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Old 04-04-2000, 02:22 PM   #1
josh
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Question Getting car corner weighted-besides SPD's align #'s, any suggestions???

I am having my car corner weighted and alighned tomorrow, and was curious if anyone had any suggestions for alignment specs besides Mike's at SPD. I used his settings before, and like them. I am just curious if anyone had better luck with any other settings.

Also any hints or must do's for pre corner balance prep is appreciated.

keep in mind i have GAB coil overs, and Toyo Proxis T-1 Plus's. I need new tires soon, but that doesn't have anything to do with the balancing.

josh
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Old 04-04-2000, 02:26 PM   #2
Wintrode
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Try shooting an e-mail to Rallispec, they set Tony's car up with a serious alignment. Plus, Dave has probably aligned a lot more imprezas than most people out there.
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Old 04-04-2000, 07:46 PM   #3
ColinL
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SPD's alignment settings are for "fast road", like much of Mike's philosophy. Whether you are autocrossing or roadracing, you're going to want more negative camber. A LOT more, in my humble opinion. I'd consider at least -2 degrees in the front for a serious autocross machine, and -3 or more for roadracing depending on tire temps.
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Old 04-04-2000, 08:12 PM   #4
Joe Hogan
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You might try 1 or 2mm toe-in (1/16" or 1/8 total toe-in) at the rear and zero toe at the front.
The RS is a front steer setup (tie rods ahead of the axle center line) so I don't think toe changes much with speed and gains toe-out with compression.
Zero toe allows for "active" steering but great turn-in. By "active" ... the car will hunt over uneven pavement, follow the crown of the road and dart when braking.
If you toe out in the front these traits get worse to an annoying level plus tire wear becomes a problem.

In the rear if you toe out the car becomes unstable under hard braking and "spooky" in hard turns. You will never really feel what will upset the rear and break it loose.
I tried toe out in the rear for a few AX events and spun the car regularly.
It is my understanding the RS has some passive rear steer which changes the rear toe when heavily loaded. This helps the rear around in a turn.
Basically I think toe out in the rear makes the car too unpredictable.

Also do not lower the car too much. The suspension geometry is optimal at about 1 to 1.5" lower than stock. Apparently the rear is more tolerant to lowering than the front.
Excessive lowering screws up the roll centers.

FWIW

Joe Hogan

[This message has been edited by Joe Hogan (edited April 04, 2000).]
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Old 04-04-2000, 08:43 PM   #5
RalliSpec
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Alignment settings are always a compromise so you need to determine exactly what is most important to you...

maximum cornering
maximum tire wear
or straightline stability

For a still somewhat reasonable street setup that isn't too bad at the autox we set the car as follows:

1.25 degrees negative front camber
0" front toe out
3/32" rear toe out

For a more aggressive setup that gets a little twitchy on the street we use:

1.5 degrees (or whatever the maximum the front eccentric bolt will allow...just keep it dead even side to side)
1/16" front toe out
3/16" rear toe out

Toe out sacrifices straight line stability but improves turn-in. Rear toe out also provides a small amount of additional oversteer tendency.

Proper corner weighting will also pay off big and we just invested in top of the line corner weight setup.
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Old 04-05-2000, 06:16 AM   #6
boxerman
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When you corner weight the car, have it set up for an event. Remove jack and cr*p in trunk.
Corner weight with 1/2 tank of gas and driver or equivalent weight in drivers seat.
Tim
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Old 04-05-2000, 07:19 AM   #7
Tony
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Thumbs up

The alignment settings Rallispec set my car to was:

Max. neg. camber in the front = 1.4-1.5 degrees
3/32" toe out front
1/8" toe out rear

I asked them for the all-out-autox-screw-the-twitchyness-and-tire-wear kinda alignment. I'm planning on alteast 30 autoxes this year, I can live with the setup on the street. Actually it isn't that bad, hunts ruts in the road like crazy but OK as long as you don't try anything dumb in the rain, etc. The tires are gonna wear out from autox anyway so I'm not worried about that aspect. The alignment alone made more of a difference than the 20mm bar did alone. YMMV.

Tony
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Old 04-05-2000, 02:47 PM   #8
josh
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Thanks guys! I will look these over and cme to a decision when I get it balanced. I am thinking of going pretty aggressive. Hell, why not, the car is already stiff as hell, and I am using my racing bucket to commute in(yeah, my kidneys have gotten alot stronger the past month!). I think I can handle the twitchyness.

Thakns again guys, and more advice on this is apprecialted.

josh
 
Old 04-05-2000, 02:53 PM   #9
Nat
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Don't want to clutter up the thread with a question, but can a car be driven with coilovers only being setup by ride height? I want to get a set of Teins in a month or so but don't know a shop around the area. I know this would affect handling when the car is driven hard, but as long as I set the car to stock ride height at all corners and get an alignment will I screw anything up but maybe tires?
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Old 04-05-2000, 02:59 PM   #10
josh
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Nat.

I have had my coilovers in for about 3 months set only by ride height. Balancing is not required, but it is nice to have done. After I get it done I am going to measure on a template all the corner heights. Then i can play with different heights by making sure each corner is raised/lowered equal amounts. Keep in mind tho, everytime you change ride height, you screw up the alignment settings.

josh
 
Old 04-05-2000, 03:03 PM   #11
ColinL
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Talking

Keep in mind tho, everytime you change ride height, you screw up the alignment settings.

Technically that's true but do the math and you'll see that for small height changes the difference is hardly significant. And if the changes are the same for L&R sides, then the net effect is even less significant.
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Old 04-05-2000, 03:09 PM   #12
josh
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yes ColinL,

small height changes do not, in the big picture, change that much. BUT lowering the car TOO much does. I lowered my car pretty signigigantly(enough to scrape almost ALL driveways), and noticed the handling sucked. I raised it up a cm and BLAMO! it was like a new car. So, yes Colin you are right about small, finite changes. Just be careful with the big, gross changes.

josh

PS our cars handle REALLY well the closer they are to stock height.

 
Old 04-05-2000, 03:20 PM   #13
Tim Prudence
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Quote:
Originally posted by josh:
lowering the car TOO much does. I lowered my car pretty signigigantly(enough to scrape almost ALL driveways), and noticed the handling sucked. I raised it up a cm and BLAMO! it was like a new car.
If it's not too much trouble could you let us all know what height you settled on front and rear (and where you took the measurements from).

Thanks in advance,
Tim
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Old 07-08-2000, 05:50 AM   #14
cj917
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Question

joe,

what's your reason for toe-in in the rear? (besides what most other people are doing: toe-out in either front or rear to sacrifice the straightline stability for better turn-in)

for those who have tried, what difference is there comparing front and rear toe-out when you leave the other one at zero? and why does Rallispec recommend a slightly more toe-out in the rear than the front?

thanx in advance!
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Old 07-08-2000, 02:07 PM   #15
RalliSpec
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Excessive rear toe will cause unpredictable oversteer characteristics, particularly under braking...very difficult to control properly and definitely not recommended.

Excessive front toe will cause straight line instability...car will be darty over bumps. Acceptable up to a point.

With that said...we generally set up the rear toe with about 3/32" total toe out. This is still within factory specs and with 0" toe up front is stable and predictable under all conditions...we have found this provides good nuetral handling and reasonable turn in. For more aggressive setups we have played around with various changes to both front and rear toe and have found that increasing rear toe beyond the factory range is not advisable (sorry about the confusion...the previous post was written by one of the other RalliSpec members and not by myself (Dave). I perform all of the alignments that come through the door and since we have tried various setups there is some confusion as to the recommended setup at this point. For more aggressive setups we generally go with more front toe-out up to about 1/4" total for autox. Beyond that and the additional drag and tire wear become unacceptable. Also keep in mind that what we are talking about is low speed tight corner handling improvements as would be seen in autox or city driving. High speeds require a more stable platform and so toe nuetral or slight toe-in is generally more desirable. And of course, like most things it is really a matter of taste and driving style. Like any tuning there are compromises to be made.
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