Chassis Brace Priority

[qoncept]

Originally Posted by TB Performance Products

Chassis braces provide the best "bang for your buck" when attempting to extract everything out of your ride! These parts shore up deficits in the stock platform and don't impact the drive-ability of the car.

Full disclosure: I quit reading after this sentence (read below why), so I'm not sure what other "chassis bracing" you're talking about specifically.

A strut tower brace is just about the absolute worst bang for your buck. Everything else is better. Stickier tires, lighter wheels, intake, catback, drop in air filter, sway bars, end links (even JUST end links!), brake pads, etc, etc, etc. You aren't talking to idiots here.

[nalc]

Originally Posted by mrk1

I see where you are coming from with doing complete R&D. However all of those R&D hours will be reflected in the final price so there has to be a balance of data and whats realistic.

Look at how F1 cars are developed, massive budget and mega software. Then once its physically built they still coat it with paint and take it for a spin to see if it actually does what the computer says it will.

I agree - as I said, I wouldn't expect a finite element analysis or computational fluid dynamics or anything like that from the aftermarket (nearly impossible anyway unless Subaru sold you their models, which they wouldn't do), I'm just wondering if there's any testing that goes into it. Do you fab up a brace, take it for a spin on a test track or an autocross event, and see if it made a measurable improvement, or built one with a $40 strain gauge to tell if the bar is actually seeing any tension or compression during cornering, or is it just "We know enthusiasts buy braces that are visible in the engine bay or that look complicated and impressive and that are easy to bolt on, so we'll just build something and make sure it fits, then sell it". I like the idea of improving my car with braces, I'm just wary of braces that were designed mostly for looks and that were never really tested with the same car, driver, and track with and without the brace to see if it actually made an improvement. I don't think it's "massive R&D" to say that in back to back test, it shaved off a half seconds of time around a course, or that with a strain gauge, it showed that the bar was under a fair amount of compression during hard cornering.

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by TB Performance Products

For example we personally have had a bone stock ford fiesta with only braces on it go out on an autocross course(his first time at a track mind you) and beat turbo miatas, Evos, Stis, and a myriad of other "better" platforms that were extensively modified. He actually laid down one of the fastest times for the day. There is a reason why chassis braces have such an impact on what class your car runs in autocross events.

http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=44360

Mind linking your times from ACS?

What kind of engineering goes into your chassis bracing? Any type of stress analysis? How much torsional rigidity does your brace add? What is a hyme joint?

Do you have any before/after results that are backed by a baseline time that is in line?

tl;dr: I'd love to see substantiated results.

[mtimney]

You know you're always smart to take a vendor's advice with a grain of salt. I've gotten some great advice from vendors here on the forum. And, I've seen some vendors offer advice that I thought was questionable. I'll let everyone pass judgement about this one on their own.

[OrbitalEllipses]

HAY GUISE ADD WEIGHT TO YOUR CAR IT GO FASTER

[Calum]

Um, no.

[TB Performance Products]

WOW! I really appreciate all the feedback from you guys! Its good to see so much interest in braces! First off Id like to address some facts on our business because after all we are the new kids on the block here. We've been doing this full time for two years now and have had our hands on tons of cars and experience is our biggest weapon. As per our size, We have a small staff of 4 guys, and we have now shipped thousands of braces internationally. Hell, the Parts Manager of Scion of San Diego has been talking with us about carrying our products in their dealership and Turbokits.com has been licensing our Kia Forte Braces for 8 months now. As far as engineering goes we designed everything based off of our real world testing and sat down with an aerospace engineer who currently is out helping the Saudis design planes. The guy has been an engineer for over 30 years and was absolutely brilliant...if a little rough around the edges. Now I could sit here and post track times from our turboed TC2, 400whp speed3, or 450whp track evo and the comparison of before and after but those times can easily be refuted based on sandbagging one lap and going hard on another...Braces truly are a hard product because the difference is in feel as well as times. As for the benefits outweighing the weight argument...we totally agree, there were several braces we tested for the frs/brz that didnt make enough of a difference, and as such we dont produce them. We have always striven for complete honesty and transparency with the community. We all drive and race modified cars and want the community to have REAL products with TANGIBLE difference. In the past two years we have never had a weld failure or ANY person say that they didnt notice a massive difference, however i know you will all take this with a grain of salt as this is our business lol.

[TB Performance Products]

As for the weight of our braces, the WHOLE package weighs in at around 15lbs...Which having owned a 2450lbs track MR2...makes the added weight worth it. Our Speed3 owner originally posted a 48 second Adams pass but after brace work ONLY shaved off right under 3 seconds. Again, i know a few of you will probably argue this with Temperature, humidity, tires, race gas, or any other myriad of reasons...however you asked for it and will give it to you. Simply put...If you dont notice a difference, ship it back and we refund you...no questions asked...Like I said weve never had any complaints of our products not working...

[xclusive_brett]

I was the test car used for the r&d of these braces. I can vouche that they had tried many different designs and braces for the vehicle and only released what they truely felt would be benefitial to the vehicle.



[/QUOTE]Full disclosure: I quit reading after this sentence (read below why), so I'm not sure what other "chassis bracing" you're talking about specifically.

A strut tower brace is just about the absolute worst bang for your buck. Everything else is better. Stickier tires, lighter wheels, intake, catback, drop in air filter, sway bars, end links (even JUST end links!), brake pads, etc, etc, etc. You aren't talking to idiots here.[/QUOTE]

They sell many braces other than just the strut brace

[OrbitalEllipses]

Originally Posted by mrk1

If anyone else have driven a car with a proper 8 point roll cage in it thats a great example of a stiff chassis. With a full cage the added stiffness is really a perk since the main design is focused on safety.

And a great example of something you should NEVER run on a street car. Aside from bashing your head in on the cage since you're obviously not wearing a helmet and properly strapped in on the street, caged cars are more prone to flipping from everything I've seen.

[switchlanez]

@nalc's questions may seem smart-ass if they all go over your head but they're really not smart-ass at all. They are objective, intelligent questions that pursue truth, not negativity. But I'll argue that his aerospace engineering way of thinking (where tolerances are of utmost importance) may be a tad out of place. That world is literally rocket science, whereas automotive engineering isn't. Applying the same levels of R&D/dev testing may be overkill.

I'll wager a guess that there are some universal points at which this unibody chassis can benefit from bracing. Examples: Front/rear stabilizer bars or the stock V-brace in the engine bay. The V-brace shall go from the strut to the center of the firewall, there's not really much wiggle room to design it any other way. But how would they know to apply it in the first place? Perhaps the proof of concept has been proven over and over again/immortalized within structural/automotive engineering circles. No need to reinvent the wheel. To be thorough, the OEM may have used a strain gauge to validate the decision. Or not, because that might be like doing integral calculus then taking the derivative of your answer to prove it (an academic exercise).

I'm no structural engineer, but I imagine they adhere to some common truths in rollcage fabrication to get it maybe 80% to 95% accurate towards being optimally functional. That last 5% may require extensive computer modeling and hundreds of thousands in resources/fab/adjust/verify/re-fab/readjust/verify/refab, etc. just so they know the perfect mounting point down to the millimeter and perfect bend angles to the tenth of a degree. But 95% accuracy may just require a tape measurer+protractor across critical points of the unibody and basic application of geometry/structural principles. I imagine it to be a plug-and-chug deal. Otherwise, thousands more dollars to squeeze out that last 5%? Ain't nobody got time for that.

Skip to 3:50 for quick clips of a Chassis Design Engineer fabricating a one-off rollcage for Toshiki Yoshioka's Formula Drift BRZ. The work he does appears to be a routine, unsophisticated deal for him:
[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSS9l4yjjbg"]The HANDICAM DIARIES: GTNET TOMEI BRZ- Episode 4 Picking up the Pace (re-upload) - YouTube[/ame]

[TB Performance Products]

Switch, I think you have hit it on the head. There are many points in unibody bracing that all brace companies tend to stick to. There are variations but in general we adhere to similar points because after designing new braces OVER AND OVER (tbperformanceproducts.com has over 120 different braces alone) we figure out how it works. Its our day to day job. We go over chassis ALL DAY LONG every day. It becomes second nature on where and how to brace a car. We promise it works, and if someone doesnt feel a change well refund them...BUUUT two years and running and no one has ever taken us up on that...we aren't here to try and market everyone to death with "our designs are better" or "if you don't buy this then you don't know about cars." We feel the products sell themselves and if someone doesn't want to buy them, we understand. If someone does, well be there to help them. Honesty and transparency is what I personally value in a company and that is how I run TB Performance. Simple as that.

[Zach3794]

Hell, if he offers a 100% guarantee on his products that you will be satisfied or your money back, why not try the products?

On a side note, I will say that just about every other brace offered for this car is made out of aluminum. TBPerformance seems to make every brace out of carbon steel. This is a hell of a lot stiffer, and when it comes to bracing, stiffer is better, no?

[wparsons]

Did you seriously claim a 3 second improvement in lap times from a strut brace??