Oh and just to do a side by side comparo.

Here are the Rear Espelir's I had on the car:



Here are the Swifts. No comparison.

 

looks like you have a great combo shawn..

hows the ride, and where do you have the shocks set?

swift, koni and rb.. good job..

beers

 

I haven't played with the shocks yet. The fronts are on full soft and the rears are on 25% from full soft right now so no change.

Honestly the Konis are a bit harsher than I'd like around town. The initial jounce is more jarring than I'd like over potholes and broken pavement. It was that way with the OEM springs too. I suppose it could be the sways as well. It's tough to tell since I put them both on at the same time.

Either way though it feels great on the corners which is what's important.

I love the flatness in the corners and the reduced body movement during braking is excellent!

 

Now THIS is an informative post for this forum! A+! Great details! Vote V74 for Pres!

Not sure of your alignment game plan however you will get even more gains by adding more camber. Add as much as your comfortable with. I have experienced a large reduction in body roll with an increased spring rate and the new weak link become grip. As a general rule of thumb (my rule of thumb), spirited road course driving on a stock suspenion with a decent driver results in the tires rolling over and the tire contact patch decreases in size. My guestimate is that pushing these cars (when I drive them) reveal the next weak link which is the tire contact patch. Pushing stock cars that have big tire roll over use only about 1/3 of the tire contact patch. Increasing camber can help this.

Happy motoring. GREAT post.

 

Talking out of my ***, basically, but I experienced the same with my Konis and I think there's too much rebound (especially as you start turning them up) and not enough compression. Shocks valved to match your springs better would theoretically produce a nicer ride over the bumps while retaining that nice cornering feel.

 

Sorry for the extra long delay: we run 26.25 +/- all the way around. Any lower (for us) and we are not legal (too low).

E

 

Thanks for the vote of confidence Eric.

I was thinking at starting around -2 camber in the front and -1.5 in the rear and then taking tire temp measurements from there to see which direction I should go. Right now I have -.9 in the front and -1.3 in the rear and have understeer at steady state on a turning circle.

 

Wow, I have -1.7 on the front and -1.5 on the rear and I'm not experiencing understear at all. In fact, I can make the back kick out on demand. I do not have aftermarket anti-sway bars though.

I started my own thread about the koni sports and racingbeat springs. But since I said I'd report back in after autocross here I am. Yesterday while autocrossing the car handled unbelievably well. The only thing that happened worth mentioning(besides kicking A$$) is on my last run I heard 2 loud thumps. In the middle of a corner there were 2 drop offs in the road and each of them produced a thump. I might of hit the bump stops when that happened.

 

Good to know. I'll talk to my alignment guy and see what he thinks between your current settings and my thinking. Since my camber is higher in the back it makes sense that I'm understeering. Hopefully to be cured this week.

 

good answer mom!

did the right thing..

beers

 

This logic is not correct.

 

I will add that its probably the super stiff Racingbeat anti-sway bar up front that is causing all the understeer.

But I'm guessing you are using racingbeat endlinks as well so you probably can't go back to stock to try the theory out. If you do go back to stock(maybe drill out the stock anti-sway bar) do front and rear.

 

The RB front and rear should result in an even balance...they did when I had them on my car.

You can go back to the stock endlinks with a bushing that is easily available...or you can drill out the stock bar like you said

 

Hi Eric. Thanks for the email. I'll copy over my thinking in this thread for the benefit of the group.

A couple of weeks ago I was at a track event and had access to a skidpad turning circle and an instructor. We did a wet turning circle test in both directions to test the behavior of the car as it loses grip under hard cornering and acceleration. I found that the car would start to break the front tires free first in a choppy light skid manner. I could let up on the throttle and the front wheels would bite and then get back on it and they would start to slide out. Same with the steering. I could unwind a little and the car would bite and so on.

So I concluded my car with my current alignment of -.9 camber in the front and -1.3 in the rear had a tendency to understeer. I thought that would be consistent with what you were teaching in that more camber in the rear was giving me a larger contact patch in the rear and more grip than in the front. So I was going to try and turn up the camber in the front to see if I could balance out the grip a bit more.

Please let me know where my logic is off so I can have a better understanding. I'm bringing the car in for an alignment tomorrow morning and hope to have a meaningful conversation with the technician that will be performing the alignment.

 

Okay I had the alignment done yesterday at Tru-Line of Seattle. A good group of guys that know their stuff and do a great job.

they aligned my car with my body weight loaded in the drivers seat. They can corner balance but since my suspension doesn't have that feature they couldn't CB mine.

Here is what they gave me based on my feedback that the car was understeering on the previous settings:

LF Camber: -1.64deg.
LF Caster: 7.34deg.
LF toe: -0.5mm

RF Camber: -1.69deg.
RF Caster: 7.38deg.
RF toe: -0.5mm

Total front Toe: -1mm
Steer ahead 0.00deg

LR camber: -1.72deg
LR Toe 0.4mm
RR camber: -1.73deg
RR toe: 0.4mm
total toe: 0.8mm
Thrust angle: 0.00deg

I told them I was thinking about -1.5 to -1.7 in the front and a little less camber in the rear to dial out the understeer. As you can see they gave me slightly more camber in the rear than in the front but it's pretty close. They decided to give me a little toe out in the front to try and dial out the understeer. It's the first I have heard of useing toe out in this manner so we'll see what happens. I was hoping to have them just adjust the camber and not play with the toe since now I won't know what actually affected the handling performance but if it works it works.

I'm going to try to take it to a parking lot somewhere secluded this afternoon and see how it breaks free.

 

quick question: does negative toe mean toe-in or toe-out?

 

Negative is out, positive is in.

 

Tyrant

Please Call Asap

E-money

317.752.9358 Any Time But Hurry

Please No Other Cars

Go Colts.

 

haha ok. For some reason i thought it was the other way around and your alignment was booboo'd up ^_^

 

How do you find the toe out in the front...I found it twitchy on the street with really wide tires...but liked the turn in on the track

I went back to 0 toe after a while for the street

 

Don't really know yet. I haven't had a chance to take it for a good drive. I Put the winter tires on Jenn's 3 and ran some errands in it so I didn't get a chance to work it out. I'm a little nervous about that so we'll see.

 

Eric it was really cool talking to you on the phone. Thanks for taking the time to say hi and talk.

Let's keep in touch and definitely let us know how your racing adventures go in the upcoming season.

 

when I had a little toe out in the front, the car roadlined (is that the right term?) a lot. Im back at zero toe myself.

 

Tramlined

 

I just took it out for a spin on the highway and through E. Mercer Way. It feels really solid and doesn't seem to tramline on the highway so I think the toe out I have will be okay. Through the light corners it feels well mannered and smooth. We'll have to see how it reacts when I can get it out on a track.