We corner balanced Wojo's and our development STi today. With the JIC coilovers, the job was not too challenging, actually we did not need to do anything on the STi it came to 50.0% cross weight with the driver the first time we put it on the scales, lol.

Few pics of the STi numbers without the driver and full tank of gas (I think Wojo will post his numbers soon as well):

 

Ignore this message, found the solution on how to post images

Thanks.

 

Hey that's my car! Can't you tell it's balanced?

 

What exactly do you do to balance a car? I keep hearing that I should have my Lancer corner-balanced now that I have the suspension done. I doubt I'll get as balanced as that, though. I think a FWD car willalways have more weight up front.

 

Try putting some bricks in the engine bay near the strut towers

Just playing... but seriously that looks pretty well balanced bro. Keep up the good work.

 

That's good stuff. Wouldn't it be better to have slightly more weight in the rear so when your losing speed going into a corner the weight will be 50/50?

 

Front to Rear desired distribution is not a simple goal to shoot for. Heck even Left to Right isn't always desirabel to be 50/50, but for street cars, I'd say 50/50 L/R is safest and a bit more upfront for stability. But out on the track, you tend to set the car up for the circuit. If you're looking to gain braking, a bit more rear bias is helpful. Depending on drive wheels, and where you will be accelerating, uphill, downhill, etc, you may want to shift some weight around, only if traction is a problem though.. There are a few handful of options to take into consideration when balancing a car. 50/50 is just a nice easy target..

 

Corner balancing does not mean getting the Front and Rear weights to equal 50/50, which is possible only by physicaly moving weight around the car. The goal of corner balancing is to equalize the cross weight (LF-RR and RF-LR) of the vehicle. This is done by adjusting the ride height of the vehicle. It obviously requires the car to have an adjustable suspension.

The main reason for corner balancing is to ensure even handling of the vehicle in left and right turns. Unbalanced handling occurs when front-to-rear weight distribution is not equal for left and right sides.

 

Thanks for the info. Now I wonder how much it costs and which shops near me (Los Angeles) do it.

 

Typically it will cost you around $200-$400 depending on the shop that does it.

 

My suspension/tire guy does it for $129.95. Guess he's got good rates then.

 

See, I think its also a function of the time it takes to do the job. We managed to do the EVO in about 1hr which is great, but if it takes like 3-4hrs then perhaps a couple hundred $$$ is justified.
Although experience will have a dramatic impact on the time it takes to get to 50% so you would expect the experienced "balancers" to charge lower prices as it should take them less time.

 

I think you pay for the experience so it doesn't take as long.. as opposed to cheap take 4 hours and being done wrong. You pay to have it done right a quickly. Otherwise Experts would be paid nothing and idiots a fortune.

 

Also, the struts we had made height adjustments quite easy. There are mechanisms out there that will drive you nuts and not to mention non MacPherson struts; it get really get very involving.

Some people do really earn that $200 or 400 I think.

 

We just uploaded some notes on corner balancing and a link to the process to our web site if you are interested:

http://www.selgp.com/FLTA2-RS.htm#Corner%20Balancing