That IMR kit is... stupid expensive looking. Why would you do that? For any of it. that's just throwing money at stuff.
As to the MG kit. I don't mind replacing a subframe. Although, I would expect the arm to bend before the subframe. Subframes are cheap!
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A little foresight on the jalopy kit. It feels great in the car in terms of steering feel, but with offset control arm bushings and e46 arms i could not get the arm positioned evenly in the wheel well, just keep that in mind. I'm sure it would work fine on stock control arms.
I believe Chelsea's complaint about Wisefab is no sway bar provision, and lack of steering feel. Not to mention it looks ungodly heavy if those arms are steel.
Id love to see if that MRT kit fits e46 Control arms. I never noticed it replaces that outer ball joint. pretty neat
Pretty simple to just weld on the sway bar tabs if it's steel. Steering feel is a result of 0 ackerman IIRC. Some people hate it, some people don't even notice it. *Shrugs* I do like having the ability to muck with ackerman settings.
Yea... nah... I'm good.
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I don’t think wisefab loss of feel is due to Ackerman, seeing as slr can achieve 0 Ackerman aswell. From my understanding (don’t quote me on this, I’m not a doctor) wisefab relocating the lca mount on the knuckle is what looses the feel. By relocating it it fucks with the kpa and makes it act kinda like a shopping cart wheel where shit just gets all wobbly, and that’s why tons of wisefab guys end up dumping it to full lock lots, because the car just kinda floats around. Atleast that’s how it was described to me and after driving with people that have wisefab that’s how the car appeared to drive (full lock wisefab cars are slow as shit, don’t be that guy plz)
ah yea. they reduced the physical caster trail by making the center of the wheel's rotation closer to the control arm mounting point. I never noticed that.
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The modification to caster trail on the wisefab kit is largely responsible for the weird floatyness and also their early kits weren't 0 ackerman, it was actually negative. Trailing wheel having more angle than the leading wheel. It feels awkward as hell. Im not sure if that has been changed but we have had many customers that have had the blue parts on their cars buy our kit email and call us to say how much better their car feels after installing an SLR kit. I mean yeah im a SLR shill and for sure I do not have any love for wisefab, not just because they are our biggest competitor but mainly due to their design focus on things that do not help a driver perform at their best. Geometry decisions that make the car handle weirdly all for the sake of a flat front contact patch which isn't even desirable at or near full lock in the first place.
Also the fact that if you talk to most FD team members who work on cars that run the kits say they routinely break from minor hits and they end up cutting and modifying the their kits for better feel and geometry. Most I've talked to will admit they don't like their setup but Wisefab does seem to have some deep pockets to keep the teams on team blue. We wish we could throw money around like they do but then again if we had their profit margins we probably could.
I mean you can take what I say with a grain of salt but like the old saying goes "Know thy enemy"
Last edited by Piner; 01-17-2018 at 03:39 PM.
When maximum driftcast interviewed Garrett from the get nuts team, he said that basically the only way to make stock wisefab Work is to put the subframe 1” off the ground, that sounds awful.
Saw that IMR/RTS Angle kit in action yesterday at vegasdrift on Branden Sorensen's E46. It shreds, still too expensive for anyone not competing IMO, unless you got phat pockets.
Also saw a relatively stock E36 on wisefab, looked like he was floating.
The SLR cars looked gangster (and faster too, Horsepower aside)
instagram @andyitslit
So here's an interesting design choice I keep seeing between kits. The wisefab/IRP kit relocate the control arm mounting point farther both inboard in the car and closer to the center of wheel rotation. This kills some mechanical trail (IE self steer). Which I suppose you could get back with gangster caster. SLR and some of the other kits keep the control arm mounting point and are more aggressive with tie rod location. This should allow you to run less caster.
I don't get why everyone doesn't keep the control arm mounting point. Is there some geometry I'm not thinking about here? Is wisefab expecting high caster simply from the longer control arm? IIRC some WF drivers note vague steering return. But I'm not entirely sure.
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Bored so I added my notes on each kit. Mainly the geometry and pros and cons of each
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As some one who has made their own roll center Knuckles and extended control arms...If i had $ and was going to buy a "kit", slr is really the only option. I have a few slr parts, lolis and camber plates, and have always been pleasantly surprised at the high quality nature of their gear, not just the machining, but more so the design.
When you start diving into complete suspension geometry alterations, you quickly realize, their is no "right way". Everything is a domino effect, one small change effects this and that yada yada. It gets out of hand very quickly, and a person's problem solving skills are tested to the max, and the end result, says a lot about the person who designed it... Out of all the kits listed, I bet anything that SLR is the lightest, which has a huge effect on performance.
I have 3d modeled e36 front suspension and plotted out the ackerman effect....interestingly enough, the ball joint inline with the lca is not actually true parallel steer, due to the racks location and castor.
My professional opinion: You need reduced ackerman when increasing lock. Parallel steer only provides a "benefit" to a very small group of people, and only in special driving situations. I think that 99% of just want extra lock, and maintain awesome steering feel (self return) so we can whip our sh*t hard and not have to feed the wheel constantly. More fun, more consistent, and snappier which depending on the layout could be faster.....
^ Exactly this.
I don't get the kits that reduce trail. Like wisefab. Are they expecting you to have mad caster to make up for it? Even then it's not as good right?
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Don’t wisefab s chassis cars normally have like 9-10* of caster? My e36 has like 6..
With all the geometry, you can't really compare the two chassis. Altho, I see various S chassis with anywhere from 4 to 12 caster. My E30 did best with about 10. Under that and the front felt very washed out.
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I was able to get 9* out of my SLR kit with BC coils, but it was sorta funky so I took it back down to 7ish
Ok so this is where sh*t gets confusing....
There is Caster at the top hat, and caster at the lca.... Pushing the lca forward increases the shock angle since they are fixed, increasing caster angle....
So wisefab and the like, introduce a caster trail, by moving the spindle further forward on the knuckle, then, their top hats, all but remove caster angle at the shock. This is to "cure" jacking, and positive camber gain on full lock caused by our beloved caster. Their whole concept is to increase front end grip, by keeping the wheel flat through-out its angle range. Which sounds cool right?! So they delete caster, and introduce the caster trail to try to bring back self aligning torque...
Also...pushing the lca forward, increase wheelbase, a smidge, and also increases ACKERMAN.....
You mean REDUCES caster trail. Trail is the center point of the wheel vs the control arm's pivot point. If you look at the wisefab kit, it moves it inward towards the wheel. Thus reducing trail. At least that's my understanding. And why the SLR kit works. By leaving that trail alone.
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Yea I was thinking about S-chassis when I wrote that...I meant, they move the LCA mount forward, not the spindle. Its still a Caster trail Increase though..... When You stand the shock up, you trail is all but deleted, might even have negative...So you have to do something, the only thing that can bring the trail back is to move the center-line backwards. Thats probably why the arms have so much caster built in...also afaik, Alignment machines measure the wheels position in space, compared to a "factory" car, so even though it says 9* caster, a wisefab trail car has much less shock angle.
Technick Slide Factory vs Wisefab caster trail drawing.png
Oh yea yea. That makes a ton of sense.
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What's the benefit of the slr half kit vs full kit? just some track width and clearance on the control arm? Id like to keep e46 lower arms for ease of replacement. If the half kit has the same feel and geometry and just less angle than the super kit that sounds right up my alley.
The half kit is really just cheaper. You don't have as much distance in the control arm so you can't access anywhere near what the kit is really capable of. If you get the half kit, I guarantee you'll upgrade the control arms at a later date.
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I just ordered the super kit and am hoping i don't regret not going ultra. I know your feels.
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