i have recently pushed my wrx to about 110mph and for some reason it feels really unstable. my brother has a bmw 330 sedan and i took that to 150mph and it was fine, no body rolls and it felt really stable. my rex has rims and is dropped. the wrx definitely has more power than the bmw but the bmw has better handling. does anybody else have this feeling?

 

noope. i was going those speeds awhile back, and felt the car was rock solid. in fact i didnt even notice the car was going that fast.
maybe it was all the wind blowing you around?

 

check your alignment/tire pressure. also, how exactly is it "dropped" with that term being used i sence a problem.

 

when the wheel moves up and down the camber changes. So if you lowered it via shorter springs then your static camber is off. thus your riding on the inside edges of the tires. And when you hit a bump it will camber in more and make it worse.

Low profile tires, with short sidewalls, extenuate this problem beacuse they do not "give" much.

Also the "camber gain", due to suspension movement, is not linear. So you may never make it handle better than stock by lowering it. It probally willl feel like it handles better while cornering at slow speeds due to "less" body roll. "Slow speeds" being probally under about 70.


Here is the low down on how a car feels. A stock car , when cornering, when approching its limits of tire adhesion will GRADUALLY let go(become loose or push , almost EVERY car will push when stock, stock is "safer"). Easily controlled to prevent an accident. The more the car is modified the more abruptly it goes from stable to loose or push. So beware of this.

My recommendation would be to get stiffer sway bars with urathane bushings(most come with these) and solid endlinks in the rear (WRXs have spherical ball ends in the front, no better solid joint than that)
For a WRX a 22mm front and a 22-24-26 adjustable in the rear.
Now it will handle better on the dry pavement but will suffer in the rain and be worse in the snow... Its a Give and Take.....

I also use strut tower bars in the front AND rear. This will remove ALOT of the flex in the chassis.. And BELIEVE ME , IT FLEXES ALOT. (you can search for cracked or broken windshield and find out that people have been autocrossing and the glass cracked. Why??? due to body flex!!!!)

I've been told that it feels like driving in a "wet tissue box" without strut tower bars. Then add strut tower bars and the box is at least dried out!!

 

i took my car 150mph+ no problem just wind noise and my car is a wrx wagon cheers

 

CHEERS :banana:

 

You lost me on.
"For a WRX a 22mm front and a 22-24-26 adjustable in the rear. Now it will handle better on the dry pavement but will suffer in the rain and be worse in the snow... Its a Give and Take....."


Why would you get worse, I thought the point of antisway bars was that, prevented sway in your suspension expecially in the rear, when you are turning instead of lifting up the one wheel it pushes against the anti sway bar and makes both tires grip the ground.... but if I am reading what I just type then technically if you are turning "hard" if your tire is lifting for a reason and now you are preventing that with the anti sway bar it pushes on both tires making them BOTH not grip the road because less of it is touching?
Am I correct or WAY off?

I wanted to get sway bars but if your car handles less than par in the winter, being that I am in PA and we get snow... that would not get good I guess...

Thanks :-)

-Nigel

 

120, no problem

 

Never a problem here and I take it up to those speeds on a weekly basics. All stock suspension tho Stock Tires also. 150MPH never belt better in an car I've rode in

 

Pick up TurboXS' Stage 4 package, or Vishnu's stage 2 package, and you too will go past 150mph when you want:banana:

 

I live in PA also..

Your way off with sway bars function.
What they do is prevent/lessen the body from rolling. they do this by linkage that is hooked in 4 spots. 1-wheel, 2-frame, 3-frame, 4-wheel. So when the body rolls the weight is transfered to the tires.

Example 1: Your going around a left hand turn. say 40MPH
Your at maximum tire adhesion to the road(if ya go 1MPH faster you'll slide)
Your body rolls , lets say, 5 degrees. You have stock sway bars.
you make it without sliding.
perhaps 75 lbs/sq in on the right side tires

vs

Example 2: Your going around a left hand turn. say 45MPH
Your at maximum tire adhesion to the road(if ya go 1MPH faster you'll slide)
Your body rolls , lets say, 2 degrees. You have bigger sway bars.
you make it without sliding.

The reason that you were able to do this was because the energy was moved to a different location. from rolling the chassis to pressing DOWN on the right side tires and lifting UP on the left side tires, resulting in less body roll. Now , hopefully, we all know that the inside tires , in this case the left, do very little as far as traction goes. This is due to the weight on them. Now the outside , RIGHT, is able to go around the corner without sliding because there is more downward pressure, to prevent sliding, and alittle more centrifical force twards the outside cancelling some of the downward pressure.

So , for this case, lets say you have 100 lbs/sq inch on your right side tires.

While going around a corner on dry asphalt your tires will not slide untill they pass the 100 lbs/sq inch point.

but if the raod is wet it may be 50 lbs/sq in MAX before sliding

and if its snow 25 lbs/sq in max before sliding


I dont know if I captured th ewhole explanination or not.

But bottom line is that the stiffer the bars the more weight is "transfered" from inside to outside and you'll be over the max at slower speeds when its slippery..

Ever see an indy or nascar race and it starts to rain and the cars are going REALLY slow and spin out???? Sure the slick tires cause SOME of this , but the stiff chassis is the cause.

Again, Thats why I said get an ADJUSTABLE sway bar for the rear. Best of both worlds....

Also another fact worth mentioning.
To make a car handle better do this:
1-rear wheel drive car+bigger front sway bar=better corner speeds

2-front wheel drive car+bigger rear sway bar=better corner speeds

3-4 wheel drive (AWD) + bigger bars at both ends=better corner speeds

I wont even get into camber gain during cornering due to stiffer sway bars pulling the suspension downward..

 

My car was kinda unstable at speed until I put a lip on IT, and installed an ALK.

 

Aerodynamics will/can create MASSIVE amounts of "down force" at higher speeds, like above 70MPH. Also puttin a lip on the front of the car to prevent air from gettin underneth it will help also. this reduces the "airplane wing" lift thats generated by the air going over the top of the body vs going underneth.

So actually with more down force your actually making your tires carry a larger load. But only in the verticle direction, not in the horizontal direction.

Put on a spoiler in the rear and that will push down in the rear. But if its located behind the rear axle (pivot point) it will reduce some downforce on the front end, i.e. lift the front. Not much. But the gains in the rear probally will be worthwile. Exspecially if its a rear wheel drive car. Because the rear tires have to corner+push the car forward with its hundreds of horsepower.