Most of those "slammed" cars you see that look like a stock car, like Speed World Challenge cars, most likely have suspension hardpoints that are not in the stock location and/or revised control arms, uprights, struts to improve the geometry of a slammed car.

Most of those race series allow the suspension hardpoints to be moved a set amount (like an inch) which can be very helpful in restoring correct roll center location and migration and dynamic camber characteristics while also allowing the cg to be as low as possible.

 

In addition to what Suspension just said, which is dead on, keep in mind what we are talking about is for the S2000. There are not a whole lot of other street cars that come with such a good camber curve to begin with, so you might not be messing anything up when you lower the car, only gaining the positive aspects without the penalties.

As for lowering the car decreasing lift, that depends. If you can decrease the pressure under the car (while maintaining the same pressure above the car) then you decrease lift/increase downforce at higher speeds. However, wether your S2000 has a 4 inch or 3 inch gap from the bumper to the ground, that's still enough room for air to get under there and maintain equal pressures. I'd be suprised if you gained any significant amount of downforce at speeds an S2000 could reach. Of course I can't be sure, since I don't have an S2000-sized wind tunnel handy, but that's my educated guess

 

[QUOTE=krazik,Jun 19 2007, 04:34 PM]no one said it FUBARS the handling, only that it can degrade it.

 

I've wondered about that myself, ever since I discovered how well the car handled after the drop. Prior to the drop I never saw anything over 0.91 G's in steady state cornering, but after the drop I started seeing numbers as high as 0.93 G's. Unfortunately, I don't know how much of that is due to the drop (if any) and how much is due to tweaking the alignment (or other variables like track surface temperature). It's not a big enough change to be sure about, but it's certainly NOT a step backwards. As most of the guys here know, lowering the car lowers the center of gravity, and if that were the only thing that changed, lateral weight transfer would go down and grip would go up, but lowering also lowers the cars roll axis, which all else being equal, would increase roll. Since the progressive rate springs have to increase roll resistance with increasing roll, the picture is almost too complex to grasp, but FWIW, it works far better than my limited understanding lead me to expect.

I have never seen a car that had less of a change in the ride and handling after lowering, so maybe it does have something to do with the wonderful setup we're starting with. Makes sense to me.

 

you have earned my respect RED Mx5 nice posts.

 

I think lowering it with linear springs (well, it has a bit of progressive rating the first coil) does not hurt the performance on the stock struts.

It feels exactly the same but different in a manner that you are now able to kick your tail out a lot more and turn into the corner a lot smoother without feeling the release of frame flexing.

I have H&R springs, lowers little less than an inch. Auto-x it with stock setup, then raced it with the lowered springs. They actually feel better lowered.

Sure the struts are going to eventually wear out, but at this point, it's working fine.

I know this isn't related, but on stock evo suspension, I pulled .98G at the auto-x. After lowering it with just the springs, i pulled 1.26G at the auto-x.

This may have been because of the track and what not, but honestly, if you don't go too much lowered than an inch, you'll be perfectly fine and i think it actually improves the ride and handling (lowered center of gravity) and you may have dampening rate a bit less, but you're not rally crossing here. For auto-x, it's more than enough dampening rate in the stock struts.

that's what I think.