How necessary is corner weighting as part of the install process for coilovers?

While having a wheel alignment after installing coilovers seems quite logical, how essential is getting a car corner weighted, as well.

Any experience you've had with or without corner weighting would be helpful.

 

The car from the factory is not precisely corner weighted, more-so if you add options and accessories. A precise installation of coilovers, meaning precisely measuring the location of the locking rings, will have acceptable corner weights for a street driven setup. Only when the installer is a slob, or you're trying to extract that last few tenths of a second per lap on the racetrack will having the car corner weighted [and adjusted] have reasonable worth.

HTH,
Ryan

 

I had coilovers installed last Tuesday, and had an alignment done on Friday. The place I went for the alignment does alot of work for the Porsche dealership a block away. It's probably safe to say they know what their talking about.

I was asking if they did corner weighting, which they do. The guy I was dealing with said he didn't think corner weighting would be necessary on a Mini because of it's small size and weight.

Any who ... that was my experience.

 

Corner weighting is great little extra on the track, but for a regular street going Mini, you're best just going around with a tape measure & get the car level (however, front should be ~1/4" lower then rear going off the wheel openings).
You will need to re-align the car after any height changes/adjustments, so try & get it somewhere that you can live with, looks versus practicality.
Down the road you can tweak it as you feel the need, move the weight forward a bit to help the rear rotate & put more traction on the front tires...

regular aftermarket lowering springs are going to put you around 24.5-25" to the top of the wheel openings, you might find that to be a good starting point.

 

Here's another thought along the same lines from my site.

You've got preload! The OEM fixed length swaybar endlinks are the culprit.

Add your weight to the driver's seat and whammo, you have preload on both swaybars at any two cross-corners. No matter if you're at stock ride height or if you've lowered your car via lowering springs or coilovers - you've got preload. In fact, the OEM links are too long in the rear if you've lowered the car and the bar's effective rate is changed... In the front, they're too short!

The ability to neutralize the sway bar in your suspension system is a great advantage to baseline, balance, and refines your vehicle's handling characteristics.

The goal is zero preload - why? To allow the swaybar to work as it was intended... Control in the corners, flatter cornering, more stability, progressive loading.

While we don't carry adjustable sway bar endlinks for the R56 it's something to think about. After installing new adjustable rear control arms I also had my alignment done with me in the drivers seat, because my size and high number of daily miles did impact the rear camber and having done this improved the wear on my tires.