Quote:
Originally Posted by ultra
Alignment is absolutely the most fun thing to play with on this car in order to fine tune the balance. 
I'm running a nearly identical setup to @ Calum ; -2.5 up front, -1.5 rear and 0 toe all around - and I'm similarly confident in recommending these settings as a baseline for an aggressively driven street car. I find the distribution of traction to be very neutral overall with plenty of front end grip on tap plus an ability to initiate rotation in the rear if you're super aggressive with your throttle lifts and/or steering inputs. Although it's a fairly aggressive setup it's not too rough in terms of tire wear, which is also nice.
Working from the above settings I find that simple toe adjustments are enough to be able to tweak the balance further, depending on my mood and preference:
- an extra half a degree of toe in (total) out back locks the rear end down a bit more.
- an extra half a degree (total) of toe out up front increases initial turn in response.
I'd suggest not looking into swaybars until you've completely exhausted all of your alignment options. That's not to say that swaybars are bad per say, just that the alignmen5 changes are really easy to notice and by far better bang for your buck.
On the topic of swaybars I'd be careful what you choose. I'm running the Hotchkis bars, which are very stiff compared to stock (over 200% stiffer at the softest settings). They're good match for full R compound rubber and even more aggressive alignment settings on a track but not so good on the street, with street tires and a less aggressive alignment. They do keep the car extremely flat but I get a lot of crosstalk on bumpy surfaces and the breakaway characteristics are very abrupt. I'll be swapping back to a much milder swaybar combo soon.
I'd actually recommend swaybars as an absolute last step in the 'mod chain' but that's just me. If you're super keen offense dialing in your car I'd speak to a pro and get them to recommend something tailored to the other parts already on your car and your own specific use cases.
A handy reference comparing different swaybars is here:
http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showp...25&postcount=1 |
This reminds me of a youtube channel I was watching the other night, and a particular video. I think you might enjoy this, if nothing else it's food for thought. [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhWZ57baTOw"]FCM Suspension Truth v2.6 - The Hidden Cost of Sway Bars - YouTube[/ame]
Disclaimer: I don't know enough to be critical of what he's saying, to me it was a compelling argument. That video also confirms some hypotheses I've held onto about sway bars, so there could be some confirmation bias.
Personally, I'm modding my car in an effort to mask my poor driving abilities. My goal is to make it so I can hold the car as close to the edge as possible, with some nod to decreasing the understeer that I found in steady state cornering. So, all of the mods I've done have been in an effort to increase; feedback, stability in mid corner bumps, and predictability when cornering forces overcome traction.
In that vein, I've been holding to the idea that I'll be staying with the stock sway bars. I've had a car that was grossly over barred, it was fun to a point, but the snap over steer was dangerous and kept me from using the car as much as I could. I
might go to a wrx rear bar to change balance slightly, but I'm very satisfied with the balance as it sits.
Another thing to consider when upgrading sway bars is corner exit. I
think increasing sway bar stiffness will reduce grip and thus the cars ability to accelerate out of a corner.
I'm sure there's compromises and balances to be found with all of this, things like upgrading the differential to combat the loss of grip from the sway bars.
