Lowered/Mac Strut suspension

[sidepod]

Looking for something else, I stumbled on this.
I’ve never really considered anything other than double wishbone setups before. Makes interesting reading.

Reducing ride height makes roll worse. True story.

What is Roll Center? And How Does Ride Height Affect It?

Roll center is where the chassis interacts with center of gravity to create weight transfer & roll. Learn common pitfalls when fitting coilovers & how to maximise grip.

ukwhitelineperformance.com

 

[B J G]

Looking for something else, I stumbled on this.
I’ve never really considered anything other than double wishbone setups before. Makes interesting reading.

Reducing ride height makes roll worse. True story.

What is Roll Center? And How Does Ride Height Affect It?

Roll center is where the chassis interacts with center of gravity to create weight transfer & roll. Learn common pitfalls when fitting coilovers & how to maximise grip.

ukwhitelineperformance.com

I had adjustable pollybushes fitted which meant that the suspension angles could be set correctly at the lowered height. Not just alignment, toe in/out.

Useful reading which confirms the need to consider the implications of changing one aspect of suspension without thought to the hidden side effects.

 

[GrahamB]

Looking for something else, I stumbled on this.
I’ve never really considered anything other than double wishbone setups before. Makes interesting reading.

Reducing ride height makes roll worse. True story.

What is Roll Center? And How Does Ride Height Affect It?

Roll center is where the chassis interacts with center of gravity to create weight transfer & roll. Learn common pitfalls when fitting coilovers & how to maximise grip.

ukwhitelineperformance.com

Looking for something else, I stumbled on this.
I’ve never really considered anything other than double wishbone setups before. Makes interesting reading.

Reducing ride height makes roll worse. True story.

What is Roll Center? And How Does Ride Height Affect It?

Roll center is where the chassis interacts with center of gravity to create weight transfer & roll. Learn common pitfalls when fitting coilovers & how to maximise grip.

ukwhitelineperformance.com

“Reducing ride height makes roll worse. True story.”

I think that must be a misunderstanding, or at least an over-generalisation. As the article suggests, this would only happen in fairly extreme lowering situations where the control arm is effectively tilting upwards, inner bush below hub centre, thus radically altering the suspension geometry. In practice a 30mm lowered Cali doesn't reach that extreme and body roll is still reduced by the lowered CoG. But the point is that a slammed look might lead you into this sort of unexpected consequence.

 

[pjm-84]

Lol and no.

 

[sidepod]

“Reducing ride height makes roll worse. True story.”

I think that must be a misunderstanding, or at least an over-generalisation. As the article suggests, this would only happen in fairly extreme lowering situations where the control arm is effectively tilting upwards, inner bush below hub centre, thus radically altering the suspension geometry. In practice a 30mm lowered Cali doesn't reach that extreme and body roll is still reduced by the lowered CoG. But the point is that a slammed look might lead you into this sort of unexpected consequence.

Agreed. It would be good to see some photos/measurements of a standard/lowered Cali lower arms for comparison.

 

[sidepod]

What’s important here, in my understanding, roll centre (self explanatory) sits below CofG. The further away from CofG the roll centre is the worse the handling gets.

Any amount of lowering increases the distance between roll centre and CofG, despite the CofG moving downward with reduced ride height.