Got my car corner weighed

[JGood]

87 325is
No A/C
No interior, just a dash and race seat
Sunroof still installed, power windows still in place
AutoPower 4-point roll bar
Nothing in the trunk
No tar anywhere
Stainless headers, single 2.5" exhaust w/ cat and muffler
15x7 Kosei K1's with street tires
3/4 tank of gas
160lb driver
spec e30 suspension

[blueapplesoda]

thats nice and light. maybe try cramming a spring pad to balance out the front end. My Spec miata's initial corner numbers were very similar percentage wise, and when we balanced it out to like 51% 49% and adjusted to correct ride height at all four corners, the handling of the car greatly improved, lap times improved, and the overall feeling of the car was much better.

if i recall correctly, my e30 had like 200# more than any other corner on the passenger front, w/ a total weight of 2900 with driver + 1/2 tank of fuel, autopower roll bar, full interior, sparco seats, no tar, full a/c, and all the nice turbo bits.

since then, i have not corner balanced my car, but i purchased a set of longacre scales. Have yet to use them on the e30 though haha.

[jlevie]

The cross weights are excellent, but the rear is light. That is going to make the car prone to oversteer and reduce the effectiveness of the rear brakes. Adding ballast to the rear (up to 236lb) between the shock towers is going to improve handling and braking.

[JGood]

The cross weights are excellent, but the rear is light. That is going to make the car prone to oversteer and reduce the effectiveness of the rear brakes. Adding ballast to the rear (up to 236lb) between the shock towers is going to improve handling and braking.

The car oversteers very bad. I have to drop rear pressures about 6psi lower then front. When I had stock sways, I disconnected the rear. That got the car more neutral. I just installed 22/19 bars, so I'll have to see how it reacts now.

I'm using HT-10 fronts and HPS rears. The rears lasted probably 20 track days, the fronts only last about 4. So they definitely aren't doing much.

Would you recommend putting weight into the car to make it more neutral? Would it have enough of an effect to lower lap times, even being heavier?

[E30Kaiser]

I would try and make as much of that weight that is added be parts, such as a wing, strut bar, etc. and then start adding ballast.

[straight6pwr]

fiberglass hood, delete power steering, etc too lighten the front up a little?

[rThor432]

fiberglass hood, delete power steering, etc too lighten the front up a little?

Yeah, I wonder how much more weight can come out of the front, if you want to nit-pick it to get it closer to 50/50. My S52 car was very close to the weight of your car (2,455 without driver and 2,606 with me in the seat) and I managed 54/46 F/R with 1/4 tank of gas. After that I removed more A/C related stuff and insulation that was unneeded. More gas would have helped my case tremendously.

But then again, your car is pretty well stripped down. Might be time to add ballast, as others have mentioned.

Great numbers by the way. Gotta love those cross-weights.

[JGood]

I'm not looking to spend money on losing weight at this point. Not in the budget. And I don't want to remove P/S. I don't feel I have the control I need on the track without it. I've tried it both ways several times. Especially since I have the e36 rack. There's not too much "extra" stuff under the hood. I took out everything I didn't feel was necessary for a reliable car that gets driven to the track.

[Skafrog]

I'll counter Jim's post.
You look at any highly prepared e30 in the country, and they are light as hell in the rear (65/35 distribution, sometimes worse). If your car oversteers, then stiffen the front bar, or disconnect the rear bar. If you aren't playing in a spec class, then get the car as light as possible, and tune the suspension to work around your "terrible" weight distribution. If you don't, you wont be winning much, and that's the hard fact.

[JGood]

I'll counter Jim's post.
You look at any highly prepared e30 in the country, and they are light as hell in the rear (65/35 distribution, sometimes worse). If your car oversteers, then stiffen the front bar, or disconnect the rear bar. If you aren't playing in a spec class, then get the car as light as possible, and tune the suspension to work around your "terrible" weight distribution. If you don't, you wont be winning much, and that's the hard fact.

This was my mindset. I can get the car to grip as-is, and I would think that would be faster then adding 200+ lb to make it neutral. That's a lot of weight...

I'm not in a spec class, so I can do whatever. I'm running NASA TT currently.

[jlevie]

There are other things you can do to get better weight balance w/o adding ballast. like stiffer front springs relative to the rear and thick spring pads to raise the front. I'd also throw a weighted spare tire (say 50-80lb) in and see what that does. If you can shorten each brake zone by 50' your times will improve. And not oversteering in the corners lets you carry more speed through the corner. When a corner leads onto a long straight that is more important than it might seem. Even .5mph more out of such a corner can yield 5-8mph more at the end of the straight, which in turn can be several tenths in lap time.

[JGood]

Would raising/stiffening the front really make a difference? I was under the impression that jacking corners doesn't make a huge difference for front-rear static balance. I didn't mess with it at all on the scales as far as adding weight or anything, now I'm starting to wish I would have.

[jlevie]

The amount that you will change front/rear height w/o screwing up other aspects of handling won't make a huge difference, but you can use that to shift weight from the front to back.

[2002maniac]

M42 swap

[nando]

I really need to do this! but my 6" springs are too long, I'd have to jack with my ride height and I don't want to do that. I should order some 5 or 5.5" springs and get it over with..