Maineiac

....what are the correct reference points to measure from? Floor to top/middle of fender?

Or does the correct corner weight determine the ride height???

Also...if running a track with mostly left hand turns...would it be beneficial to set the right side a little higher than the left?....or again, it's dependent on the corner weighting?


Please....educate me. Thanks.

MattB

Well, I don't know, I don't even play an expert on the internet

But, take a look at this page for some good info, some one else posted it a while ago:
http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/new...er-weights.php

To be honest, I don't know what the "stock" ride height is, when I looked at the service manual it has a HUGE range for the ride height (or what seemed huge). So, I'm confused as to a good height to shoot for, most posts here say 1/2 inch lower than stock, but not sure what that starting point is :o

Maybe some one could clue us in

AU N EGL

Stock Ride height

There are actually four trim height measurements: Z, D, J, K.

The Z height measurement is the distance from the lowest point on the front ball joint to the center of the front side of the lower control arm mounting bolt. The D height is the same measurement for the rear.

The J and K heights are measured from the frame to the ground, roughly at the jacking puck locations, again front and rear respectively.

I don't know if the specs vary year-to-year. On my 03, the stock measurements are( were ): Z=49mm/1.93", D=104mm/4.09", J=152mm/5.98", K=152mm/5.98" (interesting that the stock spec is for zero rake). There are tolerances for each in the maintenance manual.

My car is on jack stands and I am making some suppenions changes. So I cant tell you what the numbers currently are

Maineiac

Good stuff there...thanks for the info. What happens if you corner weight the car to get the cross 50/50, but then your ride height isn't the same side to side, or front to back....does it matter?

AU N EGL

Rember when you corner ballance the Driver ( or drivers wt ) must be in the drivers seat. Plus fuel.

Corner balancing is more important then equal ride heights.

The C5 frame is not as straight as ppl think or want it to be. Factory specs can be off as much as 1/" left to right AND up to down. Thus the importance of cornerbalancing.

z060ntrack

Set your ride height to what you want it to be and then corner weight, obviously with one end of the sway bars diconnected and weight equal to the driver on the drivers side, 1/2 fuel load and the scales must be perfectly level front to back, side to side and diagonal corner to corner.

wtknght1

Well I've beat this dead horse over and over but I'll say it again... Take it to a pro shop like Phoenix! You can really screw up a good handling car by altering the ride height, etc.

The best investment you'll make on that car is taking it to those guys, having them set the correct ride height, corner balancing it and tuning the engine. Guys that slam the car down screw up the suspension geometry and really ruin a nice car. The Phoenix guys have worked with Mr. Corvette (John Heinricy) and know the sweet spot for these cars. Buy a set of T1 bars, have Joe and his guys balance and tune the car and then go drive the wheels off of it. It'll be reliable and ultra fast!

davidfarmer

I set ride height roughly where I want it, then use the scales to tell me where to go. No car is perfectly level, and you can't get hung up on that. On most cars, if you get the front level, the rear will be higher on one side, and vica-versa.

Anyway, unless the corner balance is way off, you won't be making any huge height changes, just tweak.

So, again, get the ride heigh roughly where you want, then look at the scales. If you need to adjust something (ie rf/lr is too heavy), you can either lower one of those corners OR raise one of the other two corners. Sometimes you get lucky, and everything is with 1/2 % right off the bat, sometimes it takes hours to get the balance/height right.

And again, for what it's worth, nothing is set in stone. I Just rescaled a car that was just set up by another shop. The left front was waaayyy too low, although the car scaled perfectly. I had to raise the left-front and lower the right rear to get the height in line while maintaining the proper balance. Then all of the bars were way off, so I had to re-set them. Springs and bushings settle, things can move, even your body panels can move around, so you have to simply do the best that you can.

davidfarmer

Au N Egl, that is interesting, as I've never studied the stock trim heights. If D is twice as much as Z, then the rear control arms are almost 2" higher than the rear, plus an extra 1/2" from the tires. Seems odd that if the rear lower control arms are 2.5" inches higher than the fronts, the frame would not be level (j=k).

I haven't had time to put much time into this, but that just seems odd to me. Maybe I have my letters mixed up??

AU N EGL

David when I found that I said WTF??? too.

davidfarmer

I guess the suspension has "rake" built into it, so setting the frame rail level is the easy way to set everything to OEM.

Of course I have my own voodoo/feng shui methods that I'll take with me to my grave, so it really doesn't matter