cossie_mike

Ive just put compresion struts & adjustable T.C.A on my escos and it now needs setting up so i phoned the ball joint centre in liverpool and they said they could set it up to what ever i want, so i need help!!!!!!!

Want it to be good on track aswell as on the road

So does any one have any settings that they have used before

The car is on 18x8 comp"s

Thanks

Mike

Mike Rainbird

iTrader: (3)

Is the rear beam adjustable or the original fixed Ford item?

How much road driving do you do compared to track?

How do you drive the car around the corners on track (as in aggressively throw it into corners or....? ) ?

cossie_mike

Its a standard rear beam untill i come back from the ring and i'll have 1 made, is this a problem???

Most wkends if that but id say more track

Around corners id say more throw into

Thanks Mike

Mike Rainbird

iTrader: (3)

Unfortunately whilest you have the standard rear beam, you will always have the roll centre disparity issue that plagues all Cosworths and will cause severe understeer (see the next Fast Ford issue for a detailed explanation of the problem and cure - 2000+ words, so I'm not typing it here ).

However, as a start, try these settings:

Front:
2° neg camber
2mm toe-in
As close to 3° 30' caster as you can get.

Measure and report back on the rear settings (which are fixed on a standard Cossie).

You want:
1.5° neg camber
3mm toe-in

Once you have experimented with this, check the tyres to see where the most wear is. If the outside edges are being worn quicker than the inner ones, then add some more camber.

Be aware that negative camber compromises straight line grip (especially in the wet), as the tyre is running on the inner edges in a straight line.

dojj

iTrader: (3)

do the sizes of the wheels/tyres affect the settings mike?

Mike Rainbird

iTrader: (3)

They effect the amount of toe you would want - the settings above are for the 18" wheels he said he had .

Obviously, the toe is also subjective, as it effects speed of turn-in and straight-line stability. Some people are prepared to sacrifice stability for better turn-in (which would be toe-OUT). However, on our poorly surfaced roads, this would cause the car to wander and follow all the imperfections, which is frankly tiring on long journies for a road car.

In fact handling is subjective, so you should really set the car up to do what YOU want it to .

cossie_mike

Cheers Mike thats been a big help

I'll print that out and take it with me

dojj

iTrader: (3)

thats the thing mate, i'm not too sure what i want the car to do
i want it to drive in a straight line when the wheels are straight
i want it to be able to self centre as normal
but i also want to have the settings so that it goes round corners better than with the factory set up
i've got adjustable tcas and comp struts and i know that i'll have to get the front mounted arb as well at some point but i also have adjustable top mounts (if i can ever figure out hwo to fit them) to go on if that will help matters too
but i don't want to go to coil overs if i'm honest bceause i can't afford them and they don't do a set for the rear of the sierra estate (not that i could afford them then either)
i'm running 205/40/17's at the mo and, as the set up is, they run great until they lose grip and then you get fairly wild understeer but lifitng off brings the nose back in line again and thats the set up i'd like to retain

Mike Rainbird

iTrader: (3)

If the rear suspension is the same as a normal Sapphire, I would have not spent any money on the things you have done, and instead bought one of the 6 deg rear beams. As you will see (I hope ) from my suspension article in Fast Ford, this is THE most crucial thing to improving the handling on the Sierras.

Coil-overs are a waste of money on a road car....

dojj

iTrader: (3)

the rear suspension is not unfortuanly
the springs still sit in the smal place but the shocks go through them and bolt onto the insides, almost like coils overs
this is due to the need for a flat floor and it's got other apendages on the beam that mean you need really strong struts and springs to cater for the load the exta 4 inch over hand puts n the suspension

i'll get a pic of one and you'll see what i mean

but thatnks for clearing up the coil over issue

markk

iTrader: (2)

the total setup can also affect high speed stability under braking

dojj

iTrader: (3)

got the mag today and had a read of it, you don't mention the bars mike, or at least i couldn't make them in both tiems i read the article

on another, i'm not sure i could justify spending that much on a 6 degree rear beam but there are loads of pointers there, very good read

i'll big up chip later on too

Mike Rainbird

iTrader: (3)

Dojj,
The bars just tighten up the chassis and don't DRASTICALLY change / improve the handling characteristics. Also, it was suspposed to be 750 words, and I couldn't keep it below 2000 as it was, so couldn't mention strut braces and the like, but these are just icing on the cake and not something that is fundementally required to be changed to improve the handling, whereas the rear beam is .

dojj

iTrader: (3)

aha, so the point of the whole thing is to make sure that you are able to adjust the one part of the vehicle that you can't actually adjust right?
which is why the rs500's you mentioned had all that adjustablility built in from the factory yes?
but how do you get 19 degrees out of them and could you not just bolt on the normal rs500 style beam ot the back?
or is that the hwole point of them being the rs500 then?

i thnk you have raised more quesitons than you answered mate, but it's really intresting to know this sort of stuff

Mike Rainbird

iTrader: (3)

You have misunderstood the article, NONE of the Cosworths have a rear beam that is adjustable and they are all compromised in their mounting position. However, homologation rules allowed the beams to be mounted more ideally (as long as these were within the dimensional positional movements stipulated) and then to exploit the rules further the RS500 had an additional pick-up point that allowed even better mounting (which was only utilised by the race teams mounting a DIFFERENT rear beam to standard, NOT the road cars, which were still lumbered with the fixed beam).

Obviously without the constraints of homologation regulations, the mounting points can be moved to an absolute ideal position, and the 6 deg rear beams are to this optimum - the Grp A rear beams could only be 9 deg at their best (although there were some cheat ones made that were better ).

cossie_mike

Mike had the car set up yesterday and it seems to handle better than it did so im happy with the car again lol

Rear beam after the Ring, if it comes back in 1 bit

Thanks for the info

Mike Rainbird

iTrader: (3)

Glad it helped .

dojj

iTrader: (3)

read it AGAIN just to make sure i wasn't goiing to say something stupid AGAIN and you are right, you did put in that thye used different beams

so question 1 is:
anything i do on the front will still leave me requiring a rear beam to get the optimum handling out of the car yes?
and question 2 is:
other than the beam, is there anything else i could do BEFORE i was to switch the beam that i could use in conjustion wit the beam, ie springs and shocks or arb?

Mike Rainbird

iTrader: (3)

1. Yes.
2. To a degree, but you will still have the front and rear working against each other, so anything you do (that isn't addressing the roll centre disparities) is only going to disguise this, but not remove it.

The other issue is that I know NOTHING about the rear ends of the Estate cars, so they "may" be better than the road cars for all I know - The Jaguar X-type Estates have better rear suspension than their saloon counter-parts...

dojj

iTrader: (3)

i can't find any pics and i've left the camera lead at work, but i'll take some pics tomorrow for you to show you what i mean