Questions about Big Als ride

[Big Al]

Click here (http://www.germanlook.com/Html/MembersRides/ViewVehicle.php?RideID=172) for more information on this ride.

[Big Al]

does anyone else go racing...????

[Sandeep]

Nice ride Big Al. :agree:

I will have my bug ready for the race track in spring 2005. I have a 914/901 5 speed to install this winter, along with my Kafer Cup brace, new gearbox mounts, an accusump and my homemade data aquisition system built around a 68hc11 microcontroller.

Do you have any video's / additional pics of your car ? What kind of camber are you running front/rear ? How about gearing ?

Thanks for any answers.

Sandeep

[Big Al]

Ive got some pics but having trouble uploading them to this site soo ill just post links.. i think the last set the front camber to 3 deg and not sure on the rear, the rear seems to ok just gotta sort the front gonna add a rear sway bar next just doin one thing at a time. Man i am dieing to put a 5 speed in my dub!! the gearing is short at 7000 rpm im doin 210ks in top its still quick enough for the track. i dont hav the ratios here sorry. We bend the top arm on the beam to pull more camber and still hav caster... how can i see ur ride dude?

http://www.aussieveedubbers.com/forum/viewthread.php?tid=26441

alex

[Sandeep]

Thanks for the information. I'm really looking forward to takin it to the track. Link here to see my bug .. http://www.germanlook.com/Forums/showthread.php?t=175

Sandeep

[DORIGTT]

Hello Big Al,

Your car looks great on the track! Let's get some video on it in action eh?

How does your car perform on the track compared to 1302's and 1303 models? There has always been the debate of strut vs beam. How has it been for you?

Also, do you have any pics of your 'extended' shock towers? What did you do and why did you do it?

When you modified your car for more negative camber up front, did you consider slicing the top tube and moving the ends together to get more negative that way? I spoke to a 356 racer and apparently that's what they do to get more negative.

Thanks in advance for your response.

[Big Al]

Will definatly get some track footage as soo as i can!!
BEAM Vs STRUT
The beam can be setup almost as good as a strut but the strut can be fine tuned much easier and also has more suspention travel, the reason we raise the shock towers is to gain abit more suspention travel when the car is very low. I would not hav a problem with the beam except for the fact that the beam has less steering lock which sumtimes in needed. Im wanting to do a strut chassis for my car in the future, Also the wider front wheel track on the front of the 1303's and 02's makes the car much easier to controlll because the rear wheels are drivin between the front wheel but with the Balljoint, IRS the rear track is much wider on the rear so when the cars steps sideways the back wheels are driving way outside the front wheel which makes it very hard to hang onto a drift or catch a lose, and less steering lock doesnt help. my brother has a 1302 and it handles AWSOME but he has had alot of time to set it up. Today he was with the WRX, Alfa and Holden club and 6 people came up to him to see who was driving the green beetle and were VERY superised in the performance and handleing of the cars, he was up the *** of a 427 cobra but the cobra wouldnt let him passed and blow a late model XR6 turbo ford and pushed a mustang untill he made a mistake and went off onto the grass, dont think he wanted the be passed my a BEETLE. He has around 80HP at the wheels nothing special, but goes to show how far setup can take you!

With the camber we found bending the arms was easiest, by cuttin the top tube u may hav to slightly shorten the springs, but is another way.

There is some new Pictures and new stock on our website, www.beetleracing.com including our GT2 wing for a beetle which the mould has just been done! PLZ check it out and if interested plz e-mail us, details in website.

Thanks for the interest DORIGTT.

Alex Holzl

[DORIGTT]

Thanks for the reply Big Al.

What plans do you have for converting the front suspension over?

Will it improve high speed stability or are the two suspension types similar at 100+ mph speeds on track?

Would converting the car over to a steering rack help the steering issues? I would think other than using a 356 steering box(shorter ratio) that a rack would be the best way to go with the beam suspension.

Also, what alignment settings are you using with the beam suspensions?

Are those Bilstien suspension components available for shipment to the USA?

I would like to use coil-overs to be able to fine-tune the setup I-ve got, but have only seen rear coil-overs.

Thanks for your help.

[Steve C]

Hi Alex

That must be my wing? :laugh:

Steve

[Vincent]

that wing looks sweet cant wait to see it installed on a car.

[Big Al]

Thats the wing Steve!

DORIGTT, For the suspention coversion i will use a superbug chassis and fabricate some strut towers and put the chassis straight under my body. The struts will improve suspention travel and give me the ability to play with spring rates much easier.
The steering rack will not gather me more steering lock, but will allow me to position the rack inorder to get the best geometry possible. So at ride hight the arms off the rack are straight not on a angle when the car is lowered, And have shoter ratio steering (1.1:1). With the beam we run about 1-2mm toe in to allow for any slop in the balljoints, I run 3 degrees of camber on the front and 2.5 degrees of caster for the track. With a street car that would be to much camber.

The Bilstien parts are for the strut beetle and are available for shipment to the USA.

Is your car beam or strut?

Cheers alex

[Wild Willy]

Hi brother Al. Good to see you here on the world stage. :cool:

[DORIGTT]

My car has the beam front suspension Alex.

According to a guy I spoke/had an email dialoge with, some of the fastest cars in the racing series found at www.boxerpokal.de are the the beam suspension cars. I've been having a serious internal battle with myself as to which way to go. Keeping the beam suspension is obviously easier, but for what I'm going to be using it for will it be best?

Here is a quote from the e-mail that I got from this gentleman.


"Hi Kevin,

of course it's easier to turn a 02 or 03 into race car but the 1200 just
looks better ;-)

For SPAX racing suspension you can look here:
http://www.spax.co.uk/SPAX-competition-page.html
To use them in a beetle you have to remove the torsion bars and replace them
by a axle with ball bearings (hard to explain - especially in english).

I used one 19mm anti roll bar in the front and a 14mm one (Porsche 944) in
the rear for hill races and added a second one for track racing
(http://www.csp-shop.de/cgi-bin/shop2/shop_main.cgi?func=start&wkid=69585125
440)."


"I only used SPAX G616 for the front - for the rear I used Bilstein shocks
and Porsche 944 turbo torsions bars (more due to evolution than any other
reason).
Clearance is not a problem - lots of space left...
The 1st and 2nd place of the German Boxerpokal 2004 (www.boxerpokal.de) went
to 1200, not 1303 Beetles :-)
But it's easier to adjust the front suspension of a 1303 - takes quite some
time to find a good setup for the 1200 front shocks.
But the big advantage of the 1200 is the weight - as soon as you know how to
setup your front, a 1200 should be faster than a 1303..."

This goes against alot of what people think is the hot set-up for the VW aircooled cars. But the record speaks for itself I guess.