Re: Mendeola Transaxles
My friend,
unfortunately this is the first product made, but in a modular way.
Something that nobody takes care are the warranties.
At the beginning, nothing, fucking works as you have planed.
You shall throw away a lot of expensive parts and replace them with other more expensive.
The testing made by a reality like mine, is insufficient to garranty to match all the conditions. For example, who was thinking that for air shipping a gasket problem would occur??? - 52°C in the luggage room of a plane were not considered. And this is a stupid cause of troubles.
On the bench only safety tests has been made on a "RODEO" test rig simulating dynamicly accelerations, decelerations and cornerings. The transmission was full of plexiglass windows, in order to see internally what happens and a stroboscopic lamp was used to stop in movement all the gears one by one. After being sure of having a correct lubrication in any conditions we wend in a vehicle.
All the testing made, was concentrated on safety, confort and functionality purposes, made by a top and very expensive professional test driver.
- I rented a Pagani Zonda where I installed the proto unit -
1) Functional shifting tests with measurments. It toke 4 months to reach a good level of shifting quality.
2) Endurance test start. We assumed that 30.000 kms hardly made by a professional test driver were sufficient to feel confortable in starting a preserie production.
3) 30.000 kms made in this way: 5% in the city traffic – 25% on mountain roads – 30% on extra urban roads – 20% on the motorway and the final 20% on the Nardò test track at high speed –
After some cooling accessories adjustments, we could start to push hardly on the gas pedal.
An AMG V12 7,1 L a bit tuned was used – 580 HP and 750 Nm – Michelin Pilot Sport 335/35- 18 were in charge to transfer the torque through a 1,1 as adherence coefficient.
You can not imagine the amount of petrol and rear tires has been used, as well as 2 clutches.
This was made all in August 2000.
4) At the end of the endurance test, we decide to do a misuse test as well, while we had 3 more days paid for the track facilities. We installed a set of slick tires and we did all the worse actions against a gearbox on the dynamic track. About 1.000 Km more of tortures.
What do you think??? I was sure about a full success………..
The first 2 lots of pre-serie have been a bath of blood. Nobody was considering the change of production process, from accurate prototyping to standard production.
75% of cases leaking, 90% of final drives singing like Pavarotti, 90% of shifting quality problems, and so on without mentioning the wrong set up of the LSD. At the beginning we were using a ZF LSD with clutches. Too aggressive and dangerous. The car was oversteering in parking. Move to a TORQUE BIASING unit….successful, but throw away 50 crown wheels.
Overheating problems due to the different applications……rear cover re-design in order to allow an oil circulation through a cooler….successful………but the winter arrived.
Impossibility to shift while the lubricant is cold due to an extremely high pressure generated by the pump….add an over-pressure cutter…..successful….but throw away 50 rear covers.
Summer again and some clients are burning everything…..for not using the correct size of piping, they were generating a too high back pressure and the over-pressure valve was always open. The oil was never reaching the end of the shafts…….drill an internal by pass in order to avoid high back pressures…successful.
And so on….I have mentioned only some of the things that they MUST occur according to the LAW OF MURPHY….because believe me, he is always sitting next to you.
I hope this will clarify more your curiosities.
Regards
Wanni