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Update:

Today I drove my car at an event with the HF bar for the first time.  When I got wheel spin before the engine obviously revved up quite a bit, I would hear the tire spin, scrape the pavement lightly and struggle for traction so I would back off throttle slightly and then back on.  What I noticed today in those situations was that the engine did not seem to rev as high, the tire would still spin some but the scraping of the tire on the pavement was stronger or higher friction and I did not find myself backing of the throttle as much.  Still a little wheel spin though but better. 

That seem about right as far as what your experiences are?

Also tried 36.5F/30.5R pressures and borrowed a sprayer and sprayed my front tires for the first time (it was really hot today).  That seemed to help so I will be picking up at sprayer before next event. 

This all added up to me being 0.3 seconds closer to my closest competitor in the Miata (I was about a second slower than him for the past 2 to 3 events pretty consistently).  At least I think those things are what made the difference.

Feel free to comment.

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Jose B.
#81 STS2

frostwhitesi:

That seem about right as far as what your experiences are?

Pretty much. The additional front spring in my car makes the bar do less work as roll is primarily controlled via spring rate (+/- 1.5in of movement at most) so the HF bar was not really doing a whole lot. I was getting slight wheelspin on corner exit in off camber corners with the HF and removing it eliminated it. I compensated with a bit more rebound damping to keep turnin the same.

Also, when dealing with wheelspin pay carefull attention to the contours of the surface. If you are on a crowned runway or there are slow undulating (not sharp) bumps it's probably the bar/camber/etc. If there are high frequency bumps (say 1in height over less than 5ft, repeated) it's most likely shock rebound damping that is causing the wheelspin. Sharp bumps (non repeating) on corner exit can also upset the inside wheel. You will want to take rebound out to let the wheel come back down quicker, keeping it in contact with pavement. Remember that you will also want to take our rear rebound (or adjust rear tire pressure, but I would suggest removing shock unless you are tuning for a balance different than you had) to keep from making the car oversteer on turnin.

thx

Ian

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--CRX Addict
--Recovered Mini Addict

Damn Ian, you wanna come help us setup our car????

 Our setup methodology was more like this: 

1.  Print Redshift's checklist.

2.  Arbitrarily add some rear spring rate (450/600)

3.  Drive the car, noting the oversteer.

4.  Curse loudly at the frustrating car, and dub it "little evil"

5.  Learn how to drive around any bad setup.

6.  Read other people's setups and wonder how far off we really are.

 

Oh well, it seems to be working so far.... Ian, keep me in mind for nats....Darrin may have found an alternate ride as expected.

 

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Jay Ruggles
#97 STS2 CRX "Lil Evil"

Yeah, the idea of eliminating wheel spin or push for that matter on corner exit is the stuff of my dreams. 

 Ian, how is the car behaving in transitional elements and at corner entry?

Hi Ian,

I have been thinking about adding a little more rate to the front to control roll a little more as I've noticed in some pictures taken of the car at events and reduce the amount of needed front camber (since I don't have a lot w/o adj. and height).  Thinking going from 420f/500r to 450f/500r and maybe then trying the car without the front bar to reduce wheel spin further.  I run the sport Konis so I can not really go higher on my rates from what I have read.

I sort of learned a hard lesson on the damper settings.  I started with the Redshift setup as most people did with the rear shocks pretty much on full stiff rebound and the fronts on full soft.  I pretty much went from a stock car  that understeered to a car that snap oversteered at random going into turns but would happen every run and could not control this and it was frustrating.  A friend suggested I take the rear damper setting down a bit so I took it to half turn from full soft and this seems to be working ok for me.  The fronts are at a quarter turn from full soft as I have read this is the correct thing to do for the drive wheels of the vehicle.  I made this adjustment not understanding what was happening but the way someone explained it to me is that the rear shock was "holding" the tire/wheel/spring up (way overdamped)  after bumps and not letting the tire/wheel/spring do its job at maintaining traction. I still don't run a bigger rear swaybar and have been trying to tune oversteer by lowering rear pressures a tiny bit at a time.  I guess these adjustments are sort of  the recommendation you made on the second paragraph.  All parking lots seems to have their imperfections and bumps, rough areas (high frequency) and maybe large sunk sections of pavement (low frequencies).  I guess I would like to seek a good balance that would work well most places I go. 

You said above "I compensated with a bit more rebound damping to keep turnin the same."  If you have time, could you expand on how that would help or works as I don't understand?  Also, the car you are speaking about, I am assuming it does not have LSD in CSP or is an ST car.

 Thanks 

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Jose B.
#81 STS2

glagola1:

Yeah, the idea of eliminating wheel spin or push for that matter on corner exit is the stuff of my dreams. 

 Ian, how is the car behaving in transitional elements and at corner entry?

Depends entirely on how fast I turn the wheel :) seriously :)

This is kinda hard to explain in words so bear with me on this. Driving "smooth" (aka no abrupt/quick wheel movements) and with my "standard" tire pressures the car will push slightly with on throttle turns/sweepers. trailing brake turnin is slightly loose, but only for the first 1/4 or so of the turn since once the car rolls over into full decel/turn the rear tires camber in and the car will switch to a straight slide (if you are too hot) or neutral. Note than when I say slide I mean 4 wheel slide, so no change in attitude once the car breaks loose. Accelerating/decelerating transistions are the same as above but more pronounced push on accell and more initial oversteer on decel. constant speed in a slalom the car is loose in the straight lines and tight in the turning sections.

Transitionally my main adjustment method is 1. shock and 2. input speed (I like to call it "tossing" the car). I'll adjust REAR shock if I need the car to be looser on both slaloms AND on normal corner entry.  Thankfully there is not any of the wheelspin issues in back like there is with front rebound adjustment. If I need to keep the car tight for a funky slalom (crowned, aka airport runway slalom, or loose surface, decelerating, etc) I can adjust the turnin for a specific corner with input speed. I'll abruptly lift throttle and quickly turn in at the same time, or if I really need oversteer I'll steer opposite and then back ( a good example of this was the 180 at the toledo pro, a slight jog towards the centerline of the courses then back in to get the arse end of the car moving). Combine either of those will trail braking and the rear end is as loose as I need it to be on turnin. In the end the rear camber catches up with the car as it rolls so it always brings itself back into line. Too much wagging or too much speed though and the car changes to a 4wd slide.

For me I find that a tight car is much faster than a loose one. I found that out the hard way at nationals last year in 40deg weather. The trick for me is finding ways to get the car to oversteer when I want it to, and only at those times. It means a combination of trail braking, left foot braking (which I still end up effing up 1/2 the time), input speed, and rear camber all with the intent of increasing my confidence that I'm not going to end up facing backwards every time I mess up or miss a line.

besides, my front bumper is allready foobar'd so I'd rather hit cones there

Ian

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--CRX Addict
--Recovered Mini Addict

Thanks for sharing your set up info.  I don't really know what to make of it though.  :)

See you in September.

You want to be really careful analyzing the results when doing an isolated change like removing the front bar or going to a smaller front bar without making any other changes to the car. For one, the roll angle will have increased if you actually increased front grip or even just maintained what you had before. This change in roll angle alone may make the car feel looser depending on where you are in the decambering of the outside rear. Also, an increase in roll angle will typically mean an increase in dynamic cg height. Total grip may have gone down, even though front grip has gone up relative to rear grip. You might see a reduction in wheelspin coming off of corners, but corner speed may be down as well.

Your main problem causing wheelspin in a CRX is the short wheelsbase. Same with the EF's. My long wheelbase EG has very little trouble with wheelspin, even with a monster front bar on it. Also, understeer will tend to make wheelspin more of an issue, especially mid-off understeer. I don't have any understeer in these phases unless I've screwed up some how. But then, my setup approach is to have a car that is tighter on entry that then gets looser as roll angle builds.

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Nate Whipple
NER
188/88 DSP ITR

So you're telling me that your EG is tight on entry, has no mid corner push and has no wheelspin?  Go faster!  Ha ha ha ha....  Seriously, how was this achieved?

Well, the no wheelspin part is most likely predominantly due to the wheelbase, though the reduction in dynamic cg height might also contribute since any additional load transfer post inside rear wheel lift would have to happen across the front axle. At 101.2" my EG is quite a bit longer then a CRX. Everything else is just the springs, bars and alignment. I'm way different in my setup then anyone else out there, so it's not too far fetched that my car handles way differently too. In short, I'm shooting to unload the inside rear at peak cornering and not any earlier. Then I use rear camber to set mid-off balance and rear toe and shock settings to set entry balance.

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Nate Whipple
NER
188/88 DSP ITR

You're taking this car to nationals aren't you? a 92 si? I will be very interested to see how this car does. Who is driving with you?

It's a 93 Si, and it has been at nats before and will be again this year. I tend to choke at big events, so look for my co-driver, KC, to do well. The car has proven to be as quick as Hollis in his 89 Si, but things like cones, red lights, snoozing at the lights, or launching in neutral prevent the true potential of the car from being shown.

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Nate Whipple
NER
188/88 DSP ITR

Now that it has been out a day or so...

 Is there a general feeling on the exhaust/intake requirements for STS Civics/STS2 CRXs to make them emissions compliant?

 Possibly Ian Baker? Hollis? Jason? Darrin? Mike? Anyone at Redshift Motorsports?

I am curious about the wording/clarifi-change and how it will impact the OBD0 crowd.... Thanks...

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»Coining the phrase... Clarifi-Change...

How do you mean? The clarichange only creates a double standard for OBD2 cars, forcing them to adhere to a different set of rules then the OBD0 and OBD1 cars. In reality, I don't think the clarichange does anything to affect legality of anyone that hasn't flat out disabled CEL's in the ECU or eliminated a secondary O2 all-together. Others may disagree, but I read the rulebook and see specific allowances. You can try to redefine "except" all you want, but it's kind of a Bill Clinton argument if you ask me.

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Nate Whipple
NER
188/88 DSP ITR

I was looking/asking/inquiring more about the impact on the OBD0 Civic/CRX ST prepped cars. I figured this was a good thread for that discussion. I read through the fast-growing thread and mainly see STX/STU OBDII people debating their points.

 This looks as though it would directly impact sts2 crx setups, (as well as STS civics)..

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»Coining the phrase... Clarifi-Change...

There is no impact on pre-OBD2 cars. Our O2 sensor relocation is legal somehow. The distinction between relocating said O2 on a civic vs. doing the same on a WRX and subsequent apparent difference in legality is perplexing to say the least, but I'm not worried since my header has a CARB tag on it. I'd be more worried if my header did not have a CARB tag, but I'm assured by owners of these types of headers that so long as a pre-OBD2 car passes a tailpipe sniffer, you're fine.

If my posts seem cryptic or confusing, that would be an accurate assesment of my impression of this entire clarifi-change. (I really like that word. Nicely done!) I'm not worried about getting protested as if I did it would mean I drove REALLY well and I'd be so elated by that I wouldn't care if someone chopped my arm off. I'm merely entertaining myself now by posting about this rediculous garbage with sarcasm and veiled criticism of the whole thing. I only have 3 events left counting nationals that I'll still be in ST for. The rules makers have killed what was left of my waining interest in the ST classes. Who would have thought the biggest threat to ST was the rules makers rather then "ringer" tires?

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Nate Whipple
NER
188/88 DSP ITR

Here's my take on it, since I was asked for my opinion.

 

My only opinion on this whole emissions mess is a call for all ST competitors to come to a gentlemans agreement to not protest anything on anyone's car based on emissions compliance. That would solve the whole what's legal and what's not when it comes down to emissions. I believe the whole ST crowd (minues a cuple I'm sure) has the same opinion that the ST understanding of the emissions rules were fine pre-June/July. I have the belief that if anyone loses Nationals or any other race because they can't pass a sniffer from whatever state they can find one really didn't lose it because of emissions. Here's my personal statement right now and you can quote me on it at Natonals if it comes down to it, I will not protest anyone based on their emissions non-compliance.

 

Just my personal opinion and this will most likely be my only statement about this subject. Hopefully the SEB will be this all rectified and "clarified" soon before everyone in ST gets rid of their cars.

 

Speaking of.... If the SEB can change all this stuff at the last minute, why can't they replace BP who has ZERO competitors with STS2 who currently has 22 competitors and give it National status early??!! No offense to anyone who runs in BP, but its simply ridiculous after the numbers that STS2 has been pulling all year long and will easily reach 25 at Nationals, that BP is given "National Championship" status and STS2 not.

 

Ok, my rant's done...time to crawl back under the CRX.

 

-MK 

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Mike King
88 CRX Si - STS2 #99
Jacksonville, FL
2007, 2008 STS2 Solo National Champion
Team Bridgestone - King Motorsports - A-Spec Racing - Renspeed

There aren't any BP competitors because it is no longer a national class.

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Steve Rife
ETRSCCA

Guess I missed that one...like I said, I'll crawl back under my CRX now....;-)

 

-Mike 

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Mike King
88 CRX Si - STS2 #99
Jacksonville, FL
2007, 2008 STS2 Solo National Champion
Team Bridgestone - King Motorsports - A-Spec Racing - Renspeed

Hey check this out:  I replaced my radius rod bushings with new oem bushings.  Didn't really feel any difference and the "bang" under hard braking that came from the front of the car persisted.  Well, I just replaced those radius rod bushings with new Energy Suspension bushings and the front of the car is super solid.  The noise is gone and the feel of the road goes straight to the steering wheel.  Nice. 

Well here' where things get a little weird.  The car has more push than it used to and that's bad.  I mean, it was pretty pushy before but I felt it was fast.  Now I think it pushes too much.  I'm speculating that the bushings are resisting the movement of the suspension since they are disc shaped and not cone shaped like the OEM and this is adding a bit of spring rate.  I'm going to try and tune back some oversteer to make up for it.

Just putting that out there.  Has anyone else done this swap and felt the same thing?

 Matt