negative camber.....i dont get it

[captainluigi]

yeah well there is a lot i dont get. yall helped straighten me out on drifting so i thought i would push the envelope. is neg. camb. just a look thing or is there a performance edge associated. i cant imagine doin a 100mph+ with my rear or front wheels at that angle.

[ceningolmo]

It's basically a cosmetic thing. Allows you to tuck a wider wheel in to a spot not really designed to for it. Plus, it helps minimize the space between the fender and the wheel.

It is generally regarded as less than ideal from a safety and tire wear standpoint. But, if you are looking for that slammed, VIP look...it's nearly a necessity.

[Q45tech]

Depends on the design of the suspension and the slope of the camber gain curve..........how much beyond 0.5 degrees negative you dial in.

MacPearson strut front suspensions don't have much camber gain when the body rolls so they need more negative static amounts than unequal A arm.

[q45VIP]

It's basically a cosmetic thing. Allows you to tuck a wider wheel in to a spot not really designed to for it. Plus, it helps minimize the space between the fender and the wheel.

It is generally regarded as less than ideal from a safety and tire wear standpoint. But, if you are looking for that slammed, VIP look...it's nearly a necessity.

Here you go.

[q45VIP]

One more .......not as agressive.

Just as beautiful .

[louiegz]

I'm not a VIP guy so I don't get how that extreme neg camber looks good. It looks like the springs craped out, like an old 280zx out a K car. I understand getting rid of wheel gap, but wouldn't it be better to just flair out the wheel wells and run with the correct camber. Form should follow function, like Falks Q. I can do without the rear curtains, but the rest of the car is spot on. "True Stance" as Falk would put it.

[captainluigi]

captainluigi rides with louiegz on this one. as i recall (barely) back in the day guys would neg. camber there right front wheel for the dirt track racing. definetly not a vip type auto. i guess my final thought on this is; its your money.

[louiegz]

captainluigi rides with louiegz on this one. as i recall (barely) back in the day guys would neg. camber there right front wheel for the dirt track racing.

Yea, some neg camber works in racing. When you have neg camber on the turns, it improve your tire contact patch, improving handling. In drag racing, you want no neg camber to get maximum tire contact patch in a strait line. In the real world, having too much neg camber will just ware the inside edge of your tire. I'm assuming these VIP cars are barely drivable and they probably get to shows on a trailer.

[Falkdesigns]

... and you want to run positive camber on the left tires for oval-track racing!

Those VIP cars don't drive like that, which to me is totally pointless. Wow, I can slam my car when it's parked, but I can't drive it. Why I call mine "True Stance" as you pointed out (I appreciate that reference!). The white Crown Majesta that q45VIP posted is beautiful though and that's an amazing stance you could almost drive daily with, however the silver car does nothing for me.

It's all what you're into and I'm not gonna knock it. My boss' 56 Biscayne is on air, and at the Orange County hot-rod show (3 day show) when we were cruising around the fair grounds with it fully slammed, he can't turn it , but it looks cool going straight at 2 mph.

[Jesda]

Everyone loves the "70s domestic car with broken air ride" look.

Sure, its for styling. No, it isn't driven that way. Question is, why the HELL does something that looks broken come across as stylish? What next, cars with simulated flat tires?

[captainluigi]

thanx again. at least i understand it now. i still dont get it, but i dont get lowriders either. once again; its yo $.

[q45VIP]

The first pic of the silver car with crazy camber is on air.....so Im sure he doesnt drive at that height.But, most of the cars you see are on coilovers.......and they do drive them at those heights.But of course, I dont expect everybody to like/appreciate the way these cars are set up.

To each their own. See pics.

[nismofly]

its for performance to an extent

what happens is when you go down the straight its angled like that, but when you go into a corner the tire rolls up and the size of the contact patch increases, creating more lateral grip

however, the amount of camber the posted VIP cars goes far beyond performance purposes, thats simply for looks

good street camber settings are around 2 front and 1.5 rear...an aggressive track setting might see 3 - 3.5 in front and 2.5 - 3 in the rear

btw, camber causing tire wear is a long time internet rumor...what actually happens is the lowering and increase of camber cause massive amounts of toe, and its the toe that actually wears your tires

this is solved by adjusting your alignment to put your toe back at normal specs after camber and everything has been adjusted

[BOOMSHAKALAKA]

Check this out...this is excessive negative camber...http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2471735

This one isn't bad.

[Q45tech]

Yea, some neg camber works in racing.....................because the suspension is improperly designed to control the tires with the amount of body roll.

Negative camber beyond negative 1.0 degrees is just a cheat to avoid fixing the suspension!

[nismofly]

thats what SPL adjustable tension rods are for...so you can adjust castor and dont need as much static camber to do the same job

[Q45tech]

Adjustable suspension just correct the static camber and caster, they DO NOTHING to correct the geometry problems lowering creates.

The oem gain curves are offset by the lowering and nothing but changing the suspension pickup points can fix that..............bump steer [toes] errors can be fixed buy shimming the tirerod end link down by the amount of the lowering.

[nismofly]

SPL also makes custom lower control arms to correct the geometry problem...theyre actually adjustable so you can adjust the gain curve, but i dont know many people that would know exactly what theyd be doing with that

how much of that stuff from the Z32 is interchangable to the Q im not sure, Wes told me one time that certain parts are but didnt say which ones

[louiegz]

So I see that the tires on the VIP cars have rounded edges on the tires. Are those motorcycle tires like the ones they use on American Chopper? I never seen regular tires like that.

[Falkdesigns]

Yea, some neg camber works in racing.....................because the suspension is improperly designed to control the tires with the amount of body roll.

Negative camber beyond negative 1.0 degrees is just a cheat to avoid fixing the suspension!

HAHAHA, I can't believe you said that. There is almost no body roll whatsoever in F1, the flex of the tires and their full carbon-fiber suspension is about all the suspension movement an F1 car even has. Formula 1 is the highest level of motorsport in the world, teams spend upwards of half a BILLION dollars each year designing, developing and racing the ultimate cars on earth. And you're gonna tell me they run negative camber, that varies depending on the tightness of each track, because the suspension is improperly designed?!?!?!?!

You could make a freakin fortune as an F1 suspension engineer since you figured out what they can't.

[Rex]

Kevin - I'm pretty sure Dennis was referring to NASCAR type racing on tracks with high banked turns. I don't think F1 does much if any racing on hgh banked tracks and I don't see where anyone mentioned F1 except you?

Also, his second comment

Negative camber beyond negative 1.0 degrees is just a cheat to avoid fixing the suspension!

seems to be inrference to why neg camber is used on streets ... not race cars.

[Falkdesigns]

He didn't point out any specific type of racing, but he said

"Yea, some neg camber works in racing.....................because the suspension is improperly designed to control the tires with the amount of body roll."

which to me implies any type of racing. Hence, my reply, but you're free to edit if you feel it's harsh or something.
Modified by Falkdesigns at 10:28 AM 10/24/2006

[elwesso]

i actually was thinking dennis was saying that the CAR suspensions are inproperly designed for no body roll... I dont know but im sure its a misinterpritation on someones part....

If your hardcore about racing with a factory suspension, youll just have to run a litlte more static camber... but the camber should be the same, your just starting at a lower (or higher depending how you look at it)... Camber gain on a multilink like the G50 is linear... I think it is anyway.... So graphically speaking your just starting part the way up the line, rather than at the origin....

You should be able to put the lower control arms on and the adjustable tie rods, but ill tell you for sure that I dont really see the point... I dont wanna spend $900 on those 2 parts... I dont experience any bump steer and I dont see how changing that could really make that much of a difference. For a finely tuned suspension I coudl see it maybe being beneficial, but for a street driven car that you just want to handle good (not handle 100%) seems like a waste of money.

[Rex]

He didn't point out any specific type of racing, but he said

"Yea, some neg camber works in racing.....................because the suspension is improperly designed to control the tires with the amount of body roll."

which to me implies any type of racing. Hence, my reply, but you're free to edit if you feel it's harsh or something.

Modified by Falkdesigns at 10:28 AM 10/24/2006

You're correct, he didn't point out any type of racing, yet your comment was specific to F1. That was the basis of my point.

In short racing on banked tracks creates a need as the tires need to track on both flat and banked surfaces. The idea is to maximize the cars ability on both the flat(ter) sections as well as the high banked.

NOthing too harsh about your comments, they just seemed somewhat out fo context, given his not mentioning F1 and you specifying F1.

[Falkdesigns]

Ok, well, to me, his statement "some neg camber works in racing.. because the suspension is improperly designed" applies to any form of racing. And the idea that such cars as F1 utilize negative camber because "suspension is improperly designed" made me fall out of my chair. The same goes for a short-track Stock Car, they run lots of negative camber on the outside wheels and lots of positive camber on the inside wheels, and I still would say it's nothing to do with suspension being improperly designed.

I know what I'm saying is right, but maybe somewhere in the ether, there's a suspension design that would provide the tires with maximum contact patch no matter it's angle and no one has come up with it yet.

[Q45tech]

What does body roll [street car] or the lack thereof [racing car] have to do with tires which cannot maintain perpendicularity due to side wall stress from weight transfer

A street car may have a tire with a side wall stiffnes of 1500 pounds/inch and run springs of 150-200 pounds/inch whereas a FI vehicle may 1000 pound/inch tires and 1500 pound/inch springs.

Whereas the street car body rolls 3" on springs the Formula rolls 1/3-1/2" max [1-1.5 degrees] the tires on the F still roll if you can't fix it in suspension you must use a preset amount of negative camber to fix the tires at some particular G load.

Whereas street cars optimize for 0.8-1.0 G Formula may set for 1.5G.

Formula tires use lower inflation than street tires 25 psi vs 35-50 psi because the cars weigh less than half Q.

Anyway static negative camber is to correct the tire induced positive camber, as most oem designs [now in the present and recent past] properly correct for body roll incuded positive camber and the camber gain FROM CASTER CURVE in a turn adds to the gain from lower/upper A arm curve.

"When a suspension does not gain camber during deflection, this causes a severe positive camber condition when the car leans during cornering. This can cause funky handling. (BOTTOM) Fight the funk: A suspension that gains camber during deflection will compensate for body roll. Tuning dynamic camber angles is one of the black arts of suspension tuning."

DON'T CONFUSE STATIC CAMBER WITH DYNAMIC CAMBER AT SPEED IN A TURN

http://does.eng.buffalo.edu/pu...6.pdf

Off topic but interesting aerodynamic design and mesh of cockpithttp://public.cranfield.ac.uk/...3.pdf

Can't find [linkable pdf] what I want to fully portray the situation may not be on Inet.

[Jesda]

You all have gone way over my head, but I appreciate the detailed information. This is why I love NICO's Infiniti section.

[elwesso]

There has to be somtehing out there that shows the dynamic camber curve on a multlink setup like the G50... it should be fairly linear, right???

Also, its fairly common knowledge that increasing static caster makes it so you dont have to run as much static camber to get the same angles on the tire.... Why is this...? I assume somehow by increasing caster you somehow increase your camber gain?

There has to be a way to get your suspension fairly optimal as far as static specifications.... I suppose the idea is to find the maximum attainable G forces (by looking at other cars of similar weight/suspension design) and design your camber/caster for that load, and then you're left with whatever static camber (no load/initial load) is left.... Makes more sense to me to figure out how to work backwards and then deal with whatever your left with, rather than try and start at the beginning and hope you end up somewhere at the end.

[Q45tech]

The problem is there is no way to accurately measure the tire contact patch shape during the load other than a video of the car [and each tire] in the turn at speed.

You can use a transparent drum with a camera inside looking at the tread and create a turn with camber and caster and varing load.

Hopefully we have all seen the pictures videos of tire contact in water on a glass road.

You can measure the effect, you can measure body roll, you can even measure camber of the wheel.

These are things manufactuerers do to test their designs or try to fix problems that show up after cars are built ...............inner tire wear/feathering/unusal wear, etc.

The major problem is everything changes as the tire wears [AGES from heat], why racers may replace half worn tires in a race multiple times.

Which do you design for brand new, 10%, 24%. 33%, 50% worn in how many hours of use?

[Q45tech]

As to the built in camber gain correction curve:All tire manufacturers supply automobile manufacturers WITH documents which outline the parameters which are used to find tires which are close to desired curves.

What happens when owners change brands/sizes of tires? The curves matches are different.

http://www.presspley.com/racec...e.htmh ... re...s.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C...ators