Suspension

[marT350T]

I see a few FWD cars jacking the back end up to get more traction. Does the opposite work for RWD cars ?

[MotorPsycho]

thats how they went about it in the gasser wars, jack the front end up to get better weight transfer to the rear wheels, in the days of dodgey tracks and without todays tyre technology it was all they had

[marT350T]

so your saying its not really worth it if you have decent drag radials ?

[MotorPsycho]

I'm no chassis/suspension expert by any means so I wouldn't ever take my opinions as golden, but the gasser trend disappeared until the nostalgia thing came back around

however, gassers are old skool cool

[GreenV8S]

marT350T said:

I see a few FWD cars jacking the back end up to get more traction. Does the opposite work for RWD cars ?

How does that work, then? I can see the logic in raising the front to increase weight transfer to the driven wheels with a RWD car, but I can't think of any strong reason to do it for FWD. The only effect I can think of is that increasing the rake might reduce aerodynamic lift, but that doesn't seem like a very convincing reason to me.

[v8 jago]

GreenV8S said:

marT350T said:

I see a few FWD cars jacking the back end up to get more traction. Does the opposite work for RWD cars ?

How does that work, then? I can see the logic in raising the front to increase weight transfer to the driven wheels with a RWD car, but I can't think of any strong reason to do it for FWD. The only effect I can think of is that increasing the rake might reduce aerodynamic lift, but that doesn't seem like a very convincing reason to me.

If you look at the fast fwd cars they seem to be lifted at the rear and the front nearly on the ground. If the back is lifted up i would think it would be hard for the weight to transfer to the rear which is the last thing they would want anyway. On a rwd car i would think you need some give on the back suspension so it will bog the back end down and get grip. But too much movement on the rear will cause it to bounce and i would say the car wants to be level front/back.

[Jon C]

v8 jago said:

GreenV8S said:

marT350T said:

I see a few FWD cars jacking the back end up to get more traction. Does the opposite work for RWD cars ?

How does that work, then? I can see the logic in raising the front to increase weight transfer to the driven wheels with a RWD car, but I can't think of any strong reason to do it for FWD. The only effect I can think of is that increasing the rake might reduce aerodynamic lift, but that doesn't seem like a very convincing reason to me.

If you look at the fast fwd cars they seem to be lifted at the rear and the front nearly on the ground. If the back is lifted up i would think it would be hard for the weight to transfer to the rear which is the last thing they would want anyway. On a rwd car i would think you need some give on the back suspension so it will bog the back end down and get grip. But too much movement on the rear will cause it to bounce and i would say the car wants to be level front/back.

Many of the super quick and fast FWD cars now run what appear to be wheelie bars. On the hit, they are lowered to offset the rearward weight transfer.

Strange, but true...

[dragsterworld]

This photo was taken a few years ago now but I imagine they are still doing the seam sort of thing. Skinny rear wheels and wheelie bars... very odd looking...

[Benni]

The wheelie bars on FWD cars are bolted straight to the chassis AFAIK .
In germany, we have a small number of cars using them,
one is a 10,8 sec. Polo (VR6Turbo) .
The driver told me it is using the bars up to 4th gear..... .
At first I also thought : what the F+ck are they doing, but it makes sense :
weight transfer is limited, and the car mostly rolls just on the driven front wheels
and the bar wheels under heavy load, like a drag bike, but "the other way round".
Regards,
Benni

[marT350T]

They have been using wheelie bars on the FWD cars for years I think it all started with the explosion of the imports over there ie civics etc.

They did get a few strange looks and laugh when they were first used but they soon shut them up with some very fast times.

[GreenV8S]

The FWD wheely bars are a cheeky way to increase the wheelbase (and hence reduce weight transfer) without breaking the regs. I still don't see why anyone would want to jack up the rear of a FWD car though. Could it be the result of a massive weight saving exercise without updating the rear springs?

[marT350T]

The reason I started this topic was because there is a mk 2 golf FWD that is running 10.6 .

One of the things he changes to race is to remove the rear shocks and added solid bars which are 70mm longer this keeps the weight over the front wheels and gives better traction.

[GreenV8S]

The only advantage I can think of from this is that with rigid rear suspension as the vehicle pitches under acceleration the front will lift, which will raise the CoG. While the CoG is accelerating upwards this will produce a temporary increase in grip. This would only be a very brief effect and it's hard to imagine that it will give any significant benefit. Is there some other side effect I'm missing?

[BennettRacing]

Basically anything using HP going upwards is not going forwards

[Benni]

marT350T said:

The reason I started this topic was because there is a mk 2 golf FWD that is running 10.6 .
One of the things he changes to race is to remove the rear shocks
and added solid bars which are 70mm longer this keeps the weight over the front wheels and gives better traction.

The 10.8 is good for a FWD (engine?),
but a rigid rear end must be a bit bumby in the runout area ?

[marT350T]

Benni said:

marT350T said:

The reason I started this topic was because there is a mk 2 golf FWD that is running 10.6 .
One of the things he changes to race is to remove the rear shocks
and added solid bars which are 70mm longer this keeps the weight over the front wheels and gives better traction.

The 10.8 is good for a FWD (engine?),
but a rigid rear end must be a bit bumby in the runout area ?

The engine is a 1.8 20v turbo and is said to be make "only" 400 bhp

[liner33]

drag bikes also lock the rear suspension if you can stop the rear going down it helps to stop the front coming up