Any X1/9 Guys lurking... say Hi., Now that we've got to know them Options

[brant]

man those are some awesome pictures..
I still love your avatar best I think.

you can also post pictures directly into the thread over here.

back when I was 15 I really wanted an X1/9 and looked at a few before buying my first 914 instead.

my grandfather had owned a VW repair shop in the 60's and my dad had grown up working for him after school and weekends, so dad was much more inclined to fix up a teener than a fiat and thus I never did get that X1/9... but I still think they are cool!

brant

[alpha434]

QUOTE (Travis Neff @ Mar 4 2006, 12:24 PM)

From your photos it looks like the two blocks has a pair of springs between them that push and lock the spider gears. I am not real knowledgeable on this style, is it like a locker with a click, click,click as you ar turning?

Yeah. The phantom grip is a hot topic over here in 914 land.

We can't get ahold of one. Driving a few guys here nuts.

And me. But everyone thinks I'm nuts anyway, yeah?

[Lou W]

Welcome Xhead.

Great looking car (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/smilie_pokal.gif)

[TravisNeff]

QUOTE (alpha434 @ Mar 4 2006, 01:20 PM)

And me. But everyone thinks I'm nuts anyway, yeah?

To be precise, "Nuttier than squirrel turds" (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif)

[XHead]

QUOTE (brant @ Mar 4 2006, 01:15 PM)

man those are some awesome pictures.. I still love your avatar best I think. brant

Thanks Brant. I like the avatar pic too.

I looked at your vintage racecar project. Sweet! Man that is going to be a very nicely turned out car.

Kinda reminds me of the car Hurly Haywood used to drive.

[XHead]

QUOTE (Travis Neff @ Mar 4 2006, 12:22 PM)

Welcome XHead!  I see in your albums that you have a phantom grip installation?  Can you give us the dog and pony show on that setup?   Rich is working with Phantom grip right now to see if they can make a unit for our gearboxes.

Phantom Grip. Oh man....

A few notes: The guys at PG are like.... just too busy to.... like.... return a phone call... dude...

It was torture getting them to make me a unit. I build racing engines and transmissions for X1/9s (other cars too) as a sideline. But I do more X1/9 transmissions than anything else. I got a couple of PG units, one for me and one for a customer's car. The first one was custom made for the X1/9 diff. I had to really beat on the PG guys to get it done.

The unit is very simple. As you can see its an aluminum block with a hardened coating. The block is divided in two with a set of four preloaded springs that force the two halves apart. The back side of those two blocks push against the spider gears. You can see in the photo that the side gears are machined so that their flat, finished surface is what the PG block is pushing against.

The LSD function comes from the friction between the PG block and the machined side of the spider gear. Its not a locker that clicks or clunks. Instead its basically a very crude clutch type. That is, the "clutch" action is between the PG block and the spider gears.

As for how it works. I know 914s are like X1/9s in that once you start making power you spin the inside rear tire off the corner. Putting a locker or clutch type LSD in an X1/9 really screws up the car's handling.

I have learned to set the cars up with a lot of front roll stiffness and a low rear roll center. This solves most of the inside rear wheel spin problem. However, as you approach 1.4 g its really tough to keep that tire from spinning, especially if the car makes good power.

The PG unit doesn't work as well as a Torsen (of course a torsen has its own unique problems) or a clutch type LSD. But it does work enough so if you set the car up right, most of the problem goes away. After some intial testing I got a number of spring sets in different weights to test and found a combination that worked. I also found that much of what the PG people told me was wrong.

I now know alot about these units so if you have any questions let me know I will be glad to answer them.

[Allan]

I'm glad you're here.... (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/smilie_pokal.gif)

[tdgray]

Welcome Xhead... great to see you here.

Phantom Grip... see there are things that we can learn from each other.

Just like Rondey said... can't we all just get along.


Great to have you... (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/welcome.png)

[XHead]

QUOTE (tdgray @ Mar 4 2006, 05:34 PM)

Welcome Xhead... great to see you here. Just like Rondey said... can't we all just get along. Great to have you... (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/welcome.png)

Hey, I ain't blaming all you guys for a couple of jerks that happen to hang out here. Get a big enough group together and there's bound to be one or two that sneek in.

I got nuthin' against 914s, heck I think their kinda neat. But then I own a bunch of Fiats (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/wink.gif)

[michel richard]

1.4 G ?

(IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/smiley_notworthy.gif)

[Mac]

BTW folks "Xhead" is Steve Hoelscher, 4 time SCCA National Champion in that blue X1/9. Serious business.

I am Mac. I am the founder and retired president of 'SeattleX1/9', which is the Pacific Northwest chapter of a North American network of X1/9 owners clubs, whose "Xweb" forums your guys chose to attack the other day for shits and giggles.

I am glad to see folks here have so quickly glossed over it as one more episode from the 'bored contingent', which I'm sure it was, but let me explain something to you about the difference in nature of our forum - it is a place that since 1999 has been wide open, never even requiring a login to post, free to all, largely self policing, and in all those years I could count on ONE HAND the number of times that level of openness has been taken advantage of.

What your guys did may be just another episode over here, but it is a watershed sh*tty moment in our forum's long running way of going about things. I am sure some at our place have already put it behind them, but there are others who most certainly have not, and have in fact a very negative first impression of your "914 crowd" as a whole as a result of those individuals and how they chose to come and crap all over our forum for entertainment.

Let me tell you, I had a best friend who owned a jet black highly modified 914 with fender flares, shaved nose and all sorts of perf mods, and he and I used to go tandem cruising together, me in my sunset orange '75 X. Great guy, and I respect the 914 for what our cars have in common (largely under-credited small, vintage, mid-engine targa that's a hell of a lot more fun than most other folks will ever realize, and has enough faults to keep the dedicated owners going in circles forever keeping them on the road)

My point? I know, as do most, that "914 guys" are not bad, in fact are not that different at all from X1/9 guys. That makes it all the more hard to stomach this kind of BS coming from your quarters. I would expect some other car enthusiast groups to want to come crap on our hangout, but you?

I personally don't hold it against your site or your group as a whole, however, be advised that there ARE still several of our long time users who are not at all pleased with these events and will take some time to lose any hard feelings it generated.

I will probably be banning certain individuals from your group from using our forum. I know this is largely ineffective, so to those folks, don't bother proving something, you've put enough egg on the faces of your group of friends here already, who deserve it as little as our group does. I understand Clay will be in complete agreement and cooperation with me if there is ever even a remote repeat performance.

Anyway, for now, probably best for all to just let the dust settle on Xweb. Time and calm are the best menders of fences.

Feel free to email me if you have anything you wish to say offline

[Joe Bob]

Probably more effective if you started your own thread as opposed to it getting buried in here.

[grantsfo]

Xhead your car looks great! (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/smilie_pokal.gif) I may have missed it, but how much does that car weigh?

[Duane Estill]

Hello from the X1/9 forum...I've posted a specific question about the 915 trans/final drive. This looks like the place to get that information..

Duane K Estill
Memphis, TN

[Howard]

Mac, I posted this link on your site in an attempt to laugh off this whole incident. Feel free to delete me as a member, no hard feelings. Likewise the xweb Frappr.

Hope at least your SoCal folks will join us for events.

[Mac]

Again this illustrates a difference in perception of the 'gravity' of what took place.

An effort to 'laugh it off' is only going to work with those in our forum who took the antics as stupid as*holes who have nothing better to do with themselves to begin with, and would blow the whole thing off with or without a laugh about it.

To the others, to whom this whole thing was a really insulting violation of our space, an effort to laugh it off is likely to be regarded as further insult, or at the least, demonstration of a continued lack of understanding over why what was done was not cool.

I think the best thing right now would be for everyone who was directly involved in the "raid" to just stop posting on Xweb - for now. Let tempers cool. Let time pass.

I am not the sole moderator of our forum and I have not yet had the opportunity to get with our other mod to go over the whole series of posts and see how we intend to deal with it (eg: what to delete, what to let stand, who to ban, or not)

I realize that crap like this is commonplace in most internet forums, and so some of you may see us as overreacting to this event, but our forum has - by good fortune and good people - never experienced this kind of crap in our 7 years online. 914world.com has the dubious "honor" of being the first outside group to invade and desecrate our space in such a way.

We've been quite happy in our open-doored little corner of the net. The major concern at our forum now is that because of this, that sort of openness will no longer be possible. Even banning people is something we've never had to do really, the idea of forcing users to have logins to post goes so against our grain as to be almost unthinkable there. Hell it took us 5 years to be prodded into posting "house rules"!

Anyway, we are a good group of folks, not too different from yours. I am sure in time it will all be water under the bridge. While this is all still fresh though, my feeling is it would be best to just let the dust settle over there.

About posting a new thread for this, no need. People who were involved and need to see it will no doubt be reading "the X1/9 thread" in here, and I don't really need a grandstand front and center in your forum to say this stuff, just a little soapbox in this thread will do

Thanks, and may your X - er, 914 - never rust

[scottb]

well this is gonna cost me here in teener town but i like the look of the x-19. don't know shite about them but i think they are alright....(IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/wub.gif)

the perception of the car in the public eye is the same as our teener:

1) POS
2) ugly
3) nobody wants one
4) only losers drive 'em
5) PITA to find parts and they rust like all hell

but we do it anyway because we all have brain damage. a tumor or some other issue that some of miles tin foil helmets may have prevented. (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/shocked[1].gif)

welcome to the x-19 contingent. a coordinated mid-motor targa event at an AX could be very cool.... (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/driving.gif) (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/aktion035.gif)

[Mac]

Obscurity allows a tremendous degree of freedom that notoriety takes away.

If being overrun by insulting crapflooders is the price of fame I am guessing our forum would prefer to remain unknown! (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/ph34r.gif) (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/wink.gif)

Peace, -Mac

[alpha434]

WOW.

The X guys seem pretty heavy handed. Way too serious for me.

[brant]

Mac,
I'm not trying to open wounds.

You didn't ask anyone to come to your little corner and give you lip.
I hope this is the end of it.

(and hopefully people around here will bite their tongues and let this go)

brant