Manifold Data

[cendiv37]

Linked here are an Excel spreadsheet, and images of the individual worksheets from the spreadsheet that contain the manifold data that the committee received from FV drivers and engine builders, manifold makers, etc. A Word document is also linked that explains each measurement.

Download the Excel spreadsheet and the (Word Document) description of the measurements as they were requested in the letter to the FV community here: http://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B9_s9jA ... NmVj&hl=en
You can view the Word Doc online or download it. The Excel spreadsheet loses it's formatting (which is important) when converted to a Google Doc so I'm making you download the actual file and open it in Excel.

If you don’t have Excel, download the images of the charts and a snapshot of the data from the spreadsheet here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/cendiv37v/D ... directlink

Understanding the spreadsheet:

The first tab is labeled Manifold Data and includes the actual measurement data summarized in a form that hopefully makes it understandable. Each row contains the measurements from a single manifold. The columns each contain a different piece of data for each manifold as labeled at the top of the sheet. “Largest OD in Bend” is the largest diameter found in either bend of the manifold. “Largest Avg OD in Bend” is the larger of a single average OD taken from each bend of the manifold (1-2 side or 3-4 side). This is calculated by averaging the largest OD found on that side with the smallest OD measured at that same location along the tubing. See the linked Word document for a fuller description of what this means. The data is sorted from low to high for the “Largest OD in Bend” column which puts most of the “largest” manifolds at the bottom.

In green cells below the data itself are the dimensional limits that could be used to limit further manifold development. Once you load up the spreadsheet in Excel, you can change the values in the green cells. Just select the cell, type a new number and press enter. When you do so, the formatting of the data will change to highlight the out of spec. manifolds for that dimension. That is, if you set "Minimum Bend2Bend" at 18.5, all Bend2Bend measurements less than 18.5 will become red. In addition, the word Disallowed will appear in the column to the left of the data for each manifold that becomes no-compliant for this measurement. Playing with the all of the numbers in green allows you look at the effect of different possible limits.

Directly below the green cells are two cells containing the total number of manifolds (in red) that would be disallowed for any given set of new dimensional controls. The first one (labeled at its left) assumes a no-go system would be used in the bend OD with the limit as set in cell B136. The next cell (below) is an estimate (usually correct) of the number of manifolds that would be disallowed if an average OD (two measurements) was used to determine compliance with the limit set as in cell B137. This allows you to compare no-go limits vs. an average limit. Note that this average is NOT the same as a multiple measurement average in the bend as has been proposed by the manifold makers. It is however, the only “average” type data we have on real manifolds and is therefore our only way to compare the two options.

The cells to the right of those contain the number of manifolds out of compliance by measurement type (column label at the top of the sheet). Note that a manifold is counted as disallowed only once if it violates more than one dimensional limit. Therefore the total disallowed is not equal to the total of the numbers to the right if them.

All of the worksheets are locked so you can only change the numbers in the green cells. If you want to really mess around, you can unlock any of the sheets. If you try to change a locked cell, it will give you a warning. Within the warning are directions as to how to unlock the worksheet. The password is “fv” (no quotes). I suggest you make a back-up copy of the spreadsheet before you do this!

The other tabs (sheet) contain histograms for each data type (Bend2Bend, Carb Flange Height, etc.) These allow you to look at the distribution of the data. The blue columns represent the number (Frequency) of manifolds in that range. The pink line is the accumulated percentage of manifolds to the left of the measurement. For instance it shows that there are very few manifolds that measure less than 18” from bend to bend but that there are a bunch that are right at 18 inches bend to bend. These graphs help you get a visual feel of how the data is distributed.

I hope this helps you understand how the committee evaluated the data we received and maybe helps you understand why we have chosen the limits we have proposed to the FSR/C and CRB. As stated in our earlier minutes, the greatest difficulty we had was in determining what "Current State of the Art" really means.

Bruce

PS: I have tried explain this adequately in this post, however, I expect questions and will answer them as best I can as they come up.

[FV80]

I would hope that those of you that are interested in this can appreciate the time and effort that Bruce put in to developing this spreadsheet. It is quite sophisticated and took MANY HOURS to build. Many of you have called the Committee 'Self Serving', but we really did do our best to analyze what data we could get and make a recommendation that was the best for the class overall. Our lone manifold builder on the Committee answered questions for us, but did not participate in the voting that led to the dimension decisions we made for our RECOMMENDATION.
Steve, FV80

[FV80]

The following emails from the Registry are still bouncing. If you know any of these people, please tell them to send me their current email address so I can update their info.
There will probably be a few more in the next hour or so. (I'll update this list).
-37 count-
oldveeracer@verizon.net
sinbar09@net.net
keith.lawrence@fedex.com
skwasnick@hotmail.com
pfovick@neo.rr.com
albrechtkuss@freenet.de
thevillageanvil@aol.com
scott@metrocpa.com
j.wilt@sbcglobel.net
mkondrla@oakvalleyfarms.com
leroyengineer@charter.net
Ruckman@mountain.net
dustin.hodges@sprint.blackberry.com
beau1150@earthlink.net
richard.w.johnson@delphi.com
smattox@tampabay.rr.com
aharrington@sunpurelabs.com
flymustang61@yahoo.com
chris@r-motorsports.com
jimyule@compuserve.com
**all these just came in, but I suspect an AOL problem - I'm pretty sure these addresses are good ... at least most of them, but I don't know if they actually received the email or not.
RMVR53@aol.com
fv33v@aol.com
bposner60@aol.com
tabbott25@aol.com
fishracers@aol.com
fvridgerunner@aol.com
SCTHAL@aol.com
greshea@aol.com
jvfv35@aol.com
OUTOFWACKBACK@aol.com
RLWhits@aol.com
Bubbree@aol.com
HarryOkOk@aol.com
ProtoformF@aol.com
p1hugh@aol.com
FV63@aol.com
JIMRFV31@aol.com

tks,
Steve
PS - we hit the magic 400 mark for Registrants yesterday . 184 list ACTIVE/SCCA/FV

[SR Racing]

Steve,

Bruce certainly did do a nice job...

BTW, most of your bounced emails are in my customer files, so I looked them all up to see if I could help. But I have the SAME email addresses that you have for them. Since I don't send out any direct mailings to them, I wouldn't know if they are good or not. But when they order that address is used for UPS notification. I haven't gotten rejects via that route, but maybe UPS doesn't notify me.

Jim

[rphillips]

Wow, if this data is representative of the entire Vee community than 30% of the manifolds out there are illegal. Definitely a higher percantage than I thought it would be.

Ray

[rphillips]

Whoops, I screwed up. I was adding the 20 and the 18 in the spreadsheet to get 38 dissallowed. I guess it is one or the other so it is actually about 15%.

Ray

[FV80]

Ray - technically (according to SCCA) *NONE* of those manifolds are illegal ... YET. I don't know what parameters you are testing - nor have I looked to see what Bruce shipped it with, but if you enter the numbers that we recommended to SCCA, I think you'll find that very few are eliminated. THAT seemed to be what the community was wanting, but we REALLY wanted to make it STOP HERE!

Steve, FV80

[cendiv37]

Ray,

That's correct, it's either one or the other, not both. The reason for showing both is to give some kind of comparison between an averaging method vs. a no-go method. But our average was a 2 measurement average of the max and min OD taken just at the point of the maximum OD in each bend.

Again, we have no data on existing manifolds using the averaging method proposed by the manifold makers (1.080" average of multiple measurements in the bends).

Steve,

I "shipped it" with the numbers set to the proposed new limits and the bend OD limits set to 1.1 (no-go) and 1.08 average which is what Ray is commenting on. this is also the "snapshot" of the data sheet available as an image to those who cannot view it in Excel.

So indeed, these numbers (20 and 18) represent about 15% of the manifolds we received data on becoming illegal as of 2011. That is at the heart of the controversy over what really is "Current State of the Art".

[rphillips]

Hi Steve,

I haven't changed any of the numbers and it looks like the numbers that are there equal the committee recomendations. However, there are a bunch of manifolds with "disallowed" by them in red and two different totals:

Total Disallowed Using Max OD: 20 (line 140)
Total Disallowed Using Avg OD: 18 (line 141)

Am I interpreting this data incorrectly? Btw, my manifold is legal.

Ray

[rphillips]

Hi Bruce,

I guess we were responding at the same time -- thanks for the verification.

Ray