Adjust weight and balance for best handling and cornering

[Smoking Joe]

To get the best handling and cornering out of the car you need fine tune all wheel weights as close as you can. I put the car wheels on 4 scales adjust the springs compression on each shock. Front left and right to same lb's and rears left and right the same then right front to left rear and left front to right rear the all same this is accomplished by adjusting each coil spring. A little as a quarter turn can change the weight 5 lb's. This becomes a balance act by adjusting each wheel spring.
This is the total weight of my completed car with cycle finders is 2267 I have 542 lb RF and 540 lb LF, =1082 and 591 lb RR and 594 lb LR =1185. RF 542+LR 594 = 1136, LF 540+RR 591 = 1136.

[erlihemi]

Nice n Lite! My car is a little heavier but I got my splits a little tighter I believe by pushing the engine back and getting the tranny mount back. Even adjusting my seat forward changes the split. Moving to dynamic weight transfer I found I could eliminate rear wheel hop on cornering by going to the QA1 DD series using the variable rate springs on the rear. To plant the Fronts harder I backed off the rebound setting on the rear and you can see this in some pictures I posted in the suspension section. The part I'm happy with is the logical response any adjustment makes. Unlike some cars that seem to do the opposite of your intent this suspension responds as the geometry appears. I haven't measured bump steer as my car sets low and I haven't felt any negative reaction on some really bad pavement.

[NAZ]

If you're not in the car all you are accomplishing is weighing an empty car and adding wedge. Unless the car is radio controlled this is not the actual weight of the car with driver on board. And what is all that weight jacking doing to ride height? Ride height can have a great deal of effect on things like roll center, instant center, and if this is a solid rear axle car, roll steer. Balance is truly more than static wheel weights. The wheel weights (front to rear, diagonal, and side to side) are dynamic and will move when the car is accelerating, stoping & taking corners. How a car transfers weight is what is important. We use static weights as a datum as it's easy to replicate at the shop or track and simply making all the weights on each corner the same is not necessarily "balanced". Corner weights are important but not at the expense of letting the suspension geometry move around wherever it want's while cranking in wedge. But while you're weighing the car you should work on determining the CG in both the X & Y planes. You can Google how to measure the CG height by using scales and you want to get this info with you in the car. This can be useful if you have a computer modeling program like SusProg3D or FastLap Sim 5 for evaluating your set-up at home to get it close before taking it to the track.

At a minimum, I'd suggest you include ride height in your set-up and if this is a solid rear axle, adjust your rear ride height so that the LCAs are parallel to the ground as a starting point and use that as your baseline rear ride height (which will change with tire diameter). Why parallel to the ground? This will minimize roll steer. And include adjusting front bump steer to the minimum you can achieve. FFR hasn't given you much chassis adjustment but you may also consider fabricating brackets that will allow you to adjust the rear instant center as this and the other adjustments mentioned should do more for your handling than any weight jacking you can do.

But have fun with the adjustments and keep good records of the results.

[Smoking Joe]

NAZ I agree with you on all you comments. I have ride height set to 6.5 " other wise I could not get in my driveway. I have IRS set -3 camber, 1/8"tow in with QA! 501DD shocks and 300 lb springs. My set up is a stating point for a daily driver as my track days are over, I'm 79 years old, When we were campaign Porsche 935 and GT cars the track setup would be different for each track. A set up for Laguna Seca would not work at Daytona. In those day we had no computers bur keep records. Track temp. wet/dry, tires selection all effected mechanical set up
NAZ week up the good comments