Fix the end that isn't working, soften front bar.
As for the tires; yes remember to gently bend the contact patch into the corner.
Fix the end that isn't working, soften front bar.
As for the tires; yes remember to gently bend the contact patch into the corner.
Softening the front bar is the same as stiffening the rear, just with less overall roll stiffness which will exaggerate the scrubbing due to greater lean. It's a common mistake to think you're adding traction at the soft end without affecting the stiff end, but really you're shifting weight transfer from one end of the car to the other in both cases.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
That's fair, though I guess I was thinking of my friends and I - we all have single position RB front bars and 3 position rear bars. Not sure what OP is rocking. Either way I was just agreeing with "fix the suspension balance if you're just talking about understeer."
Though really you need to get a tire pyrometer to make good choices on alignment, setup, and tire pressure. Well, and a good idea of how heat-cycled out the tires are. There's no point in trying to setup a car on E36 M3 tires - so add a tire durometer into the mix. Oh the rabbit hole...
Keith Tanner said:Softening the front bar is the same as stiffening the rear, just with less overall roll stiffness which will exaggerate the scrubbing due to greater lean. It's a common mistake to think you're adding traction at the soft end without affecting the stiff end, but really you're shifting weight transfer from one end of the car to the other in both cases.
I agree with the overall message, but starting it out with that statement is dangerous. They're very much NOT the same, because of the reasons you go on to describe.
Fair enough. I usually make the wrong adjustment the first time.. but when there's a 50/50 chance, I can get it right there second time pretty often!
:)
WonkoTheSane (Forum Supporter) said:Fair enough. I usually make the wrong adjustment the first time.. but when there's a 50/50 chance, I can get it right there second time pretty often!
:)
I can't really cast that stone from my glass house, I have a pyrometer and just don't bother using 9/10 times. I guess you've really chased the advice you're looking for at this point - you probably don't want to add much more camber according to the dork collective, which matches what all the "fast people" tell me to do/not do. I just usually try to get as close as I can to the 949 recommended race setup and adjust from there.
https://supermiata.com/miata-race-alignment-info.aspx
dps214 said:Keith Tanner said:Softening the front bar is the same as stiffening the rear, just with less overall roll stiffness which will exaggerate the scrubbing due to greater lean. It's a common mistake to think you're adding traction at the soft end without affecting the stiff end, but really you're shifting weight transfer from one end of the car to the other in both cases.
I agree with the overall message, but starting it out with that statement is dangerous. They're very much NOT the same, because of the reasons you go on to describe.
Can you elaborate? Other than the decreased overall roll stiffness and the overall increased lean, they are very much the same. They both put a higher percentage of total weight transfer on the rear wheels, but neither one changes the total amount of weight transfer.
In this case - decrease the amount of steady state understeer - they are the same unless you run into edge cases like the end of suspension travel.
I'm in the same camp as dps214 but as I arn't an engineer I would have to page through large sections of "Tune to Win" to not sound like a Mo-ron in an effort to explain why.
"Soften the front bar to decrease understeer" usually gets interpreted as "soft bars mean more traction". But the two ends of the car are connected and cannot be viewed in isolation. That weight is going to get transferred no matter what you do with the sway bars. All you're doing is deciding how it's distributed.
This is why I made my first statement about my splainin things; I'm aware that softer and too soft are completely different things.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
I'm just saying they're not the same because one includes an overall decrease in roll stiffness which a lot of people forget about. I guess it's mainly a difference of opinion. I would hesitate to say "they're the same except..." Because inevitably somebody will stop reading there and get the wrong idea.
That's their problem, it's not exactly a wall of text! Damn kids and their short attent...squirrel!
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