Hi all,

I keep reading about lift off oversteer on reviews and forum posts, however my GP felt incredibly stable on track and would only slightly alter the line upon lift off. No where close to any oversteer.

Does anyone have any experience with this? Wether its really supposed to oversteer upon lift off, or is that more of a myth? Im running Pilot Sport 4 and not the stock Kumhos, maybe thats why?

 

LOL.

I autocross, which means a bit of oversteer is my friend sometimes. If I was doing HPDE then not so much.

I provoke it, with a stiff rear bar, ,and camber plates. I seek that front end bite and the rear end wag.

I run 5 lbs more pressure in the back to unleash it.

It is exhilarating when done right, but problematic when not needed.

If you tune a Mini right, then you definitely see lift oversteer, but not in stock form.

If you don't like it, just do what Miata drivers do in the same predicament, which is, floor it.

Cheers,

Charlie

 

A bit of a myth IMHO in stock form. The car was designed to do fast laps at the ring. As a result, the suspension setup and stock alignment has a very stable rear end. This is optimal for good lap times on a circuit with fast high speed sweepers.

 

Stock is set up with understeer........thus very little chance of getting to the limit and experiencing this.

 

Great! Good to know. Since these cars' suspension is adjustable sometimes I wonder if the previous owner changed the height and therefore the alignment is not the correct stock one. Good to know its the way the car is supposed to behave, it felt very stable in the corners.

As im switching to Ohlins (with softer rear springs), ill be getting a slightly stiffer 19mm swaybar to help mimic the stock balance, maybe a tiny bit more oversteer.

Thanks!

 

Hi Charlie,

I like the extra psi on the rear tires idea. I agree that I wouldn't like to deal with oversteer on the road, however on track when looking for a little more fun and not necessarily the fastest lap times it could be a bit of fun. Sounds like a good way to make that adjustment on the fly.

Thanks!

 

The RSB will make a world of difference. Then all you need to remember is:
Understeer: The front of the car hits the wall
Oversteer: The rear of the car hits the wall
Horsepower: How fast you hit the wall
Torque: How far the wall moves

 

Do you know what the values for stock alignment are?

Im taking it in this saturday and i doubt they will have the GP specific values on their alignment computer.

Thanks

 

The GP should be a nice track car. One thing they did was add front negative camber as compared to other versions of that MINI. The front camber is -1.5 deg. I believe the rest of the suspension settings are the same.

Any of the MINIs can be made to oversteer; some are just more difficult to provoke (without the hand brake) than others. The hardest is the base MINI and the easiest will be your GP. Trail braking hard into a corner and abruptly lifting off the brake may do it or being in a long high speed sweeper with power on and then lift abruptly off the gas will likely do it. Go to 25:00 in this video and they will show you how it is done...


There is a lot of discussion about how to make a MINI “handle better”. The common “fix” is a big RSB. But then, there are some of us who found that a larger front and rear sway bar is actually better (at least for us). Just sayin’...

 

https://www.newtis.info/tisv2/a/en/r...ement/KU8ynFun

 

Thanks for the link!

That is a wealth of information that I thought BMW held closely guarded and didn’t let out.

I knew that the GP had more front wheel camber. This lists -2 +/- 1/2 deg, so that is likely where someone got the -1.5 that I had found some time ago; they probably listed the low end of the range. It is interesting that they reduced the front toe to about half that of the other versions of the R56 and their is more negative rear camber by a little over half a degree. This is getting to be a right proper track setup.