urbanknight

iTrader: (14)

Yes, I remember my settings. When all I had was rims and tires (ahem Babaab) getting the rear to spin was easy because the car had zero camber, ie lack of traction. Once I lowered it and stiffened the suspension, the traction was much better but the back end didn't come around at all (it was like driving a snow plow). I had it up to -2.25 front camber and -1.25 rear camber, with the suspension full stiff or full stiff in the rear and 2 clicks down in the front. That rotated very nicely, not too much and not too little, but I would have loved to get more like -3 front and -1.5 to -2 rear given the weight of the car. I still wore the outsides like crazy, as a car that heavy should have at least -2.5 camber up front.

03RallyLancer

iTrader: (6)

so you saying you had like 16R and 14F?

urbanknight

iTrader: (14)

Yes, but that was after dropping it to balanced control arms on a Tein SS kit, loading it up with strut bars and sway bars, and putting -2.25 camber up front with -1.25 in the rear, and driving on rather smooth tarmac. With that combination, I had just enough oversteer to point the car where I wanted to go, when I wanted to go there. It was also when I finally won a trophy and started earning some props from fellow racers (even got mentioned on a national autocross forum, yipee!)

Alchemist

iTrader: (23)

wait wait wait. full hard is zero, full soft is sixteen. Start over, please.

my settings are 2 front and 6 rear. That's 2 clicks off of full hard up front and 6 at the rear. Tire pressure is 42PSI hot front and 38 rear. And yes, I can get the rear to follow the front- in fact, I drifted around a turnaround cone last time and one of the new announcers said "look at that Evo's 4 wheel drift"

You guys must have some funky surfaces down there

03RallyLancer

iTrader: (6)

maybe i need to try out harder settings in the front now that i have all my strut bars and everything else. Sorry eboy... i use all the way left as 0/1 as soft and all the way right 16 as hard. No wonder it was confusing for me... cuz i definatly couldnt get the rear to do anything with it on soft i tried that out. I guess im gonna harden up the front in 2 weeks at my nxt event. But ill probably stay a little bit softer in the front then you guys since i have the rear tie.

CG5TougeMaster

i got hooked on autocross/road racing/gymkhana myself a while back but even before that i used my city as one big road course haha. the biggest thing to remember tho is that racing is about 80% driver 20% car. the first thing you should do is practice. really get to know your car. learn it's limits. what it can and can't do. that'll help alot. also, watch other drivers, the things they do, the way they drive, shift, etc. and use that to learn. most guys at autoX are cool as **** and experienced drivers can give you alot of pointers to help you out. another good source is DVD's such as best motoring international vids. i say those because during the races they have camera's mounted at the pedals so you can watch the footwork. as far as handling goes, i'm a suspension junkie haha. for better handling...the biggest difference will be felt with a good wheel/tire combonation. Get some wider wheels. make sure you get the correct tire size so the overall diameter of the wheel doesn't change and throw off your speedo, etc. also, do your best to get light weight wheels. forged if possible. if you get 18x8 rims that weigh 22lbs, it may improve your handling a little, but it will also kill your acceleration because of the increase in unsprung weight. Next should be coilovers. I saw alot of people talking about tein. they are a really good company. i'd go with tein super street or type FLEX if they make it for your car. Or if you're serious about rally, tein actually makes a custom coilover just for dirt and gravel racing. urethane bushings, urethane motor mounts, rear strut bar, lower tie bar, X brace (if they make it for your car), rear sway bar, roll cage (if you're going all out), have the car seam welded (if you're REALLY going all out lol), inject urethane foam into the wholes in your car to stiffen the chassis without too much more weight...those are all ways to help the handling. when lowering the car, take care not too lower too much. if you lower the car too much you can actually drop the roll center below the center of gravity and actually make body roll worse. remember, the car's chassis can never be too stiff, but the suspension can. i hope that helps, good luck with the project, and good luck on the track.

comatose721

iTrader: (16)

really? what kind of holes are we talking about here? if that's true it doesn't sound like a bad idea for how cheap urethane is.

urbanknight

iTrader: (14)

sorry engineer boy, I know that Tein rates its dampening by how many clicks off full stiff, but since all the people who don't own Teins don't understand that, I just reverse it. But yes, I generally ran 0/0 or 2/0

streetspeed

I've been talking to some other people that have modified their cars and suspensions. A couple of people have said not to go with coilovers. The one guy said something about the camber getting thrown off and having to buy a camber kit or camber plates. What are the specific problems with getting coilovers? It seems like everyone on here has suggested wheels/tires (which I'm getting) and coilovers. I've been working my *** off at my job to be able to afford the TEIN SS Coilovers, but now that I have enough money, I'm hesitant. Is there an advantage of getting coilovers instead of springs and shocks/struts or vise-versa? I just want the best suspension setup for my car, without ruining anything. Thanks again for any help.

urbanknight

iTrader: (14)

Whoever said not to get coilovers because you'll throw the camber off must not be driving a Lancer. The Lancer has bad camber alignment from factory. We measured positive .25 on one of my front tires within months of buying it! You can't get much worse than that. So yes, you'll want to get a camber kit, but when you're driving a 2700 lb car you need as much camber as you can get anyway. After I added the Tein SS kit and adjusted the ride height, we measured -1 in the rears and -.25 up front. Still not even close to an ideal racing alignment, but much better than the stock settings.

I bought the SS kit and put some decent camber up front, and started posting times only a couple seconds off of cars 900 lb lighter than mine and prepped even better. The only thing I would have done differently was buy the JIC kit instead of Tein, but if you're in a daily driver you don't want JIC anyway.

streetspeed

So, the Tein Coilovers actually help the camber for Lancers? I know Road Race has a camber kit for around $100, is that something that I should buy along with the Tein SS Coilovers? My lancer is my daily driver, but I might be willing to pay more for the JIC Coilovers if they would be better for autocrossing. Is the ride a lot worse for the JIC's? Also, in some magazines I've seen complete suspension kits, including sway bars, springs, coilovers, etc. Does anyone know if such a kit exists for the Lancer? I need everything except for a front strut bar and I know the kits are usually a little cheaper than buying everything individually. Thanks again.

urbanknight

iTrader: (14)

Yes, they help a little. But of course you'll want to tune it even more for racing so yes I would buy the RRM camber kit to go with the SS kit. My camber kit was custom (step drilled holes in the shocks), but the camber kit is safer unless you know a really good tuner like I did. once you do that, get as much negative camber as you can in the front, and then have the rear adjusted to about half that. After you do that, the sway bars and strut bars are just gravy.

I can't speak personally for the JIC kit, but I've been told that it's more racing oriented while the SS kit is more street oriented (hence the name "Super Street"). As always, you'll rattle things loose even faster if you drive daily on a racing suspension, so it depends on how many miles you drive and how much you're willing to sacrifice.

EVOlutionary

iTrader: (38)

"but when you're driving a 2700 lb car you need as much camber as you can get anyway"


Please correct me if I am wrong, but I don't believe optimal camber adjustment has anything to do with weight. It all has to do with how much body roll, suspension compression, and therefore added camber you get under hard cornering. This is ALL affected by what type of suspension you are running and how you have your ride height set. A stock suspension Lancer will perform best with a different camber setting than a lowered one on stiff coilovers.

You adjust camber based on tire temps after a hard run. You want to adjust camber so that you get a consistent temp across the tire, outside, middle and inside areas. If the inside is significantly hotter than the outside, lower your camber (less negative). If the outside is significantly hotter than the inside, raise your camber (more negative). You adjust tire pressures to keep it from rolling over and scrubbing too far down the sidewall.

I just finished an AX this past weekend. I beat the next closest car (race-prepped Honda on Hoosiers) in SM by over 4 seconds, and I am running street tires. I was only about 0.75-1.0 second off the fastest car of the day, a full AX prepped Mustang Cobra R 351ci. that was running huge Hoosier A3SO5's. He is very consitently near the top of the ESP class (only beat by EVOs on Hoosiers).

The Azenis RT-615 is an amazing tire. Anyone who does not believe so should read the latest issue of Grassroots Motorsports. They have a full AX test of all the popular street and DOT legal race tires.

Good luck with your ventures in AX, I know for a fact that it is addicting!

EVOlutionary

urbanknight

iTrader: (14)

You are absolutely correct, however you have to keep in mind that a heavier car will naturally have more body roll. Furthermore, a car that sits taller (like the Lancer or the Evo) will have even more body roll. To support my statement, tire temperatures on the outside of my tires were way higher than those on the inside, and the results can easily be seen when there was 50% tread left on the insides while the outsides were completely spent. For that reason, both a stock Lancer and a lowered Lancer need more than zero camber. But I still agree with you that the needs will vary according to suspension mods, body roll, tire pressure, etc. So in a way we agree but I wasn't addressing the variables.

Unfortunately for us, the Lancer has static camber, which puts it at a disadvantage to the Civic SI. Not that there aren't ways to compensate, but it is a disadvantage.

But to address your comment, I would estimate that a stock Lancer would want to have the same camber all around. This opinion only comes from the experience that when I autocrossed my Lancer stock, it was a little too easy to rotate the rear end. But that's limited experience which I might improve upon if I end up racing my back-to-stock Lancer more often.

Alchemist

iTrader: (23)

whoever said to stay away from coilovers probably meant "stay away from coilover sleeves that fit over the stock dampers" because yeah, they pretty much suck

For the camber bolts, go to optionauto.com and get their camber bolts- you get 4 (which will give you about -1.75 deg camber) for $50 shipped. Same stuff, half the price.

EVOlutionary:
Thanks for the input. You probably aren't aware that our camber is not adjustable. We take what we can get.

I'd be more inclined to buy a new set of Azenis if they were the same price as the old Azenis. These are $25 more per tire than the previous generation. Plus the non-R-compund winners in my club are on the Hankooks, which are about the same price as the old Azenis.