continued from above
We just got the custom re-valved Moton Clubsport shocks yesterday, but haven't put them on yet. I will cover that in a future update - the guys here have been working on the 330 motor swap and our massive influx of orders, and I'm buried in the new construction, so these Motons won't go on the car until sometime in August, probably after we've moved into the new shop. Any higher end shock set-up with remote reservoirs and hoses takes a bit of extra time, care, and planning to install
properly. Add to that the copious pictures we'll be doing for an installation gallery. We've ordered and received the custom rear upper mounts needed for these shocks and for this chassis, as well as high-end rubber grommets bulkheads for the hose pass-thrus, but there's still a good 8+ hours of wrenching, drilling, reservoir bracket/mounting, bushing machining, and four corner set-up to perform. Never rush an install on high end shocks.
These double adjustable monotube shocks have remote reservoirs, and were customized with both new pistons and new valving from AST/Moton USA. After they dyno'd the off-the-shelf S197 Club Sports they saw the need for some valving changes, and we will work with these guys to get these set-up for autocross and track use on the S197 Mustang over the coming months (the new Vorshlag shop will be 200 feet from AST/Moton USA's facility, so that helps). The custom upper rear mounts converts Moton's "eye to eye" shocks to "eye to pin", but I'll still need to machine some bushings on the lathe to fit these mounts and upper sphericals. This is common on race car shocks, BTW. Vorshlag will stock the rear mounts and supply the custom bushings, plus the front Vorshlag camber plates, allowing customers to buy a Moton shock kit from us that more easily bolts-onto this chassis. The picture (above right) of the rear shock does not show the screw-on spherical upper end, nor the eye-to-pin adapter mounts that we have acquired.
The
prototype D-Force/Vorshlag 18x10" wheels have been mounted with an extra set of (track abused but still deep tread) 265/40/18 Yokohama AD08 tires, and we've been bombing around on the street for a couple of weeks on these without incident - well, other than the many lustful stares the car now gets rolling on these big meats. They look...
frakking awesome. The fit is perfect - we nailed the offset exactly. All of that wheel testing paid off! Spoke to caliper clearance is ridiculous - there's almost
an inch between the inside of the spokes and the big Brembo 4-pot. There's more fender room outboard up front and inboard out back, but movement of the wheel flange in either direction would require spacers up front or cause the wheels to poke out in the rear... this is the best "bolt it onto either end of the car and it fits" offset, which most people want. Sure, two separate offsets could allow another 1/2" of width, but most folks don't want a different front and rear wheel. This allows for one wheel to fit anywhere, and easy tire rotation. Stay tuned for more information about the initial
pre-purchase specials we will offer on the production batch of S197 18x10's; these wheels will be available exclusively form Vorshlag.
Last up, the Odyssey PC680 battery. We picked up one of these
14 pound AGM batteries months back but finally got around to ordering a battery mounting bracket to help install this thing. We ordered a Braille unit for
$76 from TireRack. CNC machined, black anodized, beautifully built, but it is
made for a Braille battery. Didn't fit the Odyssey, at all, so we found another battery bracket from West Coast Batteries -
right from the Odyssey website. $55 and it looks as good if not better than the Braille. Why we didn't see this one and order it first, I cannot explain?! That's now on order and we'll install it soon.
That's it for the latest parts - the coverage of our last autocross (SCCA SW Divisional #3) is below.