I brought in the GT3 for a tech inspection and was informed that my rears (PS2s) are corded on the inside. I had 3 AutoXs and 1 track day on them and about 1000 street miles. They suspect that my toe is off. I had 2.7/2.4 camber.

I went to the guy that aligned my car initially and he suggested the ERP toe links and the bearing or bushings as well.

I went to GMG and asked the same thing and they suggested the "dog Bones" 1050 to lock in the camber. Inner A arm bearing 550 inner thrust assembly and their toe links.

I'm lost at this point. Ilike the settings on the car butan't be buying rears every few k miles. I have no problem buying dedicated track tires which will work better with the camber but then what do I do on the street? I like driving it on weekends.

Is there a "lite" setting for the suspension that copromises street and autoX/track?

I never had these issues with my M3 that was dual purpose and tey are coming as quite a shock.

Please advise, going nuts.

 

Oh, no disrespect for any of the tuners I mentioned. I respect all the advice I've been given, I just don't have the technical knowlege to know what I need.

 

Are they the same tires that came on the car when you bought it?

No doubt others will give their advice, but what works for me as a good compromise is around 0.16° rear toe-in per side and around -2.1° rear camber.

 

I bought it barely used with 4 k on it. Total garage queen.
Tires were 95% or better till I got a hold of it.

Thanks for the advice.

 

Can I run 0 toe in the rear and toe out in front? Or will that make the car "darty" Sorry can't think of a better adjetive

 

How can your service people 'suspect' toe is off???? It is or it isn't, they measure it and tell you, its not rocket science.
Short answer is that for US owners the RK formula works best. If you are serious then consider a complete suspension swap.

R+C

 

The rears do wear more on the inside edge. Autocross wears the tires rapidly. Identify a set-up shop in your area that's well recommended and whom you trust. The rear toe links from Taggett Engineering are a desireable modification and are not expensive. You could also call Austin at The Racer's Group (referred to in the Discussion Forums here as "TRG") to source Cup Car rear toe links (which are more expensive than the ones from Taggett); advise on settings and perhaps recommend someone in your area to set up your car.

Richard Bain

 

Vic,

That car with 4000 miles of easy driving isn't going to have 95% or better of tread left. In fact the easier you drive it, the more inside wear you'll have. The outsides will wear during the AutoX and track events (remember my outer rights during the DE at the Q).

Which brings me to the Q, that has to be the most abbrasive surface you will ever drive on. Tires are just shredded there.

My rear camber isn't as aggressive as yours (2.0 for mine), but I suspect I'll need to go more aggressive for the type of stuff we're doing.

Do a search for a post from NJ-GT. If I remember correctly, he posted something to the effect that he was chewing through tires as well and changed out the toe links and bushings. That allowed his tires to last a long time. Good luck.

 

What about the motor mounts? Necessary?

 

"What about the motor mounts? Necessary?"

I think not. I run with quite a few owners and none of them have them.

Richard Bain

 

Monoball strut tops? I'd like to do the mods one at a time, but hate to pay for labor twice.

 

If the car had 4,000 miles and 95% tire life remaining I don't think those were the original tires. The rears do not last very long on the GT3 cars.

If you do a search on this forum you will find additional alignment and tire wear information from other owners.

 

Negative camber doesn't kill tires rapidly, negative camber combined with lots of toe is what kills tires.

I used to lose my alignment pretty often (between 2-3 weeks). Every time I brought the car for alignment, the Before specs showed wacky rear toe numbers. At those times, I was going through 5-6 sets of tires per 7 months driving season.

The advice you're getting from the shops is good. Everything told by GMG fixes the rear problem, with stock or aftermarket springs/shocks. Fabryce has been racing the 996 for a while, and he's gained experience that is being applied and tested on street cars successfully.

Currently I've over 9,000 miles with a set of PS2 265/315 with 2 track days (Pocono North), 8 autocross runs at Pocono East Racetrack (100 secs course), 9 runs at a Metro NY PCA AutoX, 8 runs at NNJR-PCA AutoX, 16 runs at NNJR-SCCA, 3 runs at the NE SCCA National Tour. These tires are far from getting replaced, I could get another season with them.

My race tires don't get corded anymore, they're dying from heat cycles, rather than wear. I used to cord a brand new set of tires in 1 1/2 AutoX.

The mods suggested by GMG are about the same price for two sets of tires. On the long term you'll save money, and the car will be more predictable to drive. As a reference, last year I spun my car twice at AutoX (one of them in the rain), the two years before I spun my car at every single AutoX, something like 30+ spins per season. The car gives so much more feedback, and it's easier to explore the grip limits.

I do run -2.6 to -2.9 Camber at all wheels, with aggressive toe-out at the front and toe-in at the rear. Rear sway at full stiff, front one at stock setting.

 

A bit ot... but NJ, that looks like your car on the new 07 SCCA calendar that showed up in the mail yesterday, is it not?

 

Correct. It also made it to SportCar magazine. The calendar picture is my co-driver, the 2006 SCCA National Champion in FPL Stephanie. She can give a hard time with my car to a lot of folks here.