Hi All & Suspension lean?

[Mark476]

Hi All,
Another new guy here, picked up my 94 Chim 4.0 on Sunday. Already solved most of my initial queries by searching and perusing the FAQs. Top forum, happy to be here.
Now, one question. After driving it for a couple of days, I've noticed a slight lean to the passenger side when parked up. Only very slight, but enough to notice if you measure with your fingers the gap between wheel top and body is slightly tighter.
Now I'm getting paranoid about this, I'm starting to wonder if the steering feels lighter when I turn left, and a slight pull that way when going straight.
Any thoughts? The car handles nice otherwise and bouncing each corner feels fine.

[tahiti450]

Mark476 said:

Hi All, .... I've noticed a slight lean to the passenger side when parked up. .....enough to notice if you measure with your fingers the gap between wheel top and body is slightly tighter. ....... I'm starting to wonder if the steering feels lighter when I turn left, and a slight pull that way when going straight. ............bouncing each corner feels fine.

Excuse the precis...

Welcome and glad you are finding the forum helpful

Just to clarify,
1) do you mean a tilt to one side measured from the chassis to the ground, or just on the basis of the tyre to body clearance?
Bear in mind that a) the body is separate to the chassis,
b) it's a hand made fibre glass (sorry GFRP / composite) body and not necessarily totally symetrical.

Consequently, since the body may not be mounted completely accurately on the chassis and that the body may differ very slightly from one side to the other, the only measurements that count are ones taken from the chassis to a true reference plane. - ie. to a more or less perfectly horizontal surface on which the car is parked with equal tyre pressures and tyre wear, equal weight distribution etc, etc.

2) the steering feeling lighter left or right is pretty tricky to gauge unless there's a gross asymmetry. Does the car run straight with no steering input (on a flat road with minimal camber?

3) Bouncing the corner, is probably about as useful as a chocolate tea pot. Whenever you deflect the body all four suspension units are working and contributing to the result, so its hardly a reliable test.

It seems like a simple query but in practice , like with all suspension issues it is rather complex and needs clear references. A soft spring, collapsed bush or a gas pressurised damper thats lost pressure could account for a list to one side. Simple things to check are for broken spring coils, bushes and oil leaks on the shocks. Otherwise if there is a genuine lean you probably need to get the car looked at by someone with proper chassis set up equipment and the necessary expertise.

[parrot of doom]

Park it on a flat bit, and measure (with a tape measure) the distance from ground to chassis rails on each corner. Check to see if you have adjustable shocks.

[scared but happy]

Road handling: Have you checked the tyre pressures? Mine was a pig when I picked it up from the garage and found it had 34 PSI all round

[Mark476]

Thanks for that Tahiti,
I think it may be 1. b) as per your questions. All I am doing is looking at an angled roof, i.e a tennis ball rolls to the passenger side on flat ground, and seeing a tighter gap between wheel top and body arch on that side.

Looks like I need to do that measurement to the chassis rail on each corner as per Parrot's advice. Sorry to be a bit uninformed, but what is the chassis rail? Will I find the corner of the actual chassis under the corners of the bodywork?

thanks again

[tahiti450]

Mark476 said:

Thanks for that Tahiti, ....... but what is the chassis rail? Will I find the corner of the actual chassis under the corners of the bodywork? thanks again

No probs Mark.
Provided that the chassis is not distorted (which is not easy to establish, but assuming no known problems or history of serious impact - possibly a necessary assumption) then provided you pick the same reference point on each side then it doesnt matter too much exactly which part od the chassis u use ( although of course it must not be part of the movable suspension parts ( wishbones etc).
Theoretically the most accurate part of the chassis would be the square section main rails down the centre of the chassis , but because these are close to the centre line any listing to one side will only produce small differences in measurement which may be difficult to identify.
On the assumtion that the chassis is all straight then i would use the chassis mounting plates in the corner between the outrigger and the sill tube, since this is the point on the chassis nearest the four corners of the car.

[M@H]

Mark476 said:

..only very slight, but enough to notice if you measure with your fingers the gap between wheel top and body is slightly tighter. .

TADTS On some it can be an inch or so either side.. As already said, as the body and chassis are separate and due to the inherent motion in fibreglass and "settle" on cooling outside the mould, this is all to be expected.

Enjoy your new car
Matt

[GreenV8S]

Worth running your hand down the outside of all four springs just to confirm none of them have broken.

[DavidLScott]

I've just submitted an almost identical query on the TVRCC Chimaera site this morning.

PoD got me to check the chassis rail measurement and they seem as good as level across the front but there is a 25mm difference between the ground to top of wheel arch between the left and right. when facing the car from the front it seems to lean down to the left.

The intitial consensus is a body repair that is out of level or it came like it - the car doesn't seem to drive oddly so I am going to check it out over the next few miles.