mongooze
Driver
Drifting 103: Suspension Tuning and Stuff
DIFFERENTIALS
Clutch vs Welded vs Viscous Limited Slip Differential
CLUTCH
Long story short clutch 2 way is the best. There are 1, 1.5, and 2 way. for drifting you usually see a 2 way.
1 way lock up on accel.
1.5 lock up on accel and partial decel.
2 way lock up on accel and decel.
Clutch type lsd is the best give yous the full 100% lock up ( like a welded or spool) when you need it and also differentiates the load when you don't.
OH the ONLY nissan to ever come with a clutch lsd factory is the 87-89 300zx z31 TURBO, super hard to find this diff goes used for about $1000, if your lucky you can find one in a junkyard, you can buy new clutch discs from nissan and restack them and have a super sweet diff for cheap, yeah good luck.
WELDED
A welded is locked up all the time, problem is a differential is designed to differentiate the load at corners (the inside wheel spins slower) and causes somewhat loss of traction and a slight feel of understeer due to the inside wheel spinning faster than it should, but honestly it's really now that bad, literally 99% of us use weldeds and we love em. And it's not bad in the rain either, your going to spin out randomly out of control unless you drive like an idiot.
welded is the best bang for the buck, clutch lsds go for 500 used up to 1500 new, a welded you can weld yourself or buy one for under 100, most of us use welded. They usually don't break either, if they do break, your just too badass of a driver.
Want to weld a vlsd? maybe you want to use the gear ratios? well you can't BUT you can hybrid it. first off a vlsd uses 2 different length inner stub axles
one is the normal size found in all opens and one is longer, basically if you want to convert a vlsd to a welded you will need 2 of the same short side stub axles and of course an open diff to weld. This is how i put a welded in my z32.
ViscousLSD
The vlsd has a viscous fluid inside just like a fan clutch does that when it heats up it locks up, problem is when it overheats to unlocks, so if your drifting for a very long period of time it turns into an open diff, also vlsds tend to go bad and lose it viscousity.
Usually more for the daily driver that dosn't like the chirping effect of a welded when you turn.
vlsd is usally found in some nissans factory, z32, j30, q45 with different gear ratios
just for fun heres some options
240sx come with 6 bolt axles, open diff and 4.08 gear ratio all from 89-97 some nissan came with 5 bolt axles you will need the axles and diff combos to match, most axles bolt right in.
ONLY ones that don't are z32 TWIN TURBO and q45. Those are super beefier but usally not used due to rarity.
S14 SE ABS 4.08 6 bolt vlsd
JDM 180sx 4.36 5 bolt vlsd
92-94 j30 5 bolt 3.90 vlsd (5 bolt axles required)
95-96 j30 6 bolt 3.90 vlsd ( direct bolt in no axles requied)
90-96 z32 5 bolt 4.08 vlsd (j30 5 bolt axles required, no you can use the z32 axles they are longer)
90-96 Q45 6 bolt 3.54 (but different 6 bolt pattern) uses 30-spline axles, hubs, and output shafts used in the 90-96 Nissan 300ZX TT
97-01 had a 3.69.
to use a Q45 diff in S13, I would use the following:
-Q45 or 300zx TT wheel hubs
-300ZX TT Driver Side Axle (installed on driver side of 240SX)
and
Infiniti Q45 Driver Side Axle (installed on passenger side of 240SX).
more diff info
http://www.ka24development.com/vlsd.html
ANGLE, like a boss.
There's a couple different things you can do for angle, tie rod spacers, cutting off your stoppers, but that dosn't do much honestly the absolute best way to get real angle is to modify your knuckles, what you do is you is you shorten the piece that your tie rod mounts too, usually about 1 inch.
Usually requires the use of longer innder tie rods and an alignment afterwards.
BUMPSTEER
When you lower your car your tie rods change angles, when you overlower your tie rods move up and sit in a different arc than your other susp arms,
baically when you hit a bump the tie rods will move in different arcs in relation to the suspension stroke causing the tie rods to self steer under bumps.
Solution- adjustable outer tie rod ends and a bumpsteer gauge, or aftermarker knuckles have the tie rod mount lowered.
ROLL CENTER
Let's make it as simple as possible. there are 2 imginary lines, your center of gravity which is the bottom of your car and buncha calculated lines of geometry from your suspension. These lines are veritcal anytime there is a gap in between the lines wheter it be the susp line over the COG (stock car or slightly lowered) or over lowered which the susp line is below the COG there will be body roll, hence roll center.
few ways to change this, calcuate and lower your car till it center, roll center adjustting ball joints, aftermarket lower control arms, aftermarket knuckles which lower the ball joint mount, drift works or PBM has these and for the rear you can raise the rear subframe by subframe bushings by PBM.
ACKERMAN ANGLE
When the wheels are turned they dont point in the same degrees, this is ackerman angle, in drifting which your wheels are turned most of the time having ackerman is bad, it creates scrub, kinda acts like a welded diff in the front, scrubing the front which will result in loss of traction on the front tyres, usually to correct this is to align the tie rod end with the ball joint, I don't really have too much info on this and i'm not too sure im correct so you might wanna look into this more.
Steering over centering.
With extreme angle modifications, you get to a point near full lock where the pws rack becomes over centered, what happens here is you go to turn the wheel and for a second your steering input dosnt respond until the rack becomes centered again.
the fix, move the rack forward either by modifications, driftworks spacers or pbm has eccentric rack bushings.
ALIGNMENT
note these are all full comp drift spec settings, alignment efects can eat up your tires so for a street car you wanna keep it mild.
To optimize alignment adjustability and to get rid of old worn of bushings, adjustable suspension arms are available.
FRONT
Caster
more caster gives you more steering return, more steering feel, more straight line stability, slower turn in and more camber gain, Too much caster will produce
understeer and provides very high steering effort.
less caster gives you less steering return and less feel. the car will tend to wander in a straight line, gives you quicker turn in and less camber gain.
Again anything in between factory setting is ok for the street for race use some people have gome past that.
Camber
negative camber in the front is very good, when you turn your wheel you get camber gain (positive camber) you want your wheel as straight as possible when the wheels is turned,
with angle mod you turn your wheel even more so you get even more caber gain thats why you see cars with super nagative caber i myself run about -8 and i had to modify my lcas
to heims to adjust more. also caster affects camber gain, the more caster you have the camber gain you get so adjust accordingly.
for street i would just max it out on your coilovers or arms.
Toe
usually pos toe 1/8 allows quicker turn in for the street id leave it at 0
REAR
Camber
You want as much traction as possible, as tyres are expensive or hard to find, you'll find some low powered cars with negative camber so they can spin their tyres
easier depending on their wheel/tyre combo. but ideally you want the widest tyre with the flattest contact patch for your power/susp/wheel setup.
most people usually run 0 camber in the rear to obtain maximun use of our tyres some even go with a little bit positive .5 - 1.0 so that way when the car squats it's 0 under drift.
Toe
Zero or Toe In
Rear toe in is a useful setting that can make the car more stable under power application while turning. It can also be used to reduce trailing throttle oversteer or snap oversteer. Don't overdo it, too much rear toe can cause initial understeer and snap oversteer.
High powered drift cars often run a lot of rear toe in which stabilizes the back of the car allowing the driver to really step on the gas and get more wheel spin. This is a crutch for proper suspension tuning but it is a quick and dirty suspension tuning trick that can be called upon in the fast paced environment of drifting.
Rear Toe In
Just Right Too Much
Helps a RWD car get on the throttle sooner and harder, making power oversteer feel more natural and manageable. Makes a car sluggish in response and creates a tendency to understeer in mid turn and sometimes on exit.
Helps a driver of a drift car stand on the gas and sometimes get more forward bite under drift. Gives a car a weird rocking wandering feeling on turn in. It feels very strange, unstable and awkward.
Less or zero toe can help an underpowered drift car maintain angle at high speed when the engine doesn’t have enough power to maintain wheel speed. Makes a drift car twitchy under drift and want to grab traction and straighten out suddenly. Extreme toe in can cause initial understeer with a sudden transition to oversteer.
Can reduce or eliminate over rotation under trailing throttle or trail braking.
for alot more info heres 1000 pages of in depth suspension stuff
http://zilvia.net/f/tech-talk/29672...ickup-steering-angle-modification-thread.html
---------- Post added at 10:27 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:16 AM ----------
sticky me!
DIFFERENTIALS
Clutch vs Welded vs Viscous Limited Slip Differential
CLUTCH
Long story short clutch 2 way is the best. There are 1, 1.5, and 2 way. for drifting you usually see a 2 way.
1 way lock up on accel.
1.5 lock up on accel and partial decel.
2 way lock up on accel and decel.
Clutch type lsd is the best give yous the full 100% lock up ( like a welded or spool) when you need it and also differentiates the load when you don't.
OH the ONLY nissan to ever come with a clutch lsd factory is the 87-89 300zx z31 TURBO, super hard to find this diff goes used for about $1000, if your lucky you can find one in a junkyard, you can buy new clutch discs from nissan and restack them and have a super sweet diff for cheap, yeah good luck.
WELDED
A welded is locked up all the time, problem is a differential is designed to differentiate the load at corners (the inside wheel spins slower) and causes somewhat loss of traction and a slight feel of understeer due to the inside wheel spinning faster than it should, but honestly it's really now that bad, literally 99% of us use weldeds and we love em. And it's not bad in the rain either, your going to spin out randomly out of control unless you drive like an idiot.
welded is the best bang for the buck, clutch lsds go for 500 used up to 1500 new, a welded you can weld yourself or buy one for under 100, most of us use welded. They usually don't break either, if they do break, your just too badass of a driver.
Want to weld a vlsd? maybe you want to use the gear ratios? well you can't BUT you can hybrid it. first off a vlsd uses 2 different length inner stub axles
one is the normal size found in all opens and one is longer, basically if you want to convert a vlsd to a welded you will need 2 of the same short side stub axles and of course an open diff to weld. This is how i put a welded in my z32.
ViscousLSD
The vlsd has a viscous fluid inside just like a fan clutch does that when it heats up it locks up, problem is when it overheats to unlocks, so if your drifting for a very long period of time it turns into an open diff, also vlsds tend to go bad and lose it viscousity.
Usually more for the daily driver that dosn't like the chirping effect of a welded when you turn.
vlsd is usally found in some nissans factory, z32, j30, q45 with different gear ratios
just for fun heres some options
240sx come with 6 bolt axles, open diff and 4.08 gear ratio all from 89-97 some nissan came with 5 bolt axles you will need the axles and diff combos to match, most axles bolt right in.
ONLY ones that don't are z32 TWIN TURBO and q45. Those are super beefier but usally not used due to rarity.
S14 SE ABS 4.08 6 bolt vlsd
JDM 180sx 4.36 5 bolt vlsd
92-94 j30 5 bolt 3.90 vlsd (5 bolt axles required)
95-96 j30 6 bolt 3.90 vlsd ( direct bolt in no axles requied)
90-96 z32 5 bolt 4.08 vlsd (j30 5 bolt axles required, no you can use the z32 axles they are longer)
90-96 Q45 6 bolt 3.54 (but different 6 bolt pattern) uses 30-spline axles, hubs, and output shafts used in the 90-96 Nissan 300ZX TT
97-01 had a 3.69.
to use a Q45 diff in S13, I would use the following:
-Q45 or 300zx TT wheel hubs
-300ZX TT Driver Side Axle (installed on driver side of 240SX)
and
Infiniti Q45 Driver Side Axle (installed on passenger side of 240SX).
more diff info
http://www.ka24development.com/vlsd.html
ANGLE, like a boss.
There's a couple different things you can do for angle, tie rod spacers, cutting off your stoppers, but that dosn't do much honestly the absolute best way to get real angle is to modify your knuckles, what you do is you is you shorten the piece that your tie rod mounts too, usually about 1 inch.
Usually requires the use of longer innder tie rods and an alignment afterwards.
BUMPSTEER
When you lower your car your tie rods change angles, when you overlower your tie rods move up and sit in a different arc than your other susp arms,
baically when you hit a bump the tie rods will move in different arcs in relation to the suspension stroke causing the tie rods to self steer under bumps.
Solution- adjustable outer tie rod ends and a bumpsteer gauge, or aftermarker knuckles have the tie rod mount lowered.
ROLL CENTER
Let's make it as simple as possible. there are 2 imginary lines, your center of gravity which is the bottom of your car and buncha calculated lines of geometry from your suspension. These lines are veritcal anytime there is a gap in between the lines wheter it be the susp line over the COG (stock car or slightly lowered) or over lowered which the susp line is below the COG there will be body roll, hence roll center.
few ways to change this, calcuate and lower your car till it center, roll center adjustting ball joints, aftermarket lower control arms, aftermarket knuckles which lower the ball joint mount, drift works or PBM has these and for the rear you can raise the rear subframe by subframe bushings by PBM.
ACKERMAN ANGLE
When the wheels are turned they dont point in the same degrees, this is ackerman angle, in drifting which your wheels are turned most of the time having ackerman is bad, it creates scrub, kinda acts like a welded diff in the front, scrubing the front which will result in loss of traction on the front tyres, usually to correct this is to align the tie rod end with the ball joint, I don't really have too much info on this and i'm not too sure im correct so you might wanna look into this more.
Steering over centering.
With extreme angle modifications, you get to a point near full lock where the pws rack becomes over centered, what happens here is you go to turn the wheel and for a second your steering input dosnt respond until the rack becomes centered again.
the fix, move the rack forward either by modifications, driftworks spacers or pbm has eccentric rack bushings.
ALIGNMENT
note these are all full comp drift spec settings, alignment efects can eat up your tires so for a street car you wanna keep it mild.
To optimize alignment adjustability and to get rid of old worn of bushings, adjustable suspension arms are available.
FRONT
Caster
more caster gives you more steering return, more steering feel, more straight line stability, slower turn in and more camber gain, Too much caster will produce
understeer and provides very high steering effort.
less caster gives you less steering return and less feel. the car will tend to wander in a straight line, gives you quicker turn in and less camber gain.
Again anything in between factory setting is ok for the street for race use some people have gome past that.
Camber
negative camber in the front is very good, when you turn your wheel you get camber gain (positive camber) you want your wheel as straight as possible when the wheels is turned,
with angle mod you turn your wheel even more so you get even more caber gain thats why you see cars with super nagative caber i myself run about -8 and i had to modify my lcas
to heims to adjust more. also caster affects camber gain, the more caster you have the camber gain you get so adjust accordingly.
for street i would just max it out on your coilovers or arms.
Toe
usually pos toe 1/8 allows quicker turn in for the street id leave it at 0
REAR
Camber
You want as much traction as possible, as tyres are expensive or hard to find, you'll find some low powered cars with negative camber so they can spin their tyres
easier depending on their wheel/tyre combo. but ideally you want the widest tyre with the flattest contact patch for your power/susp/wheel setup.
most people usually run 0 camber in the rear to obtain maximun use of our tyres some even go with a little bit positive .5 - 1.0 so that way when the car squats it's 0 under drift.
Toe
Zero or Toe In
Rear toe in is a useful setting that can make the car more stable under power application while turning. It can also be used to reduce trailing throttle oversteer or snap oversteer. Don't overdo it, too much rear toe can cause initial understeer and snap oversteer.
High powered drift cars often run a lot of rear toe in which stabilizes the back of the car allowing the driver to really step on the gas and get more wheel spin. This is a crutch for proper suspension tuning but it is a quick and dirty suspension tuning trick that can be called upon in the fast paced environment of drifting.
Rear Toe In
Just Right Too Much
Helps a RWD car get on the throttle sooner and harder, making power oversteer feel more natural and manageable. Makes a car sluggish in response and creates a tendency to understeer in mid turn and sometimes on exit.
Helps a driver of a drift car stand on the gas and sometimes get more forward bite under drift. Gives a car a weird rocking wandering feeling on turn in. It feels very strange, unstable and awkward.
Less or zero toe can help an underpowered drift car maintain angle at high speed when the engine doesn’t have enough power to maintain wheel speed. Makes a drift car twitchy under drift and want to grab traction and straighten out suddenly. Extreme toe in can cause initial understeer with a sudden transition to oversteer.
Can reduce or eliminate over rotation under trailing throttle or trail braking.
for alot more info heres 1000 pages of in depth suspension stuff
http://zilvia.net/f/tech-talk/29672...ickup-steering-angle-modification-thread.html
---------- Post added at 10:27 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:16 AM ----------
sticky me!
Last edited:
