Ride Height

[Wess-RA]

In another thread "Rear Lid Lift" a couple of you had suggested a ride height spring setting of 3" Front, 3 1/2" Rear. I did a preliminary check (without any weight in the drivers seat). Here are my findings:
Front/left 3.7" Front/right 3.55"
Rear/left 5.1" Rear/right 4.75

The left side averages higher than the right-presumably because of no drivers weight. I took my measurements at the bottom of the frame directly in line with the center of the wheel hub.

These numbers are way higher than what you guys are recommending. So do I lower the car strictly by spinning the collar on the shocks? Do I need a spanner pin wrench or are you guys just putting a couple of pins in and wrenching it the hard way?

I'll be swithcing out the springs to the 550#/350# values while making the height adjustments.

[Scrapper]

i always check mine on leval ground and i mesure all four finder whells right in the middle of fender to the ground. do this a see what mesurments you get? but you have to have it ground or cement to get the right highth and this is the first thing i do before i start alighning it and tire pressure.

[Wess-RA]

I think the fenders are too flimsy to measure-plastic body parts.
I did check it with correct tire pressure, on my flat concrete garage floor. I used machinists ground gage blocks shimmed between the floor and the frame member- just to be persnickety about it.

[NZGTRA17]

Originally Posted by Wess-RA

I used machinists ground gage blocks shimmed between the floor and the frame member- just to be persnickety about it.

Uwe, the method that you have used for checking ride height is good. We recently went right through the set up on my car (using factory settings for ride height due rough run off areas at my local track) and did basic ride height prior to putting the car on scales and corner weighting it with me in the seat and fuel at normal running level.

Corner weighting requirements will obviously depend on what the predominant corners (i.e. more rights than lefts or vice versa) are at your local circuit.

Chuck in your new springs, set the basic ride height and then put in any additional corner weight. You will be very happy with decision to run the 550 / 350 combo it makes for way more fun.

Kel.

[eric1h]

Originally Posted by Scrapper

i always check mine on leval ground and i mesure all four finder whells right in the middle of fender to the ground. do this a see what mesurments you get? but you have to have it ground or cement to get the right highth and this is the first thing i do before i start alighning it and tire pressure.

another problem with this method is, most of these cars bodies are so far out of whack that i'd bet no two fenders are in the exact same spot!

It's best to measure the frame height just to the inside of each wheel.

Mine is set to 4.5" and 5.5" but when I swap out the 550's with 750's (move the 550's to the rear) I plan to lower it down to 3.5"/4.5"

[Craig245]

Just for reference, the specs from Panoz are 3.5" in the front and 4.0-4.25" in the rear. It would be a good place to start.