Progress Update: How Is BCL's Car Going?

[JimmyXR6T04]

bugger, and just when you thought all was about to be sorted sorry to hear mate!! but I guess if any car was gonna break a T56, it was gonna be yours!

I hope it's sorted soon!! I'd love to see how much more power/torque it can make

[YPURV4]

Tuff luck brian, but im sure you will get it sorted mate.

good luck

[mbjunior99]

Damn that must be a monster to break a gearbox like that

[2MUCHKW]

Hi Brian,

Sorry to hear of the your gearbox issues ... was really looking forward to seeing the dyno results of your final tune with the tougher CV's now installed. Hope it does'nt take long to freshen up and have your car bak on the road again!

Has Nizpro started doing any work on the internals of the ZF box yet to toughen them up for big RWKW? I remember Simon saying late last yr Nizpro were going to strenghten the ZF themselves instead of using Tony @ Yarra Valley as has previously been the case.

cheers

Justin

[MrBean]

Bad news is that the 6-speed gearbox is officially broken.

1st gear has a whine, 2nd gear sychro is bad, 3rd is OK, 4th you can get into, although not a clean shift, 5th you can get into, but it pops straight out, and there is no 6th.

Guys, let's be realistic here - with these type of power-levels, nothing will last. The engine is build to survive at roughly 1200 odd HP on the flywheel, no problem with that.

But.....nothing else will survive. Not the gearbox, strengthen that (which is not going to be possible with these torque-levels anyway), and the driveshaft will go next, you will always have something that's going to fail when we venture into this territory.

I have watched this thread and work on Brian's car with great interest, and my feeling is it is sucking money big, big time. Even at 400-430rwkw, we are at the limits of mechanical "reliability", and I say this tongue-in-the-cheek.

Soz about this latest misfortune, Brian, but it must be so sad to spend so much, have all that power, and not being able to enjoy it, constantly worrying if you smash the throttle down "What's going to break next?"

Once it's going at full blast, it must be hair-raising, but there is always that fear about what will let go next.

I mentioned before that once you exceed 400-425rwkw's on these cars, it is anyway totally useless on the street, no way to hook up, and still maintain good roadracing capability.

We have reached a point here where too much power is just that - to much.

Unless we can get our hands on a race-prepped 2-speed Powerglide, or something similar.....we not going to be able to enjoy these power-levels.

Not for sustained periods anyway.

Tune it down to 450rwkw, and enjoy the beast. Eevn at these "mundane" levels, you going to have so much more enjoyment from it.

Take care, and keep us posted - when I am in Sydney next, would luv to buy you a cup of coffee or something.

Br,

Beanie.

-

Edited 16/03/07 11:05 PM by MrBean

[F6 UTE]

We have reached a point here where too much power is just that - to much.

mmm, I don't think so Bean.. I also don't think the cash is much of a problem to bcl

It does take money, and plenty of it to pioneer anything.. lucky bcl is our resident Burke and Wills.. !!!

[MrBean]

lol @ F6 Ute.

We all luv too much power, it is addictive - I just feel sorry for Brian for not being able to enjoy his car.

These cars were not engineered to sustain these type of power-levels, and once Brian get's gearbox sorted, maybe stronger propshaft, and he now has very strong sideshafts, well, next thing to go will be blowing the differential right from it's cradle.

Rip the crownwheel right out of the housing.

Still the gearbox input shaft would most likely depart before we reach that point though.

Point is that we are suppose to enjoy these cars.

I would also luv to have 550+rwkw....but, even if I had the funding to do it, I would never go there - max the F6 will see me at would be maybe 420-440 - and that's a big maybe.

Even then it would be quite impractical, and difficult to drive - when applying some throttle at highway speeds anyway.

Just my opinion, Guys, I had been there before, 750hp and 1000Nm from a twin-turbo V8 375-cid Nascar Winston Cup Stroker Winsor Ford Sierra, fair bit lighter than the Falcon, very good power:mass ratio.

Would get it sideways at 120 in 3rd on the freeway if I dared smash the throttle.

But, the list of things that end up breaking just keeps on growing - like the diff ripped out from the cradle. IRS mounting points ripping out of the body. Things like that :(

Just not practical.

[bcl]

Has Nizpro started doing any work on the internals of the ZF box yet to toughen them up for big RWKW? I remember Simon saying late last yr Nizpro were going to strenghten the ZF themselves instead of using Tony @ Yarra Valley as has previously been the case.

←

I don't think the ZF box is a priority at the moment; he has a much bigger Ford T project happening (as you probably know).

Brian

[bcl]

I haven’t lost any sleep over it, as it’s always a question of what will break next; and I do have a spare F6 & Sti to drive

Mal can have a look at the gearbox box, try to work out what happened, fix the problem, and we move on. I doubt that any of the gears have been stripped; it may have just been a matter of something working its way loose. It may be advisable that the gearboxes have regular scheduled maintenance, and I would not expect to go another 12 months before the next refresh.

I’ve also bought a spare gearbox to keep the car on the road in the meantime.

As MrBean suggests, there will probably be something else that breaks; at this stage the attitude is fix it, rather than bail out; but it’s not finished yet….. yes with stronger cv’s the next to break could be tailshaft, axle or diff.

At the moment Simon (WA) and Shane’s cars have held together pretty well. They are running around the same power level (480-500), although with the smaller turbo they are running there power comes on harder from 3000 to 5000 revs, whereas mine is 4000 to 7000 revs sustained … this may make a difference.

Also, I now have about the stickiest street rubber you can get, and much tougher cv’s, so the there will be far more pressure on other components. Simon and Shane don’t have sticky rubber, so lose lots of power via wheelspin, but it will preserve some driveline components. If they started ¼ mile racing with sticky rubber I’d bet on breakages.

Ideally I would like to have a reliable 500rwkw on the street, rather than go backwards.

So it goes on….

Brian

[G6ET8U]

That a shame to hear you've broken a gearbox Brian, good luck with it mate!!

Jack