losing the rear

[offtheline]

Im sure most of you understand that feeling of wanting to learn about your car as it is just stock before going out and modifying it. I havent had it for very long and am still just driving it and testing its limits. So my question is that when I am trying to throw the tail around on a turn, rather than hearing a nice squeal sound, all I am getting is a rather ugly shudder. Litterally it is like the car is skidding and roughly bouncing through the turn. It sounds bad and doesnt really feel exceptional.

I know that my struts are blown and will be replacing those soon but is this common for 240s without an lsd? I was always under the impression that even without the lsd these cars were pretty good about the drifting rage that everyone is so into these days. I am asking the question because the only other rwd car I have ever driven was a 93 mustang at a scca event and the tail was really easy to throw around and was quite smooth. thanks a lot for your information. Oh yea and I have a 96 240sx.

[driftaholic]

i don't have an lsd and i don't get nice squeeling til at least 20 mph. slower than that and it just sounds like draggin and crunching. it was the same when i had blown struts as it is now with my agx's

[offtheline]

ok... so what your saying is that I just need more speed?

[driftaholic]

might be it, you never said how fast you were actually going. if you were going slow, try faster and see (but don't crash or anything )

[offtheline]

yeah its usually at a fairly slow pace. I mean if I find a place with a really sharp turn Ill often try to throw the tail around by punching the gas with the steering wheel turned... this often is at somewhat low speeds.

[Meantime]

Sounds like you have a case of axle hop. I had similar symptoms on my '90 FB. Worn, bent struts and/or damage to any of the multi-link components in the back is often the culprit. It doesn't sound like a problem with your diff. Replace the struts and closely inspect the rear links for damage.

[TomsMR2]

its definately the struts.. you said it yourself, they're blown.

[sil80drifter]

hmm...maybe he is talking about the front end shuddering... I have that too, and it's usually in the rain, the front tires lose grip, and kind of slip/grip in the direction of the momentum, so the car understeers a lot, and does not drift. This can be corrected by more negative camber inv the front, or more positive camber in the back. The goal here being to increase oversteer.

sil80

[offtheline]

Im going to throw some kyb agxs on it soon enough though i hate leaving the unmodified category for the scca races. Although today I was able to get it to squeal without any shudder. I was going a bit faster and maybe the speed had a lot to do with it.