front suspension

[Lord Flashart]

Hi all,

 

I'm fitting the front suspension on my car and I was wondering if the "R" on the upper control arms stands for "right" or "rear"?

 

Cheers

 

 

Paul

[Tony Millward]

Hi all,

 

I'm fitting the front suspension on my car and I was wondering if the "R" on the upper control arms stands for "right" or "rear"?

 

Cheers

 

 

Paul

 

 

 

Hi Paul,

 

The 'R' stands for right mate. There should be an 'L' on the other one.

 

Cheers

 

Tony

[littlejim]

On mine ('67 4A) the L and R refer to Left and Right. I understand that earlier TRs had other letters stamped on the parts.

It is possible to assemble the bits back to front with everything fitting; however castro angle etc. alters a bit.

Picture should show what is accepted as correct for the 4A. (Stuart agreed after a bit of chip spitting.)

 

 

The longer of the two bits is at the front

Edited July 30, 2010 by littlejim

[Lord Flashart]

Cheers guys. I thought it meant right, but after a discussion with somebody older and allegedly wise I started to doubt myself!

 

 

Thanks

 

Paul

[TR 2100]

The 'R' stands for right mate. There should be an 'L' on the other one.

 

 

The Parts Book refers to these as "Front" and "Rear".

If that's the basis for the 'R', then . . .

 

Also, the Fronts have one part number, the Rears another.

One one side, the front arm would be on the right, on the

other side, it would be on the left.

 

(I should add that these comments relate to TR4s AFTER the

changes at CT 6350)

 

AlanR

Edited July 31, 2010 by TR 2100

[Kiwifrog]

If you look closley they have R on one side and L on the other of the same part. Depending on which side they are mounted the Letter for the side faces up. Eg when mounted on the Rh side the R faces up and when mounted on the LH side the L faces up. I only know this because the pair Stuart gave me were like new when cleaned up and I could read the stamped letters on both sides

 

Cheers

 

Alan

[Badfrog]

Hi,

 

I have a question about front axle settings. Now that L.A. is going full blast, I'm facing the classic problem: Why do you want power if you can't use it? I mean that if your roadhandling and steering is ****, all you can expect from the throttle is a quick trip off the curve and into the ditch. Not to mention roundabouts, poor road surface and rain.

 

My car being a '63 TR4, I already have a quick turn rack. It is secured with the medium hard yellow polypro bushes. I have in stock the hard blue bushes and an alloy clamp system. Which would be best in the general opinion ?

 

Now for steering. It is always a drag to keep straight with your wheels turned when going fast into a downhill curve, due to excessive mass transfer. The original front suspension can't be fully adjusted to cope with this situation. What is your opinion on Moss's modified neg. camber link and on the various adjustable Fulcrum systems (Moss, Revington....) ?

 

Thanks for your help,

 

Badfrog

[Guest ntc]

Hi,

 

I have a question about front axle settings. Now that L.A. is going full blast, I'm facing the classic problem: Why do you want power if you can't use it? I mean that if your roadhandling and steering is ****, all you can expect from the throttle is a quick trip off the curve and into the ditch. Not to mention roundabouts, poor road surface and rain.

 

My car being a '63 TR4, I already have a quick turn rack. It is secured with the medium hard yellow polypro bushes. I have in stock the hard blue bushes and an alloy clamp system. Which would be best in the general opinion ?

 

Now for steering. It is always a drag to keep straight with your wheels turned when going fast into a downhill curve, due to excessive mass transfer. The original front suspension can't be fully adjusted to cope with this situation. What is your opinion on Moss's modified neg. camber link and on the various adjustable Fulcrum systems (Moss, Revington....) ?

 

Thanks for your help,

 

Badfrog

 

 

 

Hi Badfrog

 

Nice to meet you at Malvern. First mistake Quick Rack this isn't needed for road use. Second Blue polypro bushes aren't hard thats the red ones. As for the negative camber you can induce this as you have already worked out. However you must make sure your wheel tyre combination and the rest of it is upto it. I would tread very carefully.

 

PM me if you need.

 

Regards

 

Neil

[Badfrog]

Nice to meet you at Malvern. First mistake Quick Rack this isn't needed for road use. Second Blue polypro bushes aren't hard thats the red ones. As for the negative camber you can induce this as you have already worked out. However you must make sure your wheel tyre combination and the rest of it is upto it. I would tread very carefully.

PM me if you need.

Neil

 

 

Hi Neil,

 

Ditto, Malvern was really a great experience and I specially enjoyed the social side of it. I'm trying to sell it overhere.

 

I wasn't inferring that quick rack was a plus in handling, just that the car had it "per spec". Did you mean that the longer 4A rack is a plus?

Same, for the bushes, I was following the color code: yellow for medium, blue for hard, red being hardest. Do you think that blue is not hard enough to provide a real improvement?

Finally, do you think that the fixed neg. camber link is enough and that an adjustable fulcrum is excessive tinkering?

 

Thanks for your advice,

 

Cheers,

 

Badfrog

[jean]

JF, I think the best improvement you can get is from the 3deg trunnions as caster improves tracking, if your car does not have them yet, plus a proper toe-in. When I rebuilt the suspension on my 3A I also fitted rack pinion steering, which brings the steering arms closer to the disks, dustshields had to go without regret

 

To improve stability I changed the caster to 3deg as on late 4As etc.. but new upper arms will be required as shown in the littlejim's picture. To bring the camber to 1deg neg I fitted the Revington adjustable fulcrums.

 

I know purists will go mad, but the car tracks and steers like a dream under all circumstances

Always open to different opinions.....

Edited August 15, 2010 by jean

[Kiwifrog]

JF, I think the best improvement you can get is from the 3deg trunnions as caster improves tracking, if your car does not have them yet, plus a proper toe-in. When I rebuilt the suspension on my 3A I also fitted rack pinion steering, which brings the steering arms closer to the disks, dustshields had to go without regret

 

To improve stability I changed the caster to 3deg as on late 4As etc.. but new upper arms will be required as shown in the littlejim's picture. To bring the camber to 1deg neg I fitted the Revington adjustable fulcrums.

 

I know purists will go mad, but the car tracks and steers like a dream under all circumstances

Always open to different opinions.....

 

Hi Jean

 

Nice to read your comments on the 3° Trunnions as I have just done this during My 3A rebuild thanks to Stuart.

 

Cheers

 

Alan,

[Trevor S]

TR4s had the 3 degree castor angle on the trunnion from CT6344 in early 1962 so Badfrog's 63 car will have them already.

[Badfrog]

Thank you all,

 

Everything else being already there, the winners will be alloy clamps plus Moss's modified neg. camber link.

 

Nice winter job coupled to grooved discs and inner front wings restoration.

 

Badfrog

[Smokey]

Real men don't need caster - all it does is keep the car going in a straight line. When I tracked a Porsche 944 Turbo for six years, I had about 3 degrees of negative camber on the front. Actually, three degrees on the left and two on the right, because Mosport has mostly right hand turns, being clockwise. Negative camber makes the car less stable, but easier to turn in, and puts most of the outside tire perpendicular to the pavement in a turn, since it is doing 90% of the work. The downside is that you lose a little bit of braking, and the tires wear unevenly on the street - the insides wear very quickly. However, without the negative camber, you tear up the outside of the tire on the track. So it's always a trade-off. For the street, you probably don't want to go over 1 1/2 degrees, but you will notice the difference. Then, of course, you must get into balancing the front and rear sway bars for the degree of understeer you want for those 100 mph bends, and setting the damper/spring combination, plus front/rear brake balance to make sure that your front brakes lock up first. So it can get interesting. The most frustrating part is that after doing all that, a really good driver with a stock suspension and street tires would pass me anyway. So I gave up the track and got the TR4. However, I'm still looking at ads for track cars - there really is no comparison between the track and the street.

[jean]

Right Smokey, but my car has to track in a straight line by itself, if not how do you think I can operate my cell-phone

[Smokey]

Bluetooth

[littlejim]

Right Smokey, but my car has to track in a straight line by itself, if not how do you think I can operate my cell-phone

 

Good for us older blokes too, keeps going straight when you nod off for a little micro-sleep.

[MadMarx]

Funny discussion here.

 

@badfrog

My advice:

- first ask a racer what he would do

- the answer of the racers would be: Buy the collection Kas Kastner tuning books, then you have first class information of how to make a TR handling.

 

BTW....

 

My wishbones and leaf springs are bushed with Deldrin plastic bushes....no soft wobbly rubber kind stuff. Less friction, less unwanted movement, only single axis movement = great handling!

 

To give you a handy advice:

Shorten your upper wishbones about 1.3cm to achieve about 1.7 degree negative camber. Also the camber gain ins greatly improved which is good.

Use front and rear swaybars to balance the car at cornering. Make them adjustable.

If you like a crisp entering of corners give about 3mm toe in for each wheel, but remember that will rise the tire wear.

If you like less tire wear stay with the factory suggestions.

 

All of this you can see at the Kastner books with photos and special advices.

 

 

Cheers

Chris

Edited August 20, 2010 by MadMarx

[Badfrog]

@badfrog

- first ask a racer what he would do

- the answer of the racers would be: Buy the collection Kas Kastner tuning books, then you have first class information of how to make a TR handling.

 

My wishbones and leaf springs are bushed with Deldrin plastic bushes....no soft wobbly rubber kind stuff. Less friction, less unwanted movement, only single axis movement = great handling!

 

Shorten your upper wishbones about 1.3cm to achieve about 1.7 degree negative camber. Also the camber gain ins greatly improved which is good.

Use front and rear swaybars to balance the car at cornering. Make them adjustable.

If you like a crisp entering of corners give about 3mm toe in for each wheel, but remember that will rise the tire wear. If you like less tire wear stay with the factory suggestions.

Chris

 

 

Thanks Chris,

 

Very good advice indeed. I have Kastner's books (original and reedition) but I wanted to challenged KK's views with the multiple experience of guys on the forum. Basically, everybody concurs on 3 mm toe-in and 1-1.7° camber. So I will start there.

 

How do you make sway bars adjustable?

 

PS: Funny nobody mentionned something I have personnally experienced: setting rear bodyshell lower than front (ca 1 cm less, measured between tyre and mid-wheel arch) greatly improves mass transfert.

 

Cheers,

 

Badfrog

[littlejim]

Thanks Chris,

 

Very good advice indeed. I have Kastner's books (original and reedition) but I wanted to challenged KK's views with the multiple experience of guys on the forum. Basically, everybody concurs on 3 mm toe-in and 1-1.7° camber. So I will start there.

 

How do you make sway bars adjustable?

 

PS: Funny nobody mentionned something I have personnally experienced: setting rear bodyshell lower than front (ca 1 cm less, measured between tyre and mid-wheel arch) greatly improves mass transfert.

 

Cheers,

 

Badfrog

 

BF,

because of the vertically challenged bit, I'm trying to go for the opposite, front lower than rear (not much though), so I can see over the bonnet better.

geez you big buggers get it easy.

[MadMarx]

.........

How do you make sway bars adjustable?

PS: Funny nobody mentionned something I have personnally experienced: setting rear bodyshell lower than front (ca 1 cm less, measured between tyre and mid-wheel arch) greatly improves mass transfert.

 

 

How to make a swaybar adjustable:

Two possible ways:

Cheap way - Put 8mm holes through the side of swaybar and slip a bolt through.

Alternative you can install a slider to the round bar.

 

I always would keep the front end lower as the rear.

 

Cheers Chris

[Badfrog]

I always would keep the front end lower as the rear.

Cheers Chris

 

 

 

Still, look at an unmodified truly original TR4 (even more so on a 4A): rear is a trifle lower (.5 to 1 cm) on most cars I measured.

 

Similarly, against most beliefs, more tyre pressure in front ((1.9) than rear (1.7-1.8). That's for 165.80.15 size.

 

Probably not ideal on track, but have a try on a winding mountain road ....

 

Badfrog

Edited August 21, 2010 by Badfrog

[MadMarx]

@badfrog

 

as far I understand you, you would like to get writ of understeer. To achieve this there are some common receipts to do this:

 

- lower the front end

- rise the rear end

- rise front tire pressure

- lower rear tire pressure

- make front swaybar softer than rear swaybar

- remove front swaybar

- fit rear swaybar

- softer front springs

- harder rear springs

- softer front shocks

- harder rear shocks

- more camber on front

 

All this will force your car to oversteer.

 

Lower front end.....

[Badfrog]

Thanks Christian,

 

This list is very complete and will be of great help to me. I like to understand how things work.

Playing each parameter separately or in combos will certainly occupy my w-e in an interesting manner.

 

Cheers,

 

Badfrog

[MadMarx]

the secret is called slip angle of a tire.

if the slip angle of the front tires are larger than on the rear than the car understeers.

 

The slip angle depends on the load of a wheel and the tire pressure and the camber has some influent on this.

 

So with that knowlege the lesson is to make the slip angle of the front tires equal or smaller than on the rear.

 

The list I gave you will do this.

 

The rest is TEST TEST TEST.

 

Cheers

Chris

Edited August 21, 2010 by MadMarx