Rear camber on 'normal' cars?

[mrmr96]

I'm pretty sure that a tarmac race car will normally have neutral rear camber, or maybe a bit of negative camber, and the front will have loads of negative camber.

By contrast there are much different setup priorities when setting up a road car, particularly a 'normal' (non sporty) one. But I'm still surprised by what I /think/ I'm seeing:

As I overtake cars on the Mway I noticed that a lot of them seem to have neutral (looking) camber on the front wheels but (by contrast) pretty significant negative camber on the rear wheels.

Now my question is: Did I imagine that? Is it a trick of perspective as I'm looking at their offside as I come up to overtake in the next lane? Or is it really setup like that, and if so then why? Is it to counter any risk of oversteer by putting a 'gripier' setup on the rear as the negative camber would increase the contact patch if the back started to get away?

Answers/comments on a postcard.

Cheers.

[Liquid Knight]

Fat bird in the back?

[Jurgen]

On the S2000 I have more camber on the back than on the front (-2 vs -1) and that is indeed to reduce oversteer. It still never understeers though I doubt you could tell by looking at it though!

As for the reason why others do it, no idea. Probably just for looks!

[paranoid airbag]

mrmr96 said:

Is it to counter any risk of oversteer by putting a 'gripier' setup on the rear as the negative camber would increase the contact patch if the back started to get away?

At a guess, this. Manufacturers really don't want an oversteery car.

[JonnyFive]

Are they sales rep cars? i.e. Heavy in the rear so inducing more negative camber?

[vrooom]

all fwd car has more camber in rear.

[GreigM]

mrmr96 said:

I'm pretty sure that a tarmac race car will normally have neutral rear camber, or maybe a bit of negative camber

Many race cars will have LOTS of negative on the rear - all depends on the track, driver, softness of setup, but in most cases it will not be neutral

[Astra Dan]

Could it be more cars have IRS these days? These noticeably have more camber when heavily loaded.

[mrmr96]

vrooom said:

all fwd car has more camber in rear.

Why would that be?