After putting the dual tiltons and the balance bar on the Spit, I won't
ever do anything else again on a race car.
And, having spent a good part of the last week in Formula cars (Ford &
Mazda), the brakes are, in fact awe inspiring.
"Jack W. Drews" wrote:
>
> Don Marshall wrote:
>
> > Amici... Its a rainy Sunday here in north Florida so it seems like a good
> > time to ask for advice from experienced racers.
> >
>
> ..........................
>
> >
> > My real question is, hassle and cost aside, is there any significant
> > difference, for vintage racing purposes, between 1) a split MC/balance bar
> > setup with adjustable brake balancing capability and 2) a stock TR6 MC? I
> > know that many of the vintage TR4s are using the TR6 MC and they seem to
> > stop OK, which would indicate that the balance of the stock MC is OK for
> > racing. But if the hassle and cost is about equal, is there an advantage
> > to keeping the separate MCs and adding the balance bar that would make a
> > difference to the average racer or should I just do whichever turns out to
> > be easier? Have I overlooked another option?
> >
> > Thanks..
> > Don
> > TR4A #11
>
> I ran a survey on the list a couple of years ago and found that most
>successful
> racers were using the dual Tilton / balance bar setup. Currently in the
>central
> part of the country there are at least four TR's with the TR6 and booster
> setup.
>
> I can only give you the results of my personal experience, and maybe they will
> help you make a difference.
>
> I ran the TR6 cylinder and booster, with the TR6 pedal assembly for five
>years.
> never any trouble except for one failure of the used booster. When that
>failed,
> the car was pretty hard to stop, but it was stoppable. I would not want a
>pedal
> that hard if I was running an endurance race.
>
> The problem I had with that setup was the lack of ability to modulate the
> brakes with precision. Maybe it was just me, but there seemed to be a critical
> point somewhere in the pedal travel where the booster came in too strong and
> I'd lock up brakes much to the amusement of my tires, which flat spotted just
> to punish me.
>
> In addition, we always felt that we needed a little more rear brakes, which of
> course is a function of cylinder sizes, but we never played around with it.
>One
> indication of this was that the rear brake shoues lasted five years but the
> front pads would last only two events. This gave us lots of practice working
>on
> the front brakes but we never got a quick as the guys at the Sebring 12 Hour.
> Wow.
>
> I'm rebuilding the car after a wreck so I have a chance to do it all over
> again. I'm installing dual Tiltons and the balance bar. To do this properly I
> reconfigured the firewall to give the pedals a vertical mounting surface. In
> addition, when I did the math for the pedal lever ratio, I found that the
>stock
> pedal length / pivot point gave a ratio that was too high, which I think would
> make the pedal effort too high, and which is probably why the brakes felt as
> they did when the booster failed. To alleviate this problem I moved the pivot
> point up on the pedals, shooting for a 6:1 ratio which according to Ted
> Schumacher is ideal. I didn't quite make 6:1 but I got close. This turns out
>to
> be a balancing act between pedal travel and ratio, becsause the Tiltons are
> limited to a 1.1" travel at the cylinder.
>
> >From my Formula Ford experience years ago (which had absolutely the most
> wonderful brakes on the planet) the adjustable balance bar is useful for
> initial setup but is seldom if ever used after that.
>
> Now, the only problem with you making any decision based on all the above is
> that I have not run the car yet with the new setup, so I don't know how it
> works. However, those three Tiltons standing proud on the firewall sure do
>look
> cool.
>
> --
>
> uncle jack
>
> Like I said, "Life isn't long enough for me to do another ground-up
> restoration". Well, thank goodness, it is.
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