Setup Question To Suspension Gurus

[Sydneykid]

SK, thanks for all the tips. So you reckon all the druft-trendy steering lock enhancement options are all crap ? Like steering rack spacers, longer tie rods, modification of hubs/knuckles ?

I never said that the parts were crap, they do exactly what they are supposed to do, but you need to aware that you can't simply bolt them on and expect a perfect result. It wouLd be like fitting a good turbo to your car and then not tuning it. You will get a crappy result, but the turbo is still a good one.

Sorry to bother you with my questions, SK, but could you specify a desired ride height for A31 ? I tried to use R32 figures you posted before, maybe I'm wrong ?

It's been a while since I did a Cefi, from memory it was 360 mm front and 350 mm rear. Check it via the rake, it should be 10 mm nose down measured at the sills, just behind the front wheels and just in front of the rear wheels.

Cheers

Gary

[nisskid]

Let's start off this way, Robbie won last years Drift Australia Championship and I can assure you his car had bump steer correction carried out. Millen's car in the US Drift also the same. Using the parts is not the issue, it's what you do to correct the issues they create that's important. I have no idea whether the Jap guys do proper set up, all I know is they should. Jap circuits are extremely flat, plus they use tarmac not gravel likes we do, so bumps may not be the issue that they are here. But they are still an issue no matter where the track is.

I bolded and underlined predictability above, because that's exactly what bump steer takes away from you. Lossing a drift because the car hits a bump and steers itself is not what I consider a good idea. Maybe less guys would hit stuff if they removed the unpredicatablity.

Cheers

Gary

Robbie and Rhys arnt the best examples, they are prime examples of westernised drift, big power, big speed, big smoke, lazy transitions and soft entries. Can hardly compare a team which spends 100's of thousands on their cars to someone simply wanting a bit more lock on a budget.

i do agree, obviously in an ideal world where money grew on trees ud go for a more expensive option and iron out any bump steer, but if ur on a budget, money can be much better spent else where.

going a different rack will give u a bit more lock over the R32 rack, but not as much as the spacers give u, well from what ive been told, i havnt tried the 2. i can safely say from first hand experience the rack spacers made drifting a lot easier, for $10, its a bloody good budget modification.

[robots]

Bump steer is simple to measure. On the front, take the springs out, put the struts back in, stick the car on the wheel aligner and measure the toe change as you jack one wheel up and down. Ideally there should be any change in the toe. On the rear its even easier, you leave both the springs and shocks out. As for the front, stick the car on the wheel aligner and measure the toe change as you jack one wheel up and down. Ideally there shouldn't be any change in the toe.

Ackerman is also pretty simple to measure, put the car on the wheel aligner and measure how much toe out occurs as you turn the steering wheel. The more degrees of turn of the wheels the larger the amount of toe out should be. Simplistically 1 mm toe out for every 10 degrees of steering angle.

Cheers

Gary

Ok, I misinterpret your meaning about the steering rack mods. Now I got some questions about those particular paragraphs above.

One is how do you correct Bump steer ? And how do you correct Ackerman ? I assume "Simplistically 1 mm toe out for every 10 degrees of steering angle" the figures that you quoted are supposed to be normal or/and advised on a good handling car, right ?

The last question is: how do you correct Ackerman angle ?

If its too hard to explain it to me right now, can you pls point out some books/websites/articles that could get my understanding up to the level you can explain it freely to me ?

Thanks!

[KODE]

SYDNEY KID CAN YOU CONTACT ME !!! YOU`VE SENT ME THE WRONG SUSPENSION KIT. I HAVE R34 NOT R33. STOP IGONRING ME PLEASE.

[nisskid]

SYDNEY KID CAN YOU CONTACT ME !!! YOU`VE SENT ME THE WRONG SUSPENSION KIT. I HAVE R34 NOT R33. STOP IGONRING ME PLEASE.

he's pretty busy mate, he gets some ridiculous amount of PM's to go through, so usually theres a few days delay. probably better off giving them a call at their shop if it's urgent about a product u bought.

[Sydneykid]

SYDNEY KID CAN YOU CONTACT ME !!! YOU`VE SENT ME THE WRONG SUSPENSION KIT. I HAVE R34 NOT R33. STOP IGONRING ME PLEASE.

Nobody is ignoring you. We get 40 to 50 PM's and emails a day, sometimes I have to actually do some work so I don't get to answer every PM and email every day. But I can assure you every single PM and every single email gets answered in the order in which we receive them. Sticking posts in innapropriate threads won't help you jump the que.

Cheers

Gary

[Sydneykid]

Ok, I misinterpret your meaning about the steering rack mods. Now I got some questions about those particular paragraphs above.

One is how do you correct Bump steer ? And how do you correct Ackerman ? I assume "Simplistically 1 mm toe out for every 10 degrees of steering angle" the figures that you quoted are supposed to be normal or/and advised on a good handling car, right ?

The last question is: how do you correct Ackerman angle ?

If its too hard to explain it to me right now, can you pls point out some books/websites/articles that could get my understanding up to the level you can explain it freely to me ?

Thanks!

My library has the following, they are a good place to start;

Tune to Win - Carrol Smith

Drive to Win - Carrol Smith

Saloon Car Race Preparation - Nigel MacKnight

Performance Handling - Don Alexander

Competition Car Suspension - Allan Staniforth

Race Car Engineering & Mechanics - Paul Van Valkenburgh

I have found that there is no one book that covers all suspension areas, the ones that may on the surface appear to be out of date still have lots of relevance and even the heavily scientific ones have some basic stuff that anyone can grasp even if you ultimately ignore the formulas.

Cheers

Gary

[robots]

Thanks, Gary ! I will start looking for books you mentioned.