rd7839 wrote:
No offense Joe but I think both ideas are bad. Trans axles do not appear to be a weak point, I've never seen one fail yet and at nationals I didn't see one car with a cooler yet we all survived. Any time you add the word "any" into a rule set you are asking for trouble and wild interpretations. Besides I don't want to be following a car that has a home brewed cooler setup when it starts to fail. Use a good gear lube and you will be fine, trust me!
As for the shifter, the slop can be fixed for pennies. The trouble point is the pin on the lever, just grind it off, tack in a bolt you already have, tighten it up and off you go. I just did this the fancy way and used needle bearing washers and it's like brand new for $5! Imagine if you say "any shifter" you'll have someone with a 3 foot long lever, pedal extensions and steering spacer and be sitting in the back seat. It's also been my experience that short shifters ADD to miss shifts not helping to stop them.
Too much vagueness, too costly and very unnecessary!
Unfortunately for you, a transaxle cooler is already in the rules:
12.8.2 Any external transmission oil cooler, and external transmission oil pump may be added.
There has been data gathered, and a need has been identified. We had a trans get changed at the East Coast Nationals and I personally had one eat itself just 2 races after purchasing my car. The weak point is the ring and pinion gear, namely the bearings that maintain the gear lash which heat up tremendously in hot environments and when used with LSDs. I ran a Trans Temp Sensor in the drain plug this entire season. During the summer months of SE Region racing, namely at the East Coast Nationals where the track temp on the Thrusday T&T was over 140 degrees, I regularly saw my temp gauge pegged at over 250 degrees F! Those were in 20 min sprint sessions to boot. Since investigating my trans cooler setup, I talked to several Porsche race shops, all who say any temp reading over 200 is too much and regularly equip their auto on systems with 190 degree t-stats. If our Transaxles had cheap and easy to replace ring and pinions, I would agree with you, but as someone who is very mechanically inclined, I wanted nothing to do with the rebuild of a transaxle after finding out my ring and pinion was what was making all that whining noise in the rear. Yes used transmissions can be sourced for just a couple hundred, but I tend not to equate my transmissions with consumables like I do tires and brakes.
I use good gear lube, AMSOIL Severe Gear 75-140.
Lastly, how many cars have homemade engine oil cooler setups?
Now for the shift linkage, I detest the stock shift linkage. I have personally missed 5th and gone into 3rd bending valves. We had a missed shift end a week end early at Daytona. Many dont know the tricks to shore up the feel on the shifter making them put up with the same hot dog down a hallway feel that many of our 180,000 donor cars come with. I believe that shifter setup is largely personal preference, and should be a positive action that provides confidence on track. The stock setup definitely doesn't do that. There are several examples of aftermarket products that are intended to improve the feel, both legal and currently illegal, that should be considered. Maybe something so simple as specifically allowing the modification of the end of the shift lever for a common hard mount knob to be added. I understand the concern of a new rule opening us up for a monster sized exploitation but I again, point to the first tenant of the rules.
"The spirit of the class is for all cars to be equal in weight and horsepower and be competitive with one another. The focus will be on driver ability and not dollar ability. This class is not intended to be an engine builder
OR INNOVATOR'S CLASS."
That last part is always a sticking point come rule change proposal time. Ive never used a short shifter on this car, but I do think there is something that can improve the current situation.
only944.com/partscatalog/only/shortshifter/
only944.com/partscatalog/only/shifter/
only944.com/partscatalog/only/shiftlinkagearm/