You are putting in differents spring rates and dampening than stock so it feels better. Granted coil-overs work but you do not have apples to apples comparision.

 

You are incorrect. GM didn't save money by using the leaf. If you understood what you are looking at you wouldn't accuse GM of doing things on the cheap. The fiberglass leaf is better than an equivalent OEM coil (not more expensive, higher stress aftermarket coils) in every way save costing MORE.

Actually they aren't rigidly clamped in the center. They are held by two flexible points. The spring does work as an soft anti-roll bar. The tubular anti-roll bar supplements the anti-roll of the leaf spring. Don't take my word, this is what Dave McLellen said in his book. Of course a lot of people don't understand that this is no different than an anti-roll bar which is also a spring that "cross talks" between the left and right side. You should always be suspicious if someone tries to convince you their suspension is better than the leaf spring because it doesn't have "cross talk". The only way they can avoid that is to remove the anti-roll bar.

The worst thing about the Corvette's leaf spring is all the people who bad mouth it without knowing what they are talking about.

 

I kow that the C2's pivoted in the middle but I've been under my C6 and no pivot, and I happen to like the transverse leaf!

 

No, it's not a center mount like the C2-C3 (and C4 rear). It's two widely spaced mounts. The Wiki link a while back does a good job of explaining the details. Each of the widely spaced mounts will allow the spring to pivot. That's how it forms an S.

The C2-C4 rear mounts were not designed to pivot. Ideally the spring was rigidly clamped to the frame and movement on one side did not move the other. However, that ideal case wasn't what really happened. Spring loads were transferred to the dif housing and then through mounts to the chassis. That makes for a long and indirect force chain. The net result is on the C2-C4 rear ends the left and right ride springs were not 100% isolated from each other and you could get a slight amount of the seesaw action that people talk about.

 

Wow!!! You're dead wrong if you think I said that!!!!

I NEVER said that you couldn't improve anything.

I have been saying that the stock suspension will allow you to enjoy the performance capability of your car - you don't need to change anything to really have a geat time driving a C6 hard.

Did you look at my videos??? The one at Sebring was on street tires, so it's hard to sustain too much more than 1.1 Gs in the corners. The one at Daytona was on Hoosiers and you can pull 1.3 Gs anytime you want with the stock suspension and sticky R-compound tires. A tunable suspension with adjustable sways and coil overs might help to get a little more out of the car, and if you feel the need for more performance than my car gives me, get what ever you want and that you can afford.

And that's what I've been saying - if you're racing and need to beat everybody else out there, get the best of everything you can afford.

I'm not a racer, I just do track days and HPDEs, and that's all most of do. For that type of activity (as well as driving on the street) the stock suspension will allow you to enjoy your car. Some of the posters on here are telling us the stock suspension is garbage and can't be used for spirited street driving, much less running on the track, but that's just not true.

My point is, we don't need to be trying to scare any owners into thinking they can't take their car to the track without upgrading the suspension - that's just not true.

Bob

 

the simple design change of going from a leaf spring to a coil spring is likely doing nothing that you would notice (assuming you keep the rates constant)

 

so GM changed it so it would kill you at high speed?

 

yea here it is, I can see the GM designer's sitting around the table" OK lets design something thats going to kill people" oh brother, and what cars /trucks where the Korean's producing in the 1940's?

 

Aero to coil vs leaf spring all in a couple days.

Randy

 

Yeah yeah yeah. You changed the wheel rate and the damping, but you think the car handles better because of the shape of the spring.

 

How would either setup kill you at high speed. I always assumed it was the stationary object that slowed you down from high speed that did you in.



No really I didn't understand what you were getting at

 

I've got a couple of hundred miles on my car at 150-170mph from doing open road races.

It's a 2006 C6 lowered pretty much all the way on the stock bolts at all 4 corners. It has been realigned after lowering.

I'd guess just dropping the back is going to make the car less stable, but since I haven't done that (makes no sense to me), I can't directly comment on it.

I can comment that all 4 corners lowered all the way on stock bolts, with a good alignment produces a very stable car when cruising at 165-170 for extended periods (10-15 miles at a time over 165, before curves necessitate slowing below 160 and re-accelerating to speed), and around sweeping rural 2 lane roads. All my ORR racing is done on closed roads, and is overseen by the State DOT in which we are racing, so no need to flame.

Stock leaf/transverse/whatever you want to call 'em springs seem to work just fine. There is a reason that Corvettes dominate these high speed events- the Corvette suspension is incredibly well-suited for "Autobahn" speeds, for extended distances.

I've been in other cars- coilover'd, regular coil springs with shocks/struts, and full-on race car suspensions (NASCAR), and only the NASCAR Cup car was more stable at speed than the Vette. But then again, we were running super speedway slicks on all 4 corners, so apples to oranges.........and our speeds were much higher than 170, so I can't directly compare the two.

HTH, and for no one who has ever done it, go run an ORR- it's absolutely the most fun you can have with a suit and helmet on.

scotty

 

headers and air intakes are next and then it turns real ugly!