Thread: Drop Spindle Discussion
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Old 07-12-2007, 04:59 AM
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Echo Leader Echo Leader is offline
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Well spoken, Nizam!

To further the discussion...JJ spaketh:

Quote:
Originally Posted by junglejustice View Post
Oh yeah... It's all good - this is a drop-spindle discussion after all and not an RSR discussion...

RSR kindo comes up (along with other suspension options), because the need for this DS modification stems from a poor suspension setup to begin with. Believe me guys - having the LCA parallel to the ground is not that big an issue with the right setup on these cars.

And you are not "masking" the issue with suspension improvements via the wallet anymore than you are "masking" flaws in the overall design via a welder...
Now I'm curious why you consider countering a subterranean RC and wonky roll stiffness by selecting relatively high spring rates and attempting to create a solid front axle with relatively thick anti-roll bars the "right" setup? To me, this seems to be something akin to 'treating the symptoms'. If that makes any sense.....Thus what you're attempting to do is overcome the problem, that you've just created when lowering the car, by increasing wheel rates and in turn roll stiffness. It's not so much about spending money, or about using coils vs. torsions. It's more about how you want to solve this roll stiffness issue, and each option probably has pros and cons. I just want to learn what all these are so that when the time comes, I can figure out what I want to do.

Now, if you're significantly lowering the ride height, you're introducing a major change to the overall design parameters of the suspension. Thus it's not a flaw in the overall design of the suspension, it's now a design that's being forced to operate outside of the parameters for which it was originally conceived. With this thought in mind, I think creating a spindle that allows the chassis to be lowered while restoring OEM geometry would be the most "gentle" (?) solution, as you would only be correcting the geometry issues that your lowering the chassis caused. If this was done, the result would be the lowered chassis and OEM geometry. In such a scenario I would then accept that any following changes would be made to address "flaws in the original design", though 'flaws' may still be a harsh word.

There's little point in going to the hassle of making yourself a new drop spindle though and keeping the stock geometry when it can be tweeked for more track performance, so this is probably always done.

I guess I tend to look at the geometry of the suspension as your foundation. This geometry is going to influence all your design considerations. So if you first engineer the foundational geometry or your lowered chassis to be less flawed, you secondary suspension design decisions can be less compromised by the need to overcome issues introduced if the car was lowered without correction. So if you've got a nice looking camber curve, maybe you don't need quite as high a wheel rate...or if your front roll couple isn't gigantic, maybe you don't need quite as much spring rate to achieve the same roll stiffness??

I'd really like to see the difference something like a properly executed drop spindle makes on two close to identical setups. I think the RSR would be an even better solution then it currently is (which is excellent as far as I can tell) if it could be integrated with a drop spindle. Maybe there could be reductions in spring and roll bar rates while maintaining the same amount of body control! And wouldn't that basically be a good thing for everyone??
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