going to use the bird for auto-x and wondering what can be done to the suspension to take hard mid speed turns. i have done plenty of mods to other cars and tuning but never touched anything like this. im 22 yrs old so i have unfortunetly been limited to fwd **** burners. any idea's would be great

 

some of the same stuff as the ricers, wider tires, wonderbar, thicker sway bars, strut tower braces, take out the carpet nd spot weld all the seams, stiffer shocks/struts, poly bushings, lowering springs. do a search on each.

 

thats what i figured but isn't there some kind of arms to the rear that can be stiffened too

 

adjustable panhard bar

 

boxed LCA's.... and sub frame connectors too. especially if its a ttop car

 

Subframes
LCAs
Sway bar upgrades
Beefier brakes
Adjustable panhard
Springs/Shocks
Poly bushings
Better tires.

 

tubular a-arms
adjustable torque arm

 

#1 best tires you can afford.
#2 best shocks you can afford.
#3 aggressive alignment
#4 go race


after you run the car a few times and see how it acts when pushed hard go from there.

 

I did those things on my 88 2.8 and it made a world of difference, granted i didn't have much power but i could sure hold the corner. The brakes are the big one if you are gonna do more than a lap or two at any kinda speed get GOOD brakes

 

I second this recommendation. In that specific order of importance.

The absolute very best next thing you can do after tires and shocks would be to replace the factory strut mounts with some aftermarket spherical bearing solid mount units before having the car aligned. These solid strut mounts will be the single very best improvement to the car in steering responsiveness in autocross.

 

See all in my sig. I have also put on 16x8 Enkei 92 with 245/50/16 Kumho ASXs and a GM wonderbar. Very smooth ride.

 

You're gonna have fun. Look at my sig. Driven correctly, you should be right up there with the fast cars.

Get bigger sways, I've got IROC springs in the front (cut) with 34/22mm sways. Works great. Box the rear suspension for sure, as it makes a huge difference. Once you get all that done, get LCA relocators, as it will improve your cornering launches a bunch.

Dont worry about the automatic, I have one too and its great. But get a shift kit and tranny cooler. And pay attention to tire temperature distribution! Under inflated tires SUCK. Just remember to brake late and have fun!

 

ya its a blast took the girlfriends stock neon out last year and was surprised what i could beat for other cars. i out ran a turbo mustang, legends race car, any honda that was there and this was with a non turbo neon. with boxing in the rear suspension should i do the trac bar too or will that not really help

 

With my boxed rear end with urethane bushing i don't see a need to do anything else the rear. Maybe an adjustable torque arm, but everything seems like its more than my driving skills can use at the moment.

 

just keep racin it will come to you. no idea what your skills are and i know this sounds stupid but games like gran turismo that have the license tests acctually give you clues to how to take multiple corners and set your own lines. plus where i auto-x there is time to walk the course take advantage of this. do it alone and acctually walk in the line you want your car to be in on your run. like i said the game thing sounds stupid and it doesn't matter if you can do it on tv but it shows where lines should be

 

just keep racin it will come to you. no idea what your skills are and i know this sounds stupid but games like gran turismo that have the license tests acctually give you clues to how to take multiple corners and set your own lines. plus where i auto-x there is time to walk the course take advantage of this. do it alone and acctually walk in the line you want your car to be in on your run. like i said the game thing sounds stupid and it doesn't matter if you can do it on tv but it shows where lines should be

 

i have a 87 formula with ws6 suspension parts car what parts on that should i use on my v6 firebird?

 

All of them...

 

Well i cant use the front springs without cutting them so im just gonna buy dropzone springs and keep the sway bars what mm are the front and rear sway bars on a 87 formula? Any other suspension parts that come from the factory i should get?

 

A wonderbar if you can find one, I built mine. Does your 87 have 3.42 gears in it? That would help launches a little more. Are the 91 sways big enough?

 

You would be amazed at the difference seat time makes. I don't know how many runs you get per auto-x (we average about 4 in the blue ridge region), but many areas also offer a "test and tune" the day before the actual auto-x, and you can get at least 2-3x more runs in. Once you've really gotten used to driving the car hard, the upgrades you need to do for your car and your driving style will really start to jump out at you. I found I learned the most when I could just run continously (we had a 24 hour event where after 1am or so you were literally running again the moment you could get from the finish back to the staging lanes), so I could try different things with my previous run fresh in my mind.

As was said before, good springs, shocks, tires and brakes are the best preparation you can have. No need to blow money on high end stuff either, just make sure if its worn out or broken that its replaced. Good condition stock equipment will be fine for your initial learning curve. Take my '84 Datsun 200sx for example.....with no power and rear drums it is still in the top half of its class. The only thing not in good shape are the rear shocks, and it is readily apparent now that I've driven it at a couple events. Once they are replaced the car should be very well sorted.

 

We're about the same here in this region. They try to do a best 3 of 4 runs, weather and time permitting. Are there any playstation games that would help someone remember coarses? It always takes me the first 3 runs to get it down good. I like the License coarses on GT3, cause they really make you do things right to get the next license.

 

If your auto-x courses are like ours, ie held in parking lots most of the time, then I doubt it. The best advice I can give you is to walk the course as many times as you can. The MINIMUM number of times I'll walk a course is four. More is better. And that's by myself, walking and chatting with a bunch of people is very detrimental unless you're a newbie walking it with someone asking questions about what you should do in specific spots. Even then I'd say you should do it at least 4 times on your own.

 

im in ct and our auto x uses best of 5 runs, then after there are fun runs where you pay a dollar a run and you can make a few extra runs after the event. when you walk the coarse try and make a mental pic of the coarse in your head and dont just look at the corner your in. plan your line looking a couple ahead. you might find the perfect line for the first could put you off line in the second and way the hell off in the third. dont be affraid to lose a little in one corner if it will help gain more in the third of fourth down the line. our events have 30 to 45 min to walk the coarse on your own then a group walk where the novices walk and explain the coarse. if your group dosent have that most novices have no problem with helping rookies out as long as they have the right attitude. be pleasent and pay attention to them and they will be happy to help. just ask

 

Whoops, signed onto wrong thresd for response- disregard.