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GraemeI

Handling Challenges

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5 hours ago, GraemeI said:

You're not kidding Kevin! Mind you, right now, I can't even get the road car to behave on the road!!!  In it's current state, just the slightest provocation of lift, throttle or even gear change sets it off :)

How much toe did you put in to stabilise things?  More than happy to balance on the throttle :) 

I am fortunate that the guys just over the road do my alignment Very cheap as part of help for racing, but they only charge £75 for 86's and are now very familiar with them, I am fully adjustable front and rear but my settings don't vary much from above. Toe in on the rear is 0.16degrees ( per side ) but be careful as some laser rigs can show toe in as positive or negative value so best to physically look at the wheel movement. If you want to chat it over just PM me and i'll give you my number

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@GraemeI as you've said you have lowering springs fitted but it still has a comfy ride I wonder if the problem you might be having is the springs are too soft for the amount they're lowered and so are basically compressing fully at the rear leaving you with no travel, effectively 'solid' springs and so a very lively rear end? 🤔

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5 minutes ago, Deacon said:

@GraemeI as you've said you have lowering springs fitted but it still has a comfy ride I wonder if the problem you might be having is the springs are too soft for the amount they're lowered and so are basically compressing fully at the rear leaving you with no travel, effectively 'solid' springs and so a very lively rear end? 🤔

That was Colin’s (and my) first thought, but the skid pan we were on has bumps and undulations and it didn’t bottom out once.  The reason is because they are progressive springs, so stiffen up with compression.  I have only managed to bottom out twice ever and that was with  unseen holes in the road.  Besides - in an 86, comfy is a relative term :D

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5 hours ago, Lauren said:

- = toe in + = toe out. He's got toe out on the rear. Works the same as camber i.e., - = negative camber + = positive camber. 

Now that’s what I always thought, but could not find anywhere on Google to back that up, which is odd.  Every single site describes it the other way round for toe, but the same for camber..

- camber is described as top in more than bottom, and - toe is described as rear of tyre further apart than front....

From my car work of nearly 3 decades ago, I (vaguely) remember the same as you’re describing Lauren, so I also wondered if it may be because different machines show it differently, but then would expect to see evidence somewhere :unsure:

Hate being (even more) confused... 

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2 hours ago, Lauren said:

 I didn't use google, I used to set up geommetry on Elises and Exiges many, many years ago. Google seems to make it a tad confusing. 

Just to add, instability at the rear is caused by toe out, not toe in. 

100% agree with instability comment.

You do have a way with words Lauren - the non edited version literally made me LOL and I have people looking at me funny :lol:

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Unfortunately that little of toe angle is hard to check visually, so quickest probably would be calling place where you did alignment and tell if positive numbers for rear axle wheels toe angle on their rig printout mean toe-out or toe-in.

Normally what is wished on RWD car - for rear wheel's front to be slightly tucked in car, so that when car leans/rolls/transfers mass on outside wheels when taking curve, it has tendency to move that end with "presteered" wheels back to center, "toe-in". Toe out, with leaned upon pre-steered with such alignment wheel, of course tends to steer that end even more out, when one leans on that outside wheel in curve.

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1 hour ago, GraemeI said:

Now that’s what I always thought, but could not find anywhere on Google to back that up, which is odd.  Every single site describes it the other way round for toe, but the same for camber..

- camber is described as top in more than bottom, and - toe is described as rear of tyre further apart than front....

From my car work of nearly 3 decades ago, I (vaguely) remember the same as you’re describing Lauren, so I also wondered if it may be because different machines show it differently, but then would expect to see evidence somewhere :unsure:

Hate being (even more) confused... 

I've just looked at my alignment again... I was/am trying toe out up front - and my printout has negative values for the front. Positive values for the rear, and so toe in.

The "before" was described to me as being toe out on the front left, and toe in on the front right... front left was negative, front right was positive.

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Spoke to Tony at Blackboots again, and he confirmed the positive readings are toe-in, so mine is just slightly toe'd in at the rear, which is what I remember him saying.  He dis say it's confusing as it appears to be different to camber where positive is top out.

Summary was camber positive is top out, toe positive is rear out, and caster positive is top further back than bottom.

Taking it back just for him to do a check to see if anything has moved, which tbh, would be the best outcome - it's not like he doesn't know what he is doing :).  

If that isn't the case and he can't spot anything obvious, I will take it elsewhere for full checkup.

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Yes, I am thinking similar or maybe even slightly more - will see what the start point is first, and I am hoping it has moved.  It doesn't feel different to me, but I am no guru on these cars (yet!) :D 

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1 hour ago, Mike said:

I've just looked at my alignment again... I was/am trying toe out up front - and my printout has negative values for the front. Positive values for the rear, and so toe in.

The "before" was described to me as being toe out on the front left, and toe in on the front right... front left was negative, front right was positive.

Well if that is the case then I'd have a quarter of a degree toe out on mine and half a degree in total! The trouble is my car is more stable than it was before. The problem we had was that the track rods were not long enough, which then gave more toe in as a result. If you look at the rear suspension the track rod is in front of the wishbones and so this then makes sense in that respect in that they weren't long enough as the shorter track rods relative to the new LCA's mean that I can't get quite the toe where I want it. How confusing!

Just found this as an example:

frs_subframe_1_1.jpg

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Lauren: maybe it's alignment rig dependent. In printout pic provided by you there was that drawing of toe angle scheme right by toe value, that for rear it was measured from below. That should reverse positive vs negative angle values vs front then.

But what seems weirdest, that Graemel's described symptoms sound exactly like what would result from toe out :((. Damn, confusing :)

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2 hours ago, Lauren said:

Well if that is the case then I'd have a quarter of a degree toe out on mine and half a degree in total! The trouble is my car is more stable than it was before. The problem we had was that the track rods were not long enough, which then gave more toe in as a result. If you look at the rear suspension the track rod is aft of the wishbones and so this then makes sense in that respect in that they weren't long enough as the shorter track rods relative to the new LCA's mean that I can't get quite the toe where I want it. How confusing!

Just found this as an example:

frs_subframe_1_1.jpg

My brain hurts more than I care to admit!

Because this is multilink instead of a double wishbone setup, I am not even sure what I am looking at when you say 'aft of the wishbone' :)  I got a pic from a different angle which may make it better or worse :) 

If I look aft (rear) of the drive shaft, there is the LCA, and anti-roll bar, and fore (in front?) of driveshaft is the tie/track rod?  Or have I lost the plot again? :D 

 

IMG2530-L.jpg.7f8de276b644309116ad12f9dfadbe29.jpg

 

 

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1 hour ago, Church said:

Lauren: maybe it's alignment rig dependent. In printout pic provided by you there was that drawing of toe angle scheme right by toe value, that for rear it was measured from below. That should reverse positive vs negative angle values vs front then.

But what seems weirdest, that Graemel's described symptoms sound exactly like what would result from toe out :((. Damn, confusing :)

Exactly this!

The different rigs seem to show it differently, but what Lauren & Kevin both said earlier is all I have to focus on - i.e. make sure the front of the tyre points inwards, not outwards, and then get the two sides to be the same, regardless of whether the machine says + or - :)

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Thanks for sharing Lauren!

Brain pain has increased however, as this is even more confusing if you don't have as much oversteer as you would like in the car, AND it's toe'd out!  Your driving style and description of how it handles suggests your first view was correct, yet these things make it seem different again!

Good grief, why can't these places standardise on output!?

I will just make sure it's definitely toe'ing in for now (physically, forget the readings!) and see how that works out :) 

Thanks again everyone for your input - your time is appreciated!

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Guest 86guns

Absolutely love this thread. No idea what everyone’s talking about but still loving it 😬. 

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15 hours ago, Lauren said:

- = toe in + = toe out. He's got toe out on the rear. 

Wrong. Confused in your old age? ;)

"Negative toe, or toe out, is the front of the wheel pointing away from the centerline of the vehicle. Positive toe, or toe in, is the front of the wheel pointing towards the centerline of the vehicle"

Camber is relative to the bottom of the wheel (contact patch), not the top. Negative camber is contact patch away from the centreline, positive is nearer.

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Well, sussed mine. I was wrong and I think there was a part of me that didn't believe I could be driving around with half a degree of toe out. So there you go. Interestingly when I got the car back from RRG, I had new rear tyres on, plus the polybushes and SPA lower arms, I remember thinking it's a bit lively at the rear end, but put it down to the new tyres. Then I noticed that in Sport mode it was activating the stability control a fair bit earlier on my test bends round the airport, so I turned everything off. Well that sorted it.

I've done two trackdays and three sprints in it with 30 seconds of toe out in total. I think the thing for me is that I just compensate for what the car is doing and then I forget I'm compensating. This is a good thing, then it's also a bad thing as I will just adjust my driving to how a car handles and once I've done that, I don't have to think about it. I've had a chat with Richard and whilst I've realised I've got toe out when somehow I had it in my head I had toe in, I guess I'm just used to it now, so I'm not sure whether to bother changing it!

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35 minutes ago, KevinA said:

Compensating costs you lap time, if the rear is out unnecessarily you are feathering the throttle to keep control. But heh it's your car :-)

Yeah, it's a bit lively for sprints with lots of oversteer which I had on all the subsequent sprints I did. Worked better on a track day though where I guess you get a bit more heat into everything. Seemed nice at Oulton last time out, being pretty neutral. 

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