rear suspension idea

[Trevor Booth]

my apologies John,
browser was only displaying log in name hence Kaspa

 

[Doug Clark]

How about laying the shocks flat, but in a 'north/south' configuration along the lenght of the chassis, not across it.
Can I be even more forward and say how about a torsion bar for springing?

The north - south thing is real cool to look at but a PITA to work out properly whats actually going on in the mechanism through the full range of motion.
It's much easier to do the math on a "2D" arrangment as shown.

Personally I like the "Sthor" method shown below...

 

[Terry Oxandale]

75 mm wheel movement turned into a 66 mm spring compression equals a spring that is roughly 30% stronger than with a 1 to 1 ratio. So if you want (just a guess here) a 200 lb/inch (sorry for the mixing of SI) wheel rate, then you'll need a 260 lb spring.

 

[Trevor Booth]

Doug,
with respect, the maths are no difference once you introduce push rod / bell crank(rocker) into the suspension system. You still need to work out the loads in progressive steps and the vertical/horizontal/north south/transverse positioning of the shock does not alter the methodology

 

[John]

Gentlemen thanks for all your help, once again the collective knowledge base on this forum has been a tremendous help.
all i have to do now is fabricate it all up. [ the fun bit ]
cheers and beers
John

 

[Doug Clark]

Doug,
with respect, the maths are no difference once you introduce push rod / bell crank(rocker) into the suspension system. You still need to work out the loads in progressive steps and the vertical/horizontal/north south/transverse positioning of the shock does not alter the methodology

Hi Trevor you're right in what you say, but I managed to confuse the crap out of myself when I attempted to work a non-planar solution :sad:

 

[John]

Ok Trevor here i hope is the sketch with all the extra dimensions you require.

i'm afraid the math involved is way past my abilities.
regards john

 

[Cliff Beer]

How about laying the shocks flat, but in a 'north/south' configuration along the lenght of the chassis, not across it.
Can I be even more forward and say how about a torsion bar for springing?

I would tend to agree with Bruce here - if you're working with a pushrod setup then one of the main advantages is flexible packaging for the spring/damper - the lever can work with a spring/damper that runs horizontal and longitudinal (or, even at off-the-horizontal or off-the-longitudinal as may be advantageous to get the right angle to avoid a rapidly rising rate pivot point. I also see that most of the racing teams are using remote dampers as well, again, partly for flexible packaging.