Senior design project Options

[i love porsche]

hey everyone, i figured id post this here to see what you all thought

I am a ME student at NJIT and for a senior design project, Myself and 2 other students will be redesigning the front suspension of the 914. the goal of the project will be to optimize the structural rigidity of the control arm while decreasing weight, also to try and optimize the camber curves and adjustability for racing use.

prettymuch we would be designing a racing control arm. depending on the results, this may be something that could go into a production run..who knows

what im asking is for donations of stock parts. A arms, shocks, tie rods...

i want to try and recreate a front corner of the car that will be easy to modulate and work on for demonstration and testing purposes.

so let me know your thoughts/ideas

thanks
Aaron

[type11969]

Did the torsion tubes warp at all when welding the new tubes on? All that welding on one side I could see creating an issue.

If you want to pick someone's brain regarding racing rod ends, call Frank Nester at High Performance Vehicle Engineering (610-515-0550, they are in Easton, PA). Tell him Chris Phelan from Ocean Power Technologies sent you (warning, he likes to talk but he knows a lot of stuff). He does a lot of race car work but also made some massive rod ends for us (made the housings and swaged the 2" ID spherical bearings in) along with making some killer clevises out of 17-4. He could definitely give you some advice. I'm sure you've found that spehreical bearings generally aren't made to take axial loads, their strength is in the radial direction. You might consider something like this:

http://www.magnaloy.com/Chris/WebStore/Pro...nt.RodEnd.M.asp

Don't ask them to give you any sort of estimate for life though, they have never done the work because they are made for slow moving hyd cylinders. They are pretty badass though.

Good luck with the project

-Chris