Springs
03-08-2009, 11:42 PM
#1
Melting Slicks
Thread Starter
Springs
This thread is an offshoot of http://forums.corvetteforum.com/auto...post1569221647
so we stop hi-jacking it.
So to continue the discussion....If you have a generic 2" shock body that uses say a 2.5" ID hyperco spring you can get any combo of length or rate you want. It is truely amazing what hyperco offers. So lets say you are at your favorite home track. You take as much other suspension stuff out of the equation. How would you find a good spring to start with on paper? Can the wheel rate be calculated for a given chassis?
If you find that starting point spring and take it to the track what would be the next appropriote springs to take to test which springs make you faster on this track? Do you do 50lb increments? but keep the computed spread front to back the same? Just how does one go through the spring selection process?
so we stop hi-jacking it.
So to continue the discussion....If you have a generic 2" shock body that uses say a 2.5" ID hyperco spring you can get any combo of length or rate you want. It is truely amazing what hyperco offers. So lets say you are at your favorite home track. You take as much other suspension stuff out of the equation. How would you find a good spring to start with on paper? Can the wheel rate be calculated for a given chassis?
If you find that starting point spring and take it to the track what would be the next appropriote springs to take to test which springs make you faster on this track? Do you do 50lb increments? but keep the computed spread front to back the same? Just how does one go through the spring selection process?
03-09-2009, 12:01 PM
#2
Safety Car
Check out the "Suspension Worksheet" at http://www.eibach.com/. Pick Motorsports on the left side, the Suspension Worksheet. It's got all the definitions and math about selecting a spring rate based on suspension frequency, etc.
If you take something as a starting point and head out blind outside of some math, I'd take something a couple hundred pounds heavier and lighter. You're going to need to test both directions to see which works. Once you find which side works best I'd test again a couple hundred pounds heavier or lighter. Once I found the sweet spot I'd start looking for the really sweet spot with smaller steps. It's effectively a binary search, pick two points, test, move towards the point you like best. Trick here, of course, is that big spring rate changes likely require shock valving changes...
If you've already tested and found the sweet spot and you're adjusting the rate for an individual track I would hope you don't have to go too far either way.
As an aside, though, the various vendors for Corvette coilovers seem to vary wildly on spring rates they choose. From the 450# range to the #850 range. The same could be said for folks running leaf springs, too. Some folks are running >2x the stock rate.
Hopefully some more knowledgable people will chime in...
If you take something as a starting point and head out blind outside of some math, I'd take something a couple hundred pounds heavier and lighter. You're going to need to test both directions to see which works. Once you find which side works best I'd test again a couple hundred pounds heavier or lighter. Once I found the sweet spot I'd start looking for the really sweet spot with smaller steps. It's effectively a binary search, pick two points, test, move towards the point you like best. Trick here, of course, is that big spring rate changes likely require shock valving changes...
If you've already tested and found the sweet spot and you're adjusting the rate for an individual track I would hope you don't have to go too far either way.
As an aside, though, the various vendors for Corvette coilovers seem to vary wildly on spring rates they choose. From the 450# range to the #850 range. The same could be said for folks running leaf springs, too. Some folks are running >2x the stock rate.
Hopefully some more knowledgable people will chime in...
