zcacogp Posted July 24, 2007 Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Chaps, My first post, as I have just registered, as I visited WIM yesterday with a Porsche 944 S2. Observations ... I was very impressed by both the kit and the guy doing the work (Tony). The kit was technologically impressive (although apparently at the new place there will be even more impressive kit!) and Tony was both friendly and extremely knowledgeable. No question was too much trouble to answer (and I asked more than my fair share), and he took the time to show me what he was doing, didn't mind me getting under the car, his feet and anywhere else that looked interesting. Thanks! The reason I had the full alignment done were that I had just replaced the suspension (shocks front and rear, ARB bushes and steering tie rods). Everything was set to manufacturers spec, apart from the rear toe in/out, for which the adjustment bolts were seized. I'll apply some penetrant spray liberally over the coming month or so before returning for the check. This does mean that the thrust angle is not straight, which should be bourne in mind. Observations from before all this work was done (so these can be attributed to either new suspension or the alignment) are ... The car is slightly quicker to respond to the steering, and has lost the very annoying tendancy to lurch backwards and forwards unless you were very careful with the throttle and brake. It doesn't track 100% straight (probably down to the rear toe being still squiff). The centre point of the steering still feels a little vague, but this loads up fairly quickly once you get slightly off centre. Once off-centre, the steering feel is excellent. The turn-in is improved, but I guess it will never be that great on the car due to the layout (front engine, rear gearbox). However, what IS new is that you can fling it 'round fast corners at utterly ridiculous (almost comedy) speeds without it breaking off line! You can make the tyres chirp if you really try, but it remains very very balanced and neutral at all times. I haven't provoked the rear end yet to see how this breaks away, but I suspect that it will be a bit of a fight to get it out. It remains exceptionally flat when cornering as well - CD cases, spare change, wives and small furry animals may get thrown against the window on the outside of the corner, but the car remains very very flat on the road. (Flatter than any other car I have driven). And this is with the standard-size, weedy ARB's (which probably says more about my expectations than the ARB's, in all honesty.) It also seems to accelerate more crisply - the back doesn't fidget as much as it used to, and brakes more cleanly (I expect that stopping distances are reduced). The downside is that you are much more aware of what the road surface is like under the wheels, and you do feel a lot more of the bumps, both small and large. So, I'm pleased - thanks Tony. (I may add that I had both front wheels re-balanced by Kipling while I was there, and was pretty underwhelmed by this - they still shimmy at 80mph, which is very annoying. Glad that the alignment was so much more convincing!) I'm looking forward to being back in a month or so to have the rear toe adjusted. Oli. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TDIPLC Posted July 24, 2007 Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Hi Oli Welcome to the club Great write up and feedback for Tony Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony Posted July 24, 2007 Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Welcome to wim Oli and thank you for the valuable fee-back. So far your report in the handling is expected. The front camber and toe positions were very violated, understandably after the work you have done to the suspension. We do still have issues with the rear toe resulting in a displaced thrust angle but this is easily solved assuming the car will comply on the fine-tune. Now the calibration is set you do need time to "feel" the car? Additional installations like the Poly's changes the chassis compliance so the road feel and the calibration are not necessarily the same assessment..... In other words give yourself a good few miles to analyse where the handling needs to be improved.... If at all. As for you?... My dream customer You were totally involved and intelligently strove to understand every step of the calibration. Visual indications for what's wrong and the consequences before and after correction you seemed to enjoy, few would want to go so deep into that area of calibration.... I salute you. In fact when wim central is opened i would give you the tools letting you set the car Why not it's your baby and team work offers a greater understanding. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jon Posted July 24, 2007 Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Oli, was it you on pistonheads I was singing Tonys praises too? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zcacogp Posted July 24, 2007 Author Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Tony, Welcome to wim Oli and thank you for the valuable fee-back.So far your report in the handling is expected. The front camber and toe positions were very violated, understandably after the work you have done to the suspension. Yes ... setting it up with the car at an angle at the side of the road, with a spirit level and ruler really didn't get it right did it! I was surprised at HOW far out I was - shows how accurate the kit you use is, eh? The worrying thing is that previously I have set all my cars up like this, so goodness only knows how far out they were! (Wheels doing reasonable impressions of a satellite-tracking dish, anyone?)We do still have issues with the rear toe resulting in a displaced thrust angle but this is easily solved assuming the car will comply on the fine-tune.Yes, I think that this is one stage of the puzzle which has not yet been cracked, and the fact that the thrust line is to the left, and the car tracks to the left, would suggest that just maybe relevant to the problem! Now the calibration is set you do need time to "feel" the car? Additional installations like the Poly's changes the chassis compliance so the road feel and the calibration are not necessarily the same assessment..... In other words give yourself a good few miles to analyse where the handling needs to be improved.... If at all.I'll wholeheartedly go along with this. Thus far I have put no more than 80 miles on the car, most of them on a motorway. ALSO, I have found that shock absorbers take a good couple of hundred miles to settle. Time to get used to it is a very good idea, and I'm looking forward to a good blast on some North Wales roads, coming up in a couple of weeks time. This will mean that I have a much better idea of what I want. Thanks again, see you in a month or so. (ETA: I can't be your dream customer - I have seen your comments about German cars elsewhere on here!) Jon, If you are talking about here: http://pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h...23&t=414052 .. then yes, it was me. Your recommendation led me to WIM. Thank you. Oli. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jon Posted July 24, 2007 Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Yep, though toecutter beat me to it. Glad you joined, if you're into your geometry here is the place to be Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ahmet Posted July 24, 2007 Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Welcome to WIM Oli Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony Posted July 24, 2007 Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Oli.... An enthusiastic owner and the car make are miles apart My dislike for German cars is not the car but the Geometric parameters required to pre-load the suspension.....Right down to making sure the floor mats are in place Any modification made to the car makes it almost impossible to theorise the consequence making my work much, much harder.... Fortunately the 944 only needs a full fuel tank. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rich Posted July 24, 2007 Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Great write up there mate Welcome to WIM as well... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony Posted July 24, 2007 Report Share Posted July 24, 2007 Oli i traced the owner of the track prept MX5 and invited him to this thread.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark_N Posted July 27, 2007 Report Share Posted July 27, 2007 That will be me then Tony did some "fine tuning" which I'm happy to say have yielded some pleasing results although some time on the track is needed to explore the envelope a little more As always, a stirling service from W.I.M. Mark. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zcacogp Posted August 20, 2007 Author Report Share Posted August 20, 2007 OK, me back again. I have now covered a bit over 1000 miles since the alignment, and need to book the fine-tune session with Tony. I have sprayed the rear bolts with some anti-seize spray a couple of times, and will do it a couple of times more before I bring it in. The wrong thrust line is annoying me! Having said that, the greater annoyance is the poor balancing done by the tyre place on the front wheels. Not impressed. They weren't that bad before, but when they did them the second wheel needed two weights. (One 10g and one 5g). The 5g weight was stuck on while the wheel was on the balance machine, and fell off before the guy refitted the wheel to the car ... so he took it back to the balance machine and re-tested it, whereupon the machine told him it needed a 10g weight. Funny, as the one that fell off was a 5g weight ... the net result was a car that has vibrated at any speed over 80mph on a recent hoon around North Wales ... I'll talk to Kipling when I go back for the fine-tune and see what they say. Mark - good to have met you at WIM. If you could stand having a hanger-on, do drop me a line next time you make it to the 'Ring. I'll make it there sometime in the next few months! Oli. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony Posted August 20, 2007 Report Share Posted August 20, 2007 OK, me back again. I have now covered a bit over 1000 miles since the alignment, and need to book the fine-tune session with Tony. I have sprayed the rear bolts with some anti-seize spray a couple of times, and will do it a couple of times more before I bring it in. The wrong thrust line is annoying me! Having said that, the greater annoyance is the poor balancing done by the tyre place on the front wheels. Not impressed. They weren't that bad before, but when they did them the second wheel needed two weights. (One 10g and one 5g). The 5g weight was stuck on while the wheel was on the balance machine, and fell off before the guy refitted the wheel to the car ... so he took it back to the balance machine and re-tested it, whereupon the machine told him it needed a 10g weight. Funny, as the one that fell off was a 5g weight ... the net result was a car that has vibrated at any speed over 80mph on a recent hoon around North Wales ... I'll talk to Kipling when I go back for the fine-tune and see what they say. Mark - good to have met you at WIM. If you could stand having a hanger-on, do drop me a line next time you make it to the 'Ring. I'll make it there sometime in the next few months! Oli. In view of the fact the initial set-up is incomplete, book the car back in, let's finish the calibration..... As for the balancing... I will oversee it next time! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zcacogp Posted August 21, 2007 Author Report Share Posted August 21, 2007 In view of the fact the initial set-up is incomplete, book the car back in, let's finish the calibration..... As for the balancing... I will oversee it next time!Tony, Thanks - I'll call. (Having re-read my post of last night it sounded pretty grumpy - apologies. I am actually still chuffed to the nines with the handling! Thanks! The balancing was done by someone else, and a different business, so it was a bit off of me to gripe about it on here. Apologies again.) Oli. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony Posted August 21, 2007 Report Share Posted August 21, 2007 In view of the fact the initial set-up is incomplete, book the car back in, let's finish the calibration..... As for the balancing... I will oversee it next time!Tony, Thanks - I'll call. (Having re-read my post of last night it sounded pretty grumpy - apologies. I am actually still chuffed to the nines with the handling! Thanks! The balancing was done by someone else, and a different business, so it was a bit off of me to gripe about it on here. Apologies again.) Oli. No worries.... You have every right to feel miffed about the balancing.. If i payed for something and it's still wrong after i would be miffed! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zcacogp Posted September 26, 2007 Author Report Share Posted September 26, 2007 OK, I went back to Tony on Friday of last week to have the 2000 mile check done ... was interested to find out that the settings had wandered quite a bit from the settings it was left with previously, and apparently this can be down to hitting a bump in the road (think speedbump). Which kind of got me wondering how much benefit there is in setting a car to the level of precision that Tony undoubtably offers, if it can be knocked out so easily within the following 2000 miles. To cut a long story short, precise tyre tread depth measurements were taken and these will be monitored to see what effect the geometry is having on the tyre wear. I had the front wheels re-balanced again (free of charge). They were supposedly out by 10g on each side (apparently the balancing machine was re-calibrated earlier in the week.) However, the wheel wobble is still evident, it has just moved down from 80mph to 70mph ... Looks like I'll be back in another 2000 miles to see what has changed then. Oli. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony Posted September 26, 2007 Report Share Posted September 26, 2007 Unfortunately the road condition being so dire is distressing to the chassis. The most common angle to be displaced is the toe so it's fortunate toe is one of the less aggressive angles when wrong. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rich Posted September 26, 2007 Report Share Posted September 26, 2007 That happened with mine when I went back for the fine tune, I think the front O/S toe was out quite abit! Be interesting to know if it's changed anymore! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zcacogp Posted September 27, 2007 Author Report Share Posted September 27, 2007 I guess it is logical - the suspension will be knocked pretty hard every time you hit a bump, and this will have an effect over time. I guess that I had hoped that the finesse of the set-up would have lasted a bit longer ... ... BTW Tony, I did some investigation around the amount of movement available on the gearbox ... according to Porsche, movement of up to 7cm each way is quite normal, and nothing to worry about. Apparently the design of the drivechain, with the prop shaft running down a torque tube which goes the length of the car and bolts onto both the bellhousing and the gearbox, means that there is very little torque applied to the gearbox in this orientation as it is entirely braced by the torque tube. (There is, however, a very large torque applied in the other orientation under acceleration - as you would expect - and the gearbox should have very little movement if twisted in the fore/aft dimension.) Oli. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony Posted September 27, 2007 Report Share Posted September 27, 2007 The amount of movement in the drive train looks somewhat generous but if that's within tolerances then fine. I find the change in the calibration positions quite acceptable (within reason) What we also need to understand is the overall wear in the bushings will displace the calibration results between visits. There is a distinct period between something being new and being knackered.... That period is the realm of worn. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zcacogp Posted September 27, 2007 Author Report Share Posted September 27, 2007 Tony, Good points all. Let's see what changes in the future. Oli. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Roger440 Posted October 21, 2007 Report Share Posted October 21, 2007 Im probably a bit late here, but on these cars we normally strip the rear hub from the steel plate/arm, clean up and then lubricate before attempting any rear camber/toe adjustments. Its very rare that they ever move when adjustment is attempted!!! Out of interest, what type of bushings are you running at the rear of the front lower arms? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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