Can steering feel, tactility, be improved? Without sacrificing adjustability?
 

Hello chassis experts.

Today I finally got the chance to test drive the GT86, with much anticipation and wanting to love it (and order it).
My findings basically agree with most things written in the reviews except one thing: I was disappointed in the steering feel.
Not the weight, not the centring, not the loading up in a corner, not the gearing. That was all perfect for me. I am talking tactility, the possibility too actually feel what is going on at the front wheels grip and direction wise, in all it's gradations. I just wasn't there for me even if reviewers talk about "bubbling with feel etc" and as a result, we did not "connect".

And unfortunately that is the single most important feature for me to getting this car.

But before dismissing the car completely, is there anything I can do to improve this? I really want to like this car for all it's other traits... thus any improvements without sacrificing comfort or changing to stiff and grippy tyres and ruining the playfullness when street driving the car? I do not plan to track the car often so driving pleasure on the street, even at moderate speeds, is no.1 for me.

One plan I already had is changing to lighter, wider 8" wheels with the stock now more stretched 215 tyre and adding some more toe (in or out, to be experimented with). Could this give me that tactile info I am missing, or shall I just surrender the search for the ulitmate tactile lightweight RWD with a kinda usuable rear seat and just get an almost as good M135i that is loads more practical?

Thank in advance for all constructive feedback.

you can find a donor rack and pinion and put that in your car.

i'd imagine any car with a rack and pinion will work, just got to custom fab mounting and adjust the steering shaft length.

Yeah, thought of that. In fact, the 86 already has a rack and pion, the electric assist motor is on the steering column. Could that be removed without getting x-mas tree lighting in the dash?
But with 720kg+ on the front axle, this is perhaps not the best idea if one intends to do any parking whatsoever... (I do ;) )

Increase your tire pressures?

Harder bushings in the front suspension?

Or perhaps a wooden/harder steering wheel?

I was also hoping to hear how the modification already done here affected steering feel, and if any lessons could be drawn from this?

Different McPherson lower arm bushes and stiffer lower arm overall could definitely help. Anything available yet?

what would be cool is to override/bypass/turn off the electric power assist and see how the car feels with full manual steering.

Tires.

My Si has fairly vague steering, stiff sidewalled tires made a huge difference everywhere, including steering feel.

Yeah, I've good experience with the tack sharp Yoko AD08 on other cars.

Is there anything similar out there that does not grip much AND lets go progressively likewise the Primacy HP?? That would be puuuurfect :D

Terrible if you don't replace the rack with a manual one. You end up fighting the fluid pressure in the rack so it's not a lot of fun. I had to drive my WRX once with no PS with a 11.5:1 rack, it sucked.

As for the OP a better set of tires goes a long way with steering feel. Increased camber would help but the car isn't really adjustable in front you have to use crash bolts or get some different tophats, coilovers, etc.

As the PS is electric, I think it is the very presence of the electric motor on the column that builds in a default resistance to the wheel wiggling away with feedback. So one would need to mechanically remove everything incl. the PS ECU and than somehow tell the main ECU it's OK that it's gone...

Yes, I could just get rubber with stiffer sidewalls, but these usually are much stickier so removing a lot of the fun of unsticking the rear at moderate lateral G's... hmm... I could just try the recipe in my OP with the stretched sidewalls etc. and see if I get the "feel" for it, and otherwise just sell at the inevitable loss...

I need to think so more what I'm willing to do accomplish, not to keen on modding too much, just wanna drive...

I think bushings, tires and maybe control arms might do the trick. Also, try a STRONG strut brace, like the one the company on this thread is developing:

http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showt...ce+strut+brace

Lower chassis bracing may also help.

How many miles did the car that you test drove have on it? I noticed a distinct softening of the steering response on my FR-S after just a few hundred miles. If the car has been [test] driven aggressively this softening could happen sooner. Stiffer bushings would probably bring back some of the feel.

Changing to a wider wheel may change the scrub radius of the steering (depending on the offset), which would definitely affect the steering feel. Also, lighter weight wheels will affect this as well.

Now, having said all that, the electric power steering may be the culprit, as several have already mentioned. Changing this would be VERY expensive and difficult.

ever read up on the electric rack used in this car? Its essentially a full manual rack with an electric device strapped to it. No fluids, no BS -- I believe the main mechanics for the electric PS are entirely housed inside of the dashboard, too.

I wish I could help you out. I've wanted a moderate grip high stability tire for ages but don't know of any.

I've had lots of high grip high stability tires. They're nice, for about 8k miles if you're lucky...
In 50k miles I've gone through over $2500 worth of tires not including shipping or installation and I am not sure if it was worth it. If I get a twin I think I'll settle for less grip and less money, but I sure would like to keep that stability.

Perhaps I could start out with an stretched + eXtra Load (XL) tyre and see how I like that... if I decide to get a 86...