What's a Sequential Box Like for Road Use ?
Discussion
curley said:
Greg
That's a really funny chug chug from your engine . Mines nothing like that , it idles smoothly and will pull away easily if you just release the clutch , yours sounds as if it would stall if you tried that .
I wonder if your idle speed needs raising a tad , mine idles circa 1150 on the dial .
Its not long back from Caterham getting the ECU replaced and they said it is all fine....I've heard another make the same noise as well. Do you have the rear silencer?That's a really funny chug chug from your engine . Mines nothing like that , it idles smoothly and will pull away easily if you just release the clutch , yours sounds as if it would stall if you tried that .
I wonder if your idle speed needs raising a tad , mine idles circa 1150 on the dial .
Right guys, time for an update of this thread.
As you will probably now know, I recently collected my new 620R with the Sadev Sequential box last week.
I have not had much chance to drive it far yet, due to the constant rain, but did manage to get out in it for about 40 miles yesterday.
The gearbox has a lovely engament feel about it when shifting gears, but it does make a very large clonk When going up the gearbox, not too bad shifting down.
There does not seem to be anywhere near as much clonking and whining from the whole drive train, but as Greig mentioned earlier here, it's easier to drive in first at low speeds around town, which stops the kangaroo effect of the sensitive throttle.
One thing I did notice is that the gearbox seems happier the harder you drive it, and gets quieter with higher speeds and revs.
On a different subject the engine gets to temp very quickly, and sitting in traffic the fan kicks in at almost 90 on the temp gauge.
However when traveling on the motorway at normal speeds the temp drops rapidly,,and stays in the blue, i.e. Almost too cold.
It was cold here yesterday,,about 5 degrees ambient. But I wondered if it needs something to keep the temp better at higher road speeds?
The car is bonkers mental though, not giving it more than 4K revs, but it still is an absolute riot to drive!
As you will probably now know, I recently collected my new 620R with the Sadev Sequential box last week.
I have not had much chance to drive it far yet, due to the constant rain, but did manage to get out in it for about 40 miles yesterday.
The gearbox has a lovely engament feel about it when shifting gears, but it does make a very large clonk When going up the gearbox, not too bad shifting down.
There does not seem to be anywhere near as much clonking and whining from the whole drive train, but as Greig mentioned earlier here, it's easier to drive in first at low speeds around town, which stops the kangaroo effect of the sensitive throttle.
One thing I did notice is that the gearbox seems happier the harder you drive it, and gets quieter with higher speeds and revs.
On a different subject the engine gets to temp very quickly, and sitting in traffic the fan kicks in at almost 90 on the temp gauge.
However when traveling on the motorway at normal speeds the temp drops rapidly,,and stays in the blue, i.e. Almost too cold.
It was cold here yesterday,,about 5 degrees ambient. But I wondered if it needs something to keep the temp better at higher road speeds?
The car is bonkers mental though, not giving it more than 4K revs, but it still is an absolute riot to drive!
nigelpugh7 said:
On a different subject the engine gets to temp very quickly, and sitting in traffic the fan kicks in at almost 90 on the temp gauge.
However when traveling on the motorway at normal speeds the temp drops rapidly,,and stays in the blue, i.e. Almost too cold.
It was cold here yesterday,,about 5 degrees ambient. But I wondered if it needs something to keep the temp better at higher road speeds?
The car is bonkers mental though, not giving it more than 4K revs, but it still is an absolute riot to drive!
Is it new as in brand new? Does it have the thermostat mod which is now available? I've had it done to my car but not had a chance to test-drive it. Would be disappointing if it had the thermostat and the temps still dropped.However when traveling on the motorway at normal speeds the temp drops rapidly,,and stays in the blue, i.e. Almost too cold.
It was cold here yesterday,,about 5 degrees ambient. But I wondered if it needs something to keep the temp better at higher road speeds?
The car is bonkers mental though, not giving it more than 4K revs, but it still is an absolute riot to drive!
Lovely car Nigel, like the colour and looking forward to you comments as you use it more. Have they moved on to the BMW diff, or does your car still use the Ford one? The Sadev is good and not noisy as many think - a lot of the rattles and clonks might not be the gearbox directly, but the clutch - are they using a plate (springless) clutch? They will rattle when the clutch is engaged. I also traced some of the clonking to the rear suspension and the watts linkage. Worth keeping an eye on these as they take a hammering with the dog engagement of the sequential boxes.
Enjoy the car
Enjoy the car
Edited by DCL on Tuesday 7th March 11:03
Order66 said:
Is it new as in brand new? Does it have the thermostat mod which is now available? I've had it done to my car but not had a chance to test-drive it. Would be disappointing if it had the thermostat and the temps still dropped.
Yes it's brend new, and it has the later mods that include the 88 degree stat fitted.Been out again this morning, and it's cold again, 4c here again today, again gets up to temp quickly, and fan cut in when stopped in traffic.
But once again it drops down to blue on the dual carriage way run back at 70mph.
DCL said:
Lovely car Nigel, like the colour and looking forward to you comments as you use it more. Have they moved on to the BMW diff, or does your car still use the Ford one? The Sadev is good and not noisy as many think - a lot of the rattles and clonks might not be the gearbox directly, but the clutch - are they using a plate (springless) clutch? They will rattle when the clutch is engaged. I also traced some of the clonking to the rear suspension and the watts linkage. Worth keeping an eye on these as they take a hammering with the dog engagement of the sequential boxes.
Enjoy the car
Thanks I'm having lots of fun, been out again today as the sun is shiny even though it's cold.Enjoy the car
Edited by DCL on Tuesday 7th March 11:03
Not sure about my clutch type, but it makes alomost no noise pedal up or down when ticking over in neutral.
Yes mine has the Ford diff unit with the Titan plate type lsd, I suspect that's where most of the noise comes from, it's nothing compared to my old,r500 with the Quaife though.
I had my 620R for over a year and the sequential box was awesome on track but I preferred the Caterham 6 speed manual for on the road especially at lower speeds, in traffic, etc.
As for running cold, unfortunately they all seem to do this with or without the thermostat. What I did to overcome this was to carbon wrap a number plate, cut it down to fit in the front grill and used this for journeys on dual carriageways and motorways and on some trackdays. I have seen other 620R's with various other means of doing this even with duck tape stuck across the grill. The car would then always run at the correct temperature rather than running cold with the gauge in the blue. However in my opinion this is totally unacceptable for a £50,000+ car and Caterham should really have sorted this before the car was launched.
As for running cold, unfortunately they all seem to do this with or without the thermostat. What I did to overcome this was to carbon wrap a number plate, cut it down to fit in the front grill and used this for journeys on dual carriageways and motorways and on some trackdays. I have seen other 620R's with various other means of doing this even with duck tape stuck across the grill. The car would then always run at the correct temperature rather than running cold with the gauge in the blue. However in my opinion this is totally unacceptable for a £50,000+ car and Caterham should really have sorted this before the car was launched.
In my experience the standard gauges are not that accurate , what does blue on the dial actually mean ? .
Following the introduction of the thermostat on mine i haven't had any really cold water temp running issues .I dont tend to go out when its 0-5 degrees but at 10 or 12 ambient it seems to sit at an acceptable level in the middle of the dial after say 5 miles of running which tallies at 80-90 on the read out from the ECU .
With all the cooling on the front of the car i think keeping the oil temps up is more of an issue and given the fact that you cannot thrash the car on the road an oil cooler seems overkill so thats often encased on mine when its not on the track or its not mid summer temperatures .
Following the introduction of the thermostat on mine i haven't had any really cold water temp running issues .I dont tend to go out when its 0-5 degrees but at 10 or 12 ambient it seems to sit at an acceptable level in the middle of the dial after say 5 miles of running which tallies at 80-90 on the read out from the ECU .
With all the cooling on the front of the car i think keeping the oil temps up is more of an issue and given the fact that you cannot thrash the car on the road an oil cooler seems overkill so thats often encased on mine when its not on the track or its not mid summer temperatures .
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