The stop-start resto of Peerless is about to take another small step forward with the rebuild of the front suspension and in doing so, I wondered about the benefits of an adjustable upper fulcrum kit to provide a degree or two of negative camber.
Has anyone any experience of the kits provided by Revington or similar? Good, bad, indifferent? Any opinions appreciated.
I know the benefits of - camber but is it worth the extra effort on a car which will probably only ever be used (albeit enthusiastically) on the road?
The extra couple of hundreds could easily be used elsewhere and if I had deep pockets I'd probably do it anyway but as I don't, I'd like to make every penny count.
Thanks in anticipation.
Mike
-- Edited by mikerf on Sunday 8th of March 2015 01:07:15 PM
Before you go and spend your hard-earned on these items, take a bit of time to measure the camber that you've already got, the result might surprise you. They are not a sure-fire improvement because problems elsewhere may have a bigger effect.
The camber is somewhat affected by front ride height, steering angle and roll angle, as well as loss of spring temper or broken springs, both front and rear. Add to this the amount of give in rubber bushes and the variability introduced by chassis twist, both dynamic and static and you really don't know what camber you will have at any particular time. If you have wire wheels as well.............
Remember that these cars were notorious for taking right and left bends differently!
Franks suggestions for improvement:
Make sure the chassis is sound and straight, a welded in steel floor or roll cage (insurance++) helps. Remove all rubber components from the suspension, Polybush or Nylatron equivalents are available and won't need periodic replacement. Make sure your springs and dampers are good, and as far as possible matched side to side. Measure what you've got on an alignment jig, or with a camber gauge or spirit level on a flat floor.
Now you can decide if you need an adjustable component to apply the final set up!
Sound advice Frank. I suppose that the top of the turrets are not too difficult to get to once everything is in situ.
I'll be renewing as much as possible in those areas anyway. Currently fitting Polybushes, new drop links, coil springs and adjustable coilovers to my Scimitar 5a at the moment and the layout is not a million miles away being as it's based on the later TR set up.
I was actually wondering about the need for -camber as a principal and whether it was percieved to have any significant benefit over the standard set-up. I guess I was hoping someone might come back and say 'amazing, transformed the handling of the car' or 'not really worth it, no noticable improvement' type of thing.
I'm guessing nobody in Peerlessland has ever tried it so I'll probably stick with the original set-up and bookmark it for another day.
Well, when I built the chassis on No 278, I deliberately built in -1 Degree at the front along with the welded in steel floor, and subtle reinforcing in a couple of other places.
I was also running uprated -1" springs front and rear, adjustable Spax all round, and Nylatron bushes in all joints. It didn't need a roll bar and cornered like a greased weasel. It was a bit of a brute to park though!
Ian and Celia run these adjustable links on the Warwick. Some of them require welding once any adjustment is complete, and some competition regs don't allow modified suspension components.
As a principle, a bit of -ve does improve the steering/cornering, provided you are prepared to put up with asymetric tyre wear, and increased load on the steering joints. Remember that most of the time road cars are not cornering.
Unless you happen to live in the Highlands of Scotland like I do. I which case, I'll be cornering all the time. We're not known for straight roads up here. Which, in a way, was why I was asking the question.
The Revington ones I was thinking of are weld on types but that wouldn't worry me as I have no competition asperations.
I'm still in two minds about this and the fact you've built in -camber and reaped the benefits suggests it might be worthwhile doing.
I suppose one advantage might be that although I've had the chassis re-built and checked for squareness, any imperfections in camber might be able to be dialed out on a side by side basis once the car is complete and before the top mounts are welded in place.
