A brief review of LCA relocation brackets on a lowered car
#1
Staging Lane
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A brief review of LCA relocation brackets on a lowered car
My car is lowered with the BMR 1.25" springs, along with the heater hose mod in the rear.
To preface this, if you've been debating doing it, stop beating around the bush and get them. They are completely worth it. I got the Founders brackets for $50, an awesome deal.
I installed them and first tried them on the top hole. Initial impressions were: as soon as I pulled out of my garage, I could feel that the back end felt tighter and more solid. I felt it even more just driving around town at a normal pace, nothing crazy. I never had wheel hop so I can't comment on that. Another thing they fixed, that always drove me insane, is that after lowering my car I'd notice hitting bumps would make the rear of the car feel like it'd shift to the side. That doesn't happen anymore. I found a pretty good business/warehouse area to test them out further on a Sunday. Basically, traction was unchanged. If there was a change, it was very small.
Then I moved them to the bottom hole: holy ****! The rear felt even more solid and firm, but definitely not like anything was binding. Something that no one ever mentions, maybe because it's kind of obvious, but you can feel the car throw you back in the seats more because you actually have traction. I used to spin all through 2nd gear, but now I can hook up about 50% of the time vs 0%. I can still get sideways just fine punching it in a corner in 2nd gear. After doing a few rolling burnouts, it's quite obvious I now have some anti-squat because it'll actually leave fairly dark tire marks, before the marks would hardly be visible. I couldn't get any rear lockup or hop when slamming on the brakes. The only thing I noticed that could get a little iffy, is when spinning the tires pulling out of a donut or a slide, near the end or top of 2nd gear, it WILL hook and throw the car forward. You have to be much more careful what direction the front tires are pointed and make sure the car isn't all squirely when it's about to hook.
All in all, an excellent mod. I highly recommend these for anyone lowered. The bite is better than stock ride height without them. THIS is how the car should drive, not so light in the rear end. It really amazes me that some people say they can hardly notice a difference. The bottom hole seems perfect for a lowered car, I wouldn't want anything lower. As far as corning goes, initial impressions tell me it hasn't affected the car in a negative way, it's also nice to have more grip to power out of a corner.
To preface this, if you've been debating doing it, stop beating around the bush and get them. They are completely worth it. I got the Founders brackets for $50, an awesome deal.
I installed them and first tried them on the top hole. Initial impressions were: as soon as I pulled out of my garage, I could feel that the back end felt tighter and more solid. I felt it even more just driving around town at a normal pace, nothing crazy. I never had wheel hop so I can't comment on that. Another thing they fixed, that always drove me insane, is that after lowering my car I'd notice hitting bumps would make the rear of the car feel like it'd shift to the side. That doesn't happen anymore. I found a pretty good business/warehouse area to test them out further on a Sunday. Basically, traction was unchanged. If there was a change, it was very small.
Then I moved them to the bottom hole: holy ****! The rear felt even more solid and firm, but definitely not like anything was binding. Something that no one ever mentions, maybe because it's kind of obvious, but you can feel the car throw you back in the seats more because you actually have traction. I used to spin all through 2nd gear, but now I can hook up about 50% of the time vs 0%. I can still get sideways just fine punching it in a corner in 2nd gear. After doing a few rolling burnouts, it's quite obvious I now have some anti-squat because it'll actually leave fairly dark tire marks, before the marks would hardly be visible. I couldn't get any rear lockup or hop when slamming on the brakes. The only thing I noticed that could get a little iffy, is when spinning the tires pulling out of a donut or a slide, near the end or top of 2nd gear, it WILL hook and throw the car forward. You have to be much more careful what direction the front tires are pointed and make sure the car isn't all squirely when it's about to hook.
All in all, an excellent mod. I highly recommend these for anyone lowered. The bite is better than stock ride height without them. THIS is how the car should drive, not so light in the rear end. It really amazes me that some people say they can hardly notice a difference. The bottom hole seems perfect for a lowered car, I wouldn't want anything lower. As far as corning goes, initial impressions tell me it hasn't affected the car in a negative way, it's also nice to have more grip to power out of a corner.
#2
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I always try to put emphasis on these parts to anyone with a lowered car. When you lower the car, you completely change the rear suspension geometry, and these brackets help you correct it. There are some that for whatever reason still do not believe in their effects. My customers always report a similar night and day difference like you have experienced. No matter how the car is being used, I always recommend them. It's not a sales pitch/hype, it's geometry and physics. They work
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Find a Quality alignment shop near you!
#7
Staging Lane
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Sorry about the delay, to answer a few questions:
When I was literally standing on the brake pedal from around 40mph to try and get wheel hop under braking, I didn't notice any discernible difference in the nose diving. It seemed to be just as it was before. I think in order to get more nose dive, they'd have to move the control arms even lower than the bottom hole. Maybe installing them at stock ride height in the bottom hole would cause it as well. This is just an estimation though.
To answer the other question, I'm still using stock control arms. They are the style that have the solid bushings rather than the fluted/slotted bushings which I suppose may give them a slight bit more stiffness.
When I was literally standing on the brake pedal from around 40mph to try and get wheel hop under braking, I didn't notice any discernible difference in the nose diving. It seemed to be just as it was before. I think in order to get more nose dive, they'd have to move the control arms even lower than the bottom hole. Maybe installing them at stock ride height in the bottom hole would cause it as well. This is just an estimation though.
To answer the other question, I'm still using stock control arms. They are the style that have the solid bushings rather than the fluted/slotted bushings which I suppose may give them a slight bit more stiffness.
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#8
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I always try to put emphasis on these parts to anyone with a lowered car. When you lower the car, you completely change the rear suspension geometry, and these brackets help you correct it. There are some that for whatever reason still do not believe in their effects. My customers always report a similar night and day difference like you have experienced. No matter how the car is being used, I always recommend them. It's not a sales pitch/hype, it's geometry and physics. They work
You keep over looking the fact that there is an advantage to having the LCAs being lower on the chassis side/higher on the axle side, it causes the car to have roll understeer which helps with stability in high speed cornering.
As you can see here there are some track guys who do like them and do not like them at all and prefer to not have them.
http://www.frrax.com/rrforum/index.p...&hl=relocation
#9
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Depends on what you want to do with the car, how its setup and how you want it to behave.
You keep over looking the fact that there is an advantage to having the LCAs being lower on the chassis side/higher on the axle side, it causes the car to have roll understeer which helps with stability in high speed cornering.
As you can see here there are some track guys who do like them and do not like them at all and prefer to not have them.
http://www.frrax.com/rrforum/index.p...&hl=relocation
You keep over looking the fact that there is an advantage to having the LCAs being lower on the chassis side/higher on the axle side, it causes the car to have roll understeer which helps with stability in high speed cornering.
As you can see here there are some track guys who do like them and do not like them at all and prefer to not have them.
http://www.frrax.com/rrforum/index.p...&hl=relocation
Now, I understand it may be noticeable on the track when you are pushing the car to the absolute limit, but on the street, so far it's made no difference to me. I'm no expert so take this with a grain of salt, but IMO roll understeer can be controlled by other methods than just control arm location. Using sway bars thick enough to basically eliminate roll altogether is one method. Or mixing sway bars with a slightly thinner one in the rear to give an understeer handling profile is another. Another way is to use less gas in the corner as more gas will put more stress on the rear, the tires become overloaded, and you oversteer. To me, the trade off is worth it. To people race seriously against the clock on an auto-x course, maybe not.
I'm sure some serious auto-x'ers are waiting to correct me and tell me how wrong I am and how you want a little body roll and whatever for more grip, but again, I drive for fun, not for competition and I like a car that's perfectly flat and drives like a go-kart. I just don't want that thought to scare people off like it did to me, I highly recommend these after trying them out. They are an amazing bang for the buck mod and quite noticeable in a good way; I just wish I had done it a long time ago.
Last edited by lt16spd1; 02-20-2017 at 11:07 AM.
#10
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Just throwing it out there but if you arn't making big power then some stock sized or a little wider sticky tires should solve the traction issues. Bigger power and its a different story.
I'm trying to set my car up to handle (yeah I know, shitty shocks), and I didn't want this to hurt it. However, after a spirited drive through the hills and throwing the car through the corners, I literally could not tell any difference in how it cornered.
Now, I understand it may be noticeable on the track when you are pushing the car to the absolute limit, but on the street, so far it's made no difference to me.
Now, I understand it may be noticeable on the track when you are pushing the car to the absolute limit, but on the street, so far it's made no difference to me.
I'm no expert so take this with a grain of salt, but IMO roll understeer can be controlled by other methods than just control arm location. Using sway bars thick enough to basically eliminate roll altogether is one method. Or mixing sway bars with a slightly thinner one in the rear to give an understeer handling profile is another.
You can compensate with changing the swaybars but you will ultimately be sacrificing cornering speed then.
Another way is to use less gas in the corner as more gas will put more stress on the rear, the tires become overloaded, and you oversteer. To me, the trade off is worth it. To people race seriously against the clock on an auto-x course, maybe not.
I'm sure some serious auto-x'ers are waiting to correct me and tell me how wrong I am and how you want a little body roll and whatever for more grip, but again, I drive for fun, not for competition and I like a car that's perfectly flat and drives like a go-kart. I just don't want that thought to scare people off like it did to me, I highly recommend these after trying them out. They are an amazing bang for the buck mod and quite noticeable in a good way; I just wish I had done it a long time ago.
I'm sure some serious auto-x'ers are waiting to correct me and tell me how wrong I am and how you want a little body roll and whatever for more grip, but again, I drive for fun, not for competition and I like a car that's perfectly flat and drives like a go-kart. I just don't want that thought to scare people off like it did to me, I highly recommend these after trying them out. They are an amazing bang for the buck mod and quite noticeable in a good way; I just wish I had done it a long time ago.
#12
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Just for the record.... LT1's don't have the brake hop issue that LS1's do, so that is a consideration.
Now having said that, the stiffer feel is from the instant center change, the downside of which is that it also makes the ride stiffer. And if you like are into cornering any angle that has the tail of the LCA down, means you get roll steer (in this case of the oversteer) variety when you are leaning on the car hard. It's just simple geometry. LCA's swing in an arc, when you compress the suspension in a turn, the outside arm gets longer first when starting tail down and the inside one effectively shortens. All that turns the axle to the outside, which isn't the ideal for great cornering. So if you do this, you want the arms to be level, not tail down.
Sure there are times and places for LCA brackets. But not on every car just because which is what the common wisdom is.
Now having said that, the stiffer feel is from the instant center change, the downside of which is that it also makes the ride stiffer. And if you like are into cornering any angle that has the tail of the LCA down, means you get roll steer (in this case of the oversteer) variety when you are leaning on the car hard. It's just simple geometry. LCA's swing in an arc, when you compress the suspension in a turn, the outside arm gets longer first when starting tail down and the inside one effectively shortens. All that turns the axle to the outside, which isn't the ideal for great cornering. So if you do this, you want the arms to be level, not tail down.
Sure there are times and places for LCA brackets. But not on every car just because which is what the common wisdom is.
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www.stranoparts.com --814-849-3450
Results matter. Talk is cheap. We are miles beyond the success anyone else has had with the 4th gens, and C5, C6, C7 Corvettes,
10 SCCA Solo National Championships, 2008 Driver of they Year, 2012 Driver of Eminence
13 SCCA Pro Solo Nationals Championships
2023 UMI King of the Mountain Champion
#13