rear drop links
Discussion
V8 GRF said:
Got Steve Heath ones on my car and they're worn out after a year.... Fitted properly and adjusted right so not that impressed. Is that other peoples experience?
Doesn't seem typical. Mine (my own supplied, not SH, but similar) have been on for years and around 100K miles all year round and are still as good as new. Have you asked SH about it?LordGrover said:
Slightly O/T - apologies OP.
Is it possible to retrofit a rear ARB on a precat? What's involved and what are the benefits?
You could retro-fit one Grover, you could either fit later lower wishbones, or have the plates welded onto your existing wishbones.Is it possible to retrofit a rear ARB on a precat? What's involved and what are the benefits?
The ARB mounts on the chassis are on the inner bush mounts ,so this is easily drilled for fitment.
V8 GRF said:
Got Steve Heath ones on my car and they're worn out after a year.... Fitted properly and adjusted right so not that impressed. Is that other peoples experience?
I am very disappointed that you didn't contact me if you had a problem. If I don't know about a problem, it's very difficult to do anything about it!In my experience, rose jointed drop links can sometimes be misdiagnosed as having worn bearings. This is due to the mistaken belief that the bolt acts as a pivot, rather than the bearing. If the bolt is not tight enough, the bearing appears to have some play as it moves on the bolt. Simply nipping up the nut and bolt, clamps the bearing and the apparent play goes away.
YHM.
Steve
The theory is where ever you add a roll bar you loose grip, they are there to control roll moment, ideally you would have all of the weight in the centre of the car thereby inducing less roll moment and ARB's would not be needed. blah blah cutting a long story short with an ARB you convert an independant rear end into semi, in real life you get a lot more feel and progressiveness to the rear letting go without a roll bar fitted at the rear (MY kOni SETUP) ,general rule of thumb, makers fit roll bars as a general rule to allow soft suspension for ride quality , and control roll in corners. You should set the car up for you and if you have very soft suspension it may in fact be better with ARB after all this is how it came?, but that does not mean its optimum progressive grippy and full of feel. You decide the characteristics you want and then set up the car, I am thinking of setting up a suspension set up business as I love the fact that everyone sets up a car differently, as what would seem hidous to me is feels brilliant to someone else, sorry for the mono logue. If you ride a Motorbike ride your best mates motorbike to see what I mean They are far more variable and user specific.
shpub said:
V8 GRF said:
Got Steve Heath ones on my car and they're worn out after a year.... Fitted properly and adjusted right so not that impressed. Is that other peoples experience?
I am very disappointed that you didn't contact me if you had a problem. If I don't know about a problem, it's very difficult to do anything about it!In my experience, rose jointed drop links can sometimes be misdiagnosed as having worn bearings. This is due to the mistaken belief that the bolt acts as a pivot, rather than the bearing. If the bolt is not tight enough, the bearing appears to have some play as it moves on the bolt. Simply nipping up the nut and bolt, clamps the bearing and the apparent play goes away.
YHM.
Steve
YHM
tvralfagtv6 said:
The theory is where ever you add a roll bar you loose grip, they are there to control roll moment, ideally you would have all of the weight in the centre of the car thereby inducing less roll moment and ARB's would not be needed. blah blah cutting a long story short with an ARB you convert an independant rear end into semi, in real life you get a lot more feel and progressiveness to the rear letting go without a roll bar fitted at the rear (MY kOni SETUP) ,general rule of thumb, makers fit roll bars as a general rule to allow soft suspension for ride quality , and control roll in corners. You should set the car up for you and if you have very soft suspension it may in fact be better with ARB after all this is how it came?, but that does not mean its optimum progressive grippy and full of feel. You decide the characteristics you want and then set up the car, I am thinking of setting up a suspension set up business as I love the fact that everyone sets up a car differently, as what would seem hidous to me is feels brilliant to someone else, sorry for the mono logue. If you ride a Motorbike ride your best mates motorbike to see what I mean They are far more variable and user specific.
I refer the honourable gentleman to this post I submitted earlier to our Chimaera bretheren:shpub said:
There are three configurations:
1. Standard setup with rear ARB and rubber drop links.
2. No rear ARB
3. ARB with SH drop links.
I've tried them all. Setup 1 as normal makes the car twitchy as the rear ARB applies its correcting force in big dollops. Instead of a gradual progressive correction force, it effectively over compensates.
Setup 2 removes the twitchiness because there is no ARB. However it does let the rear of the car roll more and this in itself does cause problems on the limit. The rear of the car wants to roll more than the front and this can cause some interesting effects when cornering on the limit in terms of stability. What is normally done is to stiffen the rear shocks/springs to compensate for the lack of the ARB. Difficult to do with a standard setup and also a bit frought in getting the balance right as the rear suspension is now stiffer and may be stiffer than the front. This causes issues with weight transfer etc as typically the front needs to be a bit stiffer to compensate. In other words, it really should be done only if the rest of the car suspension is upgraded to compensate. When the car rolls, it reduces the tyre contact patch as well which can reduce traction. The cure for this is to increase camber but this reduces the contact patch when the car isn't cornering i.e. straight line. So taking the ARB off solves one issue but introduces other issues so it is not a panacea for all suspension problems.
I have tried it on my Griff and Cerbera. With the Griff, while it was an improvement over the standard setup, it traded one set of problems for another in that the increased roll made it slower through complex corners and roundabouts. It felt like the front and rear were fighting each other. I suspect that the front ARB was trying to compensate for the front and rear at the same time and not doing a good job. On the Cerbera, I have experienced similar characteristics which doesn't give me the same confidence in the car and so the rear ARB is going back on. As I said, with adjustable shocks and changing springs these problems can be addressed but usually at the expence of a stiffer and harsher ride as the suspension is doing the additional job of the ARB.
Setup 3 lets the ARB work progressively. What is interesting is than many people have been able to soften the rear suspension when the SH droplinks have been fitted because the rear shocks/springs no longer need to compensate for the ARB issues. This results in a softer and more complient ride without increasing roll and so on. This does give some indication of the amount of work the ARB actually does in terms of effect. It doesn't change the amount of stiffness on the rear at all because the ARB controls the roll progressively so only the amount of correction needed for the roll is applied. It may seem as if a stiffer rear ARB has been fitted compared to the standard version because the car rolls less. However the ARB stiffness is determined by the ARB dimensions and that has not changed. What has changed is how the correction force is applied. With the standard setup, it is a very coarse application. With the SH droplinks it is progressive. To use a shopping trolley metaphor, one steers the trolley by kicking it from the side and then kicking it from the other side when the trolley turns too much and repeating the operation. The other steers the trolley by applying just enough force to turn it the right amount. One is smooth and the other extremely twitchy.
So what do you do? Personally I wouldn't remove the rear ARB unless it was part of a suspension upgrade where the springs and shocks have been changed to compensate for the missing ARB. It doesn't turn it into a dangerous car for normal restrained driving but it trades the ARB induced twitchyness for increased roll and some peculiar pitching and movement which can be very unpleasant, especially with high speed corners or direction change.
If you do keep the rear ARB, fitting the SH droplinks will remove the twitchyness and make the back end more stable i.e. the suspension works as it was intended to.
1. Standard setup with rear ARB and rubber drop links.
2. No rear ARB
3. ARB with SH drop links.
I've tried them all. Setup 1 as normal makes the car twitchy as the rear ARB applies its correcting force in big dollops. Instead of a gradual progressive correction force, it effectively over compensates.
Setup 2 removes the twitchiness because there is no ARB. However it does let the rear of the car roll more and this in itself does cause problems on the limit. The rear of the car wants to roll more than the front and this can cause some interesting effects when cornering on the limit in terms of stability. What is normally done is to stiffen the rear shocks/springs to compensate for the lack of the ARB. Difficult to do with a standard setup and also a bit frought in getting the balance right as the rear suspension is now stiffer and may be stiffer than the front. This causes issues with weight transfer etc as typically the front needs to be a bit stiffer to compensate. In other words, it really should be done only if the rest of the car suspension is upgraded to compensate. When the car rolls, it reduces the tyre contact patch as well which can reduce traction. The cure for this is to increase camber but this reduces the contact patch when the car isn't cornering i.e. straight line. So taking the ARB off solves one issue but introduces other issues so it is not a panacea for all suspension problems.
I have tried it on my Griff and Cerbera. With the Griff, while it was an improvement over the standard setup, it traded one set of problems for another in that the increased roll made it slower through complex corners and roundabouts. It felt like the front and rear were fighting each other. I suspect that the front ARB was trying to compensate for the front and rear at the same time and not doing a good job. On the Cerbera, I have experienced similar characteristics which doesn't give me the same confidence in the car and so the rear ARB is going back on. As I said, with adjustable shocks and changing springs these problems can be addressed but usually at the expence of a stiffer and harsher ride as the suspension is doing the additional job of the ARB.
Setup 3 lets the ARB work progressively. What is interesting is than many people have been able to soften the rear suspension when the SH droplinks have been fitted because the rear shocks/springs no longer need to compensate for the ARB issues. This results in a softer and more complient ride without increasing roll and so on. This does give some indication of the amount of work the ARB actually does in terms of effect. It doesn't change the amount of stiffness on the rear at all because the ARB controls the roll progressively so only the amount of correction needed for the roll is applied. It may seem as if a stiffer rear ARB has been fitted compared to the standard version because the car rolls less. However the ARB stiffness is determined by the ARB dimensions and that has not changed. What has changed is how the correction force is applied. With the standard setup, it is a very coarse application. With the SH droplinks it is progressive. To use a shopping trolley metaphor, one steers the trolley by kicking it from the side and then kicking it from the other side when the trolley turns too much and repeating the operation. The other steers the trolley by applying just enough force to turn it the right amount. One is smooth and the other extremely twitchy.
So what do you do? Personally I wouldn't remove the rear ARB unless it was part of a suspension upgrade where the springs and shocks have been changed to compensate for the missing ARB. It doesn't turn it into a dangerous car for normal restrained driving but it trades the ARB induced twitchyness for increased roll and some peculiar pitching and movement which can be very unpleasant, especially with high speed corners or direction change.
If you do keep the rear ARB, fitting the SH droplinks will remove the twitchyness and make the back end more stable i.e. the suspension works as it was intended to.
Edited by shpub on Monday 22 September 17:29
Agree steve its all about,balance just read any ohlins manual front pushes on rear and vice versa its all about the symbiosis of front and rear. Mind you I will say, I would not want to drive a well set up track car on the road and why car suspension generally has linked compression and rebound infuriates as you can tune out a lot of "nasties"with good rebound settings. anyway nice article and well put.
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