S130 Suspension Tech

[hoov100]

I thought the best thing to do for road racing with a trailing/semi trailing arm design was to make it as stiff as possible to limit the negatives of the design?

[Smokescreen]

Yeah, thats seems to be the theory. I can see where you would want to stiffen the rear end up, but how far do you go before you have limited travel and the car beats you to death on the daily drive? Its all relative. Racecare/streetcar...Can't have both. I will be adding front and rear strut tower braces as well as thicker sway bars and a tire that has lower sidewall profile and see where that gets me.

Edited February 28, 2010 by Smokescreen

[260DET]

I thought the best thing to do for road racing with a trailing/semi trailing arm design was to make it as stiff as possible to limit the negatives of the design?

 

Remember the M3 BMW tarmac rally video, plenty of rear suspension movement there but, yes, it does have to be controlled movement. The rear needs to be a bit compliant to put the power down and grip, I'd look at a big front ARB and none on the rear, I hate rear ARB's for race purposes, different for drift cars.

 

On spring rates, mine has 400's on the front and it rides quite well on the road. How come? Body has been seam welded and stiffened up, plus the dampers are valved correctly. It really pays to have top class dampers, valved by someone who knows what they are doing.

[Smokescreen]

400 Lbs. front and rear spring rates? Whats your cars total weight and what type of tires are you running? Just curious as to How the thing rides on the street? Also, forgive a n00b but, what do you mean by ARBs???

Edited February 28, 2010 by Smokescreen

[260DET]

400 Lbs. front and rear spring rates? Whats your cars total weight and what type of tires are you running? Just curious as to How the thing rides on the street? Also, forgive a n00b but, what do you mean by ARBs???

 

ARB = anti roll bar, check out the stickies at the Suspension section for general info. My car has 400 pound front springs and the equivalent of 300 at the rear, weighs 1240 KG with driver, BFG Gforce street tyres. As I said, its all in the dampers, can't emphasise that enough. Ride is firm but it does not jolt or bounce or shake my teeth loose See my signature video and

Edited March 1, 2010 by 260DET

[frank280zx]

ARB = anti roll bar, check out the stickies at the Suspension section for general info. My car has 400 pound front springs and the equivalent of 300 at the rear, weighs 1240 KG with driver, BFG Gforce street tyres. As I said, its all in the dampers, can't emphasise that enough. Ride is firm but it does not jolt or bounce or shake my teeth loose See my signature video and

1240 KG??? that seems heavy do you have full glass and steel/interior ?

 

Did you convert your rear supesion or only the front to s14 ? asnormally the rears would be allot stiffer due to the trailing arms, i have seen e30 with 650 in the bak and 570 upfront, full track cars i might ad so round 1000KG's

(i tend to compare the zx allot to the e30 due to the fact technically and weightwhise its allot like a zx )

[260DET]

1240 KG??? that seems heavy do you have full glass and steel/interior ?

 

Did you convert your rear supesion or only the front to s14 ? asnormally the rears would be allot stiffer due to the trailing arms, i have seen e30 with 650 in the bak and 570 upfront, full track cars i might ad so round 1000KG's

(i tend to compare the zx allot to the e30 due to the fact technically and weightwhise its allot like a zx )

 

1150 KG without me in it. Yeh I should have said 300 pounds rear wheel rate, instead of saying 'equivalent'. Car drives great on the circuit, there is nothing to change, its perfect. And I am a fussy bugger

 

Will say it again - dampers,dampers,dampers............

 

EDIT: Mine has semi slicks for circuit laps, slicks require a different setup according to the guru who did my suspension. Euros do seem to generally use a relatively stiff suspension setup from what I've heard and seen, my (amateur) preference is to get the car sitting nicely without much body roll, pitch etc, using the lightest springs/ARBs that will do the job. And use no anti dive or anti squat.

Edited March 1, 2010 by 260DET

[frank280zx]

1150 KG without me in it. Yeh I should have said 300 pounds rear wheel rate, instead of saying 'equivalent'. Car drives great on the circuit, there is nothing to change, its perfect. And I am a fussy bugger

 

Will say it again - dampers,dampers,dampers............

 

EDIT: Mine has semi slicks for circuit laps, slicks require a different setup according to the guru who did my suspension. Euros do seem to generally use a relatively stiff suspension setup from what I've heard and seen, my (amateur) preference is to get the car sitting nicely without much body roll, pitch etc, using the lightest springs/ARBs that will do the job. And use no anti dive or anti squat.

 

My bought set up has 400's rate springs and the car wil be under 1000KG.. (aiming for 950) That should be easy considering i use 78 slicktop s130 with the full isma kit (so that means the bigger part of the rear fenders is fiberglass as wel) fiberglass doors, hatch, hood and front fenders, lexan windows, no interior, carbon shell seat.

 

I have fairly thick ARBs (I’m starting of with the MSA kit) and Slicks aswel, however it will be a dog in the rain with 400's in the rean i like more roll and 250's in spring rates, and 300's for the Nurburgring

Only point is i have to use 15"by class so 50 or 60 tires who by themselves will act as softeners for the rate aswel

However lets see what it will bring! the suspension for now is my main worry

[Smokescreen]

Thanks for the info richard.I'll do more homework.

Jason

[260DET]

My bought set up has 400's rate springs and the car wil be under 1000KG.. (aiming for 950) That should be easy considering i use 78 slicktop s130 with the full isma kit (so that means the bigger part of the rear fenders is fiberglass as wel) fiberglass doors, hatch, hood and front fenders, lexan windows, no interior, carbon shell seat.

 

I have fairly thick ARBs (I’m starting of with the MSA kit) and Slicks aswel, however it will be a dog in the rain with 400's in the rean i like more roll and 250's in spring rates, and 300's for the Nurburgring

Only point is i have to use 15"by class so 50 or 60 tires who by themselves will act as softeners for the rate aswel

However lets see what it will bring! the suspension for now is my main worry

 

To save some weight my front ARB is a hollow one off a Cima, about 34mm in diameter. I almost wish I'd kept the stock rear suspension, just to play around with and get it right, I'm sure that doable with the S130. A good semi trailing rear end is fun on corner exit, the more you stick your boot into it the more it grips into power oversteer The M3 tarmac video is great for showing that, black lines on corner exit, whoo

Edited March 2, 2010 by 260DET

[frank280zx]

To save some weight my front ARB is a hollow one off a Cima, about 34mm in diameter. I almost wish I'd kept the stock rear suspension, just to play around with and get it right, I'm sure that doable with the S130. A good semi trailing rear end is fun on corner exit, the more you stick your boot into it the more it grips into power oversteer The M3 tarmac video is great for showing that, black lines on corner exit, whoo

 

I never had any problems with trailingarms .. in fact i like it better than the set up on my Z4 coupe. To me the trailingarms help me exiting the corner i like that Sqat in feeling upon the apex! I wish we could drive on the same track once and datlog the cars to see where the one is faster than the other due to supsension setup, just from curiosity

I admire your car as you seem to be one of the only s130 drivers that caged up here haha !

Edited March 2, 2010 by frank280zx

[260DET]

You would love that Lakeside circuit I go to Frank, its all about momentum and big balls, I'm a better builder than driver though. Yeh there is no reason at all why your suspension should not work great, just got to find the right man to valve those dampers. Keep us informed of how you go, Nurburgring, scarey fast

[Afshin]

I'm using 280lbs/in front and rear springs rates and find the ride to be significantly better than I had expected. This is using a s13 stance coilover set up which I feel to be excellent dampers, that I modified for my 280 ZXT.

This car is a little more set up for track use, but it's still driven on the street. Ride on regular roads/highway is excellent, gets reasonably bumpy on some city roads, but still acceptable and with sufficient travel to keep good tire patch contact on uneven roads. I also feel that the dampers affect the final ride more than spring rates (within a reasonable range).

[JMortensen]

This car is a little more set up for track use, but it's still driven on the street. Ride on regular roads/highway is excellent, gets reasonably bumpy on some city roads, but still acceptable and with sufficient travel to keep good tire patch contact on uneven roads. I also feel that the dampers affect the final ride more than spring rates (within a reasonable range).

I got a real common sense explanation of the relationship between shock valving and ride the other day. If you've ever pushed on the suspension of a car that had no shocks or blown shocks, you've felt that the springs alone can be pushed fairly easily. Add the shocks, and now it takes a LOT more effort to get that chassis to move. The shocks make more difference than the springs for sure.

[Smokescreen]

Ahh, so the dampers we are talkin about are the Shocks??? That make sense I read the previous post and thought there was some strut mount insulator or something I had overlooked. In that light, I take it that the Tokicos are what they are...STIFF!!! LOL. Cheap and non-adjustable. It's all makin sense now, The difference in terminology from the US to ACross the pond has been throwing me. I am so glad all you guys put into this thread, I knew there were some S130 folks with fast cars out there. I just needed to be a fly on the wall to learn something. Thanks again.

[frank280zx]

basically this is what im working on for the front, a threaded CNC tube pressed over the stock strut and than welded.

We are now working on the for the brake calipers, nothing to fancy but im sure it will turn out nice

[Jared]

basically this is what im working on for the front, a threaded CNC tube pressed over the stock strut and than welded.

We are now working on the for the brake calipers, nothing to fancy but im sure it will turn out nice

 

What's the eta on those items?

[frank280zx]

What's the eta on those items?

 

Well i hope to have it done this or next month.. its one of those weekend things you have to plan the time for. ill post pics when i have it done.

[Afshin]

Ahh, so the dampers we are talkin about are the Shocks??? That make sense I read the previous post and thought there was some strut mount insulator or something I had overlooked. In that light, I take it that the Tokicos are what they are...STIFF!!! LOL. Cheap and non-adjustable. It's all makin sense now, The difference in terminology from the US to ACross the pond has been throwing me. I am so glad all you guys put into this thread, I knew there were some S130 folks with fast cars out there. I just needed to be a fly on the wall to learn something. Thanks again.

 

I don't mean to imply that the Tokicos are not good. I had the somewhat standard tokico/eibach combination for many years and was certainly satisfied with them and think they're appropriate for a street car with occasional light track duty. You would get your money's worth out of them.

I upgraded once I started to spend more time on the track. Suspension is mostly about balance and proper set up for each intended use, which is why it's soooo much trickier than increasing power/boost for example. When I first put my coil over set up it felt better (less lean and play..) but I also think it was slower around the track until I got to tune it some (change my alignment settings, camber, height, sway bar...) and then it finally performed better. So in short eibach/tokico is a reasonable start along with new bushings. I'm a fan of Bilstein's, but have not seen them for a stock ZX.

[frank280zx]

I don't mean to imply that the Tokicos are not good. I had the somewhat standard tokico/eibach combination for many years and was certainly satisfied with them and think they're appropriate for a street car with occasional light track duty. You would get your money's worth out of them.

I upgraded once I started to spend more time on the track. Suspension is mostly about balance and proper set up for each intended use, which is why it's soooo much trickier than increasing power/boost for example. When I first put my coil over set up it felt better (less lean and play..) but I also think it was slower around the track until I got to tune it some (change my alignment settings, camber, height, sway bar...) and then it finally performed better. So in short eibach/tokico is a reasonable start along with new bushings. I'm a fan of Bilstein's, but have not seen them for a stock ZX.

 

 

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