Ride height question

[ERA Chas]

Originally Posted by ERA2076

I think ERA has much balance built into their cars as designed, manufactured, and delivered. If you did not purchase a roller, then suspension blue printing makes sense. If not, other than a very good educational exercise, why bother corner weighting a street bound ERA?

Everything Cliff said in his post is exactly my experience with mine-in the '90's. Mine was a pallet car, not a factory roller. It has no add-on's but does have magnesium wheels. It's a very elemental car like S/C's were.
I did c/w it and here were the results with 1/2 tank of fuel, batt in trunk and me in it:
CORNER WEIGHT W/DRIVER: LF: 682 / RF: 648 / LR:755 / RR: 748
WEIGHT DISTRIBUTION W/DRIVER: F: 1330- 46.9% / R: 1503 – 53.1%
I made no changes and found it perfect for autox, track days and street.
Those that claim a remarkable transformation in street driving after corner adjustments are deceived by lack of force input of a racetrack. Unless the car is saddled with amenities, sound-deadner, fake aluminum and such, it will be very close right from ERA-and they will all be similar. A good alignment with a performance bias will be much more beneficial to improved 'feel'.
So the improvement after c/w is largely psychological-unless you plan what Cliff does on track.

[patrickt]

Originally Posted by ERA Chas

I did c/w it and here were the results with 1/2 tank of fuel, batt in trunk and me in it:
CORNER WEIGHT W/DRIVER: LF: 682 / RF: 648 / LR:755 / RR: 748
WEIGHT DISTRIBUTION W/DRIVER: F: 1330- 46.9% / R: 1503 – 53.1%
I made no changes and found it perfect for autox, track days and street..

That's a cross-weight of 49.5%, which is pretty darn good. Several of the Cobras on here have had much, much worse numbers than that. I was one of the first cars to be put on Peter's new digital scales, back in 2006, and Doug was able to get me to 49.9% -- with pretty much the same conditions as yours, except the battery is up front. The difference of .4% is only 11 pounds, which is two gallons of gas. I agree that your car was pretty close to perfect right out of the box, but other cars around here are not so lucky. Maybe most ERA cars are where yours was, maybe they're not. The only way you know for sure is to check.

[ERA Chas]

Originally Posted by patrickt

Maybe most ERA cars are where yours was, maybe they're not. The only way you know for sure is to check.

We should clarify by saying that's true for FE cars with Jag rears.-the FIA Windsors are somewhat different with batt location in the rr wheelwell, forward-mounted gas tanks, 50 pound-lighter rears, and of course engine weight and location.
I wonder if the Wilwoods are heavier than the standard ERA GM fronts?? I started with GMs and they weighed a ton but never actually checked-the Wilwoods came on the second rebuild.

[ERA2076]

In the case it did not weight well, based on experience with mine, I would pull all the suspension and start checking for squareness of everything associated at the chassis. I would correct that if needed and then build back checking as I go. It has to be in tolerancing stackup and should be corrected, but we are talking something really wild.

I would not discount - why do we disconnect the roll bars for weighting?

I am sure they don't all weight the same, but I would bet they all weight within some acceptable range. The components are jig manufactured.

If I purchased a new one and found such an error, I would be on the phone before the day was over and I would not be happy. After all, I purchased an ERA and waited a year(?) to get it.

chr

[patrickt]

Originally Posted by ERA2076

I would not discount - why do we disconnect the roll bars for weighting?

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If I purchased a new one and found such an error, I would be on the phone before the day was over and I would not be happy. After all, I purchased an ERA and waited a year(?) to get it.

I know you mean sway bars -- when I think of roll bars, well.... If you bought a turnkey from ERA, I agree the weights should be set, and I would bet they are. Anything other than that, then you have to check them. It would be interesting to see, as a lark, just how far off you could get the corner weights and still have the car appear to sit reasonably right.

[Bobcat]

Good points by both ERA 2076 and Era Charles .
There is a relationship/goal that the suspension guys I know use for initial setup for track cars . The left side tires should have the same front to rear wgt distribution as the whole car and ditto for the right side . However , please note that the LS and RS actual wheel weights may not be the same because the CG`s may be offset .
So , just for the fun of it , I put ERA Charles` weights into my formulas to see how close his car was to the "ideal" setup . Pretty close .
Charles .... per my formula , you should be at : RF @ 656 lbs , RR @733lbs , LF @ 675 lbs and LR @ 762lbs . Your actual weights were RF ... 648 lbs , RR ... 748lbs , LF ... 682lbs and LR .. 755 lbs . The rule we use is , if you are within 10 lbs of the goal , don`t touch the car until you drive it . 50 lbs off , you readjust .
FYI .... my weights were all within 1 to 3 lbs of the "ideal" and the car handled great on the track . Note , I said on the track . I will bet you that a car can be off 50+ lbs and the average driver will never notice it . Also , tell someone his car was off and then say you adjusted it and I bet you he will say it handles better . We did this several times to drivers when i was doing dirt track .
I weighed/adjusted my car because : I was going to track it and I had replaced all shocks and springs and the ERA settings didn`t necessarily apply anymore for the heavier springs . They got me in the ballpark for the street , but not where I wanted to be for the track .
BTW , my suspension guy has over 20 years setting up dirt cars , SVRA , HSR cars and NASCAR truck series trucks .

[Bobcat]

The reason you disconnect the anti sway bars before setting corner weights isn`t because of the bars weight , but to eliminate any possible binding due to links being misadjusted etc . Reconnect the bars after setting the weights and make sure there is no preload on them .
It goes without saying ( I hope ) that all this is done with weight in the driver`s seat and 1/2 to 3/4 tank of fuel .
Yes , I agree that all of this is probably overkill for the street , but after all , these cars are toys for us to play with and experiment on .

[patrickt]

You know, it's funny. This topic has come up time and time again over the years. Considering all the money we waste on these cars, why somebody would be reluctant to just pull in to a suspension shop, and drive their car up on the scales and have the guys write the weights down, is absolutely beyond me. I bet a weight check with no adjustments is $50 or less. And that's only if your local club doesn't have a set to loan out. You can then choose to either do nothing, or have them adjusted, depending on your preference. Why would you not want to know? Jeez, it's no different than checking your blood pressure or cholesterol, or the air in your tires. The difference is that you only have to do it once.

[ERA2076]

Originally Posted by bobcat

the reason you disconnect the anti sway bars before setting corner weights isn`t because of the bars weight , but to eliminate any possible binding due to links being misadjusted etc .

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