Do any of you guys have the toe locks that cancel out the "rear wheel steering"? how does it handle compared to before? just wanted to get some reviews to see if i should buy a set or not. thanks

 

i bought a set, havent installed them yet, from what i've read they make a big difference...

especially for drifting.

 

Better than worn out DTSS bushings

Some people claim they corner better with solid replacements, but if the driver knows the DTSS system and can use it for its true potential it has been proven that a DTSS equipped car will corner at faster speeds than a non DTSS equipped FC.

But again, if you are not experienced with the system the toe shift of the DTSS can throw your driving style and in these cases you may be better off with solid repalcements.

 

I heard when it was explained to me that it frees up the rear end and makes it feel "loose", easier to kick out the rear end and such.

But then again, I have no 1st hand experience, just to what I was told .

 

DTSS was Mazdas way to put some passive toe change into a semi trailing arm setup (FC is semi trailing arm, right?). Ultimately, though, its dependant on the compliance of the bushings, and I havent seen any sort of replacement for them, except for the DTSS elimination bushings.

Personally, though, Id rahter just lock it and have something more progressive vs something with a higher limit, but transision from limit to past it thats a lot more sudden than the progressive oversteer of no DTSS.

 

I had a lot of people tell me to change mine out when I was redoing my suspension last month. I decided to wait and see. I put in new shocks, springs and the ES kit along with new tires. With the old tires and worn out shocks I couldn't drive the car in the rain. You could feel the DTSS trying to compensate for the tires going in a straight line. On dry roads I didn't like the way it kicked in either but felt that was the tires and or shocks/bushings. When I changed out my bushings they all looked pretty good for having 100k on them and like I said the shocks were shot. Now on wet or dry pavement I have none of the old problems, and I do like the way the DTSS works. I haven't noticed it being a sudden change when it's working but can feel it coming into play whcih allows me to work the car more to take advantage of it if needed. I don't know if that makes sense but that's the way it seems to me.

 

Is there anyway to test if the system is working or not?

 

the system should always work, but due to its age it does not work as well as it used to... replacing the dtss is expensive as mazda does not sell the dtss bushings alone that is why most people go with dtss eliminator bushings

 

So we prolly can't get our hands on new one's can we?

 

I was talking about this exact same thing to a friend about an hour ago..
Before I got used to DTSS, I was like WTF WHY DOES THIS CAR HAVE SHITTY UNDERSTEER
But now...
I have a RX that's stock + cone filter.. and I can turn faster and drift better than a friend with a similar setup + coilovers.

 

i like my dtss it helps in autox

 

I replaced my worn out DTSS bushings with new ones, AutoX for 2 seasons and then eliminated them all together. I think the car with the DTSS working wants to turn in much quicker and understeer ALOT less. However the catch is that it's more finicky when the *** steps out, and a bigger pain in the *** to get it under control than with the system eliminated. I'm drving right now with the system eliminated and am much happier. Far easier to predict exactly what the limit of adhesion is. and far easier to interpret what the tires and the car is doing on it's axis. I for one...vote for eliminating them.

 

DTTS causes understeer? What's the ups of it, high turning radius?

 

DTSS should cause more oversteer then understeer by it's nature.

I eliminated mine, as drag launches with high torque/HP engines tend to be, interesting, with the bushings installed.

 

Doesn't DTTS give you a higher turning radius cause it has some kind of mini-4ws.

 

i think the DTSS system prevents you from kicking out the rear...

 

yeah pretty much the only way to kick the rear out would be to overpower the rear tires and basiclly do a drift. Otherwise on standard cornering the front will give out before the rear does.

 

the dtss is supposed to help the car corner harder by changing toe at the limit of adhesion. I find though that as they get old, and yes our cars are old by todays standards, it tends to cause too much understeer as well as make the car unpredictable at times. I believe mine are wore out. My car gets real finicky in turns and on wet or slippery surfaces. I've been checking the hell out of my tires and rear suspension and cant find anything. Their the only thing left I havent eliminated from my list of what may be wrong.

 

wait i was under the impression that dtss induces oversteer....

during a reducing radius turn i can feel the backend "snap oversteer" into place and i thought that was dues to the dtss...

wheres ted, mark, aaron etc. when you need them

 

DTSS is a bushing in the rear arm that compresses at a given G load. ( I used to know what, but i can't remember) anyway it helps the car decrease the turning radius by altering the toe in the rear tires. It doesn't induce oversteer OR understeer for that matter, the driver does that. I know this sounds elementary, but some of you are spilling wrong info. DTSS biggest handicap is age, by which the two bushing don't comress at an equal rate & point, meaning one may compress more than another, also they don't rebound as quickly as sometimes needed. In their defense, new bushings with proper driving can be very rewarding. In my opinion DTSS is a little harder to learn to drive on. I hope this clears up some confused thoughts? and hopefully some new questions.

 

Quote:
Originally Posted by nightzonekids
i think the DTSS system prevents you from kicking out the rear...




How is that if i can do a drift any time, I still have my DTSS. I love them it makes me keep up with and pass sti's in the touge, then i can also drift all day. Also u need to have good front tires, before i got mine i was thinking the same thing u are, but after it changed so get new tires and then go drift .

 

DTSS should allow more steering in a corner before the rear end breaks loose. When it DOES kick loose, you will be in a state of oversteer (front tires biting, rear tires sliding).

The DTSS will make the car feel like its understeering at the limit, vs. the same car without, as track of the car changes mid-turn. In reality it should not actually BE understeering, regardless of the sensation.

 

My Illustrated history of the RX7 says that the s4 prototypes exhibited extremely stable handling, and were designed to be especially resistant to throttle lift over steer, unlike the competing, targeted Porsche 944. In fact the only handlling related crash during developement happened at Nurbergring in Germany when Mazda test driver Uchiyama crashed a 944, suprised by the lift-off oversteer after getting out of the RX7. This was BEFORE the DTSS. The problem with RX7's new suspension was it's lack of intitial turn-in response. This was caused by toe-in designed into the rear suspension during cornering. Mazda thus became first to solve the problem of thottle lift oversteer on independent rear suspensions. The problem was that although the car could be driven very fast, very predictably, the handling was definitively NOT of a sporting nature.

Mazda then experimented with active rear steering. One of the engineers was fooling around with a test mule that had a mode selector switch. He switched the mode to opposite steering while driving at speed. It worked, solving the turn-in problem. The bushing was revised to resist the originally designed toe in. At low speeds, the car had crisp responsive steering response. At higher speeds, the DTSS bushing's initial resistance to toe-in also provided for sharp turn-in, but then at .4 - .5 g's the bushing transitions. Thus the DTSS bushing causes the car to have sharp turn-in, then allows the suspension to transition and behave as originally designed.

I don't know what all that means to our 15-20 year old suspensions. I suspect that if you replace the DTSS bushins with the solid ones, you will have crisp initial turn-in, no transition effect and a strong tendency to have trailing throttle and throttle lift oversteer. Sounds like racecar knife-edge handling. Not what I want for the street.

 

^ very interesting

my bushings because they are old must react late then or i must not be putting enough load on initial turn in because i can feel the car pivoting sometimes mid corner.....

but on a side note i would think that mazda would put the dtss in to eliminate lift-oversteer just like most car companies implement traction control these days to eliminate lift-oversteer so that most everyday drivers would stop killing themselves. isnt it the same concept just different technology?

 

DTSS elimination makes it push more, but be more controllable when you do break it loose, with DTSS it turns in more but when it does break loose its less controllable.

Also, if your bushings are old or worn out theyd react faster and give way sooner from less resistance! Theyd be MORE compliant.