Suspension Geometry - SRT Forums

Santorican · 10-18-2009, 07:16 PM

If you could change any aspect of the suspension geometry using custom front lower control arms what would you change..........?

stowaway · 10-19-2009, 07:08 AM

more caster (and make it adjustable), more camber adjustment, a better camber curve, less bumpsteer

Santorican · 10-19-2009, 10:19 PM

Hmmm time to go bug one of my professors so he can help me design some LCA out of 6061 Al and make sure I have all the geometries right...

stowaway · 10-20-2009, 07:15 AM

steel. tubular steel.

Santorican · 10-20-2009, 09:01 AM

Quote: Originally Posted by stowaway

steel. tubular steel.

I was thinking that but then I was looking at an E30 M3 and it uses casted Al lca in the front and was thinking that I could probably engineer a cnc machined lca to withstand daily use and track days while being significantly lighter then a chromoly steel tube style ones.

Santorican · 10-20-2009, 09:02 AM

not to mention they'd look much nicer

Santorican · 10-20-2009, 09:03 AM

Here is what I'm talking about

njshift · 10-20-2009, 09:48 AM

Modified balljoint to adjust roll center. This is essential for lowered cars. I'm 100% good with aluminum arms.

stowaway · 10-20-2009, 11:55 AM

If it's beefy enough then aluminum can work. I think as a cost/weight/strentgh a tubular steel is the best way to go. With the cast aluminum you can get exacting stuff done for optimum strength and doing so out of al. tubes would mean you're paying someone to tig weld out the ass and it'll be something I'd only expect or want on a full street car. Just to give you an idea of what costs are, the Miata crowd is HUGE in comparison to the SRT/neon crowd when it comes to hitting up things with turns (autox, road course, etc), these just came out recently Tubular Control Arms 90-05 Miata and they are steel, still looking at 700 bucks for front lower only. I'd say lowers for us would be at least 50% more than that because the added strength needed to be designed in, extra labor, and to a minimal extent extra material.

Santorican · 10-20-2009, 02:42 PM

I figured they'd be around 800 but damn didn't think they'd be that much more.

njshift · 10-20-2009, 02:59 PM

Will you be making a small batch of these lcas?

Santorican · 10-20-2009, 03:16 PM

I'm going to look into it and see how it turns out. I'd like to but we will see

manny z · 10-20-2009, 03:22 PM

All I can say is, if you try and use aluminum for these, make sure you use the strongest you can find. Personally when I designed mine, the first thing I put into thought was, stregnth. Then I went through a few designs before I finally found a good combination on matirial, geomotry, and option like adj, for caster and camber.
As it is now, I am saving close to 5lbs per arm over stock.

Good luck with your venture bud. I would like to see what you come up with.

Santorican · 10-21-2009, 07:16 PM

What did you use for a ball joint? I was thinking about using a chromoly rod end but I was talking with a friend and he was saying that unless I have a bolt that is machined to fit into where the pinch bolt hole goes in it's a bad idea....

Specimen Kane · 10-21-2009, 08:51 PM