Best touge setup.

Best touge setup.

I've been doing some research into this since I rather enjoy spirited touge runs once in a while. Please add or correct me on anything.

Keep in mind that this a mild street setup for canyon runs where the roads won't be as well maintained and glass smooth as tarmac on a closed track or field. This is also directed to front wheel drive as opposed to rear wheel drive setups.

1) Stiff lower suspension, but not too stiff to compromise bumps in the road. We wouldn't want to hit a bump with an overly stiff suspension and skid into a guardrail or over a cliff. Definitely don't want something bouncy. Firm and properly dampened. A little overdampened might be acceptable. Underdampened = bouncy.

2) Much stiffer rear sway than the front to enhance neutral handling. Sway bars as well. Perhaps no front strut bar or only one in the rear.

3) Grippier tires. Large contact blocks would contribute to better cornering abilities. I'm considering the Falken Azenis RT-615's as my next set of tires. The Toyo Proxes4's are all seasons and pretty good all around, but the sidewalls are still too soft. The Azenis are known for their reinforced and very stiff sidewalls that I've heard can run fine even underinflated. LOL They're cost effective too. Cost less than the Toyo's.

4) Staggered tires and/or wheels. Wider in the front and slightly more narrow in the rear.

5) 10-15 psi higher tire pressure in the front and stock recommended pressure in the rear. Ex. 42 psi front, 32 psi rear. The tire would bow out and there would be less contact on the edges of the tires, meaning less sidewall flex.

Of course, staggering the tires and/or wheels would be expensive so that might not even be an option for some of us. However, with a basic suspension and wheel/tire combo, this setup should do the trick.

i see lots of problems and inconsistencies with your theories there, good luck making it down the mountain.

Why wider tires on front wheels than the rear?

his theory is that the thicker tires on the steering wheels the better...

My car doesn't have a sway bar somehow in the front... and feels like shit driven hard downhill...

lol dayum.

Care to correct me? I'm still trying to figure this out. My theories are just theories. They're not necessarily correct. Any input would be nice.

no sway bar in the front is plain wrong... I can attest to that one....
feels fucking wrong lol

i don't agree with 4 and 5. the stiffness would be determined more on how low your car is too i think.. i would also prefer stiffer springs in the front than rear.

#5 is the most asinine thing I've ever heard. Don't overinflate tires unless you like screwing up the bead or belts. Just keep the fronts at about 35 PSI and the rears at about 32-33 PSI. Done.

I did some more research and I found that the front spring rates should be stiffer in the front, but the rear dampening should be stiffer.

You have a point. I'm running the exact pressures you listed right now by chance.

front spring rates should always be stiffer because they have to house the engine too....

Not necessarily - look at what lot of auto-x people setup their tires. Some run pressures that approach 50-60PSI easily. Also has a great bearing on tire choices - as some tires are known to be able to take lots of pressure, some do not.

I wouldn't worry about tire blowouts either - unless you hit something, hard enough to damage a normally inflated tire. We tested tires running 150-300PSI in the tire - to make them blow up on purpose. Some tires did blow up immediately, some had to be run at highspeeds with extreme loads on a test stand before they blew up.

Pumping up a tire with that much air will sharpen the steering considerably. Since you reduced the overall rolling resistance of the tire, stiffen the sidewall to maintain tire rigidity and road feedback, and minimize potential to overheat. The big drawback - you have less tire contacting the road = less available grip. Depending on the susupension setup and the particular road you are running on, this would help or hurt. Cannot blindly over-inflate a tire - unless you knew what you were doing. But I would not recommend "dropping" the pressure either - what to keep it in the 32-35PSI range at the very minimum.

As for the suspension changes - need to give us more info. You have not mentioned alignment - which can influence steering and stability more than absolute suspension modifications. Example = just lower the car with performance springs or similar will introduce toe-steering - which will not make your day. There are commercial programs that you can input parameters and it will spit out recommendations for spring rates, damping, alignment modifications. One of those things that you don't want to "road test".

Here is a decent write up on a FWD setup from Club4ag.
http://club4ag.com/faq_and_tech_pages/ae92_light_tuning_guide.htm

Thanks very much everyone. This is exactly what I need to know.

i want to buy a mountain...

A mountain of what? LOL

a mountain filled with hot girls or one with nice roads.. both must have good curves.. which ever comes first.. i'm not picky