Upgraded Oil Pan Development - Formula Delta

[Frost]

Hi folks!

As some of you may know, my buddy and I made a video regarding the real issue on the FA24 and its lubrication problems specifically on right hand turns.

We've got a prototype pan in testing right now and are almost production ready. New video coming soon but long story short, we'd like to gauge interest in the crowd as to who would put their money where their mouth is to actually put a deposit down on a pan should we choose to deploy production to mass manufacture it.

Please fill out the poll above.

Depending on numbers, the initial production run of pans is likely going to cost $750 USD OR LESS depending on how many people put money down. Knowing this, are you going to do so?

Why buy this pan:

Mitigates observed oil starvation:
Provides an additional capacity for extra oil (on top of factory fill volume)
Has vertical baffling with traps near oil pickup ensures what oil is in the pan remains near pickup tube

Direct OEM fitment:
Retains all OEM headers, heat shielding and skid plates
No added mechanical complexity or parasitic losses

Track proven:
Data from four race tracks (CTMP DDT & GP, SMP, TMP) with one being one of the fastest tracks in North America (CTMP Grand Prix track) at 118mph / 190 kmh entry speeds on a sustained right turn using the test 2022 Subaru BRZ

By the people for the people:
All of us who helped develop this pan own the car (and have blown an engine due to the issue) and track it hard across various tracks. We love the car and want to put this issue to bed for everyone. We just happen to be engineering problem solvers as well.

[OldBiker]

I voted MAYBE... not because of the price, but because I have to see the finished product first then assess. Others might be in a similar camp, don't want to give you a wrong view of the economics.

[Frost]

Originally Posted by OldBiker

I voted MAYBE... not because of the price, but because I have to see the finished product first then assess. Others might be in a similar camp, don't want to give you a wrong view of the economics.

What do you need to see from the finished product? Asking so I take notes on the next video we release.

[OldBiker]

Shape/size, material, quality, fit, baffle system.... Would be nice to have a few people try it first, install, test, write reviews. I don't track, but planning to drop the pan after the warranty and scrape the RTV... seems like that would be a good time to "upgrade" the pan. Just my thoughts, since you asked. (I would be very happy to see the whole oiling issue put to bed. Thanks for working on it! :-)

[Frost]

Originally Posted by OldBiker

Shape/size, material, quality, fit, baffle system.... Would be nice to have a few people try it first, install, test, write reviews. I don't track, but planning to drop the pan after the warranty and scrape the RTV... seems like that would be a good time to "upgrade" the pan. Just my thoughts, since you asked. (I would be very happy to see the whole oiling issue put to bed. Thanks for working on it! :-)

Thanks for this breakdown!

The shape and baffle system is purposely being not revealed at the moment for fear of the design being ripped off from us. We've already calculated that as soon as this pan hits the market, knock-offs will happen. Once we launch to market, more details will be provided to ensure we have a good production run before it runs its life out due to copy-cats.

As for other people trying it out - see above. There's only so many people we'd trust that wouldn't screw us over because ... well... we're nobodies. If you screw over a larger company, they can go after you better. We're just a team of two guys who put our own money into this so we're trying to protect ourselves.

More than happy to publish data with video showing pressures etc. but sending out pans to people remotely requires LOTS of vetting.

[DarkSunrise]

Originally Posted by Frost

Hi folks!

Track proven:
Data from four race tracks (CTMP DDT & GP, SMP, TMP) with one being one of the fastest tracks in North America (CTMP Grand Prix track) at 118mph / 190 kmh entry speeds on a sustained right turn using the test 2022 Subaru BRZ

Can you post some before vs. after oil pressure plots?

[Frost]

Originally Posted by DarkSunrise

Can you post some before vs. after oil pressure plots?

Oh absolutely! We're going back to do final testing on August 27th at CTMP GP track and will post some data as soon as we're done.

The pan has currently seen 2 track days at Shannonville Motorsports Park and we're stepping up to CTMP Driver Development Track where at least ONE of us blew an engine on T3.

Then 48 hours later, we will be going back to CTMP Grand Prix with full alignment and 245 CRS tires to prove that we finally have licked the problem with before (stock) vs. after (full alignment + 245 width CRS) to prove that we have a solution.

[gshopper]

I would absolutely buy one, but I would need to know that it works. As Dark Sunrise said, would need data re oil pressure drops.

[OkieSnuffBox]

People tracking are likely running an oil cooler, so giving up some of the extra capacity for more fitment options for aftermarket headers seems like a good trade off.

[ruturaj001]

Originally Posted by OkieSnuffBox

People tracking are likely running an oil cooler, so giving up some of the extra capacity for more fitment options for aftermarket headers seems like a good trade off.

With some UEL headers, there can be more clearance hence larger capacity and with intuitive pan shape than 'shape formed from trying work around stock headers'. Looking at Verus solution, I don't think anyone would develop pan of that shape if not considering headers.

[OldBiker]

I would add heat gain from the headers to my original list... Wonder if there is room to wrap the headers and if that makes a difference to this car?

[Petah78]

Originally Posted by OldBiker

I voted MAYBE... not because of the price, but because I have to see the finished product first then assess. Others might be in a similar camp, don't want to give you a wrong view of the economics.

This. I am absolutely interested in a larger oil capacity pan but there will be quite a few different designs coming to the market in the near future. I just need to evaluate my options and go with the one that i feel best meets my needs.

Thank you for doing what you guys are doing for the community and continual support for this platform.

[zeroomega]

I am not sure if vertical trap door is a good design choice. The reason why the GR86 starve oil on lateral g is not primarily due to oil leaving the pan under lateral g, but the oil cannot return back to the pan from engine head and timing chain cover under lateral g. There is a very detailed Subaru paper illustrate that. STI team did an oil path analysis on their FA24DIT engine on their WRX endurance race car and part of their improvement is to add a small vertical baffle to the timing chain cover to help oil return back to the pan when car transit from left turn to right turn.

Rubber flaps are a bit risky if it is close to the pick up tube as it may fall off and clog the pickup, causing engine blow up immediately. And that already happened on a few 86 owners on the internet. For this specific engine, the baffle will be relatively more effective if it can block or slow down the oil from entering the timing chain cover under braking, as shown in SYMs oil pan design.

I assume you already have a prototype pan on your car. Did you run any oil pressure data logging with it? How does it data looks like compared to OEM pan?

BTW, I am nostreetracing86 on youtube. I am the first person to illustrate FA24 oil starvation issue on this forum.

[Frost]

Originally Posted by zeroomega

I am not sure if vertical trap door is a good design choice. The reason why the GR86 starve oil on lateral g is not primarily due to oil leaving the pan under lateral g, but the oil cannot return back to the pan from engine head and timing chain cover under lateral g. There is a very detailed Subaru paper illustrate that. STI team did an oil path analysis on their FA24DIT engine on their WRX endurance race car and part of their improvement is to add a small vertical baffle to the timing chain cover to help oil return back to the pan when car transit from left turn to right turn.

Rubber flaps are a bit risky if it is close to the pick up tube as it may fall off and clog the pickup, causing engine blow up immediately. And that already happened on a few 86 owners on the internet. For this specific engine, the baffle will be relatively more effective if it can block or slow down the oil from entering the timing chain cover under braking, as shown in SYMs oil pan design.

I assume you already have a prototype pan on your car. Did you run any oil pressure data logging with it? How does it data looks like compared to OEM pan?

BTW, I am nostreetracing86 on youtube. I am the first person to illustrate FA24 oil starvation issue on this forum.

Nice to finally "meet" you and thanks to all of your work and 900BRZ. It's a godsend and what got me finally off my ass to get it started on my end.

I already have the original prototype (call it v1) in my car and there are promising results but we don't want to release data on it just yet because it is not the production model yet. Mine has a bunch of features for making it easy to retrofit or change features during testing. The v2 basically strips it down to as close as production will be and then we are going to go test it out and that will be the proper data to release.

That said, the data we harvested on the v1 (but with Nankang CRS 245 square and -3 alignment front, -2.5 rear) was very helpful (most importantly: I didn't blow my engine - oil analysis inbound as well) and that's what's driving some feature changes in the new pan. We pulled ~1.5G on the corners compared to the 1.1 on stock tires so it's been battle tested.

The vertical baffling is helpful to mitigate the right hand turn drops in our opinion because whatever oil that does return in preceding turns can stay near the pickup area instead of moving off away. The baffles are also designed for the operating temperatures of the stock oil without cooling and yes, I did have the same concern about it coming off and clogging the pickup tube but the design has mitigated most of those concerns.

Sit tight, we're about to go do final testing soon and the data will be ready to release shortly. Bear with us! I'm just as excited as everyone else is.