Reluctant to upgrade suspension
 

I keep looking at other upgrades for the car, and the trackday instructors all say to focus on handling upgrades before horsepower. The obvious handling upgrades are coilovers and antisways, but I've been very reluctant to make these changes.

While playing Forza 3 today, I realized why. There are so many adjustments for the suspension that I don't think I'll find a setting that's better than my stock setup (ie I won't have the time to find the setting and may not even appreciate it if I did). Am I wrong? Does the upgrade alone with the 'middle' settings result in an improvement, or are coilovers only beneficial if you dedicate hours upon hours to track testing and adjusting? I certainly don't want to make my car handle WORSE than stock, but I don't have the time to fiddle with suspension adjustments (nor do I think I'd appreciate some of the fine nuances in these adjustments unless someone was demonstrating it for me).

Any thoughts?

Great question! :tup: I would really like to know also.

if you plan on tracking your car then of course upgrading the suspension is the way to go as you can squeeze even better handling than stock for sure (even as good as the stock setup is)..the question you should ask is though at what expense literally $$$ and
what expense to overall comfort for street use if that matters... or just stick with stock if your not sure you want to explore the endless possibilities

Well, you could always start slow and do something that works on the street as well...... new sway bars. I put a 15mm spacer on the rear to widen the track a little and fill out the real wheel well, then ordered Stillen sways. I plan on leaving the stock shocks and springs. In talking with others that have done this, they like the reduction in body roll the stiffer sways provide, while not disturbing the ride quality. Of course I am approaching this from a "street" standpoint, but I think your ride is street and some track time, double duty correct?

John

Buy k3s, some sways , drop it a 1/2in, put the front sway one on middle stiffness and the rear on full stiff and call it a day

Don't buy coilovers until you are happy that you are maxing out the car as it is, which is going to take probably a year of track driving to get to that happy place. I would however buy uprated swaybars and front camber arms. With the bigger sway bars the stock suspension is pretty respectable at the track, and as most instructors will tell you, do driver upgrades first.

:iagree: Kinda what I was trying to say in my "start slow" post.

Its not that big of a deal to adjust coils. Just set them around the med stiffness and adjust as you need it later on. Sway bars will make a difference. Hotchkis for the G37 has 3 settings in the rear. There are others though that don't have adjustable settings, so you don't have to worry.

You're correct...I'm a daily driver with a few track days a year. The sways sound like a good way to go and I like that I don't have to do an alignment afterwards too. As you guys said, there is plenty of improvement on my part as a driver to be had before the car becomes the limiting factor.

The thing with fully adjustable coilovers is you have to get the spring pre-load set as even as possible at all 4 corners. If you mess that up no matter what else you do the handling will be way worse than stock.

Corner balancing is the way to properly adjust coilovers, but few here do it...:ugh2:

Spearfish, you are on the same boat as I am as far as what you use your car. Don't take forza as any sort of indication of what you will be doing when tuning your real car's setup. Forza has a level of adjustability you wont have. For example, your swaybars arent going to be endlessly adjustable, they are going to have probably one setting front and 3 rear.

I would familiarize myself a little with the effects of suspension changes before you do something. Also, try and only do one thing at a time. I would suggest starting out with a set of sways and by getting an alignment at your local shop. Tell them to squeeze the most negative camber they can at the front and then match the rear. Leave all other settings alone and set the rear bar to middle stiffness.

These two changes will put a big smile on your face already. After that you can invest in some camber control arms and lower, stiffer springs. Or if you feel like going straight to coilovers, even better.

Forza has insane levels of adjustment...some of it is realistic, some of it...not even close...or if it is, it'll cost somewhere in the 5-6 figures to be able to.

I'll probably get KW V3's, sways, and upgrade the brake pads a step up...when I get around to it. sways will be first.

Good plan. Plus, review this chart to see what affect proposed changes will make on the car's handling...Ultimately you're looking for a good balance. Do one at a time until you get to where you want to be...

Roger Kraus Racing Enterprises, oversteer/understeer chart

Personally (for me) 15mm spacers all around and Stillen Sways (back set to the medium position) work just great for a moderately aggressive street set-up..

I've had a LOT of cars and modified a LOT of suspensions...This works for me.

I think that the z is completely capable how it is stock, and most average drivers wouldnt even be able to harness all of the power and handling until they get very comfortable with driving the car for a while on the track.

LOL! For real...don't think just because it happens in FORZA it happens in real life.

Well - Sway bars help you set your car up for generally over/under steer. Factory Zs understeer a lot - so you could get a ratio of stiffness between the front and back that will bring it closer to neutral.

A lot of major suspension tuners say that all the suspension work in the world will only give you a 5-15% increase in handling...

^that is not necessarily true. It all depends on the car, and for example if you are tuning a suspension on a Porsche gt3 the yield isn't going to be that much as its already pretty good from the factory. If you are talking about changing suspension in a 240sx the suspension benefits could be way more than 15% increase.

Ehhh ... well I guess thats true... But how exactly do you measure suspension increase? I am talking about keeping the chassis stock... Lets say a 370 can take corner A at 60mph stock... I mean with the BEST set of coils I would not see it taking it past 70... I have seen my buddy tune his G35s suspension after he got his cusco's and it took him 2 months to get it handling like stock - and he had to run his car w/ no sway bars lol... after another month he could take his calibration turn about 5mph faster than stock. Of course if you picked up a POS car - maybe the improvement is higher.

I have more of a problem with driver-initiated oversteer...with VDC off...

The only solution I've found so far is to leave it in the garage, or leave VDC on - lol...

I hate adjustable stuff too, for the same reason spearfish said, I would be afraid to screw it up.

I'm very happy with the eibachs, stillen sways (with rear on stiffest) and 275s all around. The car is very neutral now.

I dont think there's anything wrong with adjustable stuff, just as long as you know what youre doing and why youre doing it. You have to build up a mental database of what each change does and how it will affect other changes and how everything works together to change the car's behavior.

Like Modshack said, its all about balance. For someone who is starting out, I would say go for a neutral setup with tendency to understeer. Set the rear sway to the softest settings (closest hole to the tips of the bar) and go from there. 99% of drivers' first impulse when they begin to slide is to let go of the gas and even press the brakes. Those are the best things to do when you understeer and the worst things to do when you oversteer. This is why most road cars are setup to understeer from the factory, because its safer for the drivers. I find it a little scary sometimes that beginner drivers think its good to set the rear sway to stiffest and call it a day.

Then it rains, they spin and dont know what happened. Truth is that most of these guys who don't know what they are doing are only safe because they drive their cars so far under the limit that it doesnt matter if the car is poorly setup. Its when you throw in rain or slippery road surfaces that disaster happens.

Dont be one of those guys, understand and learn what the car will do at the limit. Take an HPDE course, go on a wet skidpad, etc. Tons of fun and you learn to really drive the car.

you can read all about what tweaking and changing this and that constitutes a better handling car....
but unless you first improve you own abilities first and become very attuned to how the car responds or fails to respond to certain inputs via braking or on the gas or built up lateral forces in either of those case while cornering..it simply doesnt matter what someone tells you if you dont cant percieve anything as "better" on track or street and then adjust accordingly..if its simply a smoother ride your after then you better stick to stock or just springs (well for now at least)...

Great information here. Thanks to everyone for the replies.

My Forza analogy was merely an observation that these changes and adjustments are probably both beyond my understanding and abilities for this car. As others have said, I could easily make changes and not appreciate the difference or end with a setup that performs worse than stock.

During my rainy track day, I ran into power oversteer more often than understeer and overall I find the stock setup to be really nice. Perhaps down the road I can begin to tinker and enjoy some of these suspension changes.

What about when you are on the street? Are you willing to give up the compliance the stock setup gives you? Are you ready to sacrifice some comfort for a harsher ride? That should be up top of the list, imo.

:iagree:Sage advice for just about anyone. :iagree:

My goals are pretty simple:

1) Correcting oversteer-like slip on bumpy interchange ramps.
2) Better street ride overall. It's a bit too soft w/ slow bumps, a bit too sharp on sharp bumps.

I figure that out of the box it'll be close/improvement...I may have to go out of state to find someone who can adjust them properly...which I guess it corner-balancing ;)

Do I need all that? Doubt it...