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+--- Thread: 'Ultimate Handling' 240D (/showthread.php?tid=364)
'Ultimate Handling' 240D - CID Vicious - 05-13-2009
Just thinking about various aspects of the car since I've acquired it, and I wonder if anyone's thought to do this...it's viable, I think, for someone adventurous with a car they don't mind tinkering with, and would be of interest to those who run turbo'd 616s.
Looking at the procedure to convert to the 617 turbo, I saw a unique opportunity afforded by the fact that this car was expected to run some dozen engines over it's production; if one were to follow part of the instructions for the turbo swap, and had some 1/4" steel plate adapters fabbed up, you could move the stock motor back 4 inches.
To give some perspective, lots of hot rodders and race teams have taken a sledgehammer to their firewall to obtain even 1" of set-back. 4", with such a relatively heavy yet compact motor, would improve the front-to-rear weight balance considerably, and wouldn't need any truly permanent modification to the car (should these become valuable classics some day, or something).
Saying one had the necessary capacity to perform the mods, and knowing that almost everyone is going to have to pay a driveshaft shop for the shortening and balancing, I'd say it could be pulled off for not very much at all, and while it's decidedly not for everyone, I thought I'd put it out there in case anyone might be interested. Between moving the engine back and relocating the battery, the weight bias would change dramatically.
Cutting coils or lowering springs would likely be necessary, as the front axle would have X pounds less weight riding on it, and the rear would need to have stiffer springs installed. By merely moving the weight around, the front would, left stock, become 'effectively stiffer' - less weight on the same spring rate, which would effect the swaybar's performance in a similar manner. The inverse would happen at the rear, becoming effectively softer.
If you're stuck in 240D purgatory, this would be a way to confound a 300 driver in the corners in a way that the 5 cylinder or more crowd can't take advantage of. Almost makes a case for turbo'ing the 616.
Almost.
RE: 'Ultimate Handling' 240D - shredator - 06-10-2009
trying to figure out how much this would help things...
anyone know what the current weight distribution of the 240 is?
anyone know how much the 616 weighs?
im not having too much luck finding either with google
RE: 'Ultimate Handling' 240D - winmutt - 06-10-2009
616 weighs about 450 lb I'd guess.
RE: 'Ultimate Handling' 240D - CID Vicious - 06-10-2009
I forgot that I'd put this thread up.
The one I did not account for...is the oil pan. One could modify the crossmember (it's less scary if you know how to weld), but you'd have to. Things like that (and what to do about the Oil Filter location) make it less easy than I had at first surmised.
The stock weight distribution is probably all right for a family sedan but far from the ideal 50/50. Even drag racers want a motor as far back as they can get it, and usually you can get about an inch. Four would be a huge move, and assuming the suspension was tuned right, it would run circles around a stock 240D in the handling department. Even changing nothing it would make the car understeer considerably less.
Moving the engine back the four inches would certainly improve the w/d, but you'd have to be married to the idea of the turbo 616 to mod the X member to do so. It's not so much the amount of weight as where it is. There's a reason Porsche and Subaru have been married to the boxer engine for most of their history, and it's because no matter how many cylinders (let's not forget the Boxer 12 Testarossa) that you have or how much they weigh, the C/G of the engine is as low as it's going to possibly get.
I intended this idea as more of a 'Food For Thought' than for much of an actual project - using this approach and swapping in, say, a TDI (they made a 5 cylinder version, too), or some kind of compact/lightweight but powerful powerplant, would make it a viable idea. The TDI, despite being 1.9l, blows the doors off of the OM617a (DI can't help but trump the IDI), and would be the ideal diesel powerplant for such a purpose. For gas, turbo-Ecotec, Ford 2.3l Turbo (don't laugh, they're stupidly stout and take lots of boost), any number of Jap powerplants, the 2.5 16... The 616, even with the same rods and pistons as the 617a and shortened stock 'a' manifolds, is always going to be chasing the power of the 617a. 600cc is not inconsequential, especially when you're talking otherwise identical motors.
Much like the Chevy 305, it's not that it isn't as viable as a powerplant as the 350, it's that they're equally common and built to the same spec the 350 is always going to make more horsepower and torque. Since they cost the same and you're not on some desert island where you can't find anything but a 305, you'd have to be obsessed with '305 performance' to spend the same money for less power (a Chevy 302 is a different story altogether
). Substitute '616' for '617a' if the analogy means nothing to you. But hey, some people want to run the underdog to prove a point, and bless 'm for doing so, I think it's kind of cool, actually.