Engine upgrade - part #2 - disassemble

• Engine out
• Bell-housing off
• Clutch off
• Flywheel off 
• Mounted engine on stand using bell-housing bolt holes (M10x75 bolts. Use washers to protect the engine.)
• Intake plenum off
• Removed loom 
• Fuel rail and injectors (undo nuts and pull)
• Coils and plugs
• Belt and tensioner

Next up was the first challenge - undo the front pulley nut using hand tools . I used a tremendous breaker bar on the pulley nut, and mounted a spanner as opposite lock on the flywheel, using one of  the old flywheel bolts. The spanner was locked against one of the engine stand mounting points. It would have been a lot easier with an impact gun. The pulley bolt shouldn't be reused.

• Coolant rail + hoses
• Alternator
• Starter motor
• Oil cooler
• Thermostat
• Water pump
• PCV valve + cover
• Cam cover
• Front cover

• Exhaust cam sprocket. 
• Cam chain
• Chain guides
• Oil pump chain tensioner
• Oil pump sprocket - tough one. I don't know why it was so tight on my engine. 
• Cam/pump sprocket on main shaft - thin washer on each side.

Cam chain and oil pumps chain

• Now finally I could remove the sump! Be careful with two bushes with five small o-rings that will fall out.

Cosworth dry sump

Note the o-rings

• Intake cam sprocket
• Cam caps and camshafts. Remember location and direction of cam caps.
• Cam buckets. Remember location of each bucket. The size of the bucket is written on the inside, write down for later.

• Head off. Torx 55 and breaker bar. But what is that really bad smell!?

Head off

• Cotters, retainers, springs and valves. Remember location. Hint: Use a strong magnet to remove the cotters.
• I left the valve seats in place. Hopefully they can stay there.

Removing springs

Ordning och Reda

• Pistons - will be replaced. Torx 55. Mark them. Direction is already marked as arrows on top of the pistons.

Old pistons

• Pistons big end bearings. These will also be replaced, but keep location and direction just in case?

• Since I couldn't reach the crank rear seal bolts when the engine was mounted to the engine stand I took it down on the floor and put it on some pieces of wood. Now it was so light I could lift it myself. I also took the opportunity to measure crankshaft play. (0.28mm, spec is 0,22-0.43mm)

• Rear oil seal 
• Crank bolts. Breaker bar and oomph!
• Crank cap. Used a piece of wood for leverage.

Crank cap

• The crank! ~16 kg!

Crank shaft

• Main bearings. Keep location and direction!

Main bearings

• And... that's it! 

Now I'll take the block and head to my local engine workshop for cleaning, honing and head port.

Next part - Engine upgrade part #3 - Parts

All parts:

Engine upgrade part #1 - intro
Engine upgrade part #2 - disassemble
Engine upgrade part #3 - parts
Engine upgrade part #4 - block assembly
Engine upgrade part #5 - head
Engine upgrade part #6 - putting it together
Engine upgrade part #7 - electrical and fuel
Engine upgrade part #8 - first start
Engine upgrade part #9 - final results

Engine upgrade - part #1 - intro

So I want more power - and have decided to copy Cosworth's 280 crate engine.

• 13:1 compression ratio
• Forged pistons and rods
• New cams
• Uprated valve springs
• Ported head
• Throttle bodies
• Uprated fuel injectors and regulator
• MBE ECU + new loom
• Open oil system with catch tank

In the beginning I thought it could be done without removing too many parts from the engine. I even had a vague vision it could be done with the engine still in the car. The plan was to simply remove the sump, split the head, replace pistons - how hard could it be? But as all parts hold each other together, I have realized that a complete engine tear down was necessary. Something I've never done before, not even close, and I admit I'm a bit nervous.

So I've started to read books on the subject and googled my way to lots of obscure parts of the internet. I have been bugging all kinds of people that knows more than me, and I've been dreaming nightmares about dropping expensive engine parts on the concrete floor.

Most of the parts have been ordered and should arrive any day now. Meanwhile I've started to tear down the engine into a naked block and head.

Next part - Part #2 - Disassemble

All parts:

Engine upgrade part #1 - intro
Engine upgrade part #2 - disassemble
Engine upgrade part #3 - parts
Engine upgrade part #4 - block assembly
Engine upgrade part #5 - head
Engine upgrade part #6 - putting it together
Engine upgrade part #7 - electrical and fuel
Engine upgrade part #8 - first start
Engine upgrade part #9 - final results

CSR Assembly Guide and other manuals

CSR Assembly Guide and other manuals can be found here: sjmmarsh

Trackday slicks part #3 - Fitting 13" rims

The rear brakes on road CSR's are to big to fit inside 13" rims, which makes the availability of tyres a bit limited. Most suitable slicks are 13" and if your're looking for second hand, 15" slicks are like water in the dessert. (see my previous email conversation with Avon)

I recently found myself a source for second hand Radical slicks at a very good price, so I decided to do whatever it takes to make 13" rims fit my car.

I ordered these nice looking split rims from Simon at 7tips, who were very helpful.

After a bit of grinding on the caliper cooling fins the rims fitted with 1.5-2mm clearance. The most grinding was on the inside part of the fins. It was an easy job to grind the calipers. Put the car on axle stands and start grinding. Measure caliper clearance by crawling under the car and measure from the inside with a feeler gauge.

Before

After

Unfortunately the hydraulic brake hose connector just barely touched the inside rim edge, so I had to either modify the connector, or put a thin spacer plate on the wheel hub.

Brake hose connector touching. Photo from the inside

Since I was concerned the wider tyres might touch the rear fenders I decided to use a banjo fitting to the calipers instead of spacers. After lots of searching for a what I thought would be a suitable banjo adapter I ended up ordering new brake lines with pressed banjo fittings. Unfortunately there was a misunderstanding with the supplier (who also was very helpful), but to keep a long story short I bent the banjo fittings myself. No problems, and the end result was good, but this can probably be done in a more clever way. It might not be necessary to have new hoses made up if you put some more effort into this. I also had to grind a small edge to make the banjo fit the caliper.

Rims
7" x 13" et40 - 139mm backspace
9" x 13" et30 - 158mm backspace

Simon at 7tips said my requested backspace on the rears was between sizes, so the backspace I got differs some than the CSR rims from Caterham (but I haven't checked how much). Be careful not to have too little backspace or the wheels will foul the rear fenders. With about 1.5 degrees of neg camber I have just about 5 millimetres to spare with my wide Dunlop slicks.

Weight

I compared the weight between my 13" 7tips wheels and 15" Caterham.

15" Caterham rims with very worn ACB10: 11.3 kg front, 14.3 kg rear
13" split-rims with wider Dunlop slicks: 9.0 kg front, 10.6 kg rear

That is a difference of 12 kg rotating inertia mass total! Using this spreadsheet that would estimate around 70kg lower chassis weight.

New brake lines (instead of spacers):
Banjo 12mm (long version)
Hose connector straight 3/8-24 conc female
Hose length 60cm (minimum, plus connectors)
Banjo bolt M12x1mm
Washers (two per caliper)
I ordered mine from NBM Hydraulic

The standard brake lines are 3/8-24 in both ends.

Spacer plates (instead of banjo fittings)
PCD 4-108 63,3mm M12 Ford standard.

They sure look fast!

Disclaimer
Beware, this is on your own risk! I have no idea how this affects caliper strength or heat transportation. I also don't know how much the calipers flex when braking hard, and I still haven't test driven this. But from my limited knowledge I don't think this will affect strength much.

If you believe it was too much grinding, MOG Racing sells a kit which also includes modified brake hose connectors.

UPDATE: Now I have tested them on track.

See also
Trackday slicks part #1, Trackday slicks part #2 and Trackdays slicks part #4

Supercharged!

I got myself a new book!
Nothing good can come out of this...

Some inspiration:
Rotrex superchargers
Supercharger kit from Caterham Austria
Some Duratec calculations
Supercharged Westfield

Mantorp, last time this year

A sunny but very cold day started with below zero degrees Celsius. The cold asphalt made the car both oversteering and understeering in different corners and all I could do was pretty much just play around. Late in the afternoon the temperature increased and the grip was much better.

On one of the day's last laps I beat my personal best: 1:27.7 on a very old set of ACB10!

I also met up with my new "pusher", who sold me one and a half set of second hand slicks at a very good price. Hope this works out, it would make a significant effect on my personal economy.

More about that later.

MOT test

No problems this year!

Last time the poor guy was too big to fit into the seats...

Adjusting Camber

Adjusting rear Camber
Rear camber is really easy to adjust, and can be done in just a few minutes.

1. Remove the wheel. 
2. Loosen the four small bolts (unlike the picture, normally two of them are hex bolts).
3. Add or remove shim plates as necessary. Silver = 1deg, red =0.75, blue=0.5 and black 0.25. You can buy them from Caterham parts.
4. Be careful not to over tight the bolts, especially the vertical ones. 

Beware that if having a cross-ply setup with not much camber, be sure you have enough threads left on the horizontal bolts, or the wheels may fall off!

Adjusting front camber
Adjusting front camber can be a pain, especially the first time.

1. Undo the camber lock nut at the end of the upper wishbone.
2. Remove the wheel
3. Remove the wing stay by loosen upper ball joint nut, and then removing the stub axle nut. The indicator wires prevent from complete removal, but tuck the wing stay out of the way and try not to scrape the wishbone paint.
4. Undo the top ball joint nut until the nut is on the end of the thread.
5. Now split the tapered joint. This can be done in several ways. Personally I use a cheap tool which fits perfect used up-side-down! See picture. I've read about others who use a hammer!? Some use a bolt with two nuts against the hub (never tried it).
6. Remove nut completely and adjust camber. One turn equals .25 degrees of camber.
7. If you feel lucky, put copaslip on for easier dismantle next time. But beware - copaslip can make it really painful to screw back the wishbone to upright nut!
8. Stub axle 82Nm
9. Upright top ball joint 52Nm. 
10. Wheel 74Nm
11. Tighten camber lock nut

Note that camber affects toe, so if you adjust camber, you must recheck your tracking!

Trackday slicks part #2

I emailed Avon asking for recommendations regarding slicks on the CSR.

Hi Niclas,

As you probably know, the racing CSR run 9”X13” front wheels and 10.5”X13” rear, we developed some radial slicks specifically for this application for use in the CSR Eurocup.

195/530R13 A24 compound

250/570R13 A24 compound

With 15” wheels things are a bit more difficult. I would recommend using radials on a CSR as the car was designed to work best on them (most other Caterhams work better on a cross-ply) but unfortunately we do not make any radials in suitable constructions and compounds for this car in 15”. The cross-ply tyres you have a probably the most suitable we have available but again, these are not perfect due to the split of compound front to rear (A24 front A56 rear).

The cross-ply tyres will only require a small amount of camber, far less than the radial set-up the car would have been built to.

Sorry I can’t be more helpful.

Regards,

Xxxxx

And after a follow up question:

Hi Niclas,

I’ve done a little digging and you are absolutely right, they did run 7” and 9” which were a little bit narrow but seamed to work well.

We have replaced the 175/550R13 front with a 195/530R13 spec number 13800S – it’s actually the same size (don’t ask).

The rear 250/570R13 spec number 9906S is still current.

I’d go with the 7s & 9s and get the necessary rear brake changes done.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Xxxxx

See also Trackday slicks part #1

Gotland Ring

A nice autumn trip to Gotland together with my family. Two full days on the track with nice sunny weather.

Gotland Ring is located on an island on the south eastern part of Sweden, and is one of the newest and most modern tracks in the country. It is a very technical track with hills and hidden corners, and takes lots of practice to master.

As usual, the day's first laps were the fastest, then downhill from there.I don't know why that is, if it is the car, the sun, the tires or in my head, but I can see that pattern on all track days.

Best time 1:30.59. A bit of a disappointment. It is better than last year, but my goal was below 1:30. I know that is possible, and now after a bit of log analysing back home, I know how!  I lose more than a whole second on the very last corner before the straight! Can't wait until next time.

I also found out that I need a little bit more neg camber all around, and a little higher tire pressures to avoid overheating - about 19.5 psi. Overall the car's handling is really good! The balance is perfect. But I still have problems with inner wheel spin on corner exit.

Nothing broken this time!? But I need a new set of tires...

Thanks to Gotland Ring - for being flexible and easy to deal with.

Limited rear droop travel

I noticed my rear droop travel was way too limited and suspected that could explain some of the rear inner wheel spin I have been troubled with.

My car is fitted with a Quaife ATB, and one of the "features" of the ATB compared to other LSDs is that if one wheel is completely unloaded, the ATB won't lock! So, when in roll while cornering hard, and the droop travel is too limited, the load on the inner wheel is reduced and the ATB is unlocked with inner wheel spin as a result.



More info about how the Quaife works

Here is a good article in Mark Ortiz Automotive CHASSIS NEWSLETTER describing what's happening when the droop travel is limited.

So now I have lowered the car with three complete turns on the spring platform on each damper.

I was at Mantorp (where else...) testing last week, and yes, the difference was obvious. No corner entry over-steer I've complained about last time, and the corner exits where a lot less dramatic. I think the inner wheel spin was reduced as well, but not completely. I've read on Blatchat that inner wheel spin is a common complaint on the ATB and what makes it not suitable for racing, and the solution is probably to change to a real LSD such as the Titan.

During the day I also experimented changing the rake to change the under/over-steer balance and found it to be a very easy and convenient way to quickly change the car characteristics in a few minutes. Just jack the front up and remove the hood and turn them with your hands. As little as an half turn each made a real difference. I made the car a little more tail happy and it did affect the lap times in a positive way.

But as usual...

That stupid plastic piece of tubing on the inlet was cracked, again. I tried to fix it with some isolation tape but it still leaked and sometimes the engine hesitatate at 6000 rpm as well as a notable lack of power. So no personal lap records today even if the chassis felt good.

Handbrake cable warning!

My handbrake cable was routed so it was in contact with the fuel tank. As a result, it the cable has dug itself into the aluminium and created quite a big scar in the tank!

So everybody out and check your handbrake cables!

Cracked exhaust manifold

Last time on Mantorp one of the exhaust primaries cracked completely. I left the car to a Ferrari race team who tried to weld it together in situ, but it was too tight so the result was not very good. No blame on them, they did the best possible under the circumstances.

Unfortunately the only way to get the exhaust system out is by lifting out the engine. So I did, and then dropped the system off to Tyresö Svets, and today the engine is back in. So much easier to take the engine out the second time!

To avoid this happening again, I now have fitted an additional exhaust mounting point in front of the silencer.

There is a threaded bush in the frame 802 mm in front of the rear mounting point. Drill with a small drill through the side skin and you'll find it.

The engine is out

Engine out due to a cracked exhaust primary. Easier the second time - I followed my step-by-step list from last time, and took it out only with help from my 5-year old son.

Trackday at Mantorp - test of slicks

A very hot day at Mantorp Park again - with slicks for my first time!

The lap times where not that much better, only about a second. A bit disappointed actually. But probably it is my driving to blame, I'm (yet) not capable to take advantage on the extra grip! I felt the biggest difference in one of the high speed corners (the fast left before the hairpin), where I now could keep the pedal floored - when I dared!



Today's Best: 1:26.9
Most laps where constantly around  ~1:27.5
Previous all time best with ACB10: 1:27.9

The day that started with oversteer problems, especially when trailbraking into corners. Reduced when lowered rear pressure to 18.5 psi. A contributing factor could have been the new front discs and pads messing up my brake balance. Overall the car balance was good - I just need to learn how to drive faster!

Avon 15" ACB0 crossply slicks (see previous post)

Front: 19 psi
Rear: 18.5 psi

At the end of the day the engine started to sound loud! The reason was a cracked exhaust manifold. I left the car for the tech guys at Mantorp Park and hopefully they'll be able to weld it together in situ. The manifold cracked most likely because the rear silencer bracket went loose, again, which caused stress on the manifold.

Trackday slicks part #1

I've bought a set of 15" Avon crossply slicks!

For a while I've been tempted to try slicks. 15" slicks are expensive and hard to find second hand. Fitting 13" rims is not possible on the road version of the CSR without modifying the rear brake calipers. MOG racing sells a kit for conversion to 13" rears, but it is rather expensive. I've also considered to just shave the caliper with a grinder, but after a bit of measuring I thought it would be too much of shaving to feel comfortable.

I'd also like to keep my crossply-setup so I can go back to ACB10 without too much hassle, so crossply slicks would be of preference, but many people recommends radial slicks.

Anyway the urge for slicks became too great to resist so until I feel comfortable on spending money on new rims and conversion kit I bought a set of Avon 15" crossply slicks. A financial disaster and probably not a very good idea for the long run but I couldn't resist.

Comparison between my current ACB10 and ACB0 slick tyres:

	Tread	Diameter	Compound
ACB10 8.0/22.0-15 (215/40-15)	206 mm	561 mm	?
ACB10 7.0/22.0-15 (195/45-15)	180 mm	551 mm	?
ACB0 8.7/21.5-15	213 mm	561 mm	A56
ACB0 7.0/21.5-15	177 mm	561 mm	A24

ACB10 tread rear/front:	1.14
ACB0 tread rear/front:	1.20
ACB10 rake:	rear 5mm higher
ACB0 rake:	0 mm

More rubber on the rears and less rake. Maybe I'll get a bit of understeer?

Sources:
http://www.avonracing.com/
http://csr.informe.com/forum/csr-track-day-slicks-dt66.html
http://www.pistonheads.co.uk/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=101&t=1010028&mid=179024&nmt=CSR+Slicks
http://www.westermann-motorsport.com/shop/product_info.php?info=p300_Conversion-for-CSR-to-13-.html

Wheel alignment check

My current wheel alignment, measured in my garage. Cross-ply setup.

	Front	Rear
Toe	0.5° out	0.7° in	per wheel
Camber	-1.25°	-0.25°	±0.25°
ARB	Hard setting	-
Tyre	195/45-15	215/40-15	ACB10 road legal
Pressure	19 psi	19 psi	warm
Rims	6.5"-15	9"-15

Rear left wear

Front left wear

The wear in the middle came after running a bit too high pressure on Mantorp earlier this year. I think 19 psi is just right. I know that sounds low, but it works for me.

My rear 9" rims are too wide for the ACB10 according to Avon, but it works ok.

New front discs and pads

Pagid RS14

Apparently I didn't change the front pads in time, so one of the discs had some ugly grooves a bit too deep for my liking. They're probably fine but I changed them anyway together with the pads. I also had a brake judder I was hoping to finally get rid of.

I found my left brake caliper had scars from a wheel bearing miss-hap a couple of years ago. I suspect that could have caused the pads to jam and that the brakes did not take evenly on the fronts. The pads on the left wheel was only half as much worn as on the right! Glad I found it and was easy to fix with a rasp.

After a test ride on a dark highway I found all brake judder was gone! It seems the new brakes has a more distinct "bite-point" than before. I don't know why because I had exactly the same model of pads and disc before. Maybe that's just while they're new.

AP Racing 10" vented disc

PAGID Pads 20349-RS14 (for the AP-Racing CP7600 4-pot caliper) €177 + VAT from Nimex Motorsport in Germany.

Brake disc AP-Racing CP3707-103P from Caterham £150 * 2 + VAT

Brake disc to hub torque: 35Nm + loctite

Brake caliper torque: 47Nm

Castellated nut torque: hand tight

Wheel bolts torque: 74Nm

Clean the new discs with brake cleaner

Grease bearings with high temperature grease while you have the hubs removed.

It is also a good idea to air the brakes while you have the wheels off.

Both the discs and the pads need to be bedded in.

UPDATE: Meteor Motorsport now sells AP-discs for Caterham!

Another lonely day at Mantorp

A nice and sunny day at Mantorp Park! The day started out well being the faster of the two cars on the track.

...then this guy came along with his brand new Formula Renault...

The driver is only 15 years old and compete at european level against adults! As a comparison he had lap times around low 1:15 and I got at best high 1:27. When I was 15 I had a moped...

Anyway the day went on well and I had time to experiment with some toe settings. Previously I had neutral toe both rear and front. This day I first tried some toe-in on the rears which really made the car more stable and predictable. I didn't had the same problems with corner exit over-steer as before and my lap times went down. Later I also tried some toe-out on the fronts which made the car easier to rotate on corner entry. No difference on the lap times but it felt good and I think it is an improvement. My top speed was really low this day but I don't know if it depends on the toe settings or the fact it was a bit windy.



I polished my personal best with a few hundreds, but my tyres are long gone and I think with a fresh set I can really improve the time!

The day ended when I ran out of battery and the engine stopped! Apparently I have a bad connector to the alternator.

Tyre pressure 19 psi warm all around.

Mantorp

It was pretty lonely this day, three cars total

This years first track day was on Mantorp Park.

I had the opportunity to talk with a professional race team engineer about my wheel alignment and got the suggestion to make a small increase in negative camber all around, but overall the settings are good.

Best lap time 1.28,66 - No personal best but I blame the dirt after the long straight and in the the fast left after the hill. The race team I shared the track with said they lost 2-2.5 seconds because of the dirt and lack of rubber on the track. I doubt I lost that much time but maybe a second or so.

I experienced that when applying power after a corner that I lost traction on the rears, but when applying even more power I got the traction back!? Is it the LSD that locks up too late? Or is it just something to accept and learn to live with?

Avon ACB10
19.5 psi all around warm pressure  (It was too much! Remember until next  time)

New battery

My previous battery was a cheap Biltema gel battery. It worked ok in the beginning, even if I had a few anoying moments when there wasn't enough power to start the engine. Now one year later it can't even turn over the engine even when fully charged. So after an embarrassing incident at the grocery store a new battery was necessary, this time one with better quality - I hope.

Odyssey Extreme Racing 25

Found it on eBay for £97 inc tax.

The weight is 7.0 kg and about the same as my old battery, but a bit smaller.

Spring!

This years first drive! Still very chilly outside and the tyres never got temperature, but what a great feeling anyway! But why is that every spring you're about to wet your pants when you push the accelerator, but in the autumn all you can think of is how to make the car go faster?

I went by a scale: 600kg +/-10 kg with 1/4 tank of petrol and windscreen on.

I need a new battery! I couldn't start the car even if it was fully charged. No other problems found.

Front bump steer

There is plenty of information about bump steer to be found on the internet. Basically bump steer is when the toe alignment changes during bump, ie when the suspension compress.

Here is an article explaining how to correct bump steer on Caterhams. 

There are lots of different techniques to measure bump steer. I used a construction laser level which projects a line when you point it on a surface.

I jacked up the car, removed the wheels and disconnected the link to the dampers on the lower a-arm making it possible to raise (bump) the wheels by hand.

Then I put my laser level firmly on brake disc with one hand and pointed the laser to it to the wall in front of the car. When I raised the wheel with my other hand and watched how the line moved on the concrete floor. With zero bump steer the line should not move sideways. To  be more accurate you can reverse the level and look backwards. The movement (if any) should be the same backwards as forwards.

There are many other ways to measure bump steer. One is explained in the article above, another one of the more clever ways I've seen is by using a mirror to remove the camber-gain effect.

You adjust bump steer by adding or removing spacers under the steering rack. It turned out that I had quite a lot bump steer on the front right and I ended up by removing one big 4mm spacer. For me it was a bit of a pain to undo the steering rack clamps because the dampers is making it hard to access the hex bolts from above, but eventually I got it apart.

If you change the steering rack height, you have to reset the toe alignment! I aim for zero degrees front toe. Some say a bit of toe out won't hurt and will give the car better turn in.

Note to self: Never undo the rod-end-to-upright nut! It's a real pain to get back!

Cross-ply rear camber

Crossply tyres such as Avon ACB10 don't need as much negative camber as radial tyres, CR500, 888 etc.

On the CSR you adjust the rear camber by using spacers. But what happens if your bolts through the spacers are not long enough?

The wheels fall off!!! Well, almost. This is what happend to me at the "NGK"-turn at Knutstorp last spring. I'm glad I stayed on the track!


This is how the rear suspension looks like:

What happened was the threads on the two horizontal bolts ripped, which caused the two vertical bolts to rip as well.

So if you have a cross-ply set-up with a bit less negative camber, check that you have enough threads left on the horizontal bolts, and maybe replace them with something longer.

Brake fluid change

Replaced the brake fluid. Used the same fluid as last time - ATE Blue racing.
Because I accidentally got some air into the system I had to remove the rear callipers and shake them around to get all air out.

I use Pagid RS14 pads on the front, and RS4-2 on the rear by recommendations from Pagid technical support. It gives me a good balance, but next time I might try one step more aggressive on the rear.

The Pagid part numbers are 20349 for the front AP-racing 4 pot calliper and 1158 for the Audi (?) rear.

Thanks to Levin Racing for their patience.