Moving Chicane

Hi all, kind of a newbie here, so forgive me for the dumb question.

I have a 996 GT3 that I do appx. 6-7 DE's a year and maybe 1 or 2 TT. How important is it to have a corner balance on the car? Because there will be an instructor in the passenger side most of the time, do I compensate the corner balancing for a 200# person on that side or not? Am I over thinking this because of the lack of tracktime this car will see?

I've done an alignment on the car and it feels really good and predictable. I thought I'd post here in this forum to get everyones opinion.

Gary R.

Yes, you're over thinking it but getting the car corner balanced for me is part of the initial track alignment process, as are ride height settings. If the car is stock I wouldn't worry about it until you get to a point where you do more track time or make a change in the car's suspension.

Noel

Out of the box the GT3 will be more than fine and any adjustments that you make to a non-race car GT3 would be hard to notice IMO. I corner balanced mine, but only because the entire suspension system was replaced/rebuilt so like with Gary's car, it was part of my alignment process.

I often hear people obsessing over 1/2 lb tire pressure adjustments, that is hard for me to take seriously for DE. Part of the learning is learning how to drive around issues IMO.

mitch236

Corner balance really comes into play when you are good enough to control weight transfer. Then it becomes very important. You would balance the car without the passenger's weight considered since you should be alone in the car when you are pushing that hard.

TD in DC

Corner balancing is so important that if every car were properly corner balanced, there would be no global warming.


Your car should be corner balanced properly, which should be relatively easy to achieve assuming the frame has not been tweaked. However, I doubt that most amatuers could detect whether a car is slightly out of corner balance . . .

Noel

LOL

Actually one way to tell if you car is really out of corner balance is if it is unstable under hard braking (Assuming that your brakes work properly).

Cornerbalancing is akin to fixing a wobbly chair. With a chair that has one leg that is just a bit shorter than the others, it rocks back and forth based on the transfer of weight. A car will do this too, based on a transfer of weight during hard braking, etc.

mdrums

Can you corner balance a stock GT3. I know my stock 997 C2S can not be corner balanced.

TD in DC

Who told you that? Why?

VaSteve

Interesting knowledge. How unstable is unstable? My 1983 911 would get wiggly in the brake zones...to my knowledge it has never even been aligned past the factory.

tkerrmd

Dont you need adjustable coilovers to corner balance or can you do a stock set up?? I dont know either

analogmike

On a car with coil springs like a GT3, corner balancing is not THAT important. The springs should be made to tight tolerances in length and spring rate, so if all four corners springs and spring mounts are not damaged, the corner balance should be fine. You CANNOT corner balance a newer stock 911 anyway as they don't have adjustable spring perches from the factory.

On a car with torsion bars like an older 911, there is no easy way to set a "perch height". You can try to install the torsion bars so the car is level, but you can be WAY OFF and have one diagonal supporting the majority of the car's weight even if the car is perfectly level. So you need to corner balance an older 911 after making changes to torsion bars.

Corner balancing has NOTHING TO DO WITH weight distribution or compensation for passengers/etc. Think of it as setting the springs to support the actual weight of their respective corners, whatever that is. You can't change weight distribution by corner balancing, the balance is either right or wrong. However you can tweek one diagonal to have a little more weight for example if you are running on a track with primarily right hand turns and need more rear grip.

Good luck!

Larry Herman

To take your analogy one step further, consider the surface that the chair rests on. If you have it on a plush carpet (stock suspension & bushings), you may not notice that one leg is slightly shorter than the other. If you have it on a flat concrete floor, you will feel it right away (race springs & monoballs).

Mike Buck

Actually, I think GT3's do. Just like a 944TurboS or 928's had. But I agree that with super soft stock springs the benefits are little.

Joe Weinstein

The importance of balancing is a product of (overall stiffness * range of possible imbalance).
A stock car with a flexi-frame and no easy adjustability (ability to screw it up) and hasn't
been crashed doesn't need it. A stiff chassis and stiffly sprung raced car that is getting one
rebuilt coilover/shock replaced almost certainly does, for optimal handling.

Noel

Great point Larry!