jayk

This is not about emissions, so please no comments about searching...

As part of the DC inspection they print out left weight, right weight, left braking force, and right braking force. Looking over the numbers I noticed that they are way different than I expected.

Axle/LF Force/Rt Force/Lf Weight/Rt Weight
0/969/944/786/827
1/288/326/837/535

The first thing I noticed is that the total weight is 2985lbs, seems high but then I think it was weighed with a driver in the car (~200lbs). Second thing is that the car is front heavy, 1613lbs vs. 1372 and also left side heavy at about the same rate. Not the advertised 50/50 balance, I guess that can all be explained by the weight of the driver though.

The other more important thing I noticed is that the LR braking force is substantially lower than RR, I've long suspected that my LR is sticking and last time I was in there I noticed the pad was virtually touching the rotor and the caliper wouldn't go in any further. Could the tested braking force correspond to a problem with the lR brakes?


Anyway, my real question is, can anybody shed some light on whether those numbers are accurate or are they really measuring something else?

Thanks.

Julian

iTrader: (14)

I don't live in DC so I have not seen your test set-ups, but I can offer the following comments. The test would be done with a diver in the car. (how much gas did you have?) 2800 w full tank and w/o driver is about right.

The front heavy "weights" are from load transfer forward under braking .. the nose goes down the back up. total vertical forces remain equal to the weight of the car. The "force" values are the horizontal load (the reaction measured in the plane of the road surface) again with more vertical load on the front wheels, these numbers will typically be larger too. (why front brakes are bigger than back, they must do more work)

Now your weight transfer: 54% on front looks resonable; car w/ driver still is about 49.5% on front. What is wird is lf lighter than rf. Car was built for japan w. driver on right thus our us cars are a little heavy on the driver side. real weird is lr being 50% more tha rr .. funcky weight transfers?? or bad readings (i.e. car out of level side to side)

Brake force distribute looks ok if I am reading correct. 1913 lbs front, 614 lbs back, cross loads 1232 vs 1298 49/51% ratio ... by the way that was a .85 g stop (total force/total weight)


As to weight distribution. if you are interested, weight the car on some race scales to get accurate weight distribution. However it should not be mucg concern, by trim level each car is very close.