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Old Apr 5, 2012 | 10:01 AM
  #19  
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Icurus
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Joined: Sep 2005
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From: kent
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What you've said is kinda what I was getting at. My car isn;t particularly far off a clio in shape/size/weight etc, yet even with a fortune spent on suspension and varying geometry changes, its still not as good.
I think this is what Massivewangerswas alluding too also...

Originally Posted by massivewangers
Many many many books have been written about vehicle dynamics. It's an enormous subject.

There are countless factors that will influence vehicle behaviour.

The list is literally as long as your arm. Every aspect of the vehicles design can influence its handling really, from weight distribution and centre of gravity, suspension geometry, which is a hugely complex area on it's own, steering geometry.

Things like the static ride height, camber, caster and toe angles are only a tiny part of it to be honest.

You could take two cars of similar weight, wheelbase, track, and set their ride heights the same, set camber, caster, toe and ride height/damping exactly the same, but they'd still handle different, because the suspension geometry will still be different, so as the suspension compresses, it will have a different effect on wheel position to the other car. Then you've got things like roll moment and things to consider, as no two cars have their centre of gravity in the same place.

There's some good books out there on the subject, but it's massive, and some of it is a bit of a mindfuck unless you're an engineering maths genius
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