It's going to be a good year for Mark.......

It wasn't quite clear.....but after yesterday, there's no more need for a crystal ball.

 

Eric, nice meeting you and your insane car in Champaign this weekend. Hope to see you around.
n8

 

What size sway bars are you running? I'm guessing too big...

 

John,
Seeing as they havn't posted the event results from yesterday, did much change after afternoon runs? Do you know what the final pax times were?
Mark

 

Paul,
The car was just awesome yesterday, but the scary part is that I think I can get it a bit better on entry. This weekend at Toledo should prove to be very telling. lol
Mark

 

Mark,
Rich told me you had PAX by 3 seconds. Granted, none of us have jackets, but we're not a slow group either. Lee was trying REAL hard....kinda funny, a couple spins and clouds of smoke showing frustration. Closest car to you was a low 64....

Oh yeah...sway bars suck! You are definitely right about that one. The whole Tender and Main spring thing is starting to look very appealing.

 

Trasitional entry or "regular" corners (or both)? You thinking of more spring up there like we were talking about (you animal )?

 

The problem is when trailbraking into a corner at the set point. Not the initial transition. I know what it is, and have another set of rear tender springs being made. Unfortunately they will not be ready for Toledo, so I will run it the way it is. My tender springs on the front are perfect, but on the rear, the only set I could find has too much load required to collapse them. The ones I am using now take over 400 lbs of load to collapse, and I only have about 600 lbs of static weight on each rear corner. What is happening is that while braking into a corner, the pitch motion is putting both rears into the soft rate causing the push, and causing me to not trail deep into the turns. More like brake hard and then roll into the turn. The new tenders are a bit less than half the load capacity, and should fix the problem. All other aspects of the balance is very good. The car puts power down unbelievable with this setup, and has a hint of oversteer through steadystate and corner exit on throttle. I actually felt that I wanted more power. I guess it is time to run the race gas map and turn up the boost. Right now I am using the rear shocks to somewhat mask the entry issue, and it works for all but hard trailbraking entries. I am still running the stock anti-roll bars front and rear, and will probably continue to do so although it may be worth experimenting at some point. I will keep everyone posted after Toledo.
Mark

 

Keep guessing.... the car has 650+ hp at the crank and spins the tires freely in 3rd.

 

93esp, markdaddio, and the rest of the advanced autocrossing members: please consider joining the Tuners and Advanced Members forum. Go to your control panel (user CP), click on group memberships, then click join group. Your expertise would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

It still could be the bars. I have driven prepped EVO's with that sort of power and if you are unloading the inside (big bars) you will have more wheelspin than you should even given your wonderfully high hp rating and you will cook the tires. Don't just blame the hp for your tires issues (in other words).

 

It's hard to have bars too big when you're not running any....

Eric

 

Eric,
If you are running really high rate springs, and no bars, I sure as heck hope you are running some form of tender springs, or that is your problem right there.
Mark

 

Eric,

Get more spring!!!! The body seemed to seriously trail the wheels, now it makes more sense since you stripped out 15-25% of your roll resistance. Of course, you might be waiting for the downforce to suck that body down.

 

Boy if only I could get this much help turning wrenches on the car.....

Mark, I do have tender springs on the front and rear to maintain full sprung travel. I will be changing the rates again as the car starts to generate downforce.

John, I was still running the bars at the Peru test and the roll issues you were noting were shock related.

I am in the experimentation phase right now trying to get the whole package put together. Anyone that has real experience with suspension setups on cars with downforce please chime in... By September it will be fully sorted and hopefully at it's full potential...