd. in Fabrication and Welding
Stupendous.

[KELTY360]

Very clean. Will the truncated trunk hide this handiwork?

'truncated trunk'...... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

I was hoping someone would notice..... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[tygaboy]

Cardboard to steel. This is just a test piece to see if I like the shape. I have a couple other designs I want to try before committing.

[tygaboy]

With the trans mount essentially done, it's time to focus on the engine mounts.
At this point, the design has come full circle: all elements of the engine mount have to be removable. Why? Glad you asked! If the aren't, I have to remove the headers to install/remove the drivetrain. I'd rather not have to do that so removable things shall be.

As usual, I need to see things in real life to develop a better understanding of what's what and where so today's effort was to mock up a rough guestimate of the "intermediate" assembly and see how things might fit.

This mock up is just that: not the real dimensional material, barely triagulated, etc. Again, it's just to help me work though design and fitment. Anyway...

The fire wall end of things is pretty straight forward: there will be a set of tabs on the fire wall that will receive a pair of tubes. One tube will run to the front area of the mount, one to the outside.

The other end will have one, possibly two, tubes: for sure, one will run to a spot high on the long and if there are two, the other will run to a lower spot on the long.

In noodling on all this with Martin, we both came to the conclusion that we should chuck the Ferrari headers and build a set from scratch as that'll allow us to get things right where we want them without having to work around a less than optimal situation.

[tygaboy]

Martin's latest sketch of the removable motor mount. This after seeing what I'd mocked up and chatting for a bit about options.
Working with him is so much fun. We work together really well: Neither if us has much ego around our ideas, there's no holding back on constructive critisism, we're both easily able to say "Oh yeah, I shoulda thought of that."
Best of all, he's got a great eye for style points! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/aktion035.gif)

[Archie]

Very nice!!

[Bullethead]

Mind boggling. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/pray.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/pray.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/pray.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/pray.gif)

[ClayPerrine]

Martin's latest sketch of the removable motor mount. This after seeing what I'd mocked up and chatting for a bit about options.
Working with him is so much fun. We work together really well: Neither if us has much ego around our ideas, there's no holding back on constructive critisism, we're both easily able to say "Oh yeah, I shoulda thought of that."
Best of all, he's got a great eye for style points! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/aktion035.gif)

Just my $.02...

It looks like it would work, but I am not a fan of a cantilevered mount. Too much stress on the welds due to all that weight being on the end of the arm.

I can't tell from the pictures, but is there a way to tie the two mounts together with a cross bar? It would help with the twisting a cantilevered mount will experience.

Something to think about?

Clay

[Superhawk996]

Regarding mount stiffness for a cantilevered mount:

If you can find any rate information on the engine mount from Ferrari or aftermarket parts, the attaching structure should be 10x the mount stiffness as a rule of thumb.

You could even set up a test rig to measure the mount yourself to get a close approximation the rate if you had the inclination.

That stiffness ratio between the engine mount and the structure will ensure you get proper isolation from the mount and avoid low frequency driveline bounce modes that will lead to a very unpleasant ride. You want to avoid ending up with a engine vertical bounce mode that is in the 4-6Hz range which will interact with the natural frequency of the human body (seated).

Enjoy watching the progress - great build thread.

[tygaboy]

Just my $.02...

It looks like it would work, but I am not a fan of a cantilevered mount. Too much stress on the welds due to all that weight being on the end of the arm.

I can't tell from the pictures, but is there a way to tie the two mounts together with a cross bar? It would help with the twisting a cantilevered mount will experience.

Something to think about?

Clay

@ClayPerrine - Clay - Let me start by saying that there's a lot of engineering/measuring/discussion that I've not covered in these posts. We've been looking at how a cross bar might be incorporated. At the very start, I assumed I could just run a cross bar under the engine, just like in my LS build. The problem is that with the dry sump design, a cross bar (in a convenient location) would hang too far below the engine and raising the drive train to solve that problem means even worse news for the height of the trans output shafts/CV angles.
The decision has already been made that the bottom of the sump is going to be below the bottom of the chassis by about 3/4" and a ramp/skid plate is planned.
As you can see in the pic, the only place for a cross bar is well back from the engine mounts and there's only room for about a 1" tall piece of material.
Remember, this motor moves around a fair bit so some additional clearance is needed on top of that.
Again, nothing is off the table at this point and whatever we end up doing, it'll be over-engineered.

[tazz9924]

Martin's latest sketch of the removable motor mount. This after seeing what I'd mocked up and chatting for a bit about options.
Working with him is so much fun. We work together really well: Neither if us has much ego around our ideas, there's no holding back on constructive critisism, we're both easily able to say "Oh yeah, I shoulda thought of that."
Best of all, he's got a great eye for style points! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/aktion035.gif)

He even shades his drawings, attention to detail i need in this world.

[Chris914n6]

A 1" crossbar is sufficient, it's not structural, it just needs to tie both sides together to stop flex. It would also give you a rear mounting point for the skid plate.

If you think of the assembly as a cradle, I think you will end up with an easy solution.

[tygaboy]

After another day of design conversation and trying to work out the "best" mount, we came up with this concept. That cross bar / ladder fits into the gap I pointed out in the pic above.
No, it's not to scale, the implied dimensions and angles aren't correct, etc. But it does seem to check all the boxes that we've identified need checking.
And it's likely overkill, which is just what I'm looking for.
I'm thinking it'll be 1.5", .095 wall DOM.

One thing that may change is going to a single tube to connect the side sections vs. the ladder struture you see here.

The rear section is there to pick up that lower trans mount. Based on my research, and given how soft the trans and motor mount rubber components are, that small link/mount is critical to preventing fore/aft movement of the entire drive train. It's got to be accounted for.

What's not shown is how that rear section will tip up and tie into the back of the chassis.

On to fab and fitment!

[930cabman]

You need help. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/happy11.gif)

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/agree.gif)
Hoping you have checked into a competent facility (IMG:style_emoticons/default/aktion035.gif)

late to the thread, is this mill from a 360? looking great, cant wait to see her finished

[roundtwo]

Martin's latest sketch of the removable motor mount. This after seeing what I'd mocked up and chatting for a bit about options.
Working with him is so much fun. We work together really well: Neither if us has much ego around our ideas, there's no holding back on constructive critisism, we're both easily able to say "Oh yeah, I shoulda thought of that."
Best of all, he's got a great eye for style points! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/aktion035.gif)

Very cool. Reminds me of the lost art of story boarding, HAND DRAWN concepts in the field. Totally inspiring. I can smell the metal from here. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/piratenanner.gif)

[roundtwo]

One more trip from the fixture table back into the chassis. Bolt the trans to the mount, verify the tubes are all correctly located and final weld the trans mount in place!

The intersection of art and skill! Looks amazing.

[Maltese Falcon]

Chris, hoping that your client has some good "Comeback remarks" to all of the Ferrari peeps that ask him why (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)
When I dropped the flat fan engine in my black six/gt tribute...the 935 guys were hunting me down with their checkbooks: "Hey we can put that fan to good work"
Keep up your amazing skills Chris !
(IMG:style_emoticons/default/marty914.jpg)