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70MPH Curves are so-so


BigT

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He Guys,

 

I'll have to admit that this is the section of the Forum that I rarely visit. I do however need some help. I was taking a curve tonight at about seventy, and I felt the weight of the car shift. Not a serious curve, but a serious problem none the less. I have heard guys talk about pinkies (the performance shocks), but don't know if they would help. What could be done to improve the handling of the car at higher end speeds without lowering it, and avoiding warranty problems? Is there a quick easy solution?

 

Looking for answers,

-T

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weight xfer happens no matter how stiff your suspension is, unless you are running steel bars for a suspension. it's the laws of nature. dont know if there is a quick easy solution that fits your stipulations. Keefe would know the answer if there was one!

 

Kenda:dm:

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My thoughts too... Now that I have a good set of tires I HATE the body roll I cant wait to get rid of that, Its my biggest gripe. Cusco sways and tein flex here I come....... In a couple of months
Just wondering why you hate the body roll so much. As long as you learn how the car corners, the body roll does not meant the car is about to depart. I initially was not used to it coming from a very stiffly sprung vehicle, but now that I have adapted, I can take corners just as fast...

 

Body roll doesn't mean poor handling...

 

Ted

:spin:
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Just wondering why you hate the body roll so much. As long as you learn how the car corners, the body roll does not meant the car is about to depart. I initially was not used to it coming from a very stiffly sprung vehicle, but now that I have adapted, I can take corners just as fast...

 

Body roll doesn't mean poor handling...

 

Ted

I'm not an expert (Keefe is more qualified to talk about this than I am), but say take a car in a salalom. Everytime you move from left to right to left, you have all that weight shifting from one side to the other as the car leans. Now, if you have a stiffer sway bar, then the car doesn't lean as much and will be in a more neutral position to turn the opposite direction. For normal driving, this would only be noticiable on the twistiest of roads, but it's definately noticable during an autoX.

 

I guess it's not about handling as much as response (is it the same thing?)

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hmmm... The sway bars from what I understand is to improve the position of the opposite tire in relation to the tire experienceing movement. ie one tire hits a pothole, and the other will not react as much with a stiffer sway bar. This might be wrong, so please correct me if it is. I'm basically talking about the feeling of a loose carriage on turns. If you have ever jammed on the brakes in a towncar, or similar car and felt the wheels and axles stop and the car keep going you know what I'm talking about. It is a similar feeling, but if feels like the back is about to skid out on some curves, or that the car overreacts to wheel movements at high speeds.

Any Ideas?

-T

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hmmm... The sway bars from what I understand is to improve the position of the opposite tire in relation to the tire experienceing movement. ie one tire hits a pothole, and the other will not react as much with a stiffer sway bar. This might be wrong, so please correct me if it is. I'm basically talking about the feeling of a loose carriage on turns. If you have ever jammed on the brakes in a towncar, or similar car and felt the wheels and axles stop and the car keep going you know what I'm talking about. It is a similar feeling, but if feels like the back is about to skid out on some curves, or that the car overreacts to wheel movements at high speeds.

Any Ideas?

-T

 

I understood it to be the oposite. The thicker/stiffer the sway bar, the more the oposite tire is going to react to a pothole. What a sway bar does, is it tries to compress both sides of the axle evenly. When you take a hard right and all the weight shifts to the outside (left) of the car, the left wheels will compress the left suspension, the sway bars then attempt to compress suspension on the right side of the car to keep the body parralell with the road. This comes at a price however, this means that the loaded tires (outside tires in a turn) lose some of their maximum grip, and i think ive read that some people have experienced better grip levels with no sway bars (even though it feels like they're in a boat). I would much rather have a flat body in turns though, it makes the driver feel much more confortable.

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Suspension setup is one of those things you can't optimize 100% with a mechanical system. Usually changing one thing will result in screwing up something else.

 

In a nutshell, going to a stiff spring or stiff roll bar will result in less body roll and loss of traction on that end. If you have a car that understeers, you would either decrease spring rate or roll bar stiffness for the front or/and increase spring rate or roll bar stiffness on the rear. With oversteering cars, you do the opposite.

 

Another part of the equation is the damper aka shock absorber. The damper determines how quickly the load is transfered to the springs and roll bars. The sensation you are describing is from the dampers more than the springs. Going to a stiffer bump and rebound would make the car react quicker, but then ride comfort will suffer. I'm not sure who makes adjustable dampers for the Legacy. If someone does, it won't be cheap.

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Scotty's right, just changing the springs yields a marginal difference. To have a balanced suspension you really need to match the springs & shocks, so new both of those. Coilovers are the most comman solution, but are generally built for racing, require maintanance & are picky about setup, not to mention tend to be a rougher ride. And they're pricey. But they also give you the most flexibility, provided you know how to take advantage of that.

 

Not much out there in the way of traditional shock upgrades for your car...yet. If you can hold out for a while there may be some good news soon from SEMA, maybe hitting the shelves around X-mas. Lots of spring options tho, Pinks, Ions, Tein, whiteline, eibach/intrax, etc. All will lower your car, some more than others. Just doing springs w/o changing shocks won't give you the cornering confidence & feel you're looking for, IMO. Hold out for both.

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I'm basically talking about the feeling of a loose carriage on turns. If you have ever jammed on the brakes in a towncar, or similar car and felt the wheels and axles stop and the car keep going you know what I'm talking about. It is a similar feeling, but if feels like the back is about to skid out on some curves, or that the car overreacts to wheel movements at high speeds.

 

You may just be experiencing the "neutral" handling balance of your car. You can make it understeer or oversteer. If you're lifting throttle or get on the brakes through a fast turn (e.g. 70 mph turn), you can definitely get the rear to feel lighter and slide out if you lift off the gas.

 

Stiffer sway bars will increase responsiveness and require you to be smoother in your actions. It will likely accentuate what you already felt.

 

Also, the Legacy GT's quick steering ratio will also make it tougher to be smooth--hence the sensation of "overreacting". I do find the steering to be overboosted, so that makes it easy to hack at the steering instead of being smooth.

 

Basically, don't spend a whole pile of bucks making things stiffer until you know what you really want it to do. :)

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I'm basically talking about the feeling of a loose carriage on turns. If you have ever jammed on the brakes in a towncar, or similar car and felt the wheels and axles stop and the car keep going you know what I'm talking about. It is a similar feeling, but if feels like the back is about to skid out on some curves, or that the car overreacts to wheel movements at high speeds.

Any Ideas?

-T

 

This sounds like the same feeling I had. I'd describe it as the wheels feel like they're initiating a turn and it takes the car body a half second to catch up to the wheels - like the car body kept trying to go straight while the wheels were turning in. I first switched to stiffer sway bars which helped bramatically with quicker turns, but longer sweepers & higher speeds still produced an unnerving amount of body roll. It felt unpredictable & made it hard to feel confident in the car's handling. Changing the springs & struts eliminated that. There's still some body roll, but it's much better modulated & predictable, and makes the car feel far more confident in sweeping turns now.

 

For the record, I'm in an OBXT which is the worst handling of the legacy line when it comes to turn-carving.

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yup nothing wrong with body roll.

Ford Lightning has a lot of bodyroll but it'll pull higher lateral G than most sedans and coupes

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