DIY Suspension Software development Excel/Scilab?

[Dean4.0]

Hi,

I´m interested in suspension design software for a hobby race car development project.

The reason is i know software like optimumK, ADAMS, IPG Carmaker, and so on but there are expensive and too powerfull.

For me i need some software where i can put in my hardpoint and calculate and visualise the basic Kinematic movement and Values:

Caster
Kingpin
Camber change bump and roll
Steering
toe in bump

etc.... all the basic stuff.

After that it will come more complex step by step to integrate more feature in future when needed.

The goal is to develop a basic sportscar (kind ofLMP style or something like that for a friend) and to understand more and more the design process.

The other reason is to tune a production car and analyse it for autocross and hillclimb.

The software i have is MS Excel 2010, Scilab (but i m not familliar with it)
Books i can borrow is RCVD.

So can anybody help me or can give me some paper Tutorials how to calculate the suspension movement and so on and model the calculation in Excel to start it?

What are the basic?
What is the best way to start that project?

Or is there anywhere a free Suspension software to get the basic values?


Thank you

[Tim.Wright]

Have a look at DynatuneXL. Its based in Excel but seems to be pretty powerful. Not free but I think it starts at around 20€$£ if I remember correctly.

[Greg Locock]

If you are only interested in double wishbone geometry then the free and excellent COSINE.BAS aka WISHBONE.BAS

- an ancient and rather ugly text based suspension analysis package for QBASIC. It is designed for SLAs, or double wishbones. Works well. It does not generate curves, it just moves your hardpoints and tells you what the new toe, camber, jounce etc is. With care and dedication this is capable of excellent results.
New version with diagram
http://www.locostusa.com/yahoo/Wishbone_setup.exe
Old version with source code, needs qbasic or quickbasic
http://www.mgbv8.co.uk/frontsus.htm

Excel is not quite ideal, unless you are a reasonably advanced Excel user or are happy with VBA.

In general you are tring to do on a computer what used to be done on a drawing board, I don't think it is practical to teach that in a forum post.

On the rare occasions I am developing a double wishbone I use cosine.bas and plot the curves in excel.