2010 Front Bulkhead Bracing Question

[Bruno Verde]

Hello,
We are a new team from Mexico in the process of finishing designing our 2010 car for FSAE West and I had some doubts about the front bulkhead supports. The rules state a minimum of 3 triangulated node to node members from the front bulkhead to the front hoop, but for packaging reasons and mainly the location of the damper and rocker the load paths for the bracing are not direct and composed of more than the 3 members but ultimately route to the front hoop.
I saw the examples in the 2010_Front_bulkheadsupport.xls (from fsaeonline.com) but the cases dont explicitly show if its posible to do it this way or if the supports must be more direct?



The image is attached:



http://imgur.com/RHzrE.jpg

Thank you,

Bruno Verde
FSAE UNAM

[poe21]

I don't know. Any answer you get here won't count if you make it to competition and they tell you it is incorrect, and you have to try and mig weld some bracing via a generator (not an easy task). Send it to the rules committee, and ask them and they will be happy to tell you whether it passes or not. That's what we did when we had a question. Hope this helps.

[Bruno Verde]

Thank you for replying, I already sent the question to the rule committee but was wondering as its not a new 2010 rule if anyone had any advice.
Thank you,
Bruno Verde
FSAE UNAM

[coastertrav]

It looks like you should pass. If not post back up here as to why.

[t21jj]

Originally posted by coastertrav:
It looks like you should pass. If not post back up here as to why.

+1 It looks like you have 3 that will pass but I'd ask the rules committee for a final answer.

[Adambomb]

Yep...I can remember AT LEAST once where we had front bulkhead supports that looked like they should pass, then we ran into problems at tech. Luckily we had a printout of the email from rules committee stating it was OK.

[t21jj]

Originally posted by Adambomb:
Yep...I can remember AT LEAST once where we had front bulkhead supports that looked like they should pass, then we ran into problems at tech. Luckily we had a printout of the email from rules committee stating it was OK.

I was there for that in 06, had we not saved and printed out those emails with the rules committee we would have had to modify the chassis at competition.

Always save and bring to competition any correspondence that you have with the rules committee.

[Bruno Verde]

Thank you for the replies, I´ll wait for the official verdict then.

Bruno Verde
FSAE UNAM

[fixitmattman]

According to the older version of the .xls file I have (Frnt_Bulkhd_Spt_Triangulation_Drgs-1.xls) from the rules website you look fine to me on the bulkhead triangluation. Although if I were you I'd double check the upper front bulkhead to front roll hoop rules, pretty sure the intent is that if multiple tubes are used they need to be colinear.

[Hector]

Originally posted by t21jj:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Adambomb:
Yep...I can remember AT LEAST once where we had front bulkhead supports that looked like they should pass, then we ran into problems at tech. Luckily we had a printout of the email from rules committee stating it was OK.

I was there for that in 06, had we not saved and printed out those emails with the rules committee we would have had to modify the chassis at competition.

Always save and bring to competition any correspondence that you have with the rules committee. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Still, make sure to interpret on the conservative side. I know of a team a couple years ago that had their official rules committee emails printed, and they were STILL denied during tech-in. They had to weld some stuff onto their frame overnight to pass tech. It seemed dirty to me that they were approved through the rules committee and were denied at comp, but so it goes...

[Bazanaius]

we had a very similar design in 09, and passed at UK and Germany without any problems, but ultimately as people have said the rules committee have the last word. If they fail you I'd also be interested if you could post their response.

cheers!

[ivanovich]

Hola Bruno, soy miembro de mi equipo FSAE de la UAEMex. Como ya varios miembros del foro te han dicho, pues es mejor esperar a ver que te dicen los del comite de reglas. pasa lo mismo con el de nosotros, los bracings no llegan a un nodo en el main hoop. Yo no soy el encargado de chasis en mi equipo pero te dejo mi correo y de esta forma te contacto con el para que puedas comentarle esto.

perezlivan@hotmail.com

saludos....

UAEMex Racing Team.