camber plate modification, your thoughts please.

[kartorium]

So I wanted to be able to run a decent amount of camber without running wheel spacers in the front, plus I wanted to gain some stroke on the strut. I came up with this option.





So, right now I simply have a couple washers to space the upper mount above the lip on the tower, and I have some real burly washers below to try and spread some load.

My main concerns are deformation of the strut tower, and to solve that an option is to get an aluminum or steel plate to go underneath instead of the washers to spread the load.

Another concern is throwing off geometry enough to matter. Someone mentioned that this might effect wheel rate in a negative way...but I haven't studied that enough. Any thoughts?

Marks car (503) doesn't have the upper lip on the strut tower, its been ground off for some time now. I don't think I want to do that though, so some sort of spacer is necessary up top also. I'm thinking just using some custom shaped aluminum to help spread the pressure out. As of right now the forces are on the lip, and the studs and the washers spacing it out.

Overall, LMK if you think this is a good idea, horrible idea, or can be a good idea if more steps are taken to do it right. Please if you respond have reasoning to back it up. Thanks a lot guys.

 

[ercp98]

my question is, do you think all three bolts holding the plate can take the load and not strip at the threads? that would be my main concern.

 

[iceman69510]

I'm picturing that this modification might actually reduce the amount of adjustability for negative camber. I can see the added stroke benefit though.

How does the spring seat (for the coilovers, right?) fit in there?

 

[GVR4_1057]

^ My thoughts too. It puts all of the stress onto the bolts. And with the galants having 3 unevenly spaced bolts I do not see that taking too much before it fails and then you will need a hood too /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/uhh.gif

 

[kartorium]

One of my concerns was the studs, but mostly just because I have no idea how strong the stock studs are in these tein plates.

So the solution to the bolt situation is to add a fourth bolt/stud somehow....


or even a fifth bolt.

 

[kartorium]

Quoting iceman69510:
I'm picturing that this modification might actually reduce the amount of adjustability for negative camber. I can see the added stroke benefit though.

How does the spring seat (for the coilovers, right?) fit in there?



I was kinda thinking the same thing, by moving the mount location further away from the hub and still leaving the adjustment on the camber plate the same it actually decreases camber.....I am having trouble visualizing and confirming these thoughts though.

I would like to use the camber plates on top to simply dial in the camber evenly side to side, I have camber bolts down low that can now be maxed out. Previously if I wanted to run the camber bolts even remotely negative my tire/wheel would contact the lower spring perch/spanner nuts.

The upper spring perch is a non issue. With coilovers its small enough that it doesn't cause problems.

If I start modifying this stuff too much I feel like it would also be prudent to incorporate some added caster or caster adjustment also.

 

[turbowop]

I think the only real safe way to do this would be to cut the top of the strut tower off and weld new ones in that are taller. I wouldn't feel safe with even four studs/bolts holding the weight of the front of the car while driving down the road.

 

[fivestardsm]

As stated above, the force and weight is designed to be implied on the reinforced strut tower. By putting the plat above, you are putting these stress' onto the bolts. No matter how strong the bolts are, they will inevitably fail. This is not a good solution to the problem. Like turbowop mentioned, "the only real safe way to do this would be to cut the top of the strut tower off and weld new ones in that are taller. I wouldn't feel safe with even four studs/bolts holding the weight of the front of the car while driving down the road."

Granted this would not be an easy job that someone would want to take on without having a very good knowledge of your materials, structure strength, or your fabrication skills.

So in other words, the set up in the pic is bad! Don't do it because it is very unsafe!

 

[kartorium]

This approach seems pretty common in many applications. IIRC ground control even has a style camber plate that mounts on top. Most of these plates have nice thick plates to go on the underside also.

I found a quote from mueller though saying he would rather not run this style of plate. He seems like a pretty smart guy when it comes to this stuff....

I find it hard to believe that you could create loads high enough to cause the stud or bolt to fail even more the case with one or two more bolts, but I do feel the stresses created by having uneven pressure might cause some sort of failure.

Has anyone heard or seen a case where such a bolt failed? You can find this kind of plate on acura's, some hondas, mustangs, evo's, probably many others.

Dialcaliper, curtis, toybreaker, any of you guys have something to add?

 

[Barnes]

Quoting fivestardsm:
No matter how strong the bolts are, they will inevitably fail.



How do you reach this conclusion? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/dunno.gif

My initial guess is that the bolts would not fail, but the sheet metal below the bolts. Unless you have a sufficient backing plate. However, I'd have to know the grade and size of those bolts before I could make that judgment.

 

[Dialcaliper]

^Ditto

I'd be more worried about the strut tower potato-chipping than the bolt strength. Make a plate out of aluminum for the underside like you were describing - As long as it distributes the load, you should be fine. Bolts are amazingly strong when stresses only in the long direction. It's when you start shearing them that you run into trouble. They may eventually wear out so keep an eye on them

I'm just curious why you are chosing to run them this way instead of swapping sides and running them underneath, normal style? The actual strut travel you are gaining is less than 1/2", and unless you've modified things to keep the upper spring perch at the original height, you haven't actually gained any travel, you've just lowered the car another 1/2" without changing the travel, and made your control arm geometry worse. Were you unable to get the clearance you needed with the camber plates installed the normal way?

 

[kartorium]

^^ I have coilovers that are only adjustable at the lower seat. Keeping all things equal I move the upper mount above everything thereby lowering the car slightly, and yes worsening the lower arm geometry. However once that happens I can raise the lower spring perch up, gain travel and take the lower arm back to a better angle.

As it sits with the camber plate on the bottom of the tower, the wheel and tire are dangerously close to the lower spring perch/spanner nuts (with the vehicle at a given height). If I move it to the top of the tower I can keep the same overall height yet raise the spanners/lower seat so that there is no chance for contact and also enable more negative camber at the lowest point.

 

[kartorium]

Quoting BarnesMobile:

My initial guess is that the bolts would not fail, but the sheet metal below the bolts. Unless you have a sufficient backing plate. However, I'd have to know the grade and size of those bolts before I could make that judgment.



Sorry, I was looking for a response from you too Jon, I figured you might have insight as well.

Thats kinda my thought also, the unknown here is the strength of the stock tein studs.


Basically if this all doesn't work out the car will go into 4x4 mode and just have big fender gap, which isn't too big of a deal too me, but I would like to find the middle ground.

 

[ercp98]

if you really want this, how about reinforcing that with a thic.k plate underneath and
use wheel studs instead of the bolts you have now. just my 2 cents

 

[atc250r]

That's scary IMHO. The amount of force being placed on the bolts on the outside strut in a corner are HUGE. This seems pretty much the same as running lift blocks in the front leaf springs of a 4x4. Definitely a dangerous situation.

John

 

[kaptainballistik]

The WRC cars run asimilar setup. However..... we are looking at larger chunks of unobtanium than what you are using.

You would need a reinforcement ring under the strutt tower so it is effectiely distributing the force in the same way.

 

[CP]

Get yee to the local (good) SCCA race shop for an opinion.

 

[curtis]

If you want to run them at that height, Why don't you take the pillow ball mount and draw it up on autocad etc, then measure out or make a template of the strut tower and over lay it on the drawing. After that is achieved add one more bolt hole to the drawing and have a 1/4 or 5/16 inch piece of steel waterjet or plasma cut. Now with these two plates simple run a bolt through the strut tower and place spacers to hold the plates in position. Now the fun part weld a few really long pieces of 1/2 inch wide to the strut towers going up and then weld them to the plates. after 2 or 3 are in position you can remove the spacers and cut out the original strut tower. Now seal up the gaps with more steel and you now changed the height of the strut towers and also reinforced the area. Be careful of hood clearance don't think our cars would look right with 3000gt hood bubbles.

But as said above the way its mounted your bolts or sheetmetal can rip away. Try to image a long hard corner under alot of G's the area that has no bolt for 180 degrees is going to be under alot of tension. Just don't want to see anything bad happen

 

[RayH]

I would worry about what would happen if you were to bottom out on something like a pothole.

 

[Gary_Chiu]

PM deluded (Bonneville Galant) about modifying the camber plates.

He has a setup that sounds similar to what you are doing on his car.