Noble M12 heavily modified

[andygtt]

born and bred in Chelmsford... live in the sticks just outside colchester now, be glad for you to come round for advice etc. Also happy to give a little 'training' and loan of tools if needed.

[stevebroad]

andygtt said:

born and bred in Chelmsford... live in the sticks just outside colchester now, be glad for you to come round for advice etc. Also happy to give a little 'training' and loan of tools if needed.

Brill! I would love to pop over and have some 'training' :-) I am easy as to when (apart from Fri and Sat mornings) PM me your number and I will give you a call.

Steve

Edited by stevebroad on Wednesday 25th January 14:10

[andygtt]

I did see another post from someone local that was interested in seeing the car, maybe a mini meet should be arranged

Not sent my number through yet as had a few family health issues to deal with so car stuff is a low priority right now... certainly I will be doing some carbon stuff in a month as I want to make myself a rear wing (as I have moulds)... Prob best to send a message to me as a prompt and I will send my number through

[zippyonline]

andygtt said:

I did see another post from someone local that was interested in seeing the car, maybe a mini meet should be arranged

Hello Andy,

I mostly lurk and read projects on the forum, and have been following this project for yonks (not to mention others like your Capri). I live in the sticks just south of Colchester (and also commute to Ipswich) so will keep an eye out.

If there's a mini meet, I would love to see this in the flesh.

[Warmfuzzies]

andygtt said:

I did see another post from someone local that was interested in seeing the car, maybe a mini meet should be arranged

Not sent my number through yet as had a few family health issues to deal with so car stuff is a low priority right now... certainly I will be doing some carbon stuff in a month as I want to make myself a rear wing (as I have moulds)... Prob best to send a message to me as a prompt and I will send my number through

Andy

That might have been me, I deleted it as I felt I might have been intruding

I'm in west bergholt. Red 964c2 is my weekend toy.

K

[andygtt]

Warmfuzzies said:

andygtt said:

I did see another post from someone local that was interested in seeing the car, maybe a mini meet should be arranged

Not sent my number through yet as had a few family health issues to deal with so car stuff is a low priority right now... certainly I will be doing some carbon stuff in a month as I want to make myself a rear wing (as I have moulds)... Prob best to send a message to me as a prompt and I will send my number through

Andy

That might have been me, I deleted it as I felt I might have been intruding

I'm in west bergholt. Red 964c2 is my weekend toy.

K

Not at all, I really enjoy meeting up with fellow enthusiasts

[stevebroad]

andygtt said:

I did see another post from someone local that was interested in seeing the car, maybe a mini meet should be arranged

Not sent my number through yet as had a few family health issues to deal with so car stuff is a low priority right now... certainly I will be doing some carbon stuff in a month as I want to make myself a rear wing (as I have moulds)... Prob best to send a message to me as a prompt and I will send my number through

Absolutely, family first!

I would be really interested in the carbon wing as I have been looking into ways to make them. So far I am leaning towards hot wired foam core then resin infusion. If my large oven ever gets built then I would consider prepreg :-)

[andygtt]

I use both prepreg and resin infusion to make parts, and I built myself an oven specifically for my wing mounds....

I cure both in the oven as it leads for the best finish etc imo

My wing is made in resin infusion as that means I can use a core to strengthen it without the need to fill it with foam... I'm expecting it to be as stiff and yet 30% lighter than the current (very expensive) as one.

Don't fall into the trap that prepreg is superior to resin infusion as it isn't, often parts are stronger land lighter using resin infusion with identical surface finish

[stevebroad]

andygtt said:

I use both prepreg and resin infusion to make parts, and I built myself an oven specifically for my wing mounds....

I cure both in the oven as it leads for the best finish etc imo

My wing is made in resin infusion as that means I can use a core to strengthen it without the need to fill it with foam... I'm expecting it to be as stiff and yet 30% lighter than the current (very expensive) as one.

Don't fall into the trap that prepreg is superior to resin infusion as it isn't, often parts are stronger land lighter using resin infusion with identical surface finish

Very interested in seeing your oven and wing construction :-)

Interesting that infusion is often lighter than prepreg, what with the prepreg being impregnated with optimum resin quantity.

[Fastdruid]

The point about pre-preg is more about consistency and that you know *exactly* what you are getting and hence it can be used for structural items where you are designing to its strengths. You should know exactly how strong and how light something should end up from your 3D model.

If you are using it for cosmetic work (ie bodywork) or aren't engineering down to the absolute bare minimum then frankly it doesn't matter, it's just somewhat more variable in strength or weight but that does not mean it's not strong or not light!

[stevebroad]

Fastdruid said:

The point about pre-preg is more about consistency and that you know *exactly* what you are getting and hence it can be used for structural items where you are designing to its strengths. You should know exactly how strong and how light something should end up from your 3D model.

If you are using it for cosmetic work (ie bodywork) or aren't engineering down to the absolute bare minimum then frankly it doesn't matter, it's just somewhat more variable in strength or weight but that does not mean it's not strong or not light!

And it is not messy :-)

[Fastdruid]

It should be pointed out as well that just because it's carbon fibre it doesn't automatically make it light weight.
I have a set of these http://tyga-performance.com/site/product_info.php?... look absolutely awesome but are heavier than the plastic ones they replace!

[stevebroad]

Fastdruid said:

It should be pointed out as well that just because it's carbon fibre it doesn't automatically make it light weight.
I have a set of these http://tyga-performance.com/site/product_info.php?... look absolutely awesome but are heavier than the plastic ones they replace!

Agreed, and it isn't always stronger than S-glass fibre, depending on your definition of strong.

Edited by stevebroad on Saturday 28th January 08:47

[andygtt]

stevebroad said:

andygtt said:

I use both prepreg and resin infusion to make parts, and I built myself an oven specifically for my wing mounds....

I cure both in the oven as it leads for the best finish etc imo

My wing is made in resin infusion as that means I can use a core to strengthen it without the need to fill it with foam... I'm expecting it to be as stiff and yet 30% lighter than the current (very expensive) as one.

Don't fall into the trap that prepreg is superior to resin infusion as it isn't, often parts are stronger land lighter using resin infusion with identical surface finish

Very interested in seeing your oven and wing construction :-)

Interesting that infusion is often lighter than prepreg, what with the prepreg being impregnated with optimum resin quantity.

The 'trap' is that a single layer of carbon is often though of as the strongest layup for the weight, however that's often not the case.... For example to make the doors on my car as stiff as mine in just pre preg it would be heavier and require more carbon ( so loads more expensive).... The foam core I used in my rein infusion makes it extremely stiff for less weight.

Resin infusion does infuse a reasonably precise amount of resin so structurally it's not a long way off of pre preg if you did the exact same layup.
Of cause you could do a core in pre preg and have the part lighter for the same strength, however In the case of the wing you would require making a mould of each side twice (inner and outer) then pulling the 4 parts and bonding foam between them.... Loads more work for a few grams lighter.

Resin infusion takes loads more time than pre preg and is harder work... That's why not many professionals use the system.

[andygtt]

Decided to take a break from the Capri and concentrate on finishing the Noble off over winter... List of jobs is extremely long and at the end of it the car will almost identical, everything will be under the skin.

Absolutely every single component of the braking system with be completely redesigned, I have even made myself a new brake pedal with bike wheel bearings as the pivot as I'm eliminating the servo.... Car has 30 pots now.

We Engine management, changing from the Motec M800 to a Syvec S8 (its a rebranded Life F88 unit). Brand new engine loom, DBW to manage the ITB's. Also upgrading the turbo from the air works range to the latest EFR one. Turbo speed will now be monitored as well.

Designing myself a roll bar setup, the M400 and M600 run a front roll bar, but i wasn't impressed with it so decided to design my own using an adjustable blade system.

Photo bucket killed all the old pics so here is rehoused ones.

Brakes:

[e30m3Mark]

Looks great as ever.

[chuntington101]

Cracking work as ever Andy! What EFR turbo are you going for? Also what the reason for scrapping the servo and who made the brake calipers? Look nice!

[andygtt]

turbo will be EFR 9180 divided housing.
One issue with ITB is making usable engine vacuum, meaning i would have had to run an electric pump to generate brake vacuum. This was my plan until i decided to change the whole braking system and decided i wanted the flexibility of 2 separate masters.
I want the car to become more 'raw' as my wife doesn't drive the car anyhow.

[andygtt]

So I have sad news... the noble has suffered from Severe spec creep!

The reason for the spec creep is complicated lol

While I was finalising the new brakes and the roll bars I decided to pull the engine and give it a refresh.

The engine had been using quite a bit of oil (2 litres per 1000 miles when I properly monitored it) and I had a slight tick from the top end... yes it smoked when accelerating but it still went well and it had done less than 5000miles since the last refresh which was just a precaution at the time.

Initial inspection showed oil on the valve stems of the exhaust plus the turbo had lost an internal circlip... both these would cause significant oil consumption.
Further investigation we discovered 3 of the bores had a 10% leak down (around what a good engine will have) and 2 had 20% which is about the limit for showing it needs a refresh.... however one cylinder had a 70% leak down and it was clearly coming from the intake so the heads would need a refresh.
Worse we found significant damage to the exhaust cam of the same bore where the rocker had clearly impacted the cam through valve bounce... either the valve spring had gone soft or the tappet had failed at high rpm... either way the cam was scrap and we found signed of impact on other cam lobes (but not all).

The bad news continued when we removed the heads and found the piston to bore clearance was 280microns and as such the pistons and bores were damaged... this was terrible news as the cosworth pistons are only available if i buy a batch of 48 pistons (and there isn't a demand for them to do a group buy). Even better news is that the block (which was new a few years back) was rebored to its max for the cosworth pistons as they are oversize, so the block can't go again


Basically my entire engine is scrap, I can save the crank and the Mountune rods will need a clean up as one of the piston pins was seized in a rod, also i can't actually replicate the engine spec again as I can no longer get the pistons and I had a gain when i moved from the previous off the shelf highest spec piston available.

So what to do?...

Upgrade of cause!

So a change of engine was decided upon... Im still using the same bottom end, I'm just going to use some heads that have VVT and remove the rockers allowing me to rev it even higher than my current 8000rpm. to that end I also need a dry sump as it seems 8000rpm is too much for the standard oil pump...
Also I decided to change the gearbox for an all new box that a friend had been developing to fit the car.
I made my own adapter plate on my mill and managed to lower the engine around 1 inch.
The good news with the heads is that the exhaust still bolt straight up, the bad news is that it changes the flow of the water and it exists into the front engine mount... Not the end of the world as I was already remaking all the other engine mounts and was moving an electric water pump anyhow.

I also decided to go for an EFR9174 as it has extra RPM capability over my previous choice of EFR9180, Also the spec I chose was the alloy bearing housing as it saves 5 lbs in weight .

Engine wise I managed to source a brand new complete engine as a starting point and I am sourcing all the forged internals to suit, Im going to piper for cams, Omega for pistons and Arrow for the rods. Ive decided to start with a slightly higher CR than previous and reduce it later if I am knock limited, I have 2 knock sensors going on the engine with the Syvec (I had none before) so I stand a better chance of controlling it than before.

All these changes should suit the ITB's and carbon plenum that I have developed and the Syvec S8 will run it perfectly.... in fact all the changes I was previously making such as removing the power steering, upgrading the ECU, fitting electric water pump all needed doing to fit the new heads so its almost as though this was my end plan all along!

Don't have many pics yet as its all development which is never particularly photogenic lol

Edited by andygtt on Tuesday 28th August 13:00

[PorkRind]

Lovely bit of kit. Would love one of thes3 but I'm not sure I'm handy enough with a spanner .