Sterling Kit Car

[arcosine]

I wonder if it would do a wheelie.

[wmjinman]

Originally Posted by arcosine

I wonder if it would do a wheelie.

Very perceptive of you! As time went by, that began to be one of my concerns. The Porsche transmission was about 1.5 inches longer than the VW tranny, so it put the engine's flywheel that much farther back. Then the 6 cylinder Corvair engine was longer than the VW engine, so that put the very back end of it even further back.

That's where I actually began to learn fiberglass construction/repair techniques, because I had to extend the back end 5 inches farther than "stock" so the engine would fit inside it.

Then to compound that, the Corvair engine was about 100 lbs. heavier than the VW engine. As I was rolling it around in my parents' back yard while working on it - without the front-mounted battery in it yet - I was almost able to lift the front wheels off the ground by hand.

So yes, I believe it would have been able to do a wheelie, and probably a LOT more easily than I would have wanted. With the battery in, and someone sitting in the seat, it would have been a little better, but I suspect it still would've been "too light in the front" for good handling.

[freebeard]

Even if you kept the front wheels on the ground, the handling in corners would be 'Tatra-like'.

[wmjinman]

Originally Posted by freebeard

Even if you kept the front wheels on the ground, the handling in corners would be 'Tatra-like'.

I don't know what "Tatra-like" is because I don't know much about Tatras, but if it means turning the front wheels wouldn't change your direction of travel under acceleration, then yeah, that's what I was fearing.

At this point, I don't even know what I'm gonna do with the thing. 30 years ago, getting it going was all I could think about & what I spent all my spare time on. Now I don't hardly even think about it, even though I see it whenever I look out the back window. I thought about trying to sell it, but I don't know if I could even get enough for it to make it worthwhile. In the meantime, the '66 Corsa engine is an antique, and at the rate I'm going, the whole thing will be! HAH!! Guess I should try to finish it & get it on the road, but just seem to lack the ambition. - so it goes -

[freebeard]

Tatra (company) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

After the 1938 invasion of Czechoslovakia by Nazi Germany, Tatras continued in production, largely because Germans liked the cars. Many German officers met their deaths driving heavy, rear-engined Tatras faster around corners than they could handle. At the time, as an anecdote, Tatra became known as the 'Czech Secret Weapon' for the scores of officers who died behind the wheel; at one point official orders were issued forbidding German officers from driving Tatras.

Catastrophic oversteer, similar to when you back off the throttle in a corner with a fast Porsche.

[wmjinman]

Oversteer or understeer? I always thought that if the car's nose didn't move sufficiently in response to the turning of the front wheels, that was "understeer". But if the thing tended to turn enough to make the rearend swing out, that was OVERSTEER. Do I have it backwards?

[some_other_dave]

No, you've got it right. But the mass in the back of the car would tend to make the back swing out in a corner, especially if the throttle were closed in the middle of it.

-soD

[wmjinman]

Oh, ok. Guess I've never aggressively driven a tail-heavy car, so I wasn't familiar with the back coming out in a corner if you lift off the gas. I can see where it would "upset" the balance though, shifting more weight (and traction) to the front tires, while all that mass in the back is trying to go straight instead of following the path of the rear tires, which suddenly have less traction.

[freebeard]

It can come in handy when you're making U-turns.

But you have to touch the brakes to transfer weight to the front. I think it has to do with the mass of the car rotating around an imaginary line drawn through the roll center height at each axle. But I could be wrong.

[aerohead]

Originally Posted by wmjinman

Oh, ok. Guess I've never aggressively driven a tail-heavy car, so I wasn't familiar with the back coming out in a corner if you lift off the gas. I can see where it would "upset" the balance though, shifting more weight (and traction) to the front tires, while all that mass in the back is trying to go straight instead of following the path of the rear tires, which suddenly have less traction.

I'm pretty certain that the fella who test drove my CRX was killed by what Freebeard refers to as catastrophic oversteer when the engine blew in a Mercedes he was testing while cornering at the Bridgestone/Firestone Proving Grounds.
If he had been in a 4-wheel power-drift at the time of the engine failure,he would have lost all chance of controlling the car.