Is it possible to corner balance our replica speedsters? I know when my mechanic did it to my 911 it made a lot of difference in the handling. I think our cars my be too light in the front end?
Richard
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Speedsters have 60-70 percent rear weight bias. Corner balancing cannot change this. Corner balancing is to balance the car left-to-right, both front and rear. Also to balance it diagonally.
You can only do this on a Speedster from the rear, if you have adjustable spring plates.
The front of a 911 IS adjustable due to the individual torsion adjusters up front, the Speedster beam is not independently adjustable.
I balanced my Spyder with scales and adjusting the rear coil springs, you can do the same with adjustable spring plates.
Many alignment shops offer corner balancing. The VW hill climb guys have used corner balancing for decades. A quality shop will load the left front with simulated driver's weight. However, corner balancing, to my knowledge, is concerned with trying to balance LF and RR with RF and LR, i.e., transverse calculations, not so much front/rear ratios. Front/rear ratios can be improved by moving heavy items, which is not very effective in our replicas. Some owners add weight to the bottom of the front axle to keep center of gravity as low as possible. Best of luck!
Jim is exactly right. Danny Piperato brought his scales to Carlisle some years back and we all weighed our cars. Mine was within a handful of pounds being perfectly corner balanced, but the fore/aft weight distribution was 39% front, 61% rear, which is about what I expected. As Jim suggested, adding weight down low forward is probably the best approach.
Interesting. Thank you all
@Jim Gilbert - Madison, Mississippi has recently added weight to his front beam in an effort to make the front end not so light. His solution is one of the best I've seen on the site. I still plan to do this but just haven't had time yet. I've been fixing and repairing everyone else's car and not mine.
I saw that. I was thinking of sand in bags in the very front or the body shell, you could make fine weight adjustments easily and the sand would conform to the lowest point? I had a 911 that had two batteries out in front of the wheels for the same reason.