Wandering Tuscan

[RedTuscan]

Anyone come across an unstable Red Rose Tuscan. Seems to wander all over the road over 90mph as if you were turning the wheel constantly from left to right. Road surface not bad enough for tramlining and no problems under that speed. Strong wind? Tyres flatspotted?

[Apache]

You need a geometry check you do, not expensive

[hexhamhc]

A simple first thing to do is to check your tyre pressures!

[RedTuscan]

Thank you very much for your replies. The car had a setup check done with lasers etc. I assume this would include geometry and an adjustment was made.

I understood that on the Bridgestone SO2's for a Red Rose the fronts should be 22 and the rears 23. Is this correct?

[andyvdg]

21 front 23 rear or 22/24. Have your shocks gone ? Have long have you had your car ? The steering has no slop at all at the straight ahead and so takes a little getting used to guiding the car with less venomn than other, lesser vehicles.

Cheers,

Andy.

>> Edited by andyvdg on Friday 31st October 14:28

[RedTuscan]

Thanks for the suggestions. It can't be the shocks. I know about the steering characteristics. It happened on a straight, dry conditions and the car is wandering, needing constant steering correction. Not the back end wanting to break away, just wandering as if it were drunk!

[basil brush]

My Tuscan drinks a lot but I've never known it get that bad.

[joospeed]

Common fault especially if dealer set-up. the tuscan (and cerbie_ sufers from excessive bump steer at teh front end, as the wheel goes into bump (up in the arch) the front gains toe out making it unstable especially on the brakes. You can do a simple mod which cures it, or you can run static toe in of 20-30 mins total. Any dealer setting the front toe to parallel or toe out should be shot!! (well you know what I mean)
PS just 'cos it says on your service receipt that it's had the geometry checked don't assume that means it was actually adjusted if it was incorrect ... you must keep winding toe in onto the front as the front springs sag (yes they do Mr Eibach!!) and the geometry gets more towards toe out.

[21TVR]

You've nailed it in one Joolz!

[donaldhunter]

joospeed said:

You can do a simple mod which cures it, or you can run static toe in of 20-30 mins total.

So what's the simple mod you can do?

[andyvdg]

These were the official settings for a Red Rose given about about June 2001 (not sure for what vintage of car though).

Has anyone got the settings for an S ?

Simon, do you run with some Toe-in then ?

If only we had that thread that girlracer started with all the settings/discussion in it......


Front Caster Left 4 °
Right 4 °
Camber Left 0.75 ° (negative)
Right 0.75 ° (negative)
Toe Left 0 ° (+/- 0.01 °)
Right 0 ° (+/- 0.01 °)
Total 0 ° - Parallel (+/- 0.02 °)
Rear Camber Left 0.75 ° (negative)
Right 0.75 ° (negative)
Toe-in Left 0.07 ° (+/- 0.01 °)
Right 0.07 ° (+/- 0.01 °)
Total 0.14 ° (+/- 0.02 °)

Editted to add more info :

www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=57704&f=5&h=0&hw=toe

www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=44535&f=5&h=0&hw=toe



>> Edited by andyvdg on Monday 3rd November 10:52

>> Edited by andyvdg on Monday 3rd November 11:10

[joospeed]

donaldhunter said:

joospeed said: You can do a simple mod which cures it, or you can run static toe in of 20-30 mins total. So what's the simple mod you can do?

I suspect you may have to pay for info like that!! it's how i make my living, fixing things dealers can't...

[donaldhunter]

joospeed said:

I suspect you may have to pay for info like that!! it's how i make my living, fixing things dealers can't...

Sharing the knowledge would be a good gesture and I'm sure you'd still get plenty business applying the mod to people's cars. Give people a chance to understand what simple enhancement you're making and perhaps you'll get more Tuscan owners knocking on your door.

For me, the 600 mile round trip makes it difficult and I wouldn't make the trip without a good explanation of what's on offer.

[basil brush]

joospeed said:

donaldhunter said: joospeed said: You can do a simple mod which cures it, or you can run static toe in of 20-30 mins total. So what's the simple mod you can do? I suspect you may have to pay for info like that!! it's how i make my living, fixing things dealers can't...

What's your price to set up a Nitron shod Tuscan Julian?

[joospeed]

donaldhunter said:

joospeed said: I suspect you may have to pay for info like that!! it's how i make my living, fixing things dealers can't... Sharing the knowledge would be a good gesture and I'm sure you'd still get plenty business applying the mod to people's cars. Give people a chance to understand what simple enhancement you're making and perhaps you'll get more Tuscan owners knocking on your door. For me, the 600 mile round trip makes it difficult and I wouldn't make the trip without a good explanation of what's on offer.

That's too simplistic a view, you've got to understand that stuff like this is worked out over a period of time, I'm not about to divulge little mods and tweaks that set my work apart from anyone elses am I? Some earlier tweaks are well documented, all you have to do is trawl the archives looking for them, the current mods are secret for a very good reason, I thought of them and they're mine! that's how the world works - give away your secrets and you lose your competitive advantage.

[joospeed]

basil brush said:

joospeed said: donaldhunter said: joospeed said: You can do a simple mod which cures it, or you can run static toe in of 20-30 mins total. So what's the simple mod you can do? I suspect you may have to pay for info like that!! it's how i make my living, fixing things dealers can't... What's your price to set up a Nitron shod Tuscan Julian?

That all depends on how bad it is to begin with, if it's been fitted correctly it'll take literally no time at all since it will be bang on already. If the car has no two wheels pointing in the same direction and all the adjusters are seized through lack of maintenance then reckon on up to a whole day, much of which could be just correcting basic service items before actually modding anything. Most cars can be sorted in under 4 hours, so around 160 pounds plus vat.

[bertie]

I'm with Julian on this one, you never give away your hard earned intelectual property.
That would be commercial suicide.

[tuscanraider]

I also agree with julian, having spoken to him i was impressed with his understanding of how the tuscan setup is and how to resolve basic and complex problems. i am in the process of purchacing a tuscan (again) and when i get it i will definetlty use julian for the setup.(and pay for it)

[fergusd]

IF it's a bumpsteer issue as is being intimated . . . changing the steering rack height relative to the chassis will change the bumpsteer . . . of course changing the upright/rod end mounting points does the same thing . . . just depends on whether the Tuscan rod ends attach in front of or behind the steering axis . . . as to whether you lower or raise the steering rack height . . . and whether you can raise or lower the rack . . . I'm sure it'll go one way easily, depends on how it's attached to the chassis.

Some cars allow both raising and lowering of the rack for this very reason . . . kinda surprising that the Tuscan doesn't . . .

Donald, if you need some steering rack shims/mounts made up I know an excellent local (to you) precision fabricator . . . ;-)

Fd

[cdd]

If no one ever handed on their hard earned knowledge this country would start going backwards, OH IT HAS!