CSG and RCE tag-team suspension Q&A thread! Ask us anything!

[JSube]

Originally Posted by churchx

On stock everything but raceseng camplates IIRC i was able to dial in some -2.3 or -2.4, and then it started to rub a bit inside of wheel arch. So maybe worth also getting some cambolts (they are cheap) for lower mount, for some of that camber. Probably ~ -1.5 with one cambolt set, and upto -2.2 to -2.3 with cambolts in both holes.
As for vorschlag camplate rattling .. were top nuts properly tightened?

Plates professionally installed, so no loose hardware. With vehicle on lift, raising the front wheels off the deck you could feel the bearings drop in the housing when touching the spindle. At stock height they got -2.4°
Not a fan of cambolts.
So churchx, are you rattle free with Raceseng plates (and how long in service?)

[strat61caster]

Originally Posted by JSube

Plates professionally installed, so no loose hardware. With vehicle on lift, raising the front wheels off the deck you could feel the bearings drop in the housing when touching the spindle. At stock height they got -2.4°
Not a fan of cambolts.
So churchx, are you rattle free with Raceseng plates (and how long in service?)

You'd be surprised.

My Racesengs were dead silent when everything was tight, I had them come loose and improperly installed once or twice and had a bad knock, I also got some rubbing when I modified them a bit but now they're dead silent, at least 10k miles, 3 track days, dozens of autox events, they're off the car now but they'll go back on next year and I have total confidence in them.

I haven't seen Vorshlag's plates in person but I know some other reputable companies have put out camber plates I wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole, but I'd certainly give Vorshlag another shot if they're replacing them for free. @churchx had Racesengs and couldn't handle how noisy they were, we've talked about it a bit before between us. Could be a couple reasons but I think he's put them back in the box after trying twice and being extremely dissatisfied.

Originally Posted by alex.s

Its at about -1.8* camber and no toe in front. Stock rear. It's the stock Michelin primacy. 215 width. I live across the street from work in downtown and walk everywhere, so the car mostly is driven on track and driving to and from the track...

You need more camber, period. I had switched off the Primacy by the time I got camber plates but with stock everything else I was getting beautiful tire wear on track with about -3 in the front. It's not throwing parts at the car, you've got a tire wear problem due to insufficient alignment, plain and simple. You can live with it for awhile, I was getting chunks out of my Primacy on track day #2 but if you want even wear (and maximum grip) you'll need more camber.

Edit: More seat time and an instructor will likely be able to understand what you're doing that's holding you back or getting you better lap times. It's my understanding that on track you should be able to hear the tires howl when cornering, some tires need more slip than you'd expect for maximum grip, some like less, some like more and you'll have to experiment to find out what's truly fastest once your driving is consistent.

Here's what CSG considers a fast lap around Buttonwillow, listen to how much he's sliding the tires.

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNmxM_gXBew"]2017 86CUP Round 2, Mike's 2017 BRZ, Buttonwillow 13CW - YouTube[/ame]

[JSube]

Originally Posted by strat61caster

You'd be surprised.

My Racesengs were dead silent when everything was tight, I had them come loose and improperly installed once or twice and had a bad knock, I also got some rubbing when I modified them a bit but now they're dead silent, at least 10k miles, 3 track days, dozens of autox events, they're off the car now but they'll go back on next year and I have total confidence in them.

I haven't seen Vorshlag's plates in person but I know some other reputable companies have put out camber plates I wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole, but I'd certainly give Vorshlag another shot if they're replacing them for free. @churchx had Racesengs and couldn't handle how noisy they were, we've talked about it a bit before between us. Could be a couple reasons but I think he's put them back in the box after trying twice and being extremely dissatisfied.

Yeah, my shop paint indexed all the fasteners during the install. Nothing moved except that bearing. And they're getting another shot, car's in the shop today for reinstall.
Mostly I'm wondering if I can get trouble-free camber from the bottom instead of the top.

[strat61caster]

Originally Posted by JSube

Yeah, my shop paint indexed all the fasteners during the install. Nothing moved except that bearing. And they're getting another shot, car's in the shop today for reinstall.
Mostly I'm wondering if I can get trouble-free camber from the bottom instead of the top.

Did they try just tightening the top nut? idk that's like 90% of the noise I've experienced with camber plates, the top nut coming loose. The bearing is supposed to rotate to allow the wheels to turn, but if the nut isn't rotating with the bearing (usually because the bearing is cheap and too stiff to handle the load) that might be a problem. If you don't plan on taking the damper off the camber plate in the future use some loctite on it, have it torqued the way Vorshlag instructs and it should hold for quite awhile.

Your camber plates are now a maintenance item, that's one of the tradeoffs of going to an all metal interface, without loctite they may need to be torqued after every event to continue being rattle free.

[mjanmohammad]

Originally Posted by JSube

Yeah, my shop paint indexed all the fasteners during the install. Nothing moved except that bearing. And they're getting another shot, car's in the shop today for reinstall.
Mostly I'm wondering if I can get trouble-free camber from the bottom instead of the top.

I've had the Vorshlag plates with RCE yellow springs on my car for about 3 weeks now, with 2 AutoX days on them and daily driving about 1500 miles. I don't hear any rattles or clunks, or really any noise at all.

I had a problem with the shop that did my alignment though, their rack was miscalibrated and my front left camber wasn't showing the proper spec. We initially thought it was the plate so Vorshlag did some testing and figured out the alignment issue after sending a couple of their cars for an alignment. They ended up calling me back in and covering the cost of an alignment at a different shop.

[churchx]

JSube: It might be some type of road irregularities, or might be due stock shocks not working well together, but on local bad roads here, camplates were bad enough noise wise to revert despite wishing for more camber. They were ok for track, ok for good roads, ok for road irregularities that loaded suspension at slower rates/gradually, but whenever there was something that compressed struts sharply, there was sound of heavy hits to car, like dropping instrument box on concrete floor. Even if that doesn't meant actually breaking something, it made driving on generic public local (bad) roads too unenjoyable making to think that i'll break car/top mounts/etc, to think much about speed/steering around worst known places/potholes .. uncomfortable, compared to just driving above anything/everwhere and let rubber topmounts dampen anything.

Camplates were professionally installed, double checked everything, nut properly tightened, bearings seemed ok/tight/without play .. but those hits on sharp road irregularities were not something i was willing to live 99% daily driving/1% track. Maybe though it's stock 40K miles worn on bad roads struts with worsened fast speed compression dampening, haven't yet other struts to compare, but as several other aftermarket coilover options with included in set pillowball camberplates are reviewed/regarded as more comfortable as stock, allows possibility that it might be bad strut/pillowball combo, not just camberplates to blame. There are also other users without untolerable NVH problems and telling that they also have bad roads there .. don't know.

At end/now i'm at -2.5 front (-2.2 max with cambolts only). SPC bolt lower hole, Whiteline upper, +Whiteline caster bushing & Powerflex camber bushings for front LCA (and group N topmounts, but that shouldn't matter. They felt not much different to stock rubber topmounts, both bad (not much felt improvement in handling due less compliant/stiffer rubber) and good (they dampen NVH as good as stock topmounts)). Gonna take at the beginning of october to another shop to recheck things twice, as maybe -2.5 is not max it can go. When in last alignment iteration i had installed/pressed in those whiteline & powerflex bushings, it was -3.02 max on left (yeah!! what i was aiming for while keeping rubber topmounts) and -2.55 max on right (hence wishing to recheck carefully, why, seems too big of difference. Installation error? Bent suspension?).
P.S.
Even if -2.5 with cambolts & powerflex bushings at stock height is max, there is extra camber to be had from lowering car. So resulting -2.8 might be good enough for someone wishing closer to -3 for better track tire wear, but rubber topmounts for NVH. Not for me, because i'm not willing to lower car/reduce ground clearance. Also some of tires may work good even with less camber for optimal alignment/even patch, it should be checked with pyrometer.

[alex.s]

cool, i'll throw on a pillow adjuster and a thicker antisway bar in the rear. thanks yall

[Racecomp Engineering]

Originally Posted by alex.s

cool, i'll throw on a pillow adjuster and a thicker antisway bar in the rear. thanks yall

Don't go too big on the rear bar without a matching front. 20mm front and 16mm rear is a good mild set-up. Dial balance in with the adjustability.

- Andrew

[churchx]

Racecomp Engineering: 20/16 - solid or hollow bars?

[Racecomp Engineering]

Originally Posted by churchx

Racecomp Engineering: 20/16 - solid or hollow bars?

Solid. Not aware of any hollows that work out to that stiffness.

Our own bars are 25mm front and 19mm rear and hollow. Comes out to about 22mm front and 16mm solid...great for auto-x. Just another option.

- Andrew

[maregt]

Hello everybody, i have a little question for the expert

Does roll center correction kit improve camber gain at stock height? If so, what is the tradeoff?

Inviato dal mio LG-M320 utilizzando Tapatalk

[Gearhead1]

I tried 3 different sets of front cam plates on my 2013 BRZ and thought I'd share my observations. I'm running OE springs and Bilstein B6 struts. My car is a daily driver that sees a few lapping days per season. I'm happy with the OE spring rates and ride height.

Raceseng Cascams--I love the design, but inadequate engagement of top nut on strut stud meant they were non-starters. Last I checked, Raceseng did not have a fix.

RCE Front Street Camber Plates--Stack height increase of 14 mm made these non-starters.

Verus Camber Plates--These are on the car now. Stack height increase of 7 mm. I wanted increased caster, so I installed the right plate on the left side and vice versa--this worked great. Comparing the max negative camber plate position to the middle, or nominal position, I gained just over 1 degree of caster and just over 2.5 degrees of camber.

Issues:
Caster and camber gains are great, but I'm not happy with increased front ride height (close to 6 mm in full negative camber plate position compared to stock).

At full suspension droop the sway bar links contact the inner fenders. This is with Whiteline sway bar and adjustable links, but the problem would still exist with OE links. The bottom spring perches and the coil springs are close to inner fenders, but do not touch.

Questions:
With cam plates at max negative, a quick measurement (tough to be really accurate) shows the front LCA outboard knuckle a bit more than 20mm below the inboard pivot. Is that a reasonable amount or too much?

Any suggestions for how to drop the front end a bit without coilovers? I thought about vertically slotting the pinch flanges on the struts, but the top bolt/nut is pretty close to the top edge of the flange to start with.

Compared to full suspension droop, it appears to me that the clearance between the bottom spring perch and inner fender will only increase as the suspension is compressed to its max. Is this correct?

The only fix I can imagine for the sway bar link interference with the inner fender is to substitute a spherical rod end on the top of each link. Those links need to handle some extreme angles from one steering lock to the other. Does anyone know if this will work? Any other suggestions for a "low profile" top pivot on the link?

[strat61caster]

Originally Posted by Gearhead1

Raceseng Cascams--I love the design, but inadequate engagement of top nut on strut stud meant they were non-starters. Last I checked, Raceseng did not have a fix.

Is there a problem with their B6/B8 fitment or are you just picky?

I've got B14's and mine look like the picture they show on their site, but there's oodles of thread engagement happening, once you get a few tenths of an inch of thread grabbing, toss a bit of loctite on it if you're paranoid and those suckers aren't going anywhere. Having more threads past where it currently stops doesn't accomplish anything, if they're loose they'll rattle around like nobodies business and you won't be able to tell by looking at it.

[Gearhead1]

Originally Posted by strat61caster

Is there a problem with their B6/B8 fitment or are you just picky?

I've got B14's and mine look like the picture they show on their site, but there's oodles of thread engagement happening, once you get a few tenths of an inch of thread grabbing, toss a bit of loctite on it if you're paranoid and those suckers aren't going anywhere. Having more threads past where it currently stops doesn't accomplish anything, if they're loose they'll rattle around like nobodies business and you won't be able to tell by looking at it.

I got only 7.5 turns of engagement, or 9.4 mm--below the minimum for a 12 mm bolt. Jarrett at Raceseng checked it on CAD and agreed, saying I should be seeing something like 3/8" engagement (i.e. same thing). Jarrett said that Raceseng needs to create a shock nut with a longer nose to increase the engagement. I asked if I could use the parts as is until they came up with the proper fix, but Jarrett replied that for safety's sake, I shouldn't use them.