I was at Infineon last weekend and noticed alot of wheelspin in the tight turns. My car is an auto(stock no sport suspension) so it does not have th elimited slip. I s there a setup that will minimize the wheelspin? Thanks!

 

I am interested in this too as I have an automatic too. Limited Slip is not offered with the automatic I was told.

I have limited slip diff in my Porsche and it is really nice at the track...nice difference.

 

I'd start with more front camber. this will help with the contact patch. Then you want to get more grip on the inside front tire, and you can go with a slightly stiffer rear bar, or there are some who have had a lot of luck with undoing one of the end links on the front bar. I know that this is counter intuitive to the "stiff for the track" mentality, but really a softer suspension can follow the road a lot better than a stiff one.

Which turns were you having the biggest problems at? Are you used to Infineon already?

Matt

 

yeah, I've raced infineon before in a stock class civic. Never had that kind of wheelspin so I was what you guys would od as you most certainly are more experienced with the mini than I! Wheelspin was happening most on 7 and eleven

 

I have a number of things that I think help on my car (an auto convertible):

1) as Matt suggests, camber plates. Make a big difference in front outside contact patch.

2) 19mm rear H-Sport swaybar, set to medium - not SUPER stiff - but enough stiffer that it flattens the car a bit, improves front inside grip a little and allows the rear to come around a bit more easily, so you're not pushing quite so hard on those front tires...

3) TSW springs and Koni FSD struts - The FSDs are pretty stiff against low-frequency loads (like cornering loads) but are compliant against high-frequency loads (like hitting the curbing) and help keep the tire planted.

4) Reasonably sticky tires... lately I'm running Nitto Neo Gens - nowhere NEAR the stickiest street tires, but WAY better than runflats....

5) M7 USS and GTT strutbrace - some folks will say these make no difference. They DO on my car. YMMV.

 

Has anyone brogh ti to the track? What are your setups for those corners? Whats the proper camber/caster/toe?

 

Yep, I've tracked my car.

Caster is stock. I've run zero toe all around, as well as 1/16th in all around. I liked zero better. I'm running about -1.8F/-1.25R camber - I'd run more camber up front if it were a dedicated track car, between -2 and -3 probably.

 

-2 front, -1 rear camber. I have a 19mm bar on mid. I'm running Goodyear F1 GS3Ds, and they're pretty good for a street tire. I've got a couple of sets of springs, and right now I have the filling rattlings 300+ lb/in set up, but it's way to stiff, only good for really, really flat surfaces (which there aren't any where I live, so I'm just being a lazy guy by not changing them out ASAP). I've got the ALTA PSRS front control arm bushing replacement, and if you're goint to track, get the factory piece of craap out of there as soon as you can (it lets camber, caster and toe all change under hard breaking and bumps, really I don't like it at all). There are a bunch of good replacements out there, MiniMadness and Powerflex make good poly replacements, and the Alta unit is good as well (there were some of these for cheap in the marketplace as well).

I'm going to go back to about a 250 lb/in spring combo for my Ledas (FWIW, there was a set in the marketplace for $400 that needed a rebuild. Rebuild is just $400, so that's $800 for a $2k set of struts!) Then I'm going to try the soft rear setting and no front end-link like John Petrich is running up in Seattle.

As an aside I had an inspirational change in perspective on sway bars and suspension in general when I had a new suspension put on my mustang. It's softer by A LOT that the "conventional wisdom" set up for mustangs, but because it addressed all of the poor geometry issues with the stock early mustang set up, the sucker sticks like you wouldn't believe. So now my philosophy is to fix what you can with geometry, then tune with springs and bars for the softest you can get away with. Soft suspensions follow the road better, deal with bumps better and are just faster to do what they have to do (the stiffer you get, the more the dampening has to go up, and this slows suspension response all over). Stiffness in suspensions is there to keep the contact patch in control by increasing roll stiffness, and if you have a suspension that can manage the contact patch through a larger range of motion, then you don't need the roll stifness to keep adhesion up.

Anyway, sorry for the long winded response.

Matt

PS the Mini is a blast at Infineon. It will go as fast as you can make it go through the carousel, and the biggest problem place (just like for all the cars) is at the last turn at the end of back straight. (I forget the number).

 

Yeha it's turn 11, its where all my wheelspin happens. I'll take a look at your recommendations and see ! thx!

 

all the front drivers spin a wheel there, and all the rear drives slide! It's sharp, and flat. It's a good turn to try some creative lines.

Matt

 

well, not exactly, because when I raced the civic , it was sticking a lot more. The wheelspin now is bordering on excessive!

 

it's mostly due to the crappy camber setting of the stock system. Depending on the year, Hondas had some pretty good front suspension hardware from the factory...

What tires are you running...

Matt

(and yes, all was a bit of an exaduration... )

 

I have not been to Infineon since I am an East Coast trackie but turn 11 sounds a lot like turn 1 in Lime Rock.

I run -1.4 fronts and -1.8 Rear with a 19 mm bar set at mid-aggressive (IE bar with sliders so I have a little more tunability).

After the initial turnin, go to throttle and spin happens. Just a breathe on the throttle will result in TTO rotation. Straighten the wheel to point to track out then add power to pull out of oversteer. Much less wheel spin because the steering is less dialed in.

 

you can add about -.5 degrees of camber to the front wheels by loosening the bolts in the engine bay and removing the little tab with a screw driver. That seemed to help a bit for me, although i lowered and added a rear sway at the same time.

 

I'm running Khumo xs. They seem pretty good...