Poor lateral grip

[tenkfeet]

My car appears to have poor lateral grip . Tyres are Bridgestones 24/26 psi fitted last year which up till now I felt have been fine . On recent runs like my run down to Kames today in the slower twistier stuff the car drifts wide in total control front and rear and is the limiting factor to what SAFE speed I go .

Any suitably qualified and third party insured volunteers fancy driving my car and see what they think on a dry day ?

I suspect I need stickier tyres to improve the grip . R888 , 048 etc etc .

Any advice ?

[kenny]

Dukes pass tomorrow if its dry?

/any excuse faction

[tenkfeet]

Dukes pass tomorrow if its dry?

/any excuse faction

May be going climbing tomorrow night if not will be there .

[mac]

Are we talking understeer?

I don't quite understand the problem.


Mac

[tut]

Tis possible Alan that you are now driving the car faster, as if you have Bridgestones in good condition, and there has been no change to your cars spec/setup, there should be no reason for the handling/grip to suddenly change.

R tyres will give you better adhesion, but the reason that I use them on the road is because they are fitted for the track, and I can not be bothered changing them over.

tut

[r055]

IIRC Alan, have you not changed your GEO recently?

[tenkfeet]

Are we talking understeer?

I don't quite understand the problem.


Mac

I cannot describe it as it feels both front and back . Just a sideways movement. I will get a second opinion .

The car was fine after the geo minor adjustment . Never noticed it on the Dukes Pass run a few weeks back.

Tut I am defo driving a bit more spiritidly as confidence is returning after my off last year .

[steve_weegie]

sounds to me like its just four wheel drift in a nice neutral handling car?

[pete]

Alan,

I'll happily take it for a shot, in fact we could swap for a bit, but mine is still off the road...

Will give you a shout if we get it back this week...

P

[mac]

sounds to me like its just four wheel drift in a nice neutral handling car?

In slow corners?



MAC

[steve_weegie]

sounds to me like its just four wheel drift in a nice neutral handling car?

In slow corners?



MAC

its unusual - certainly on the bridgestones, i'd expect to be running out of front grip way before the rear. High entry speed to the corner while off the throttle would make it happen though... With the entire car sliding, it can only be running out of mechanical grip at all 4 corners simultaneously though.

Tyres gone off, wierd geo problem, or simply tenkfeet needing super stickies would be my guess!

[steve_weegie]

tenkfeet, is this dependant on road camber at all? what's your driving style through the corners - does it start to drift while you're off the throttle, turning in on the brakes, feeding in the power??

i'd happily have a look, and could even swap my toyos on to troubleshoot if you'd like.

[tenkfeet]

tenkfeet, is this dependant on road camber at all? what's your driving style through the corners - does it start to drift while you're off the throttle, turning in on the brakes, feeding in the power??

i'd happily have a look, and could even swap my toyos on to troubleshoot if you'd like.

I will PM you Steve .

[tenkfeet]

OK was out today and all is much clearer .

The lack of grip happens when tyres get hot and its understeer I tried to tune it out using the tyres pressures but it just got oversteery and overall grip was less. I think its the fundemantal set up of the car ,the way I drive and expecting too much from the tyres . So nothing new then .

Conclusion: I am not going to do anything till I get new set of sticky tyres and will mess around with setup ON TRACK .

[mac]

It's a safety mechanism built in to the S2 - Lotus noticed that a lot of S1 were written off going backwards into fields/hedges and walls due to oversteer - so on the S2 the built in understeer so that the S2 gets written off going nose first into fields/hedges and walls.

I found the Lotus Motorsport ARB a go way of dialing out some of the understeer - or you could try a wider tyre (eg the proxy 185 or 195) or the AD07 tyre in the standard size.


Of course it could be just that your driving into corners too fast too