longfellow

These things? Energy Suspension Subframe Pineapple Bushing : S13/14 1989-98 240SX
Hmm.. 1/16" off.. Hmm.. I have friend with a grandpa with a machine shop. Going to make life soo much easier when it comes to bushings.

God soo many things I want to do now... I hate zilvia sometimes... LOL

Subframe was pretty simple, I bought ES poly subframe bushings then took a hack saw and chopped off the tops so they where about 1/16" thick, I left just enough so that there the subframe and chassis dont make contact. It corrects some of the roll center issues in the rear of the car. The bushings are only like 60$. Just time consuming because getting the stockers out is a total bitch and it requires you to drop the entire subframe.

Oh yeah he did! I'll have to hunt him down later. Yeah I my are almost splitting last time I checked... wurd.

Well it really dependents on the corner. Like in the pass auto-x event we had a Lane Changes corners. Now Those SUCK! For the first one I had to brake to slow down turn-in, next was lift with a lil brake to get the traction and the last one was a small lift. It was crazy I only 2 out of 4 laps i hit cones.
Yeah I'd like to start Road racing but I'd like more money before I start on that part of my life.

wow that's nice. damn you guys and your boost.. D= tbh I'd be in trouble if I got more power atm. I'm finishing up my drifting this season getting down the last of my car control. I'm going to get serious next season with my times.

I've lighted my S14 already I just pull my A/C cuz I broke it... C/F Hood and lighter battery. So that a good amount there. I actually had to lower the front a lil because of that.

Just in general anything bigger than 215 is going to help. More traction is soo helpful than the grip oh god. I'm soo not going to be use to grip and traction again.. LOL. Yeah I kinda want to but then don't.. I do a lot of hwy driving and I like my MPG hehe.

So what did you do for your Sub Frame bushing thing?

Def on here made some. There was a group buy a while back. PM him as he might still have a few sets left. As for the RLCA's I dont really plan on doing anything with them other than replacing the ball joints with new OEM ones. If I can find a semi cheap solution for a spherical bushing then I'll get it but as things stand now its not really needed. The nice thing about the RLCA is it has two tie-in points on the sub-frame meaning it has a lot less axial motion than all the upper arms do. Plus the stock rubber on mine are in good shape and its not really restricting all that much as is.

Yeah I've noticed a lot of auto-x guys like to be able to steer the car with the throttle. I'm not that keen on it. I do like some slip angle but my car is more all-purpose as I take it Road racing, mountain roads and Auto-x so the set up is going to be different. I can control the rear end and slide it when I need to but I try not to do it as much as a normal auto-cross car would. So My car probably isnt as competitive as it could be but I'm not focused on one area of racing.

My car also makes 300hp 300tq, hits full boost by 2800rpm and runs pretty much to redline at 7400 so I have to set things up a bit different. Its pretty surprising how much grip alone I get from just 255-40-17 NT05's I have in the rear. The give an amazing amount of traction for street tires. Also by switching to an SR with no A/C I have probably a 75lb advantage on front end weight which makes quite a difference.

4.36 will help some with the stock KA if you dont already have one.

As for tires I think you'd like 235-40-17 NT05's on all 4 corners. That might help balance the car out alot since you have it set up to steer with the throtle. I think you'd like the extra grip and response you'd get with those tires.

Yeah my tires are turning to shit. I ran with 235/40/17 RT 615 for a while but I wasn't has a good driver back then. I bet it would! Next season I'll be buying better tires for autox. I'm going to shoot for 1st in class I got 3rd last year =D

I prefer the same setup. But I had to go about the same front and rear because of the tire grips I've running so I had to softness the front a lil more than I like. I don't have a stock rear... D= hehe. Uh... I know that's what it felt like then I add some more preload now to the rear and it handle like I want it to. It take more to get to the limit now. Yeah I want to try a softer spring in there rear now because of all of this. I totally forgot that SPL sell the springs. I'll have to try that now.

I understand that I've been reading a lot how poly bushing are being more maintenance then rubber. Where did you get your Spherical for your rears? What are you going to do about your LCA bushings? My are all Shot up. D=

Hehe I hear you there. I've got a good friend that a Pro driver and has taught me a lot about driving. On most auto-x course he's only about 2 sec faster than me. So that makes feel good about myself. So my idea to my car is to able to feel everything. My rears have great traction normally and during a drift or oversteer. My fronts is just my tires just don't have any traction cuz how small I've been running.

Wow M3 level. Hehe M3 are soo fast! They give SOOO much grip but when you get to limit it just goes! Like grip girp - gone!

That is most likely true... but when I change to bigger tires it won't hinder my times too much. I like more rotation in my rear, so basically I'm oversteer but not into a drifting. I drive my S14 like it's a AE86 more time on the throttle the better.

I have a S14 with a KA in it. All i have a Intake, exhaust and Jim Wolf ECU so I'd like to say 160-165ish WHP. But I really have no idea.
I plan on a supercharger far down the road after I fix up a lot of stuff.

Mostly it just sounds like you have shit tires that are too small. Tryi running a 235-40-17 NT05 in the front, I can guarentee that will help with understeer issues. Better tires will make a huge difference in how your car will change direction and steering response. You could have everything done to your suspension but if you have crap tires its not going to do much.

Also I prefer the front of the car to be more stiff than the rear on faster courses, and about even on smaller courses. I'd go back to a stock rear sway bar too. It sounds like the rear suspension is too stiff in both roll and shock and is binding pretty nasty under compression. I also thing stance coil-overs valving is even more stiff than KTS's and that kinda hinders things. I think you would benifit from 6k-4.5k spring set up like I have. Even a 7k/5k spring set up would be decent. You can get a set of 65mm ID 5k swift springs from SPLparts.com for pretty cheap.

Dont run poly bushings, they require to much maintenance and dont provide enough axial motion and just end up being worse than the stock rubber ones. My suggestion is change it all out, Its a lot of money but if you can afford to replace the SPC arms with something that has Spherical bearings and also replace the upright bushings with sphericals it will make a huge difference. Its pretty amazing how much grip and traction is gained when there is no binding in the rear suspension any more. You'll also notice when DD that the car wont hop around going over bumps and imperfections in the road it really smooths things out. It also allows the softer spring set up to work much more efficently since the shock can go through a longer range/stroke.

Personally I try to keep the car as neutral as possible. It might not be the fastest set up over all but its the easiest to control and I like the balance especially for a DD/tracker. I'm not trying to be the fastest guy on track, I look more for consistancy since my driving isnt exactly spectacular.

Bascially my thoughts are I want my car to ride like a well tuned M3 on the street but with the ability and adjusment to make the suspension more stiff when on the track to help with the extra load/forces.

The reason why I dont think you're lifting the inside rear is its too stiff so instead of lifting it just slides.

Do you have an S13 or S14? If S13 I'd highly suggest swapping to an S14 rear subframe. It will solve part of your traction issues. Also how much power are you making and what rear tires?

I'm loading a video of how my car drove last week with my new SR set up, spherical upright bushings, and a few other changes. I'll send that when its done loading and you can see what its like. The track was pretty bumpy in places and the surface was very slick so traction was sort of an issue at first but it got better as the day went on.

Also about my understeer. atm it isn't bad at all. I have to up my shocks to half way to get them to turn in better but for being on 215/40/17 Goodyear F1's with less 50% thread left I'm super happy with my setup. I just minor problems in like chicane and lane changes where I need more traction up to turn in. I can't just lift i to get it i have to tap the brake and it makes me lose speed through the rest of the course. TBH I can't explain it well it's just a small problem that fixed I know. blah. -.-

I have Stance GR+Pros coils and they come with 9k-6k springs. So it's what I have on me right now to try out. Currently I've been driving back on 215 to learn limit on my car and the suspension. I'll be going back to either 235 or 245 for my next season of Auto-x
My setup is:
Stance GR+Pro 8k/7k
Whiteline Sway front and rear. Soft setting in the front and Stiffer in the rear.
All SPC arms for the rear.
Some ebay Spherical tension rod in the front with Tein tie rods.
Nismo power brace and f/r ebay struts bar.
Nismo 1.5 LSD

-1.8 camber front, 0.1 toe (stock setting), i think 6.6* caster
-1.4 camber rear, Stock setting toe?
My alignment is not dial in yet... I have a old RLCA that needs to be replace.. =|

I wished I could get my video's of the pass auto-x and from another date so I could show you how my car handles. In this video YouTube - NorCal UFO Marina Autocross Runs 5/2/10 I couldn't keep my rear in check at all it just wanted to slide. This pass auto-x I adjusted my preload in my rears to add a lil more on the spring helper and it fixed my oversteer problems. Over 2 years ago I use to play with my preload a lot to see how it could effected the suspension but that was before auto-x where I learned how to race more or less.

I like your thought behind all of this work and I'm wanting to follow. Just like you I DD my car everyday and track it. But the roads I DD on BAADD like that haven't been worked on for 25 years now. So I've been thinking how to balance out softness with being able to apply good roll stiffness to that car. I do the same thing the shock better much at the softest setting and it ride alright just get some extra bounds.

That's a interesting about thought about the rear drool I haven't thought about that. I need to change out my bushing.. I still haven't thought about it yet to use poly or Spherical yet. But after reading your setup I may lead toward Spherical now.
I know haven't had a problem with lifting yet. My car has it is look like it's flat through everything but inside you can feel the roll and it isn't bad roll at least to me.
Since my front sway is actually not that much bigger than stock I still feel roll. I don't mind it till it effects my handing. So I want to try out what softer springs and a stiffer setting on sways will do to my car.

Sorry if my English is a messy and I start to ramble a lot think... But I'll let you know what happens when I change my springs out.

Thanks for the input!

Also I personally think if you you should try 7k/5k springs. I think if you run the 7k/6k set up your going to get a mild case of under steer from the front being to soft and the back end is going to loose traction because its too stiff and its going to want to slide out. I could be wrong though. Either way try it out and let me know what you think.

Everything in the rear is Spherical except the RLCA's. The biggest issue is with the rubber bushings in the uprights. They cause the most amount of binding and wont allow for the rear suspension to droop. They also cause issues under compression too. Also dont forget my subframe is flush with the chassis as well. Some people seem to think that the combination of soft springs/raised subframe creates to much squat but I beg to differ.

I have the traction rods adjusted also to correct some of the camber/toe curve under compression as well. You can see in the picture I posted on the suspension thread that my rear wheel is pretty much perpendicular with the ground and I'm getting a very very good contact patch with the ground. Also the opposite rear tire is pretty firmly on the ground still as well. So along with lateral mechanical grip I also have a lot of traction as well even with the car being as low as it is.

So far I have no issues with lifting the inside rear wheel any more. I have a S15 helical so I've built the suspension around the fact that I need to keep both wheels on the ground at all times. It might still lift under a very very hard switch back but so far I haven't run into that issue yet. I have almost 6" of droop travel now with out the use of tender springs.

I think the progress front bar / stock rear bar is also a nice complement to each other. I run the front bar at the middle setting all the time. If you run similar spring rates to mine you'll notice quite a lot more roll especially with the shock damping turned all the way down, but the valving is so stiff that just a few clicks will make quite a difference. I think the softer springs actually allow the shock to work more efficently and through out a wider stoke travel.

When I have it set to DD status with the shocks fully soft the car rides pretty damn nice. Its no Lexus, but its actually not too much worse than a shock spring combo. I think the tires I run (NT05) make the biggest difference in lack of ride quality.

No worries, if you have any other questions I'll be happy to answer them.