Report from Motorsport News, June 4th - Steve Wilkinson:
'Steve Broughton returned to the fray after a long absence through injury. His new OMS was suffering from gear selection problems throughout the weekend, het he still made both run-offs, collecting his first points of the season & getting in some useful mileage as he dialled in his latest mount.'
The new SBD Motorsport OMS/JADE Single seater will be out competing this season with a new 1396cc Suzuki Hayabusa engine producing 251bhp/122lbft.
The original engine used for testing and all events up to Goodwood at the beginning of June was a standard Suzuki GSXR 1300cc Hayabusa, the only changes were external to the engine. We used our own fuel rail design and an MBE 992 ECU, which had been specially developed for use on bike engines.
The 992 was designed to run sequential fuel and sequential ignition, which is required for high revving bike engines. A special piece of software was also written by MBE called soft start, this was produced due to known problem with the standard starter motors, that if the battery got a bit low sometimes the engine would kick back on starting and engage the starter clutch. This would, if you were lucky only damage the starter clutch itself, but if unlucky could break off part of the engine cases. Without going into too much detail, the ECU allows the engine to get up to speed during cranking before attempting to start the engine, if the engine does not reach sufficient speed it will not allow the engine to start, so damage can not occur.
The 992 is generally designed to allow the user to optimise the fuel & ignition settings to get the best out of an engine. It uses USB communication from your laptop, which is then converted by a small piece of hardware (985) that converts the USB in CAN, which is a more stable system, used by car manufacturers worldwide. The 992 has upgradeable software that can be downloaded by the user or returned to us. There are many additional functions the 992 can also control, not all the functions have been finalised at the time of writing this, but to list just a few (all additional functions in the ECU are free of charge, however it should be noted for some functions it may necessary to make complex additions to your existing wiring harness) Shift light, Rad fan control, Power shift & Launch control.
We are developing a new ECU, the MBE 998, to run in conjunction with the 992. The two ECUs talk via a CAN link, this allows the 998 to do Gear box control, Data logging & Lambda control. This information the 998 is able to generate is then transmitted to the 992, which allows the fuel mixture to be continually monitored and adjusted by the 992. The wheel speed information that the 998 produces, is also used by the 992 to control Traction.
The 2006 season began with a change in colour to the OMS, along with new improved taper throttle bodies & more improvements to the MBE management system.
View the 2006 Season. Steve was 3rd Overall & won the Racing Car 1100-1600cc Class in the British Sprint Championship 2006. Kim won the Patsy Burt Trophy 2006 (British Sprint Championship Ladies Trophy).
At the Brighton Speed Trials, Steve qualified for the Top 6 run-off & came 1st in Class. Kim won the Chater Lea Trophy for Ladies FTD.
Shown right is Steve sprinting the new OMS at Goodwood in April 2005. Picture:Kim Kingham
View the 2005 Season, when Steve once again won the Racing Car 1100-1600cc Class & acheived 7th Overall in the British Sprint Championship 2005.
In 2005, we got a new carbon-fibre tub OMS, but maintained the Suzuki GSXR 1300cc Hayabusa. The MBE management (see below) & gearbox control system was retained, although this has been refined over the last year & continues to be improved in the years ahead. The engine now has our own design of taper throttle bodies, to improve performance.
In Speedscene April/June2004, Paul Parker had this to say about the new electronics;
"The cleverest piece of kit I've seen so far this year (although it's only April as I write this!) is the SBD electronics set up. Like pre 2004 F1 cars it incorporates traction control, fully automatic up-shift (hit the pre-determined rev limit and it performs the up change seamlessly for you) and fully automatic downshift (when revs drop to safe level it will down change, with the requisite throttle blips to avoid rear end locks-ups). It means that you need only concentrate on your two a pedals and your steering wheel in our branch of motorsport, where fractions of a second count, total concentration on your lines and braking/acceleration points has to be a bonus. The gear changes are made with compressed air bottles (about six inches long by about an inch and a half diameter) that are switched between runs and refilled from a diving bottle. I already know of one competitor who is going to have this equipment fitted ASAP and I am sure others will follow"
In true last minute style, we made it to Lydden at Easter, where despite the weather Steve brought the new car home first in the opening round of the British Sprint Championship.
New
software was being produced in conjunction with MBE Systems to allow the
car to automatically up-shift & downshift. This took many months of
work & testing. Two test days at Curborough were arranged, the first
in February with temperatures only just reaching above freezing all day.
This allowed us to check the set up of the car and try out the new gear
change mechanism, which utilises compressed air to power the gear change
action including blipping the throttle for the down change.
The second time in March, MBE specialists Steve Baker & Jody England were on hand with their laptops. Steve Broughton took the car round the circuit many times, coming in for software refinements.
