Dan's last comment on swaybars (unless provoked)

[skerocdriver@juno.com (Shawn C Meze)]

On Sat, 19 Jan 2002 16:16:35 -0500 "Dan Bubb" <jdbubb@ix.netcom.com>
writes:
>Christian makes a good point here.
>Autocrossing a Scirocco means spending alot of time with one rear 
>wheel in the air.


OK, ill provoke! Not true. Not in SP. Stock suspended VW's do this as a
result from stock components and geometry. A properly setup VW in SP will
barely, if at all, lift the inside rear wheel in a turn. 



>A lot of it depends on how you drive. If you approach corners
>slowly and power out, a big rear bar may be the ticket. If you burn 
>into
>corners and count on trailing throttle oversteer to pivot and slow the 
>car
>adding a bigger rear bar may cause the rear end to come around too 
>fast.

OK, it really depends on:
1) the car
2) the driver

Not all cars will perform the same with the exact same components bolted
to them. That's #1. The driver part of it is fairly complex and to be as
vague as possible (allow my "Chris" moment here if you will.) just
depends on how the driver is comfortable in what the car is doing. This
could be good driving habits and this could be bad driving habits. Just
depends on the driver. 

Most novice drivers almost NEVER enter a corner too slow. The only
experienced students ive ever ridden with who enter turns too slow are
honestly, older people (50-65 yr bracket), usually corvette drivers too
FWIW. ( how do you think I beat the Z06's to win the "SS" championship
this year?! LOL!!) 

To get back on topic just a little, I have my 82 Scirocco setup for FSP.
Its about 80% what it should be to be competitive but, its a daily driver
and that why im building the 79 Scirocco. With the suspension the way it
is, I need a 28mm rear bar WITH a stock rear bar installed inverted. So I
have essentially a 42mm rear bar on the car with a 22mm front bar sitting
on H&R Group G race springs. Koni's are set to full stiff in the rear,
full soft in the front. I adjust for over/understeer with mostly rear
tire pressures and can fine tune it with front pressures.

On some cars, this setup would make the car spin like a top. On my car
its what ive figured out, over the years to what works and what doesn't.
For the most part, people really need to find out for themselves via
trial and error, what works for them and their car and what doesn't. I do
know that installing a 16v rear bar wont make much of a difference over
the stock bar. At least not like what some folks are fearing. 

Now, going fast into a turn and trail braking is something that, with a
FWD car I find extremely usefull! I can basically trail brake all the way
to the apex and then right away, throttle off the corner. Once you figure
out how to do this, it A) feels great and B) will shead a few tenths off
your time. Add up 25 turns and you've found speed and people are
scratching their heads thinking they need more HP. Funny too. It takes a
while to figure out how much speed to cary into a turn but that just
comes with seat time. 

Another thing with suspension setups. I find that to be fast, you got to
set it up right one the edge. You do want some oversteer to help rotate
thru the corners but it needs to be controllable oversteer. Of course a
quaife helps to pull you out of a turn when you've crossed the line
between oversteer and a spin. :)

I waited til this thread was dead before jumping in with all this
gar-bage. So, discuss, and have fun! Anybody interested in doing a track
event school in Pahrump Nevada at the end of March where ill be doing
some racey-teaching things, e-mail me for details.


Shawn Méze  (has left the building!) 
86' Jetta GLi 8V     84' Scirocco 8V    88' Corvette -SS 30- 2001 SDR
Solo2 Champion
82' Scirocco GTi -FSP 54-     79' "Project FSP Scirocco"
The Fastest, Quickest, Cleanest and best looking Scirocco(s) in all of
San Diego!
http://www.Geocities.com/MotorCity/Speedway/1308/index.htm

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