dyintorace wrote:
Derick Freese wrote:
I just noticed it, but is that Tucker's $2011 Miata in the background there?
As a matter of fact, it is! I sold the car to the rally school as an addition to their school fleet. Rumor has it that it raced in the recent Daytona chump car race too. I wonder if they kept the turbo on for that. If so, it would have been pretty illegal by CC standards!
Wow! I would love to see the condition of the "Bump Stop" front spring setup we put in there after an endurance race. 
(heck, I would really love to see how my "Bathroom Stall Wall" homemade bushing set is holding up as well)
Ian F
UberDork
6/5/12 8:32 a.m.
alfadriver wrote:
If you put the beam far enough out, more of the force will be in bending instead of twisting. And the bending stiffness is easy to manipulate via the cross section that will be tried to be bent.
Yes, all of that force does have to move through the mounting ends and into the twist beam, but that seems like a farily basic design.
One of the cool things about using the stiffness of a twist beam to act as a sway bar is that you can put the additional stiffness anywhere, not just below the car.
I think something is getting lost in the description here. 
Installing something away from the beam may have packaging issues as well. I'm not sure about a Fiesta, but there isn't a lot of room around the beam on a VW Mk IV. The options are basically a Shine-style bar or a traditional style bar bolted below the beam.
In reply to Ian F:
basically, I'm making what could be called an I beam for twisting resistance. roughly.
The pictures I've seen for the fiesta do show some room for something like this, but with the inverted U design of the beam, a natural sway adustment would go right down the middle of it, 100% loaded in twist....
Actually, one could design alternate "closures" of the beam that change the stiffness of the beam quite a bit. (making the U an O'ish shape)
The beam shown in pictures above with the hose clamp thing is a different beam shape, and would have to use something else.
Ian F
UberDork
6/5/12 8:58 a.m.
alfadriver wrote:
In reply to Ian F:
basically, I'm making what could be called an I beam for twisting resistance. roughly.
I get that, but I'm still not getting how you are making it adjustable while maintaining permanent attachment points on the beam.
I'm just glad to see that car getting some use.
I have been thinking of a normal sway bar that is bolted to the trailing arms, similar to what is done on solid rear axles.
I think there is one being developed by one of the suspension companies.
Seems that it would remove the stress points.
Ian F wrote:
alfadriver wrote:
In reply to Ian F:
basically, I'm making what could be called an I beam for twisting resistance. roughly.
I get that, but I'm still not getting how you are making it adjustable while maintaining permanent attachment points on the beam.
The ends of the beam are note exactly permentent- with splined ends, you could take it partially apart, and rotate the orientation of the beam so that it has different bending stiffness. That's the concept, at least.
