02-10-2008, 09:11 PM
have you gone too far with modifying your car when others interpret something they feel as something else?
here's the story:
everybody knows i've been nuts about modifying the car, and have gone to great lengths to stiffen things up - i took up the challenge of tightening up the chassis, because there were those who said a cab would never be stiff - ok - i solved that one - after measuring the car on a 4 pin layout, with a 1G load of about 750lbs per corner, i found .065" of chassis flex in stock form - after the mods, i have .011" of flex - that's an 83% reduction in flex - not bad so far
that was great until my last round of suspension mods
i pulled out the koni yellow sport struts that so many people are running, as well as the 300# springs and rubber strut bearings, and installed some koni dual adjustable hydraulic struts, 4003 springs and kla monoball strut bearings - i also stuck 600# springs on the dual adjustable hydraulic carrera shocks in the rear
i had already changed out every other rubber bushing in the car to a sealed monoball and such, so there was none of the rubber bushing sloshing anywhere that tends to mask things in stock cars, and give you a very false impression of how the car is doing (you find it out in a hurry on the track)
then i made the mistake of rushing through things and not spending the time tuning it fully, because i was too busy sorting out some last minute problems elsewhere in the car - then i ended up taking it on a fun run like that - no, nothing happened - the front end was bouncing a bit, and there is an imbalance front to rear, but that's it
however, i let a couple of people drive it, and realized afterward that i should have dialed it in first - what was in reality a mismatched front/rear shock tuning, was interpreted as chassis flex - for the record, there is almost no chassis flex - ok - 17% of what was there - by the way, the 2 hardtops i measured had .006" of flex, so we are talking about the difference of a thickness of a business card now - still, a whole lot less than the .375" i had in my race car (which was very competitive by the way)
ok - the bottom line - now that there is no rubber to mask anything, everything shows up very quickly in a sense of uneven movement front to rear - tuning it will be fun, but i am confident that i have nailed the components down, and just need to spend time dialing it in - the hydraulics are much more compliant than the gas, and the ride is very nice - i will be chasing down the last odd twitches and such though, and will probably spend a lot more time than i anticipated doing it
i shudder to think what a formula team goes through to tune their suspension
i am starting to get tired of tuning though, and would like to drive it - sometimes a little goosh is a good thing - had i have left the rubber in the car, i could be driving it instead of tuning it - not nearly as fast in the corners, but possibly jut as pleasing overall nonetheless
the moral of the story - before you run out and buy that hot suspension, be sure you know what you are getting into - you may miss driving that car as you stand there and watch it sit in your garage waiting for you to finish tinkering
here's the story:
everybody knows i've been nuts about modifying the car, and have gone to great lengths to stiffen things up - i took up the challenge of tightening up the chassis, because there were those who said a cab would never be stiff - ok - i solved that one - after measuring the car on a 4 pin layout, with a 1G load of about 750lbs per corner, i found .065" of chassis flex in stock form - after the mods, i have .011" of flex - that's an 83% reduction in flex - not bad so far
that was great until my last round of suspension mods
i pulled out the koni yellow sport struts that so many people are running, as well as the 300# springs and rubber strut bearings, and installed some koni dual adjustable hydraulic struts, 4003 springs and kla monoball strut bearings - i also stuck 600# springs on the dual adjustable hydraulic carrera shocks in the rear
i had already changed out every other rubber bushing in the car to a sealed monoball and such, so there was none of the rubber bushing sloshing anywhere that tends to mask things in stock cars, and give you a very false impression of how the car is doing (you find it out in a hurry on the track)
then i made the mistake of rushing through things and not spending the time tuning it fully, because i was too busy sorting out some last minute problems elsewhere in the car - then i ended up taking it on a fun run like that - no, nothing happened - the front end was bouncing a bit, and there is an imbalance front to rear, but that's it
however, i let a couple of people drive it, and realized afterward that i should have dialed it in first - what was in reality a mismatched front/rear shock tuning, was interpreted as chassis flex - for the record, there is almost no chassis flex - ok - 17% of what was there - by the way, the 2 hardtops i measured had .006" of flex, so we are talking about the difference of a thickness of a business card now - still, a whole lot less than the .375" i had in my race car (which was very competitive by the way)
ok - the bottom line - now that there is no rubber to mask anything, everything shows up very quickly in a sense of uneven movement front to rear - tuning it will be fun, but i am confident that i have nailed the components down, and just need to spend time dialing it in - the hydraulics are much more compliant than the gas, and the ride is very nice - i will be chasing down the last odd twitches and such though, and will probably spend a lot more time than i anticipated doing it
i shudder to think what a formula team goes through to tune their suspension
i am starting to get tired of tuning though, and would like to drive it - sometimes a little goosh is a good thing - had i have left the rubber in the car, i could be driving it instead of tuning it - not nearly as fast in the corners, but possibly jut as pleasing overall nonetheless
the moral of the story - before you run out and buy that hot suspension, be sure you know what you are getting into - you may miss driving that car as you stand there and watch it sit in your garage waiting for you to finish tinkering
94 Midnight Metallic Blue Cab Porsche 968 w/deviating cashmere/black interior and WAY too many mods to list - thanks to eric for creating www.968forums.com
"It isn't nearly as expensive to do it right as it is to do it wrong."
