Just got my Hotchkis sways....I'm running 245/35/19 tires up front and 295/30/19 in the rear. I was recommended to set my sways to med/med, is this the best setup considering my tires setup?



in the pic below can someone point me to the settings (soft, med, stiff and whats the 4th hole?) because I'm confused?

 

anyone?

 

just think of simple leverage, the furthest away will be the softest and thus the furthest in will be the firmest. In your picture 1=soft, 4=firm. hope that helps

 

so which hole is the medium?

 

guys I'm installing the sways in a couple of hours....anybody knows which hole is the medium? and is it recommended to run med/med for my setup?



thanks...

 

When I put my Stillen's on, I didnt see any recommendations in the docuentation based on the tires. I just sent em both for the firmest.

 

Hotchkis recommends firm in front and soft in the rear (man, that sounds funny).Start off with hole number 3 in front and 1 in the rear, which is the hole the furthest away from the bar. This is what Hotchkis reccommonds. Which is a great setup and you'll probably end up sticking with it?

Maybe next week you can go one step firmer and do some testing. It's a lot different at high speed cornering. This is the step I'm at and I like it. But that's me.

 

2 front, 2 rear, meaning med/med. That would be your starting point. Put some miles on the car and slowly work up to testing the settings out, you may want to go up or down 1 setting depending on how you want to car to behave at the handling limits.

 

hole 4 is for the G35 coupe

 

So is medium hole 2 or hole 3?

Hole 4 is only for the G and not to be used on the Z?

Do the newer Hotchkis sways still have that bumping squeaking problem?

 

I don't know about that. Hole 4 should be the stiffest setting (that's what you want for the front). This is what Hotchkis recommends just so you don't have too much understeer and spin out. I started off with the recommended setting which is Hole 4 in the front and Hole 1 in the rear. Now I'm running Hole 3 in the front and Hole 1 in the rear. Feels better to me. The initial setting had too much oversteer in my taste.

 

Med in the front, full firm in the rear

 

Stiffer in the front, and softer in the rear promotes more undesteer, not less. The stiffer end is the one that breaks loose first, in your case the front, which will cause understeering.

 

I use and like hole 2 front , hole 1 rear.

 

I use hole 3 in the front, and hole 2 in the rear, and so far this has been the best setting for me.

 

I know your heart's in the right place. But, the FM platform is a classic case of following the advise of the tuning books to the full extent. After telling you what changes do what. They all tell you that you must test and verify after making said changes. Many here have discovered that this platform does not lend itself to obey all known tuning laws to the letter. Understand that you have geometric things at play relating to anti dive and anti squat that causes things to go on that defy the books. I get it that not everyone here will bother to test or will have run the different setps I have run. But, I've certainly found a much more rewarding setup for the effort, one that does not obey all the law's of my favorite author's to the letter. Which is basically what the Unitech race team discovered when they did the R&D setup work for the Truechoice coilover setup. Tuning theory should have taken them down a different path, testing told the real direction they needed to take.

 

http://www.thezstore.com/page/TZS/PROD/23-4116

 

IONO how relevant this is but I just did some testing on GT4 and when the Z has stiff front springs in relation to the rear, the car oversteers. Also, when the springs are the same all around (or marginally stiffer in the rear like mine), the car pushed. But if you have relatively close spring rates front and rear, and then go stiffer stabilizer bar in the front, the car oversteered again, but did it just beautifully.
Coincidence that I happened to be playing and thinking the same thing today.

 

I thought I was tripping out so I went to look at the Hotchkis tuning manual. It recommends stiffest in the front and lightest in the rear. This is so your car doesn't break loose in the rear right?

According to what redlude97 says, if the front breaks loose first, it's understeer? Isn't it the exact opposite? For example, drifting... that's oversteer? Correct me if I'm wrong guys.

 

What I suggested is true for convential suggestions for the majority of cars out there. I guess that isn't true for the FM platform though as Gsedan35 pointed out. Upon further research, the majority of people are running med/med on the hotchkis bars