Hi people, this is my design of a mid engined chassis, building with 1.5 x 0.1 inch 4130 round tube as well as some square tube. It is a track only car, homebrew cars like these cannot get legally registered in my country.
It's my first time designing a big project like this and I'm also quite new to welding and fabrication. So my main design goals are driver safety and ease of construction. At the meantime I'll try to make it as lightweight as possible and achieve good torsional rigidity (which is guesswork for now, I don't have the access or knowledge to do fancy FEA software)
Anyhow the construction started like half a year ago but I stopped because of the covid19 and other things in life... which is also a good time to revisit the design and thought it definitely needed some changes before I get back on with construction
this is what it looks like now (or for the past 2 months)
and here is my design, for now
It probably looks very crude compared to many of the amazing builds I'm seeing on this forum, which is why I could really use some honest opinion from you guys
the front subframe
and the roll hoop area/ rear subframe and engine bay
my own thoughts:
so the first thing that comes to mind is that it needs a roll hoop in the front, along with the rear hoop, provides enough protection to the driver in case of a rollover. it looks like too much weight in the back, but at the same time the engine/rear frame sill looks flimsy... I don't like how the front subframe (the reverse trapezoid box) connects to the main frame. seems weak and also the subframe itself is unnecessarily heavy.
man this is hard