Hardcore street car. I drive 100+ miles a day on the highway. And then when the weekend comes it's a backroad slayer and every other weekend it sees auto cross events. The only problem I've ever had is on road courses, really fast 80+mph cornering the rear end wants to slide out. I just figured its a solid axle car causing that.

 

Voyager buddy, you probably ought to get in touch with Sam Strano for the road course stuff.

 

17x11's with some 315mm rears help out rear end traction in corners immensely!

 

For what you do with the car the ideal torque arm setup would be one of our full length BMR adjustable torque arms along with one of our torque arm relocation crossmembers. This will allow you to fine tune the pinion angle and instant center of the car. This is the same torque arm setup we used on GM High-Tech Magazine's STI killer and that car handled ridiculously well.

What wheel/tire combination do you have on the car?

 

I love Sam! Super helpful guy. I run his springs on SLP shocks, the Bilsteins. He recommended Konis, but I really don't have that kinda cash. Sam told me they would do fine for my applications though

 

Nice. I need to save up for that combo. On the street I run factory 16" wheels with 245/50/R16 Coopers (lol). But on race day I have a set of C5Z06 17x9.5 with some Nitto radials, 275/40/R17.

 

I wish I could afford those!! I'm not even sure if 17x11 would fit. I have sprano springs with the heater hose mod and its really pushing it with the 17x9.5 on a bumpy autocross track

 

Thank you all for the replies. Any sugg on a good rear shock that doesn't break the bank? I'm also going with umi lca's + relo's to give a good angle. Car will eventually get H/C when the money is available. This winter it's getting tune, headers, and ewp.

 

So I have the umi panhard bar and umi lca's coming in the mail. Plus lca relocation brackets. Are the competition engineering c2700 shocks a good choice for the money? They are $100 for a pair and I read they get the job done. Bilstein's are out of the question because of $$$. Any cheaper than the comp c2700's that work good?

 

I raced my car for about 200 passes on the stock springs, stock torque arm, and aftermarket LCAs and Bilstein HD shocks with sumitomo tires cutting 1.8-2.0 60's and never had the problems you are having. I'm 99% sure it's driver error, you are not launching properly. LCA relocation brackets are really only needed if your LCAs are sloping down from back to front, they should be about 2 degrees sloping up from back to front, if your stock springs are sagging or you have a lot of weight in the rear or you are lowered, then you need relocation brackets because the imaginary line of the LCAs needs to cross the imaginary line of your torque arm somewhere towards the front of the car, if your LCAs slope down they will never cross, giving no instant center in the center of the car, warranting relo brackets, but if you are stock you shouldn't need them.

Regarding launching on street tires on a 10 bolt on a stock power car:

If the water box has standing water, like a puddle, go AROUND the water box. If it's just a wet surface, you can go through it. If it's standing water, the water will get in your treads and get thrown all over the track, causing you to lose traction.

Do a 2 second 1st gear burnout once you are past the water box just to clear the sand off your tires, you are not trying to heat them up. Sidestep it from 4000, touch the brake for a second to stop you moving forward too far, then release the brake and ease off the throttle to roll forward slightly while still spinning to get off your sand/dust spot and then grab the clutch and roll forward a little more towards staging.

Stage the first beam, wait for the other guy, then stage the second beam, the wait for the other guy.

Bring the rpms up to 2000rpm when the first ambers start. When you see the 3rd amber start your launch, if you wait for green you are late.

From 2000rpm you withdraw your left foot while pressing the throttle all in 1 fluid motion to bog the car a little and get off the clutch as quick as you can without stalling and without burning the clutch or letting the rpms get over 2000. You want to let the torque of the car pull you out smoothly, you want no jerking or bucking or anything to spike power to the tires or you will spin, the easiest way to not shock the tires at all is just letting the torque pull you out smoothly. If you are burning the clutch or rpms are too high you will shock the tires and spin, or worse you will get traction and shock the ring and pinion and blow your 10 bolt.

Now that the clutch is out you bury your right foot into the floor and let it pull to your shift point.

When you get your launch down you can start learning to powershift. I would NOT recommend power shifting on your first try, it takes a LOT of practice. You miss a gear or if you are too slow you will over rev the motor. Eventually you want to be no lift shifting at 100% throttle at 6300rpm, but first start at 25% throttle. You can practice on the street. When you are getting ready to shift put a little bit of force in your hand on the shifter in the direction you want to go, not enough to pull it out of gear, but a little. When you go to shift you stab the clutch hard and fast and you will feel in your hand as the clutch engages the shifter will start to release, and put the rest of the force in your hand to the next gear. As soon as you feel your hand traveling with the shifter towards the next gear, your brain will tell your left foot to withdraw quickly, and by the time your brain signaled your foot and your foot has withdrawn your hand will be in the next gear. Eventually all your left foot is doing is stabbing and immediately withdrawing, zero pause in the motion. Do this first at 25% throttle, when you have that down, then 50%, then 75%, then 100%. You will know your going fast enough when your rpms do not rise at all when you shift, even at 100% throttle. You can see the guys who have it down at the track and the nose never dives when shifting, when the nose dives you are unloading the rear suspension, and you can spin, if you shift fast enough, and the nose doesn't dive, not only will you go faster because your shifts are faster, but you will go faster because you won't spin on the 1-2 or 2-3 shift.

I do agree you should get new shocks, I think the first mod people should do to these F bodys is get rid of the POS decarbon shocks and get some Bilstein HDs or something. Also anything that had rubber is deteriorating after 20 years, so rear lower control arms are also something to look into, but no need for LCA relocation brackets unless your LCAs are sloping downward towards the front. I do not like poly/poly LCAs though as they do NOT flex at all, get at least 1 rod end or the new ones with the ball in them that allow for some rotation. And when you do long tubes you need to do eurathane motor and trans mounts.

 

Thanks for choosing UMI! If you need any pricing or info on shocks please feel free to call me anytime here at the shop

 

A better wheel and tire combination would definitely help you out quite a bit but I have to say that you are doing very well with the car considering the combination.

Competition Engineering C2700 are actually a decent shock for the money. They aren't go to be anywhere close to what a Strange or Viking would offer but they are a solid budget rear drag shock. I had a set on a local car and the car was a consistent mid 9 second car and would regularly cut mid 1.3X 60ft times. Really for the money they are hard to beat.

 

They only cost $20-30 more a wheel than 17x9.5s.....the tires aren't THAT much more expensive unless you buy some high end rubber. Of course they will fit, been done hundreds if not thousands of time....you may or may not need a BFH mod on the inner fender well and bumpstops I paid some dude to roll my fenders as well...no biggie! The deep dish wheels look are a big improvement looks wise IMO and fully fill out the wheel wells.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/One-Rim-17-x11-Black-Fits-Corvette-ZR1-rims-Camaro-C4-/391258110384?hash=item5b18ccf9b0&vxp=mtr

 

It'd be nice if I could run those up front too... Out on Autox/road course if you run a staggered setup the car tends to over grip in the rear and push the front through corners. Plus I hate staggered look on 4th gens, it screams Joe dirt special to me however... If I could run those same rims on all 4 corners and instead of black be regular aluminum.... you know, your the only one I see on these forums that has actually done literally everything imaginable to your F-body and still maintained street-ability, that's one nice car man!