pronounced oversteer of stock S2000
 

OK, let's be honest- although the S2000 is a great car it has one heck of an oversteer on the racetrack. I know from experience, because I underwent one heck of a spinout (aka, offtrack excursion) on a tight turn (turn 8) at Putnam Park, Indiana, at speed. (Yeah, I know, where the heck is that- it's just outside of Greencastle, west of Indianapolis on I70, if that helps or makes any difference). OK- here's my question. What are the options for taming down this feature of the S000? Ideally, the options would be ordered from the lowest cost proceeding to higher. When I say stock, I really mean stock- S02s with no suspension mods, etc. Thanks for any help.

Get a bigger front swaybar, that will help with the oversteer problems. I know someone who runs a larger tire in the rear (Khumo V700, 225 front, 265 rear instead of 245's), and likes the balance, he says if feels more nuetral. For myself, I just deal with the oversteer and kind of like it (suite's my driving style, you just have to be really smoooooth).


Dale

The larger front anti-roll (sway) bar is the choice for many '00, '01 owners. Since the suspension was re-tuned for '02 I don't know if there is agreement on changes for that model. Some searches will turn up plenty of discussion.

I would start with checking your alignment, if you haven't already. There's no telling what your alignment actually is without getting your car on the rig.

My car had pronounced understeer from day 1; it was hard to provoke oversteer. When I finally had it aligned, it had almost no negative camber in the front, among other unusual settings. Your car might have no negative camber in the rear. Who knows?

So before you start changing parts on the car, make sure it's aligned to something reasonable. I'm using the "UK Settings", and liking them so far.

Ted

When I first got the car.. I was lifting off the throttle mid-corner and the car went into "oversteer" I quickly learned that this is driver-error and since been correcting my ways...As the next step, I'm learning to control over-steer, and it is quite fun.

Point being: Honda built these cars well - work on the biggest bottleneck first, the driver, before you touch anything else - at least that seems to be the opinion of senior s2k members and I'm using it to justify not having bought a supercharger.. yet :)

Before blaming the car, are you sure you just didn't do something stupid mid-corner?

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Kauffman
[B]OK, let's be honest- although the S2000 is a great car it has one heck of an oversteer on the racetrack.

Check your settings but...

The S-02s don't offer a typical amount of feedback at the limit. Settings won't change that. You'll have to get used to a narrow window of feedback between grip and slip. Or try another high performance tire. Most premium summer tires grip within a few % of the S-02 (either way) and offer better feedback so that you can drive at the limit more often (and more successfully.) They also manage to last longer while doing it.

I've had great success with AVS Sports (although a couple of others will tell you they hate them.) In our region we have people running all of the different ultra-performance tires with good success.

Don't be afraid to experiment. You'll go faster more often and oversteer less with better balanced tire characteristics. IMHO the stock rears are highly over-rated.

setting your alignment to better fit your driving style will make a huge improvement. If that's not enough, get a stiffer front swaybar and change the alignment to suit that. The tire compound and front-rear contact patch ratio can be changed as well to correct any percieved abnormalities.

As far as I know all of the national level autocrossers run a larger front swaybar to help control oversteer and to keep the inside rear tire planted. I sure liked what adding one did for my car and my driving style. Alignment and smoothness also make a much bigger than average difference with this car too.