Matt Marks

Slightly OT, but Honda was having some handling issues with their MotoGP and WSB bikes in the late 90's. They figured out that at full lean, the chassis was so stiff that the springs were no longer really engaged, and that the only real spring action/damping was coming from tire flex and chassis flex - both undamped. By reducing the stiffness (slightly) they were able to better engage the springs/shocks/forks which resulted in better handling.

Larry Herman

I remember reading about that. They had to allow their front forks and rear swing arms to have a little sideways deflection in order to provide some movement when the bikes were leaned over hard. I think that's one of the reasons that they went away from single sided arms in racing.

Now if you have your Porsche leaned over that far, you have a bigger problem than chassis flex.

RJay

Seems reeeedickooollus to me too. From everything I understand, springs and shocks can be too stiff, but a chassis can never be stiff enough.

911pcars

I started a discussion about this over at Pelican's forum. I compiled this info based on some web searches showing relative chassis rigidity:

Here's the rest of the thread:
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/showt...hlight=chassis

Sherwood
http://members.rennlist.org/911pcars