Oversteer help

[pontiacgp]

that is great that you know what you running for springs and the selection you have might just work. If you can pick up a 36 mm front sway that will add to the spring rate on the front right. As for the shocks just cause you can't use adjustable you can still choose the valves you want in the shocks. Afco shocks gives you a choice of what valve you can get. I use the Afco's in my street car and they hold up well. I don't know how the car will react with only one adjustable shock since the others can't be tuned.

For the stagger if you didn't have any or enough you'll be burning up your right rear before the race finished and you'd be fighting to stay ahead of your rear end in the corner. But the crowds love to see you going sideways around the corners..

 

[ReQ]

I tried everything I could today, just cannot find any scales, I guess I will resort to building a "mechanical reduction" type setup

anyway, I just got back from the track a bit ago, getting closer to the season so I actually got to run with some other cars in my class for once, the new ride height and better springs made a huge difference, still not perfect but I can get it around the track now, has some really bad wheel-hop if I do get it sideways now, I assume its the shocks(still haven't replaced them yet)

all and all it is probably raceable(that is not a word.. is it) as it is now, running with the other cars went very well, the few really fast cars were not at the track unfortunately, but if I am to gauge its performance based on tonight, I think this car would run in the front as it sits

but I would like to give myself some room for error when I get it wrong, or when other cars get me wrong I want to play with my tire stagger and get my weight sorted out, we have a 54% left side rule but that is it, what should I do for the front/rear balance?


I would also like to know if any g-body came with a factory rear sway-bar, this is the only way I could get away with running one, mounting it in the factory location

thanks for the help so far! it is definitely working

 

[pontiacgp]

yes G body's did come with a rear sway but circle track cars don't use them. Nascar only started testing a rear sway bar last year and I don't think that any have begun using them. For your wheel hop shocks should cure than and remember your running on a real green track. There is no rubber on that track yet.
You can set up your left weight but a metric is nose heavy and you can try what you want but you won't get the front as light as you'd like. The engine sits too high and a couple of inches too far forward. Guys have been trying to slide the engine back but that mechanical fuel pump sitting in front of the cross member gives them away every time. The wheels sit too far back on the frame as well. If you look at a camaro and metric sitting side by side with no body on it you'll see the camaro engine sitting lower and further back plus the F body's front wheels are closer to the front of the car. That is why the camaro is easier to set up and will always handle better than the metric.
Sounds like you had a good day tho, once you get the scales it'll help you alot. And you need to get a tire temp gauge. How did you do your wheel alignment?

 

[UMI Sales]

I was going to mention the same thing. With "oversteer" in the title, we definitely don't want a rear bar.

I tried one on my Street Stock one time just to see. Literally three laps into hot laps we took it off.

Agree on the shock thing. That should really help with wheel hop. Even if it's not a perfect shock setting, it should still hold the wheels on the ground.

Here are the front shocks pontiacgp. http://www.proshocks.com/rshocks/baseli ... Street.htm

ReQ, are you braking on corner entry or rolling in? Does your wheel hop occur under braking only? What happens if you diamond the corner by rolling in high, turning sharp and powering out early?

ramey

 

[pontiacgp]

we ran the adjustable pro shocks and they are good shocks...as for the wheel hop I wonder if it could be the front tire chattering. Next time your out put a 2" wide chalk mark on the side of the right tires from the edge of the tread and down the sidewall about 5". That will tell you if the tire is rolling over. What pressure are you running the tires at, cold and hot..

 

[ReQ]

My car sponsor is a tire shop, they did all the alignment following the track rules, everything must remain stock except the right front camber (-3)

we have been experimenting with different tire pressures, other drivers are running anywhere from 45-54 RF and RR, 15-30 LF and LR, at least this is what they have marked on their tires, we have been moving around in these areas each time we go out, usually 50 RF- 45 RR / 20 LF - 25 LR, which gives these tires about a 2" stagger on the rear and about 2.5+ front stagger, not sure if this is too much in the front or not

the wheel hop occurs when the back starts to slip, I do "diamond" the turns more or less, we call it "straightening" the turns out, stay against the wall as high as possible until the last second and turn in, through the turn and pretty much aim straight for the wall on exit, scary as HELL with this cars looseness at the back on exit lol I have been so sure the rear was going to swing out and tag the wall several times

this is how you have to run this track if you want to get anywhere in lower powered cars, you cant see daylight between the right side and the wall watching the fast cars in this class run

anyway, back to the wheel hop, when I enter the turn, its quite a steep turn-in and if I get on the brakes too hard or too late, the back will slide out and start to hop, then of course it slides out violently once the hopping starts and I spend the rest of the corner sideways rattling my teeth out, been excepting something to brake every time, I roll off the throttle and on the brakes at the same time, if I get it wrong it really upsets everything, if this a setup problem or just the nature of this new beast?

tried different approaches but everything has to be slowed down so much its not worth it, cant run in at a shallow angle carrying any kind of speed, it just pushes up the track unless I slow it down

I am not very accustomed to "driving" one of these cars.. so far it seems more like I am just a long for the ride, last season I was in a modified 4cylinder with coilovers, rack n pinion steering etc. etc., I could win a race one handed... so much for sunday driving, guess I am just spoiled

 

[pontiacgp]

did you take any lap times? Tracks use different methods of slowing cars down and one common way is with tires. You have some power in that engine and it could be that the tires won't hold up to the speed and your lap times might be on target. Are you allowed to adjust your brake bias?

 

[ReQ]

not allowed to run a bias adjuster, but as long as all our brakes are factory and operational they don't care how they are setup, some guys just pinch the right rear brake line closed apparently, techs never check brakes

my lap times are very inconsistent as one would expect right now, my last practice session, which was my best one so far with this car, my lap times were 2 seconds faster than anything I have recorded thus far, putting me on pace with the fastest cars in this class, so the changes made a very big difference already

I went from the back of the pack to the front in one week, just by changing springs and stagger, seems amazing to me lol

all of the lower tier classes have 2 packs every Saturday night, the fast cars that lap the second pack of slow cars, just the way it is, you cheat and "run what you brung" or you run at the back, but everyone seems to have a lot of fun doing what they do regardless of where they run, so the officials don't lean too hard on the fast guys, though technically I am not illegal anywhere except for shocks, I just have a much better powerband with what little engine I do have, comparatively

am I running too much stagger in the front of my car? 2.5" maybe closer to 2-3/4, brakes are all completely stock oem replacements, only adjustment so far has been backing the right rear off a lot, and left rear slightly which seemed to help, a long with the 2" rear stagger, note that this track is banked 12 degrees, if that makes much difference or not

 

[pontiacgp]

I would go with a 2 1/2 to 2 3/4 rear stagger and 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 in front. If you have too much front you car will dive left under braking...too little it won't rotate around the corner well.....as far as pinching off the right brake you have a locked differential so only a left brake will not help you corner. In fact it will hurt you cause that back brake will heat up causing the drum to expand leaving you with a low brake pedal and then you'll start locking up the left front


and where's ramey...did he get the day off?

 

[UMI Sales]

I'm here.

We are working on 3rd Gen Camaro front coilovers and I got dirty in the shop today.

2 seconds improvement? Wow, that's awesome.

When is your next track day?

ramey