Correct. All stock, minus the alignment pins pulled in front.Your rear camber is with the stock suspension?
Interesting... I wanted the springs for the aesthetics regardless but I honestly didn't know there was enough room for getting the ~2 degrees out of the stock suspension.Correct. All stock, minus the alignment pins pulled in front.
Getting camber out of the rear is rarely an issue on most cars, unless you want to do some silly toe in or toe out, which I wouldn't recommend. On my gti I could get as much as -2.8 with a 17x8 wheel and knocking the fuel filler back with a rubber mallet and zip tieing it in place. That was too much for that car though, and would be for this one as well unless running some extensive suspension and geo changes.
Are there any ball joints out there that aren't whiteline?Interesting... I wanted the springs for the aesthetics regardless but I honestly didn't know there was enough room for getting the ~2 degrees out of the stock suspension.
I will probably give my local dealer a shot at removing the pins, but not sure when. I don't know if I'll get another track/autocross event in before November, which is around when I'll swap over to all seasons anyway. By springtime I may just do the ball joints, but I might want to jump in on a cheap-thrills trackday in October and I want to try the extra camber... It'll be a gametime decision.
I'm glad you asked this, because I had pretty much assumed Whiteline was the only show in town. Turns out we do have some options.Are there any ball joints out there that aren't whiteline?
I've owned a lot of whiteline parts in the past on my subarus and I was a bit let down by durability and support. This was 6 years ago, so it's certainly possible they've improved, but I've seen people in the vw community have a lot of issues recently as well .
I like the evs and j's racing because of how they adjust. The pinhole adjustment is fine, but chance of slipping or misaligning during install (especially if rushed like a trackside replacement) is higher.I'm glad you asked this, because I had pretty much assumed Whiteline was the only show in town. Turns out we do have some options.
https://www.evasivemotorsports.com/store/category/ball-joints-roll-center-adjuster/?MANUFACTURER=Honda&MODEL_1=Civic Type R FL5&Per_Page=12&Sort_By=disp_order
Yeah... I'm not experienced enough to know or be able to articulate exactly what I experienced today but it felt like I took two steps forward and one step back since I had the springs installed. In some circumstances I felt like the car was doing exactly what I wanted it to, in others it suffered terminal understeer. A lot of it (probably all of it) was me overdriving and I'm aware of that... but I wonder how much of that could have been cleaned up if I had an extra degree of camber up front and/or stickier tires. I'm very curious to make this change, and I have at least one more event to test it out on in a month. Plenty of time to see if my dealer is as cool as yours and get these pins pulled.I got the car back from the dealer this morning. They did not fix the front bumper cowl, and after I pointed it out further they're seeing and understanding what they missed. The stick on fender they also didn't align super well so now the gap isn't even around. They'll get another chance to fix both of these as soon as the hatch grab handles on order come in.
They did fix the faint rattle in the dash/visor/infotainment area it seems. Time will tell, but that's no longer there. The window rattle is much better, but not entirely gone. The higher rpm rattle seems to have settled down, but I'm not quite sure on the mid rpm rattle yet since I had a couple water bottles in the car adding to the noise.
The suspension geo changes were IMMEDIATELY apparent on the few ramps I took getting g home. No longer am I getting understeer on initial entry that jumped to snappy oversteer on right turns. The diff and torque steer also appear to be less intrusive after the geo changes as well. Seeing that the before had over 1/8" toe in on right and over 1/16" on left, AFTER they loosened the strut nuts tells me a lot about why it was a bit off with certain inputs and why turning right was more off and understeer prone than turning left. This is exactly why I always get an alignment on any car I buy, new or not!
Here's some photos of what the camber looks like now. The fenders have a lot of room for more tire, so I'm pretty confident with the apex 18x10.5 et 47 being the right fit to try and stuff a 285 or 295 tire. That will be a next year goal .
I haven't driven on the nankangs but I've been told they're a bit more prone to understeer. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but you'd have to compensate with a lot more toe out in rear, with probably zero or 1/32nd out. Other tires that have more directional tread or larger inside blocks/smaller grooves tend to have a bit more oversteer tendency.Yeah... I'm not experienced enough to know or be able to articulate exactly what I experienced today but it felt like I took two steps forward and one step back since I had the springs installed. In some circumstances I felt like the car was doing exactly what I wanted it to, in others it suffered terminal understeer. A lot of it (probably all of it) was me overdriving and I'm aware of that... but I wonder how much of that could have been cleaned up if I had an extra degree of camber up front and/or stickier tires. I'm very curious to make this change, and I have at least one more event to test it out on in a month. Plenty of time to see if my dealer is as cool as yours and get these pins pulled.
As for tire sizes, I'm also feeling kind of aware that a switch to 18s would be beneficial. But I love the way the car looks with the 19s. I'm going to try a 200tw 19" option, probably Nankang CRS, and see how things go.
I'm kind of enjoying just trying things out right now though, one step at a time.
I saw this article that sold me on the Nankangs: https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/articles/why-is-nankang-is-going-all-in-on-the-sportnex-crs/I haven't driven on the nankangs but I've been told they're a bit more prone to understeer. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but you'd have to compensate with a lot more toe out in rear, with probably zero or 1/32nd out. Other tires that have more directional tread or larger inside blocks/smaller grooves tend to have a bit more oversteer tendency.
Also keep in mind a gripper tire will initially mask understeer, but as you get faster the grippier tires will cause more roll and require even more camber. A 200tw tire type performs best around -1.8 to -2.5 depending on tire. 100tw like -2.2 to 2.8 typically. True slicks and treaded R comps in the 40-60tw range like -2.5 to -3.5.
Other things you can do to change fore-aft handling balance and INCREASE tendency towards oversteer:
Increase rear tire pressure (3psi at a time)
Decrease front tire pressure
Increase rear or front (only on mcstrut cars) anti roll bar stiffness
Higher grip rear brake pad (applies only to corner entry)
Increase rear spring rate (you can use a spring isolator)
Decrease front spring rate
More toe out rear (if you feel the understeer mid corner or corner out)
More toe out front (if the understeer is on corner entry)
Decrease rear camber
Increase front camber
And of course changing things about driving habits usually involves how you apply and release the brake:
Brake later and come off the brake slower and closer to the apex
Apply less brake a bit earlier for slower entry
Turn in later and a bit slower
And if all else fails, there's always pinching off the corner by reducing brake input on entry and then adding some brake input in the 4-6ft before the apex, before smoothly releasing the brake.
I will say that 90% of fixing understeer on a car that's already sorted out is how you release the brake. Slower and smoother brake release is usually the solve because it unloads the front slower, keeping traction on the rotation tires and the weight forward. Getting it just right becomes an amazing feeling and you get a sense of "piloting" the car through the corner rather than fighting grip for rotation. In this particular video at KS speedway, you can see in first corner (coming down from roughly 150mph), the entirety of rotation I do is on the brake. It's a good example because of the large disparity between the top speed of the "straight" before it and the slowness of that first corner. And admittedly if you keep watching you'll see a couple times I understeer a bit as a result of not quite enough brake pressure. Most of it is a result of adding a passenger that changed my balance, but it took me a couple hot laps to adjust as the tires gained grip/speed and the outside rear became the hottest.
If you have a speed chart, like you'd get out of Harry's lap timer, I can show you how to read it and determine what to change about your brake release technique.
That's a lot of rear camber compared to the front and that's probably hurting. I'd also check your toe and make sure you're at zero or near it.I saw this article that sold me on the Nankangs: https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/articles/why-is-nankang-is-going-all-in-on-the-sportnex-crs/
Apparently they've been revised somewhat recently and at least in that comparison test fared very well against two of arguably the best tires out there, the RE-71RS and A052. I can't get either of those tires in a 19" size that I want so the Nankang seem to be the best option vs the RT660 or Cup2 that I was considering in 19s.
It's hard enough for me to remember to hook up my GoPro while I'm doing autocross let alone a lap timer, and like I mentioned I haven't been to the track since last October essentially right after I got the car. Maybe next spring I'll start looking into that stuff because I do think I'll need some legit metrics to help me improve at this point. It's like, I recognize when I run into severe understeer that I could have easily prevented it, but it continues to happen anyway. More reps will help, but also seeing hard evidence I think will help train my brain even more...
But I think what I may be experiencing is the true negative impact of the spring install. I didn't get "before" numbers for the alignment, but the readout from after the spring install I was at -1.5 degrees front camber, and -2.5 degrees rear camber. I feel like dropping the car gave me at least another .5 degree or so rear camber, and without pulling the pins the front didn't get the same treatment and that seems to me to be a recipe to introduce more understeer vs stock... I can't really say it brought a catastrophic amount of understeer as when I got it "right" I could still easily flip the rear around, but it did seem that when it pushed it REALLY pushed- and it was easier to get into those "oh shit I screwed up" moments than I noticed a few weeks ago when I felt like I made some "brain adjustments" to combat understeer.
Again, could be attributed to this particular course and me just not making the right mental adjustments, but also physics may be playing a role too.
Also, side question- at what point do I expect my OEM PS4S to start showing actual signs of performance degradation? They look pretty hilarious- some 60+ autocross runs and the shoulders look truly tortured- but from a wear perspective they don't look catastrophic either. I've got ~8k miles, and the aforementioned 60+ AX runs and the one pretty mild/moderate track day.
So what I'm reading is my tires are probably toast then lol.That's a lot of rear camber compared to the front and that's probably hurting. I'd also check your toe and make sure you're at zero or near it.
With most tires the life is measured in heat cycles, with the basic definition of a heat cycle being it reached operating temp for some length of time. Whether that's 40s in an autox run or 20 mins on a road course, the tire doesn't care. You can use tire warmers to keep the tire in temp range and that can certainly help extend life, but the trick is to reduce the amount of temp fluctuation for the tire as much as possible.
That being said, a 300tw tire is typically 60 heat cycles or so and they turn into rocks, unless the tread is worn away first. They reach peak grip around the 3rd or 4th cycle and then slowly start falling off at 12.
200tw, you're looking at more like 48 cycles or so. 2nd or 3rd cycle is fastest, starts to gradually fall off around 12 cycles or so.
100tw track day treaded or r comp type tires are similar to the 200tw, but they tend to stay a bit more consistent. Typically 36-40 cycles until cycled out, 3rd or 4th cycle is the fastest, and after 20 they fall off moderately.
True slick, it varies a bit on compound, but typically 2nd cycle is fastest, 3rd to 8th are consistent, 8 to 16 or so there's a gradual falloff, and after 16 they fall off quickly until they run a 100tw pace around 20 cycles and a 200tw pace until 36 or so cycles. After that they're useless.
This is all assuming you either had them heat cycled or heat cycled yourself. If you don't do a first heat cycle, you can trim the numbers down 15% or so. Shaved tires will sometimes go a little longer as well depending on your use case. Temp ranges make the biggest difference so running a 300tw on a damp day yields lower fall than using a 200tw because they have different operating temps. More autox geared tires like 160-180F. More track oriented street tires like 180-200F. True track day tires and slicks like 180-220F.
Also, if you push a tire too far out of its temp range, it will start to "grease" or basically just get more slippy and easy to overdrive. In this instance the tread tends to go faster as well. The ps4s are fairly easy to get past their upper end of temp range because they're really geared to be a faster street tire. I've burned out a set in one day on a rough track before. I only got 12 cycles out of the tire before it was bald, but those were 30 minute cycles.
One thing that might help in self review is to try to move the camera back or setup a wider angle so you can see yourself and what you're doing.So what I'm reading is my tires are probably toast then lol.
Might as well post the runs I'm talking about. I don't think I ran this course particularly well; and the reason I say this is my times did little to improve throughout the day. Sometimes a course speaks to you, sometimes it doesn't... but also could have just been the car. Or just me.
I think I still have PTSD with slaloms.
Here's my fastest run, number 4 of 7:
And here's one I'll throw in where I hit some really bad understeer, especially right at the ~:40 second mark after the uphill slalom and probably taking too much speed. Too bad too because I felt like the rest of the run was pretty solid and it would've been my fastest time of the day.
Overall I finished not too far off where I usually do; a couple other autocross vets in 997s are usually my benchmarks, and I finished relatively close to them as I usually do (40th out of 73 total participants... pretty meh). But something felt a little off throughout the day. Maybe it's just in my head.
Where I'm fighting the car is mostly mid-corner and some corner exit, literally feels like the car just wants to keep going straight despite the wheels turned in whatever direction I'm trying to go- but to your point it's also almost surely induced by barreling into the corner too fast and/or a non-ideal angle. The turn-in screwups are surely attributed to bad braking, I'm more or less aware of those and for sure did some of that in both of those runs.One thing that might help in self review is to try to move the camera back or setup a wider angle so you can see yourself and what you're doing.
Where are you feeling the understeer when it happens?
I noticed a couple things, one was getting some understeer on turn in, which could be as a result of too much brake (taking away from being able to steer - think string from steering wheel to throttle analogy, but on brake too) or it could be a result of alignment fighting you to rotate. It's hard to tell which, or how much combination between the two.
The other thing I noticed was understeer on corner out, which was definitely under power. In this case your best bet was to let off the gas or spend more time on brake while turning in to really try and pitch the rear out. Either way the car isn't rotating and you have to push balance forward somehow from the driver's seat. Our general instinct, especially coming from rwd cars is to add too much throttle to fix it. While fun, it's also slow, and not effective in fwd. The fun part is what makes our brains want to do it more though, so try to fight some of that instinct. Part of also why you were fighting the understeer was because you weren't setup going in, which could also be a result of that entry understeer. Alignment can definitely play a strong role, but you can also up rear pressure a bunch when you don't have time to make geo changes. Don't be afraid of 40-50 psi if you have to.
Having said that, what are you feeling and where do you feel like you're fighting the car?
I'm going to be playing with mounting soon, actually. I've thought about the back glass with a greater focal length, but it won't capture enough of the driver. The most ideal place is like 3" behind the driver's ear. I might rig up a pvc pipe with some zip ties on the passenger headrest.Where I'm fighting the car is mostly mid-corner and some corner exit, literally feels like the car just wants to keep going straight despite the wheels turned in whatever direction I'm trying to go- but to your point it's also almost surely induced by barreling into the corner too fast and/or a non-ideal angle. The turn-in screwups are surely attributed to bad braking, I'm more or less aware of those and for sure did some of that in both of those runs.
I am open to suggestion on where to mount the camera. On the Boxsters it was super easy- just an adhesive mount between the seats. My 911 was easy too, mine had a sunroof so I stuck it to that, but I've seen others with a slicktop stick them to the rear glass and it still worked. I feel like it would be too far to see out the windshield if I stuck it on the rear glass... but I have a snake mount laying around somewhere that I'm going to try. Just wrap it around the headrest, that should work... failing that I could try to mount it outside.