A great project in personalization. I admire your persistence of perfection, and weight loss. I love to shift and have spent the better part of 3 decades perfecting double clutch downshifts and heel and toe on the road and track, but I have to admit that the first time I had the opportunity to try a 360F1 on one of my favorite stretches of road, I was instantly much faster with the F1. Rather than get angry with the march of technology and wax on about the connection with the car, etc., I chose to embrace the technology, develop left foot braking and just get faster! Don't get me wrong, there is nothing like getting it right on your own and the rewards that go along with that and I still enjoy it. But if it's raw point to point pace, the new technology, along with a new skill set is the way forward. ..... And to the guy who says that "we never could drive our cars to the limit, so why bother with the weight loss"....... speak for yourself!
Right from the start there was never any doubt in my mind that a hydraulically actuated AMT (automated manual transmission) would be quicker shifting than my best efforts, especially in circuit racing applications. I suppose it all comes down to how you use your car. I own other cars that can do the 'auto' bit for me yes they are very competant but I find I like auto's for my everyday mundane transport, big Merc's like the AMG CL range. There is however a niche for me of special cars, 'weekend cars' if you like, that I don't drive very frequently and when I get in and drive them with a manual ****er, every hair on the back of my neck stands to attention. I built this car, my interpretation of a 'CS2' for my own tastes (and surprisingly with mostly original Ferrari parts minus a few things such as the ti exhaust/hyperflow cats [ferrari only sell ti tips so far, shame on them!] ). Evolution dictates that the V12 and V8 engines and boxes will be replaced with something else, likely candidates are fuel cell technology or hyper efficient batteries. Silent running cars which are ruthlessly quicker than todays machine with 0mph instant off the line torque and no gears. Very likely within 50 years that cities will ban manually driven cars and all traffic entering will be GPS automatically controlled and you'll just be there for the ride, still at least you can eat or play on Gran Turisimo 10 on your Playstation 12 while getting to your destination..
The old adarge that racing improves the breed is certainly true of engine performance. Ferrari eventually extracted 118bhp per litre out of the 3.6 engine found in the CS and that was directly attributed to some learnings that happened in the Challenge racing series. This compares with the offical 111bhp per litre in the Modena and Spider from the same engine (which was mostly never really achieved in real life due to reasons I'll explain later on). The ultimate evolution of the 3.6 V8 it transpires that it is possible to extract 125bhp per litre without opening up the unit but it requires to fine tuning and a higher rev limit. Thats one of the best figure I've seen out of essentially an unopened 3.6 litre 'factory' production engine in normally aspirated trim. Lets think about that for a minute, 450bhp from a 3.6 litre engine, its a highly impressive achievement and much to do with the 5 valves per cylinder well developed engine in the 360 to begin with. The work to evolve to this power output was done in the UK and Italy (Michelotti in Italy, Ferrari's official tuner) by Challenge team race engineers wanting to extract every last bhp out of the 360 Challenge cars to keep them in competition. What they discovered was garnered through some very dedicated and advanced techniques (many of these guys work in Formula One so have access to some pretty impressive technology) where they bench flowed the airflow through the 360's engine and identified the bottlenecks where power sapping was at work. Lets go back to school for a minute so we can understand whats going on. The engine is essentially best though of as an air pump. You pump in as much air and fuel in as possible, ignite the mixture in a short space of time and then hope to get it all out of the exhaust as quickly as possible. As the rev's rise the restrictions on getting airflow in increase quite dramatically and bottlenecks quickly form in area's you just wouldn't expect. Wing Mirrors Upset Airflow On the 360 Challenge the first restriction was in actual fact the blocking of airflow and turbulence generated by the size and placement of the originally styled front wing mirrors (!) in association with the side air vents. This meant that not enough clean air was getting into the side intakes of the car to deliver the air needs of the engine. The first mod was to replace the wing mirrors with ones out of the way of the airflow (improving aerodynamics and drag too). Hence in the 360 GT series you got much longer (and thinner in Carbon) mirrors that didn't upset the airflow at all. In the Challenge Stradale this lesson was well understood, they took what was learned from this and modified the shape and position so as not to upset the air [GT Mirrors are still superior in this regard but for road car mirrors the CS ones are a big improvement over the originals]. Already a power increase was felt. Ironically this is one of the reasons that prevented the stock 360 and 360 Spider from generating the factory quoted power output of 400bhp. Strange but true! Side Intakes a little too small After sorting out the airflow into the side intake the other issue is the size of the aperture itself. Some race teams actually modified rear quarters bodywork (expensive!) adding some carbon kevlar here so the intake was much deeper into the body with a larger in volume so it could gorge on more air. They extended the air intake size into the car so it still looked close to factory but it could take much more airflow. Air Box Design & Manufacturing Material The next restriction they faced where (the challenge cars don't run air resonator boxes, they use a large pipe) the original airboxes which where machined out of aluminium and the welding and fabricating lead to inefficient airflow. When replaced with carbon these retrictions could be lifted and a much smoother flowing shape could be made. Ironically its still not perfect and neither is the airbox itself which in factory trim on the 360 only has 1 intake bringing in air. Some aftermarket guys realized they could improve things further by opening up the second airflow aperture relocating the gearbox raditor. Challenge teams also quickly realized that due to the location of the airbox close to the backbox and cats the heat (and that fact the airbox is made from aluminium) could 'heat soak' into the airbox quickly leading to power losses so many also heat shielded with aluminium wrap. the airboxes themselves to keep the air intake temperatures lower. (Hot air is less dense than cold air so the colder the air the more air you get in the same space and hence more power). Challenge cars already ran K&N's for higher airflow at very high revs (in actual fact standard paper air filters are pretty good with regards to flow so where retained on the CS). While making the airbox entirely out of carbon would have improved efficiency even further (and saved more weight) the cost would have been very high. Air Flow Meters Restrictions After the airfliters as the air flowed into the engine the next restriction was the Air Flow Meters. These are stock parts used from several production cars. The 360 uses 2 (1 per bank 4 of cylinders). The restriction was the size of the AFM pipe diameter, Some teams modified their original afm's fitting them into larger pipes but still ran into problems with the range of readings the original electronics could understand (requiring quite a lot of programming around to get working properly) so eventually ran larger ones from other cars. Thankfully Ferrari begun to use larger AFM's on the F599, 612 and 430 so the CS also got these larger AFM's. This meant that at the higher revs' the power drop off present in the 360 Modena was no longer a problem. Power usually begins to tail off in the early 8,000 rev range on the smaller AFM's but in the larger AFM's power continues on for at least another 600-700 rpm gaining more power as a result. Further refinements where gleaned from Challenge engineers when they discoverd that stripping off the metal mesh improved airflow disturbance issues further still. It was also noted that on the 360 these metal mesh 'air stream flow equalizers' where in fact not required due to to the design of the 360 and 430's airboxes in the first place. Remember these AFM's are stock industry parts off the shelf and used in other cars. 'Corrugated' Flexible Hoses After the AFM's came the corrugated flexible hoses which lose about 5hp too as they also disturb the airflow creating 'eddies' in the air. These can be replaced by smooth tubing and an easy 5hp. Restrictive Flow Throttle Bodies The final piece to the puzzle of restriction was the throttle bodies. Here the airflow was entering in such a way that at high revs the restriction to air intake is like hitting a concrete wall. The challenge engine engineers discovered that by modifying the thottle bodies with some careful machining of swirls into them they could overcome the high airflow restrictions and allow the engine to develop significantly more power. With a remap for more fuel this equated to another 30hp over a CS. Exhaust Ferrari already did a lot of the hardwork on the exhausts and discovered that 5 valves helped to get the exhaust gasses out more quickly so the only thing left to do was reduce back pressure by fitting sport free flowing exhaust and free flowing cats. Final result was 450hp. Dyno verified out of the 3.6 @ 9,000 revs! So for all you people out there who believe you can get 440hp out of just a 'remap' on a 360 think again. It requires a lot of painstaking effort but it can be done. Its allerged that Ferrari bench tested all 360 engines at 10,000 rpm for 2 hours as part of their factory soak testing. Next steps to go even further would be to use some of the more recent technology such as ion sensing detonation sensors (as found on the Scud) then increase the compression ratio through a new set of pistons and a perhaps a switch to custom mapping such as a Motec system. Interestingly if Ferrari had pursued the 3.6 further (insteading of switching to the Maserati origin engine found in the 430) and added direct injection it would have been possible to achieve similar power outputs out of the 3.6 liters than they achieved with 4.3 litres. In the end I guess it was far easier and cheaper to go to larger capacity rather than investing yet more effort in refining the relatively small cc engine. Also it would have no doubt been a much harder sell to convince people that a new car based on the same 360 engine was a significantly different too considering how many parts they ended up sharing (chassis, roof, doors, suspension, etc.). Bigger cc vs higher revs also means effortless torque too but it changes the character of the car and how you drive one almost completely. It all comes back to the fact that the engineers really did a great job on the CS, styling, aero, engine, the lot, and you can thank Challenge Racing series for a lot of what made the CS what it is today. Its been fascinating learning about what these Challenge boys where upto though!
Wow! That is a great write up Trev. You took me back to school! I installed the Gruppe M air box system on my car. It has all the good points you mentioned. Smooth surface throughout the air box and it takes air from both sides. It also uses a heat shield and a wrap all my test pipes from the manifold to the exhaust with a high temp heat wrap. It also uses K&N big and conic filters. The only bad thing is that the sytems weights 14 pound over 10 of the stock system. I notice a better response at low and high revs. Some people thinks that it s waste f money but step by step you will achieving great results! Thanks again for such a great information.
Trev, I am truely amazed on how you are going through every aspect and how you are covering every detail. GREAT work. I never even thought of the following question until after reading your last post. question is: I have a 360 spider and want to install the F430 mirrors (just because I like the look / massing / design and want to paint them the same color as the car. So getting stradale carbon mirrors and painting them dont make a lot of financial sense). Will the airflow be reduced by changing to F430 OEM mirrors and will I have overheating issues. thanks in advance again, fantastic project !!! !!!
Ferrari designed the mirrors on the F430 to be much less aerodynamically challenged than on the 360 so you shouldn't have problems The mirrors have specially profiled twin mounting arms that channel air flow to the engine intakes!
okay so here is my question. on my cs how do i go about doing these things. . "The 360 engine is more than capable of producing a dyno verified 450 BHP (!!!!)... but it requires; a) Modified CS/430/599 AFM's (Air Flow Meters) ... Removal of the metal mesh from the AFM's improves air flow and isn't required on the 360 anyway, its a throwback to the design being an 'off the shelf' component used on other cars. b) Modified ECU remapping (with upped rev limited) c) Speciallly Machined Throttle bodies (machined with a swirl design to stop a restrictive airflow from stopping more power). d) High Flow BMC air filters e) High flow cats f) High flow exhaust With this setup and overlap valve timing for the intake and exhaust 450 BHP is very much on the cards..."
Derek, On the CS your already very close @ 425bhp. Read my long post #253, your missing just a few things. The main ones being machined throttle bodies and a remap. I'll see if I can get a part-exchange programme sorted out with the Challenge race engineers I talked to last week. After fitting modified air optimized throttle bodies you'll need a remap to take advantage of the extra air.
Nobody sell's 'em yet. They where developed by UK challenge race support teams. I'll make some enquires!
Few pics [update]. Also on the cards a swap from CS brakes to 430 Challenge / Scud ones. As well as 430 ch center locking with 2 sets of wheels. 1 road tires, 1 set pirelli pzero racing slicks [for track use only]. Only problem with Center lock nuts is that only garages equipped with tools to service an Enzo/430Ch can take the wheels off/on! Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
That's fantastic! Were there any upstream changes that had to be made to the braking system? (e.g. larger master cylinder, ABS software/ECU, etc.) Is there a bias valve in the stock system, and if so, did that have to be swapped out to the 430Ch / Scud ones?
Trev, awesome car and I WILL get that Timate this autumn and replace my Tubi. Have you got any details for those alloys on the oics above please? I'm keen to put 19s on mine and like the look of those! Cheers
Trev, I talked to a buddy of mine who said at the Porsche dealership over here that services the Carrerra GT ect, said they torque wheels, untorque re torque in a sequence. I think this is cause of dot standards? I have seen old lug guns for sale from previous race shops. they have two for both sides since its a reverse thread on the right side. May be something worth looking into. I know those guns can pack down those center lugs good. and most of them come with the socket. or you can find one to match or make a nut to match socket.
did you happen to get any video trev? I really want to see how the timate sounds! i saw a video on youtube.. but there was to much other noise and the quality wasn't great.
Greg, Correct, as i mentioned on the center lock thread. Before they go on the car properly (I've already purchased the parts so I'm committed now!) I am having my center lock wheels refinished in a color similar to the Scud's Titanium alloy wheel finish. Looks better to my eyes than very bright silver. Also still verifying everything electronically WRT the ABS wheel speed sensors and physical fit on a 360 wheel hub. If not I have to source 430 hub carriers too. Ho hum, even more cost. The center lock conversion is complicated and not for the faint hearted, its big investment in time and money and costs a lot but the results from both a unsprung performance of the center bells you can use (600g vs 2kg's per wheel) are worthwhile and ofcourse they look just astonishingly good. It also allows you to go wider with tires than on the scud so you get better grip at the front end. Here's a pic of the seats now fitted with 430 Scuderia alcantara harness pads. These OMP Challenge seats are fantastically supportive and the multipoint harnesses really offer so much more control of your body motions that you feel more in control during cornering. They work far better than I'd envisaged, yes, even on the road. Its a little bit more difficult getting past the high seat bolsters compared to my original road biased 360 Carbon sports seats but the benefits in weight reduction and outright support. If I am fair I would say overall they definately don't make very good everyday seats because it would be a pain getting in and out a lot but for a car which is used sparingly or for longer distances they actually work really well. I've upgraded the back support foam in my seats for some expensive 'memory foam' and they now feel super comfortable and I think they look excellent. IMHO these seats should have been a factory option on the CS. Trouble is unlike the road cf seats, these don't come in large lol. More progress on interior. Today hoping to pull the upper dash and recover in alcantara. Already lower dash has been recovered so getting close now. Image Unavailable, Please Login
I'll post some vids asap. I've got a fantastic Sony full hd 1080 (1920x1080i) handycam here so I should be able to get good quality.
