GFWilliams Purple, Slightly Modified, Exige V6

[DangerousDave]

Very interesting texture on the rear hatch.

[tactical lizard]

That purple is well nice!

Did you lacquer the 3d printed parts? printed nylon is porous so might be worth getting them lacquered to seal them up from the elements.

[GFWilliams]

Time to talk about my new dampers from CORE (by Tractive).

I have known Simon from Raceshocks UK for years, and back in 2019 I went to visit him as it was vaguely on route to a shoot. He told me about the CORE dampers, but at the time the price was a bit out of reach for me.  I kept in contact though as I knew it was something I eventually wanted to do.  Having the car in pieces seemed the sensible time to go for it as it made the install a lot simpler.

The loom was the hardest bit, but it wasn't too bad. 

I opted to mount the TCU under the passenger seat. You can see where the wires have to go.  The wires for the front dampers were the hardest to route.  I drilled a hole in the wheel arch next to where the thick live wires go through from the dash (your jump point under the front access panel).  I then struggled to get the wire into the wheel arch from inside the dash as access is quite hard.  If I was better at wiring, I'd snip the wires so I could push the wires into the cabin from the wheel arch side, then reconnect the wire. 

Simon delivered the loom before the dampers to help with the timing of having the clam off etc. To be honest, you don't need the clam off to install these, you just need to have the wheel arch liners out.

The quality of the actual dampers is lovely. On a par with Nitron etc.

You'll notice there are remote reservoirs, but no adjustment on them, this is the suggested setup from Simon as the best solution for my needs. My dampers are the ACE+ system, there is a R-ACE system which has high & low speed compression, but having now seen how well Simon set these up and how the active systems work, I don't think it's necessary.

I fitted these myself and got the ride heights as close as I could, basically seeing how low I could have the car at the front without the lovely carbon splitter touching on the speed bumps near my house (128mm was the magic number).

I was keen to visit Simon again to get the car setup how he thinks it should be, plus learn as much as I could about the dampers in the process. I filmed a video of this which I'll stick on YouTube once I've caught up with my backlog of videos of the rebuild.  Raceshocks UK are in South Wales, so it was 500 mile round trip for me which is obviously a lot, and while the trip wasn't strictly necessary as I could get it set up locally, I felt it was worth the trip to learn about how they work and how changes in setup/the dampers will change how the car feels.

The first thing was to adjust the ride heights to where we thought they should be, 130mm front and 136mm rear. The car was slightly out in the corner weights, so the heights were then adjusted to suit. This weight is with a driver and was how we decided to leave the car so that the heights were close enough to where we wanted. 48% across the axles is still pretty good.

After the heights, the geometry was checked and only small tweaks were required to the toe.  The front camber was 0.3 degrees more on one side, but I will sort this at a later date.

I learnt how the touch screen will change the way the dampers react, and it's actually quite simple (plus you can feel it immediately).  If you put all 4 adjustments into full soft, the active (DDA) valve isn't active, so it becomes a passive damper effectively in the softest damping setting. The ride quality in this mode is unbelievable, perfect for a SUPER bumpy Surrey back road.  The next mode up is where things start to get clever though as the DDA valve turns on. The ride quality in this mode is still VERY good, but when you load the car up, it will stiffen up as required.  I found it very interesting that the active systems don't feel active or unpredictable in any way, they just feel like the car is more in control than they do with a normal damper.

To control the balance of the car (if needed), you can adjust the front and rear damper stiffness (these are they outer of the 4 variables), so if you want to do a skid, you can just set the rear to full stiff 😎

The two inner variables are the roll and pitch, which do as they say on the tin really.

The M 1-5 on the right hand side are the memory positions so you can change things easily to different ones while driving.  To save them you just press and hold, as you'd expect.

My one criticism of the screen is that it's very bright at night, it'd be nice if it was in a standby brightness until you touched it to wake it up. You can turn the brightness down though if you want.

So the bit that really matters... HOW DOES IT DRIVE??

It's quite hard to put into words just how much of an improvement these are over any other Exige I've been in.  The ride quality is very close to as good as an Alpine A110, but with more body control.  Simon recommend softer springs (450/700 IIRC) than I was on with the Nitrons and this is quite a big part of why the car drives so well.  Simon explained wheel frequencies etc to me, and while they make sense to me, the reality is that the car just feels much better than it did before.  The dampers will stiffen up as required, and if you didn't know they were active or change settings on the touch screen, I don't think you'd ever know as they feel natural in their operation.  They really are very good. I find myself driving most of the time in full soft, then if I get to a roundabout or corner, I'll turn the dampers onto the softest active setting.  I haven't tried them on track yet, but I'm confident that even with these soft spring rates, they'll be brilliant.

I can't wait to take people out for a ride in the car, it's immediately obvious how good the dampers are, and even after spending ages on all the body mods, I think the dampers are the stand out for me.

I only have one photo of where the screen ended up. It fits perfectly in the gap under the headlight switches, with just a small bit of foam tape to hold it in place.

The car is away being detailed with Kelly from KDS Keltec / Lake Country, and to be honest I'm in no rush to get the car back as work is so busy.  The car looked good before, I can't wait to see it once Kelly has finished!

ETA:  For those who want to learn/understand more about the CORE dampers, there is some more info here: https://raceshocks.uk/trusted-brands/core-suspension/semi-active-suspension/

I suggest calling Simon (ask him about my car if you want, he had a nice drive in it) if you want any more info

 

[GFWilliams]

I thought I was done with mods, but Greg’s Race Parts just brought out a new central mirror. I’m in America next week, so perfect timing. 

Now the all important question… leave it exposed carbon or tint it?

https://www.gregsraceparts.com/products/carbon-fiber-rear-view-mirrors-for-elise-exige

[DangerousDave]

Could you have the 4 settings be left right brake/accel? Then use a yaw sensor to trigger the different modes?

I saw an on track video with the old coilovers above and the tractive below and the camera bouncing around was almost eliminated with the tractive....

Just can't find that bloody video anymore all I can find is the focus rs on autobahn one....

Edited May 7, 2022 by DangerousDave

[mayak]

You've built yourself an impressive machine, not just optically but also technically. Replacing a already good Nitron with something better 🤯 What should I say with my stock Bilsteins 😬

Purple isn't my color but it looks fabulous still. I like the yellow Lotus letters/logo at the back and the body colored rear hatch particularly.

I hope you don't sell your car anytime soon.

Edit: How many different settings can you have on your wing? The mounts seem to have many holes.

Edited May 7, 2022 by mayak

[GFWilliams]

@DangerousDave- I have no idea why you’d want to, that’d just add an extra complication.

@mayak - thanks for the kind words, car will hopefully never be for sale. Very much built as a keeper!   

The rear wing has lots of different holes to allow pitch to be adjusted between -4 degrees and 14 degrees AOA. I decided to make my uprights a bit simpler with 4 degrees and 8 degrees AOA, then I can drill more holes if I want more options.  Hopefully at some point, I can get on track and see how it affects the balance of the car, and lap times.

[Brendonian]

The more I look at those mirrors, the more I dislike them. Really not keen on the raised lip around the edge. For me, they’re ok, but disappointing for the price. 

[GFWilliams]

5 hours ago, Brendonian said:

The more I look at those mirrors, the more I dislike them. Really not keen on the raised lip around the edge. For me, they’re ok, but disappointing for the price. 

Cool, you can stick to your plastic fantastic mirror  

[Brendonian]

At least mine looks like it was designed by somebody with eyes 😉

[DangerousDave]

I have to say being able to zero out the suspension for the straights/potholes and switch back over to more aggressive with corners and the push of a button really is pretty amazing.

On the ohlins TTX with mechatronix it rides like a lexus in the straights

[Matt W]

Really interesting read, thanks for taking the time to share, will be great to hear how the system performs on track. 

This will sound odd, but hopefully you've not made it too good to the point of taking out some of the driver interaction. 

[Bibs]

 

[Techyd]

A very well executed piece of work.  I particularly like the wheels and reprofiled front bumper - very effective.

[DangerousDave]

I'd have to disagree with the air vents. In the tropics the ac barely is noticible even with the updated komotec vents. However the problem lies with the exige cabin air mode closed it still lets in 30% of outside air and is not completely sealed. Which is why even my s2000 is way colder than the exige.

Edited May 27, 2022 by DangerousDave

[El-RGB]

Exceptional build! Very very nice! 

[DangerousDave]

Is it just me or are pictures in this thread even one page back not working anymore?

[Bibs]

It's being looked at by the support team. 

[DangerousDave]

New host for the pics in this thread?

 

[geartox]

I watch again the last videos. Impressive paint work !

Awesome job, really !

Regarding the videos where you remove the clams, I was quite surprised by the dust problem. The car is not so old and we can say that you take care of your car 🙂 .