& Forum Mecanica Contents Introduction.......... Chapter1 The Idea of a Chassis... Chapter2 Suspension Systems. ..................... Chapter3 The Loads on a Vehicle Frame.................... 44 Chapter4 Four-Tube Chassis and Space Frames...51 Chapters Stressed Skin Construction..........0........74 Chapter6 Tube Frame Materials and Details............. 85 Chapter7 Stressed Skin Materials and Details .......98 Chapters Survey of Current Types. BibliographyIntroduction ‘ew people make their own race car chassis. There are assorted reasons for this. For one, potential chassis makers might doubt their own fabrication skills. A chassis is obviously a safety-critical item, re- uiring a higher level of competence at, say, welding than you might need to work on a trailer. Do-it-yourself bullders might also feet they lack the ability to design a chassis in the fist place, so they would be forced to copy an existing item, In that case, they might conclude their time is better spent making the money to buy a duplicate, since a copy Is bound to be no better than the original, and may be worse. In addition, producing a chassis requires some sort of jig. Depending on its complexity, this tooling can involve more time and expense than making the finished chassis itself, strengthening the argument for buying rather than building, ‘Why, then, this book? For one thing, commercially built chassis will like- 'y become increasingly expensive and rare in the fur ture. Recent liability suits by injured drivers have re- sulted in multi-million dollar settlements against com- onent suppliers, and it’s only a matter of time before a chassis builder becomes lable in such an action. Merely the fear of lability and the cost of product-lia. bility insurance will surely discourage builders, creat- ing a shortage of ready-made chassis. Second, some Facing classes involve so few cats that the class does n't economically justify specially built chassis. These classes exist in all forms of auto racing, from drags to ovals to road racing. Competitors are forced to either buy a uséd vehicle or chassis or “roll their own.” Third, all chassis represent a tracle-off between perfor- ‘mance and cost, and commercially made ones often seem particularly afficted by this compromise. An Individual with modest shop facilities couldn't hope to make, say, a custom camshaft, but sophisticated face car chassis can be (and are) made with relatively Drimitive resources. Materials, forthe most part, are quite cheap—and an efficient chassis uses very litie of them, Required tools are all within the financal reach of anyone who can afforl to go racing, and most racers already have almost everything needed. Finally, the skis ancl knowi- cexlge needed to design and fabricate a racing chassis are well within the grasp of anyone willing to leam, ‘My final reason for writing this book is a convic- tion that the study of chassis structures—and the way It affects the overall performance of the entire car—is interesting in its own right. Except for the composite sandwich structures in Formula One and indy cars, there is no “rocket sci- ence” involved in chassis design and construction, The basic mechanical principles were worked out genera- tions ago, mostiy by the aircraft community. A thor- ‘ough stress analysis of any type of chassis structure ‘might be beyond the abilities of most readers, but it's lunusual for a race car chassis to be subjected to that degree of theoretical investigation. The majority of Chassis bult and raced over the years—including those running right now—were designed by “eyeball,” usu- ally with the other eyeball on someone else's work. This doesn’t mean a chassis builder can do as he leases; that would be irtesponsible. Unless the de- sign is very different from any other car in its class, you can safely copy the size, gauge, and choice of material from other competitors. Even when a design does differ markedly from the norm, common sense application of basic structural principles goes a long way toward avoiding the worst mistakes. This book is Intended to convey the rudiments of those principlesChapter 1 The Idea of a Chassis 1 the early days of the automobile, many luxury car makers offered thelr customers a choice of body- work, according to taste and budget, built by any of a number of independent coach-bullders. The vehicle was supplied to these specialists as a naked “running chassis"—a complete car, less bodywork. This term Is now pretty much obsolete, although itis still used to describe the driveable skeleton supplied by truck makers to builders of motor homes, school buses, and other specialized commercial vehicles. But the word. “chassis” has several other definitions. More current meanings crop up in the world of race cars. When a car Is bought or sold, It's often in the form of a “roller"—a rolling chassis, minus engine and gearbox, and usually without tires. At the same time, the word “chassis” Is also used to describe just the structure that holds the vehicle together—al- though some people call this last the “chassis frame,” or just “frame.” Used in this way, the word “chassis” becomes confused by the fact that all mociern passenger cars and most modem racing cars have unit-body con- struction, so the bodywork is part of the structure. It's impossible to strike a distinction between the body and frame, since there is no “frame,” as such. Setting aside the historical definition, that still leaves two overlapping but distinct meanings for the nents to alter the car's response to control inputs. In this case, the word chassis specifically excludes the structure—there is nothing "tunable" about a frame. Race car chassis In the narrowest meaning of the term—the structural frame alone—may seem like a very limited topic. Its not. This book will look at race car chassis principally as structures—as “frames,” if you like. It will also relate the nature of that struc- ture—its size, shape, and material, its strength, stiff ness, and welght—to the rest of the chassis and the car overall. Chassis Frames as Structures IF we consider a vehicle chassis in this way, we heed to define what we mean by a structure. In gener- al, a structure is a specific arrangement of material, In- tended to resist loads. A structure must support its loads without breaking, and without excess deflection, For example, a bridge must resist the loads pro- duced by the weight of people and vehicles passing over it. IF it can’t, it will collapse, and the vehicles and people will fall into the water. At the same time, it's possible that a bridge might safely support all the traf- fic passing over it, yet deflect so much that It notice- ably droops in the middle. In the case of a bridge, that might be acceptable. In the case of a race car chassis, this kind of de-chassis, then, is to figure out where the parts have to {g0 first, then to design the frame so It connects all the Mounting points. So while a race car chassis might be the first part to be built—to provide a convenient as- sembly platform—a well-engineered chassis is always designed last, after all the other components have been correctly positioned, The shape of the chassis should conform to the location of the components, not the other way around. In effect, the mounts for the engine, transmis- sion, fuel tank(s), seat(s}, suspension links, springs, and all the other pieces are located In space, then lines drawn in to “connect the dots,” so to speak. Those lines might be straight or curved, and they might represent anything from tubes to frame ralls to a monocoque tub. Given the large number of “dots” in a race car, an even larger number of paths are possible between ‘one dot and another. The chassis designer's task is to The shape of the chassis should conform to the location of the components, not the other way around. When you see brackets for attaching major items le suspension springs that extend this far from the rest of the structure it ie doves that the structure is in the wrong place. Jack Gladback 6 choose paths between clots that use the smallest amount of material to provide the greatest strength, without conflicting with other requirements. It obvi- ously won't do to draw up a frame with a tube pass- ing right through the middle of something impor- tant—the driver, for instance. With certain types of chassis, it's fairly easy to see. how a structure connects the source of a force to its destination. It's also reasonably straightforward to cal- culate the size of the foads—once the chassis is de- signed and built. But because of the innumerable ways the lines might connect the mounting holes, the process of design—at least during the initial con- cept—is far from obvious. In this case, design is not simply analysis viewed from the other en So just how do you get started? A study of other peoples’ work certainly gives perspective, Despite the fact that a chassis is a three-climensional object and difficult to visualize from drawings or photographs, this