Okay heres the question during my last round of installs.

List:

lightweight wheels, tires, rear caster upper and lower adjustments, and h-sport springs. Yep got an alignment....

There seems to be some pretty obvious torque steering at
heavy acceleration. I have a rear h-sport comp bar on the middle setting also.

The steering wheel also seems to go back and forth a bit, if I take my hands off the wheel. Like a "shimmy" Kinda wierd. Looking for some people that might know whats going on. Is my alignment off?

 

first eliminate some variables: tire pressure; road camber, are you going in a straight line?

I found the wheels like to hop in first when gassing it, so try it in 3rd gear.

the mini has equal length axles, so there should not be any "real" torque steer, (which is caused by differential axle wind-up from side to side, the longer axles twising more). you are probably experiencing changing traction hunting of the LSD. it is questionable whether a toque is better than lsd anyway, especially in california.

 

Okay, I went out out and drove it again... The shimmy is simply the CRAPPY ROAD!

That parts gone. And the problem is only happening in first gear. So your saying it's the fact that there is wheel hop? Hmmm guess I cannot accelerate as much as I wanted. I do have the LSD, so... HELP! :D

In fact the car holds a straight line, almost near perfect. So the alignment must be right. *shrugs* Is there anything one can do to fix that problem in first? Almost feels like there is too much torque and it cannot keep up or something?

 

Not sure, but would a bigger front sway bar help this?

 

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...=Google+Search
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&l...lanche&defl=en
An interesting anecdote comes from the book “The New Professional Chef” (Culinary Institute of America, 1991), it’s a bit long but the shortened version is chefs got used to wearing the tall black hats worn in Greek Orthodox monasteries where they were hiding out to avoid persecution circa Byzantine empire. When the persecution threat lessened they differentiated themselves by wearing white hats. Having lived and cooked in Greece and now holding the Chef credential I can relate to this version best. Also having been a teenager at the end of the 60’s era I can relate to jlm’s humorous play on words and acronyms, however, I believe the spelling used to be “toke”.

 

A friend of mine was looking under my Mini one day & mentioned that the Mini has the same lower engine roll restricter as his VW Jetta has. He has many engine mods and was getting a lot of wheel hop & pull in first gear untill he replaced that lower engine roll restricter with a more solid bushing. I haven't made this change myself yet, so can't say for sure, but may help you too.

 

That sounds a lot like the behavior of a poorly aligned MINI. I can say this from experience....lol...mine was horrible until I got it aligned [post-spring install]. On a flat road, will the car kind of dive from side to side under hard braking? Try that.

If it's alignment, it will misbehave both on acceleration AND deceleration. If not, it's not your alignment.

Wheel hop is a problem with these cars in lower gears, yes- especially with lighter wheels. It is made much worse by badly balanced wheels [losing a balancing weight will do this].

So, you might also need to check the wheel balance... which is from at some tire shops, especially if they did your install.

Good luck! [hope something above helps].

 

See the problem is At HEAVY acceleration. At regular acceleration and deceleration she is fine...

 

I have never experienced any appreciable torque steer in my
car and I have driven it pretty hard at times, mostly at
AutoX where I really put the power down in 1st gear. And,
I am very familiar with torque steer, having had a turbo
1988 Mazda 626 (what a sleeper ) which really had it
bad in 1st and 2nd primarily.

So, I suspect it is either the LSD or a bad alignment.

 

What could be wrong with the LSD? Should I get another alignment first then? help :(

 

my 18"s are 16 pounds and i have tremendouse torq steer


when you have heavy wheels it acually reduces torq steer but when they get really light its more prevenlent

but i have the same setup kinda and have the same issues so no worries all is normal

 

bugger, so is there a way to dial it out then? with a front sway bar or something? There has to be a way :(

 

well i notive some tires also have an affect i had worse torqsteer with other tires and i have had a alignment so its just one of those things it also depends on the road surface sometimes

but for the norm its a normal side affect with going with lighter rims with all the positives of lighter rims you gotta give of something

 

As a general rule the BMW Mini does not suffer from torq steer.Mini went to great lengths to eliminate torq steer. The original mini had tons , I know from experience, and they did not want to duplicate that problem with the new car.As JLM posted the design ofthe car is such that torq steer has all but been eliminated. Based on my observations and the other people in this thread if you have a torq steer " problem " it may because of a specific problem with your particular vehicle. Start with a good 4 wheel alingnment and then maby check your tire issue. I've been watching this and similar boards for over 3 years now and this is one of the few times I have seen this topic come up. I have even seen some chat about a product to eliminate " torq steer " a problem that really doesn't exist . Go figure.

John

 

so what tire pressure should I be running then? I just had a really good alignment done :/... That's why I was kinda bumbed :/

 

What? Last time I was under there they are clearly not equal length.

They look close to equal length, but they arent the same.

 

There are a lot of different views on tire pressures. My personal is to run the rears 2 lbs less than the fronts . This all varies on your particular tire of course but I run 36f and 34 r my self. Good luck !

John

 

To quote from the Mini USA web site.

" Most car companies don't put in enough time and effort to SOLVE the problem of torque steer in their front wheel drive cars. This occurs when a car's steering pulls to one side because of the engine torque during rapid acceleration. That was unacceptable for us. The Mini Cooper and Mini Cooper S are designed with EQUAL LENGTH drive shafts to VIRTUALLY ELIMINATE torque steer. SO while accelerating away from a tollbooth, you don't have to worry about your mini steering in any direction but straight "

John

 

Then why do I still have it? I don't understand? Did they mess up on my car or something?

 

the pass side has a third driveshaft, larger diameter, with another outboard bearing. the result is the "real" driveshafts are the same length.

 

How many miles are on the clock?

 

1800 :d

 

OT again (sorry). As a Canadian, I was sure this thread was about wool hats and cattle! "Toque" is the Canadian word for for a knitted wool hat/cap (for winter use). Anyway...sounds like "bum steer"!

 

torque steer to a point is inevitable on a FF... i think.

one part i don't like about FF's... very obvious after driving my other
car which is a FR.

 

After driving rear wheel drives for many years getting into the FWD I guess will take some time and some finess. I hope my driving instructor this weekend can help me out with this