Dan J Hill <dhillrcp@juno.com> wrote:
> A good friend and mentor told me about the book "tune to win" by Carroll
> Smith. I started reading it but alas, I got a D in physics in college
> and had to retake it and this book takes me back to that time. I was
> hoping for something a little more practical and less theoritical.
Well, as difficult as it might seem, you're much better off biting the bullet
and learning the theory. Once you finally wrap your mind around it and start to
understand how it all works, car setup becomes a lot less frustrating.
Beware of "Voodoo car setup" by which I mean "Here's a book of recipies to fix
problems - follow the recipie exactly, and you'll get the result without having
to understand anything" More often than not, the recipie works in the general
case, but the exceptions will bite you.
And you own an exception. :)
For example, adding rear sway bar tends to loosen a car (more oversteer) -
unless you drive a Talon, which has these really nasty camber change curves in
roll, so that if you limit (increase) rear roll resistance, the tires stay
flatter on the ground and bite better, *tightening* the car - unless you go too
stiff, in which case weight transfer effects take over, and you get terminal
oversteer. :)
> Anyone have any suggestions? I mean I don't want "see spot run" but
> something more like "increase front suspension to help with..." Thanks
Give a man a fish, he eats today. Teach a man to fish, and he eats forever.
(Unless he's a Newfie)
For other sources of information that might be a little easier to read, I humbly
suggest www.dsm.org. There you will find a series of introductory theory posts
made by a certain verbose Canadian - and most of it is accurate. :) You can also
try autocross.dsm.org, which has a new "required reading" section (being
expanded all the time) linked to the appropriate spots at Amazon.com so you can
buy the books. I'm also going to be posting my ESP Talon setup lessons learned
to that site - and ignore my comments about the pre-95's, Eric Stemler proved
that they can be made to work in ESP.
Incidently, I've been planning on editing and re-issuing my chicken scratches on
the www.dsm.org site, so if anybody finds any factual errors there, let me know
so I can correct them.
DG
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