What's the ballpark $$ for a set of to-spec spindles?
Good question? Call them and ask? I haven't approached them yet as I haven't finished the design... and the exact nature of the design is going to impact the production cost considerably.
Heading to the famous Road America next weekend.... Bought a 7in digital dash and a bunch of pressure sensors to get ready for the stressful oil situations that RA will put me in. I am also going through the front suspension again, adding in the baer roll center adjusters again. Adding another degree of camber out back to help with the removed sway bar. WIll have some pics and updates in a few days.
Nothing yet, i should have clarified I didnt include the control arms in that, and i was just redoing the steering rack.
Reports from road america are great, but also bad. Good news is the car ran flawlessly. Alternator repair over the last few weeks solved all of my misfire issues and throttle response issues. Also, racing my friends s2000 was not only very fun, but i was able to pull away in the corners while not losing any ground in the straights (figured it would be faster, but oh well). Bad news is that the high speed stability is absolutely crap, and I'm pretty sure it isn't aero related. I tried a few things but nothing really helped, the car has tons of grip but it "wanders" on the brakes and at speed with what feels like again a loose tie rod or something in the front end. I am going to see if the upper control arm butterflies are coming loose again. It tended to become very unsettled over bumps as well, which make me question the front suspension geometry as a whole package because its just not predictable and smooth enough for me to actually drive at the limit all the time. Many small slides and close calls when running at the limit, and one sketch slide at 115mph through a very dangerous turn called the kink.... not my car but a good angle that shows how scary this thing is.
Originally posted by darkhorizon: running at the limit, and one sketch slide at 115mph through a very dangerous turn called the kink.... not my car but a good angle that shows how scary this thing is.
The kink is sketchy in a lot of cars. My LS1 GTO did a 4 wheel slide at 120, My friends STI felt even less grounded.
The kink is sketchy in a lot of cars. My LS1 GTO did a 4 wheel slide at 120, My friends STI felt even less grounded.
I really feel like the areo is close to great on this car as it sits too, its just this darn front end "bump steer" that is giving me issues now. The rear is smooth and predictable with really nice slip angle and doesnt snap at all when loaded up.... just sucks to have a random number generator dictating what the front is doing.
Anyone have any great ideas to lock down the upper control arm adjustment better? The slotted bolt holes just arent giving me any good feelings no matter how hard I torque them down.... I dont think they failed this weekend but i feel like its a matter of time before they do.
Yeah, I know how you feel. Mine is kind of wavey at high speed - very white knuckle inducing!😵
I set my front suspension with more camber than the rear. This gives good control in cornering. Nice and tight. However, the straights are a bit more trickey to hold.
I'm not sure the aero plays in below 150 to 160km/h, but above it will tend to lighten the front.
Again, my car gets jacked up on the rear when tackling a fast track. You don't win the shoe test for the lack of wheel/fender clearance, but you do keep the front more predictable heading towards 200km/h!😁
For your bolt issues, try largeur washers. If no good then washer with small piece of threaded bar welded to the washer. A fixed stop welded to the arm and then lock nuts to block the washer at a set distance. The threaded bar passes through the stop. (Similar to how the rear wheel on a motorcycle is blocked for chain tension and centering.) Alot of fabrication though😟
I was struggling to get a good reading, but a ton, like 6-8 degrees. I try to set it up about the same as my s2000. I do notice that in parking lots it likes to push badly at high steering angles as well, which suggests that I have a bunch I believe.
The wondering under hard braking in my case went away when I drove it at the track with the welded differential. Before, even letting off the gas the car started to wonder at high speeds. Even trail braking was very predictable with the welded diff. That's why I invested in a real diff. Will warned me but like a kid I had to burn my fingers to find out the water was hot!
I was struggling to get a good reading, but a ton, like 6-8 degrees. I try to set it up about the same as my s2000. I do notice that in parking lots it likes to push badly at high steering angles as well, which suggests that I have a bunch I believe.
The shop manual says 5.5 degrees for the GT & Formula with less for the 4 cylinder. As you get more caster, you raise the outer tie rod end out of its bumpsteer sweet spot. You may want to do a bump steer sweep on the suspension.
I'm also about to test fully adjustable upper control arms for my Formula.
I assume you've tried the 3-9 and 12-6 shake tests on each wheel.
The wondering under hard braking in my case went away when I drove it at the track with the welded differential. Before, even letting off the gas the car started to wonder at high speeds. Even trail braking was very predictable with the welded diff. That's why I invested in a real diff. Will warned me but like a kid I had to burn my fingers to find out the water was hot!
I expect the phantom slip has given up the "ghost" already, but it technically is a little limited in the amount of slip it has. I absolutely am not ready to trail brake but some more brake bleeding and balancing will hopefully fix that soon, although I honestly dont need to trail brake at all when I get into a more "gokart" style driving habit with this car as I can always lay big power out and flick in with quick easy rotation the way its setup now.
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Triple check the rack body.p
I really have big doubts here. I have a legit new old stock rack with baer ends on it (one is pretty beat up and loose, but im talking a very tiny amount, will be replacing it before the last track outing this year). I will look around and probably machine up some sort of billet mounts for the rack soon.
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You may want to do a bump steer sweep on the suspension.
With almost no travel left in the suspension thanks to my heavy front springs and bar, i really cant imagine I get much here. However I would like to increase my droop height somehow, i really think these QA1 shocks are just a little short for what I'm doing. My front tie rod is just slightly under parallel at ride height so I cant imagine another less than 2 inches of suspension movement at the wheel is going to cause much here. The droop increase will let me gain a tiny bit less understeer out of corners due to the roll I'm building into the rear of the car over what the previous owner had. I really have the balance setup super neutral now that the alignment is coming up to my standards.
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I assume you've tried the 3-9 and 12-6 shake tests on each wheel.
And the results were "bad" but honestly I'm not sure how I'm ever going to get and keep a perfectly tight bearing on this car at this point. I email'd dickman and he didnt get back to me with any info on his bearings, and I'm dragging ass on doing a custom e30 M3 bearing so far.
I'm still expecting my upper control arms to come loose, so an adjustable one would be fun as I could just weld in the dog bone butteryfly nut system and run all my adjustments manually. I will be hopefully checking the old delrin bushings for failure tomorrow, but I'm really doubting they have failed considering I cant find any play in the arms by hand at all.
I'm deleting the rear scoop thing, I realized I really hate how it looks and how it functions. I am going to run some 84-esk louvers over the intake manifold.
I'm still expecting my upper control arms to come loose, so an adjustable one would be fun as I could just weld in the dog bone butteryfly nut system and run all my adjustments manually. I will be hopefully checking the old delrin bushings for failure tomorrow, but I'm really doubting they have failed considering I cant find any play in the arms by hand at all.
Yeah, trying to keep 5x100 bearings in a Fiero race car is kind of an exercise in futility.
I will say i have little use for the adjust ability of the upper control arms, I really just want a non delrin bushing option, and a way to lock the dog bone cross bar to the car better.
Thats a nice comparison pic, I figured I could raise the upper control arm significantly, and also lower my lower control arm pickup about 1.25 inches without much issues... I wouldnt consider it a big discouragement unless there is something else I'm missing? I already have $300 invested into my steering rack with spherical ends that should make the steering part just fine.
i feel like the rotor will clear the control arms. I will look at the helm arms, but they didnt have any issues with his, and I can shorten the steering radius without any major issues.
I think I am going to start down the Kappa front knuckle path soon. I've been looking around at the other fiero track dudes out there and the reports of hubs shattering, falling apart, constant bearing issues, etc, just give me all sorts of fear. The Kappa knuckle will take alot of strain off of my control arms due to the wider spread between the balljoints, offer a better brake up front where I want it, and cost less than 1 88 fiero hub thats in good shape... and parts that arent 30 years old are available for it still. I just cant see it being any more complicated than welding in 2 new ball joints per side, but I guess we will see.
The Kappa tie rod end is on the bottom of the steering arm, right? You're going to have crazy bump steer unless you put the tie rod end above the steering arm, which then requires using a tapered reamer from the top of the steering arm.
The Kappa tie rod end is on the bottom of the steering arm, right? You're going to have crazy bump steer unless you put the tie rod end above the steering arm, which then requires using a tapered reamer from the top of the steering arm.
I have a reamer, and a long tie rod end already. It shouldnt be that wild of a project, and if I need a longer tie rod stud to adjust the bump steer even more I wont have much of an issue doing so.
Maybe you have seen this thread. They make a new front suspension starting on page 5.
as far as i can tell, they are still using stock knuckles and are using a fairly illegal (for my class) front UCA relocation. Side note from that thread is I dont see much complaints about ruining the stock front bearings....
I stopped by to visit my old drag car last night, and both front bearings are absolutely perfectly tight
How much cornering load do you put on a drag car's front end?
Lol, about half as much as a 26inch hooiser front runner tire can give me. I'm going to grab some new 88 fronts from Justin today and get to work, leaving for the track Wednesday night.
New wheel bearings on the front, very confidence inspiring to have good bearings up there. I noticed the castings of the bearings I took out were different and the entire bearing looked "new", which leads me to believe I had some of the Chinese reman bearings in there. I also now noticed the rears are in as bad of shape or worse than the fronts, so the Jbody rear conversion is on deck for next year. Last race of the year for me today, i'll be on track bright and early tomorrow, hopefully in the dry and not 30 degree weather.
Also, I noticed that my front lower ball joint was just loose in the taper, so a few cranks of the 19mm and I have fixed that as well, so hopes are high to have a car that doesnt want to throw me off the track.
[This message has been edited by darkhorizon (edited 10-01-2020).]
