Hi guys,

How much caster angle are you guys using for your FDs, I am just getting into HPDEs...

I was wondering does more positive caster means you will get better handling?

Thanks...

 

No, more caster is not always better. For the FD, 6-7 deg of caster is good, this should be easily achieved.

 

I heard too much caster will take away some rotatability in the FDs, making it understeers more? Is that true?

 

I had tried 4 degrees of caster, and found it to be a real hoot at first. Made the car feel more nimble/nervous but became a real handful on the highway/daily driving.

I've gone back to 6 deg caster.

 

I have heard people make the modification and was able to get 7.5 with the newer 99+ knuckles... is there such thing as too much caster?

 

Yes there is, as I mentioned above. Stick with 6-7 deg.

 

too much caster will actually move the camber curve too far one way. in a turn, the outside tire will camber quite a bit since the caster pre-tilts the tire in when the wheel is rotated. and it will take a bit of compression to get to the proper part of the camber curve to optimize contact patch. thus not as sharp on turn in. 6-7 is good...more won't be.

 

lots of Pos caster will make it really easy to drive in a straight line, with pos caster you will also notice it takes more power to turn the car, wiht negitive caster the car turns alot faster, and is more "fun" to drive but can be a handfull on the highway. if you want an idea of what extreme neg castor does, think of a shoping cart realyl easy to turn but does not like a srtiaght line, as HedgeHog stated too much extreme castor will affect Camber, which can be a pain to understand, but most people can get it, well most people who are not mechanicly challenged.



Prôdigy

 

Adding caster makes it gain camber when cornering - that can be a good thing, but if its leaning too far that its just got too much negative camber youre going to wear out the inside edges of your tires instead of more evenly distributing the contact patch.

Everything in moderation - you wouldnt want as much camber as the steering column, would ya?

 

Yep, yep, yep.

How much is too much? You have to try. My car runs -2 degrees of front camber and therefore I can only get about 5 degrees of caster in it. On slow and slick surfaces I would run less caster (and camber) but I'm not willing to align the car every weekend either.

All that said if you're running any negative camber on an FD at all I don't think the stock adjustments have enough room to enable you to get "far too much" caster in the car.