First time autocrossing. SRT swapped Neon ACR

[Mopar318]

Well, my first time ever I went autocrossing. I quickly relized that I need stiffer springs, and more rear sway bar. Car does not like to rotate AT ALL, and tires are on outside edge to do lean during cornering.

Running on maxed out camber with slotted konis. I have -1.5 in the front, but may try to run closer to -3 with crash bolts.

The next one is in two weeks, and I will be going from High Rates to X-High rates, as well as a 20mm bar in the rear.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MPxCjE_yI8&feature=youtu.be

[GLHNSLHT2]

-3?!?! You're nuts!! Ok just joking. yea AutoX/racing need lots of camber. Maybe reduce the rear camber?

[Mopar318]

-3?!?! You're nuts!! Ok just joking. yea AutoX/racing need lots of camber. Maybe reduce the rear camber?

I think I might just do a rear bar, and camber adjustment first. Then springs, then make rear more positive if I am still pushing. Also, my current setup is taking chunks from my tire, so good tires will wait until I get that under control.

[Pat]

Don't forget to look at the basics, like air pressure. You can change the dynamics of the car drastically with air pressure. Tires also make a tremendous difference. If the tires suck, and you have no front grip, you'll always understeer. Getting the rear to slide a bit needs grip up front.

The other thing to consider is that was a very slow course. Getting the car to rotate better with springs and bars on such a slow course will likely make it much more of a handful at a higher speed course. I'd start with the easy stuff first and see if you can fine tune it a bit more.

[Mopar318]

Thanks Pat,

I will try some more small changes as well. I was playing with tire pressure, and the konis and knocked a second off my time.

The biggest problem I was having was hitting bump stops into the corners. I did let a 14 time FWD champ drive my car, and he said without higher rate springs, I would always get the lean in which caused my camber to go way positive. You could identify this by the outsides of my tires chunking off rubber. So the last thing I want to do is spend 600 on tires and ruin them right away.

[Johnny]

When id added a strut brace and a k-frame brace i was able to cut my camber in half...from -3 to only -1.5
This helped traction in the staights also, giving the tire patch contact.
I ran Mopar autocross springs with a coil cut off, now switched to coil overs and not sortted that yet.
On the front i have a endlink style 1-1/8th inch bar and the same effective same size in the rear.

Good you went out, its great fun!!!

[Mopar318]

When id added a strut brace and a k-frame brace i was able to cut my camber in half...from -3 to only -1.5
This helped traction in the staights also, giving the tire patch contact.
I ran Mopar autocross springs with a coil cut off, now switched to coil overs and not sortted that yet.
On the front i have a endlink style 1-1/8th inch bar and the same effective same size in the rear.

Good you went out, its great fun!!!

What were the spring rates you were running?

The High rates I had are pretty low.225lb/in front and 185lb/in rear

I went ahead and got some mopar X-high rate, where are still relatively low compared to most cars. 310lb/in front and 220lb/in rear

---------- Post added at 08:10 AM ---------- Previous post was at 08:09 AM ----------

And when are you going to make some poly spring isolators for neons? I love the ones you made for the K-cars.

[Johnny]

Dont know what spring rate they were, just the Mopar autocross springs with the coil cut off.


And when are you going to make some poly spring isolators for neons? I love the ones you made for the K-cars.

No market for them so far, no one has ever asked for them before.

[OmniLuvr]

caused my camber to go way positive

i didnt watch the video, but is your neon lowered already? mcphearson strut cars have problems when lowered, same thing as our td's, you want your control arms to be angled downwards, not upwards, because as the control arm goes through its arc, it will gain and lose camber.

if your arms angle downwards at ride height, then when you enter a corner they will start to angle upwards, when the arm is parallel with the k-frame, that is the most negative camber you can achive. so as the arms angle more towards the sky, you will start getting more positive camber again. if your car has the arms angled upwards at ride height, then your only going to get more positive camber as you wheel moves upwards when entering turns.

[Mopar318]

Arms are angle slightly above flat. High rates only lower the car 1", which is why I need the stiffer springs to keep the car from leaning so much and cause the camber to go way positive.

I want to try to keep the arms flat like you said.

[Reaper1]

GRM had to add POSITIVE camber to the rear of their SRT-4 project car way back in the day to get it to rotate. I remember them having some interesting alignment settings, but it completely changed the car and made it drivable according to them...

[GLHNSLHT2]

Back when neons came out and I have the oppurtunity to play with one they always said Don't lower the car. I drove the piss out of the 98 DOHC sport and never chunked a tire. With ABS you could really throw the car into a corner hard on the brakes and be fine.

[Mopar318]

Back when neons came out and I have the oppurtunity to play with one they always said Don't lower the car. I drove the piss out of the 98 DOHC sport and never chunked a tire. With ABS you could really throw the car into a corner hard on the brakes and be fine.

The mopar springs lower it 1". Every other spring slams it, what would be my options at that point?

[OmniLuvr]

i was thinking you could get the heavy coil over "sleeves", but run them at a stockish ride height. i like the idea of a bigger bar in the rear, but i believe the issues you are having is more in the front right now, so once you resolve that, i would attack the rear. the only other option which i dont think exists is a spacer for the balljoint, or like on the turbo dodges, if you get the 91 and up spindles. they push the arm down about another inch, so on an omni, if i lowered it an inch, but put the 91 and up spindles on it, then the arms would be at the stock angle, but the car would be an inch lower...

[Mopar318]

Yeah, I could do a shadow knuckle swap. I had already swapped out for PT knuckles, and am running 11" rotors with SRT/PT calipers and hawk pads.

I think I will get these X-high rates in, and see how the car reacts. I may also find some rubber isolaters, which will raise the car about 1/2".

[Orangetona]

Unfortunately I was much too busy being distracted by farts. :) Looks like the thing has some go though, thats for sure

[Mopar318]

Yeah, that other neon was a stock SOHC road course car. It sure did not sound as good as mine...and was about 10 times louder. However, It beat me by a few seconds on the course.

[Juggy]

I found that negative toe in the rear also helps rotate the azz end around.
my train of thought works off the principle of rear wheel steering vehicles. with the outside tires like this \ / . most of the force is relieved on the inside tire when turning, so as weight transfers to the outside tire, the tire will help steer the rear end around.

only negative effect is that you are pulling the 2 back tires on the straight. it will cause a little uneven wear and use a couple more hp then it would to go if they were perfectly straight

[GLHNSLHT2]

good AutoX setup but not something I'd do high speed or daily driving with though.

[OmniLuvr]

so i was thinking about your car after driving my friends neon (stock) for the past week. were you having troubles on intial turn in and throughout the turn, or on exit? im finding that the slow in fast out technique works well with the neon... maybe with the turbo it may be a little harder to modulate the throttle though...

[Mopar318]

Initial turn-in and throughout is the hardest, where the weight is being transferred and the car is trying to slow down. The tires are trying to do too much, so I would lay on the brakes earlier and turn in quicker to make up for that.

On throttle out, it will spin a bunch but will obviously happen with high HP and no LSD.

Im not a real experience driver anyways. I did add a larger rear sway bar, and will be racing again this sunday.

[RoadWarrior222]

Imagine you have a barbell, but with only weight on one end of the bar, say 50lb.. now you hold it, light end in front of your chest and set it swinging.. like a pendulum.. you will notice this pendulum has a period... now, if you were to do a slalom walking between cones, you'd find you were fighting this period, you'd find the least effort, smoothest and likely quickest route, would be to match the period of the pendulum to the distance between the cones... once you learn the period well, you can use it to pull you round a tight corner, by setting up an opposite oscillation that will swing the right way just as you need it...

and so it is with cars, you can blame the cars inadequacies, it's weight, the weird ways it transfers momentum from side to side and front to back, it should be stiffer, coner flatter, etc etc... don't matter, learn it, make it work for you rather than against you.