Lack of grip
 

Hi guys

I have a fairly stock (suspension wise) car. I have Tein RA coilovers and the rest of my suspension is stock it's an AP1.

The car handles predictably well in the dry but then I'm not pushing 11/10th's but in the wet where the dynamics should be the same just at a lower level there is a severe lack of grip. I believe it is also less noticeable in the dry because I drive around it with more trail braking then in the wet.

On corner entry the car understeers considerably and then as the car finally turns in the rear wants to come out, the car 4-wheel drifts too which is fun and all but not so fast.

Now before you jump all over me being a shitty driver I have pretty good experience and I have had a few very experienced guys ride and drive the car and they observed the same behaviours.

One guy is very good with setup of his Miata but isn't sure about the S2000. He suspects I do not have enough front camber, or perhaps I have too much rear camber.

So I figured I throw out my current alignment setup to you guys and see (if I need more front camber I'll get some ball joints).

front:
caster 4.55 degrees
camber -1.8
toe front -1/8 (thats tow out) -1/16 per wheel

rear:
camber -2.6
toe: 3/16 each wheel 11/32 total

what are the spring rates on the shocks and how stiff is the damping?

Spring rates are 10k all around.

Damping was set to full soft since it was raining all day. Usually in the dry I set them full stiff.

bump?

Do you have a big front bar? Stiction and the reduced wet grip loads could be artificially raising your front roll rate, leading to understeer. Is your front antiroll bar hard to rotate at low loads?

What tires are you running?

Does the car take a set at all when you turn it in? Or does it just wash out from the moment you turn the wheel.

ie, as you are finishing off your braking and turning in, does the car plant and turn in and then progressively lose grip, or does it just refuse to bite and doesn't turn in as you'd like.

^^^^ Need to know this.

No. The dynamics change completely in the wet. It's not only a lower threshold, but with lower speeds, and a slippery surface brings less force being applied on the tires and the suspension doing much less work.

In the rain, soften EVERYTHING. Soft/softest settings on shocks, lower the tire pressures. With a high spring rate, you may find that the softest setting is still too high as the springs resist the soft compression needed for body roll to transfer weight more gradually in the wet.

--kC

Sounds like an AP1. Let me check ... yup, according to your profile you have an AP1. OK, so...?

Since I saw your car at Calabogie on thursday, I'm going to assume this is the track you drove on in the wet that day.

Which corner(s) did the car do this on and at what phase of the entry did it exhibit this behaviour.