Rear Grip Improvements?

[svtcanuck]

The most important question doesn't appear to be addressed here.

What tires are you using? That's the first place you should be looking for more grip. If you're not using something like a RE71R, BFG RIVAL, NT01, or R888 then you should be.

 

[PunkST]

So adding the torsion brace adds some oversteer? Color me interested.

 

[jeffreylyon]

So adding the torsion brace adds some oversteer? Color me interested.

It does not set balance towards oversteer, but it does make the car more eager to rotate when you move weight off the rear.

 

[maestromaestro]

Fascinating. I can't make mine rotate no matter what I do, short of a Scandinavian flick. . In fact, Eibach REAR sway bar is going on to it pretty soon just so that it will over street some.

 

[PunkST]

It does not set balance towards oversteer, but it does make the car more eager to rotate when you move weight off the rear.

Thats what i want, lol. I likenhow easy it to get some rotation. I want more.

 

[Plainrt]

Thats what i want, lol. I likenhow easy it to get some rotation. I want more.[/

Lol dells autocross this weekend What........ bunch of fist signed up.

 

[PunkST]

^id love to go but my car is being a pain. Constant evap and check engine codes. So im gonna be underneath it pitting some stock stuff backnon hoping to trouble shoot it.

 

[Dpro]

Fascinating. I can't make mine rotate no matter what I do, short of a Scandinavian flick. . In fact, Eibach REAR sway bar is going on to it pretty soon just so that it will over street some.

I can get mine to rotate just lift off the throtttle at the beginning of a corner crank in rear comes out and punch it. Car slides the rear end through the corner. I have passed people on dual lane on ramps doing that . Grab the outside cormer slide through and pass on the move lol. By the time they are shocked that someone passed them there you are a couple car lengths away.

Never had a problem with it rotating too much though. I drove drift cars for years. Built them as well. One of the reasons I fell in love with the FiST is because you could drive it like this. It does not act like most FWD cars. Funny thing is MKI and II Fiestas handled much the same way. I remember owning a couple of those in when I lived in San Francisco and drove for Waiters in Wheels when I was in Sound engineering school. Id slide them the same way. Fun cars , dirt cheap too $500 used in 1991 for a 1979 MKI .

 

[jeffreylyon]

Funny thing is MKI and II Fiestas handled much the same way. I remember owning a couple of those in when I lived in San Francisco and drove for Waiters in Wheels when I was in Sound engineering school. Id slide them the same way. Fun cars , dirt cheap too $500 used in 1991 for a 1979 MKI .

My first two cars where MKI's. I don't remember them handling like that at all. My first just had a rear sway bar from an S model and my second was pretty built - torque steer for miles and tons of understeer. I was a development driver for a FF team then and I think that I learned more about corner entry trying to coax my MKI into a tight a/c turn than I did in an FF at speed.

 

[maestromaestro]

These stories make me really -REALLY- perplexed. My 2015 understeers lots - much like expected for a FWD, but it won't oversteer. Every time I came off track was due to OS. The only time it starts rotating/sliding into turns is when the surface is slightly greasy after a rain.

How could it be that we seem to have vast behavioral differences? I have stiffening braces in the rear, midship, and front (all from TB Performance).

 

[JiminVirginia]

Using the throttle too aggressively will shift weight rearward and can cause understeer. It's a driving style issue at that point.

I'm more interested in getting better front grip and am considering the Eibach rear bar to flatten it our a little. (I'm in H Street and can't do much in the way of mods.) Any stories about installation and effect would interest me. Thanks

 

[maestromaestro]

Using the throttle too aggressively will shift weight rearward and can cause understeer. It's a driving style issue at that point.

I'm more interested in getting better front grip and am considering the Eibach rear bar to flatten it our a little. (I'm in H Street and can't do much in the way of mods.) Any stories about installation and effect would interest me. Thanks

I appreciate the weight transference under abrupt inputs. To that end, people have been talking about lift overrsteer in FiSTs, as if our cars are 911s. So if anything, I'd be off the throttle rather than on it early in the turn.

To your question - I will be installing the Eibach rear sway bar in the next few days. Will post an update once I get situated.

 

[Plainrt]

I believe the difference comes down to driving style. I do think will be happy with the added rear bar

 

[SonicDeathmonkey]

In general, stiffening the rear end will decrease grip. So if you have bracing, sway bar, etc, get rid of that stuff. Also check tire pressure to make sure you're not over-inflated. You could also try increasing camber but that's not easily done. Also remember that the car's balance is cumulative so you could also try *reducing* grip at the front but that wouldn't be recommended.

 

[Dpro]

My first two cars where MKI's. I don't remember them handling like that at all. My first just had a rear sway bar from an S model and my second was pretty built - torque steer for miles and tons of understeer. I was a development driver for a FF team then and I think that I learned more about corner entry trying to coax my MKI into a tight a/c turn than I did in an FF at speed.

Actually my secomd ome was an S model. Might have had something to do witjh it. The first one was a rust bucket and some guy opened his door on my passenger fender on haight steet and wound up paying for the car. I remember when I scored the S because it was pretty clean. Lol a darker Gold S .
I learned how to drive in a Datsun 510 first a 72 4 door and then a 69 2 door. Dropped with suspension and built engine.
Everytime it rained we went out and got sideways. Lol. Between that and driving in the Santa Cruz Mountains I learned a lot about car control. I then moved on to 240z’s. Granted that was all RWD. Though one my good 510 owning friends family had a MKI at that time. Lol
But ya I probably have a different driving technique than you do.
On bot of mine I found them to handle wheel and not to much understeer.
If you ever drove a stock 240z in tight corners you would experience sever understeer, worse than any of the these Fiestas. You literally had to drive them into oversteer to negoitate the corner. In fact I learned to do that for fun as well. Come into a corner fast and bury the pedal.

I also owned and drove, drifted and built S13 240sx fastbacks aka 180sx. Along with AE86’s the worlds ultimitate drift cars. As well as MR2’s.


I do not find any of the Fiesta line to understeer. They track quite well in fact. I think people are screwing up their corner entry to cause it in fact. You really have to overcook a corner n these cars to cause it. In fact for the most part these cars go through corners so fast its nearly mind boggling.
IMO.

Now intiating a slide in the Fiesta is counterintuitive to RWD but it was a easy adaption. Plus once your in the slide burying the throttle pulls you out amd straightens the car up.

 

[Intuit]

Yup. Don't think many people are having that issue.

Right now the front has a good amount of grip, but the rear keeps stepping out causing the traction control to intervene.

Mine did that until I more closely followed the tire pressure recommendations on the door jamb sticker. Not necessarily that I'm setting the pressures equal to the door jamb, (because the craters, skillets and road-wrinkles would kill my rims if I did,) just that the front vs rear pressures are balanced the same as the door jamb sticker.

 

[Pablo Pistoffo]

One thing I found over the past two weekends of autocross was that the Pierce torsion brace, coupled with Swift spings, Bilstein B6s, Rivals, and low temps were really causing nasty over steer at the limit, especially through slaloms. Tire pressure changes helped mitigate it a bit, but I pulled the Pierce brace and was able to regain confidence and decrease times. The car wasn't as neutral going through constant radius turns, but felt much more predictable. In street driving on the stock tires, I hadn't noticed the snappy oversteer effect, but am now much happier with the setup, and glad I didn't discover it in an emergency maneuver. The cumulative effect of much higher rear spring rates and the brace were just too much.