Suspension: Front Stiff vs Rear Stiff

[kiukiu]

Sorry if this has been posted. Just something that's been on my mind. I've been drifting GT4 for a while now and have made a few posts.

Majority of the suspension settings that we've made (I got a few myself..) are to make the Front stiffer and the Rear looser. This makes the tail easier to slide out and drift. I ocassionally faces difficulties with this, usually the European cars, and have been tinkering around with the suspensions.

I read somewhere about tyre slippage and what causes it 💡 so, I decided to make the front looser (Not too loose) and the rear stiffer and have a go at my usual track. Guess what.... IT WORKS!!! This however affects the dynamic of drifting the car. Different methods need to be employed to initiate a drift and to stop it. I however found that for long corners, this works very, very well since u can just floor the accelarator and let her rip.

I do find some weakness in it, but am not sure whether it's because I'm not used to it or it's because of the setting.

1. Slow Entry Speed: Entry speed to a corner is usually very important but this is doubly so since if you screw this up, you mess up the drift with this setting.

2. Unforgiving: Rear Stiff setting is harder to drift with. If you get any of the 3 (speed, angle, line) wrong, it's very hard to correct it.

3.Easy to spin out: May be due to my skill.

I tried this on the M5 and I have pics if anyone's interested. It's not that good though. I'm still experimenting on it.

NOW, the meat here is:
1.) Is Front-Biased (Rear Stiffer) setting possible?
2.) Any Pros and Cons?

Any feedback is welcomed.

 

[d3p0]

It's all relative; relative to the car/settings and the driver/preferences. I will say that, if your settings require you to enter slowly, something should be adjusted. Entering at speed and maintaining speed is fundamental to drifting, it's what makes drifting exciting.

What specific settings are you changing?

 

[Suzuki]

Tankspanker had a thread up in the gt3 drift forums about this very thing. i know diff game, but same physics behind it. he used to do his settings stiff rear, loose front, then he saw some settings of mine, and started a thread on it. ill get the link and edit this.
https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showthread.php?t=53655&highlight=spring+rate
there it is... lots of info for you to browse through.

 

[ViXeN]

Sup Kiukiu my buddy...

Well, I've never played with a stiff rear because my soft rear settings have always worked... But, logically a stiffer rear will promote more grip, which is harder to drift with... But, when you get in a drift you'll NEED to keep the gas flat to hold it... Lift off, and I assume the car just straightens out?

 

[kiukiu]

Actually no. It's easier to drift, or more specifically, to brake drift. Coz when u brake, u shift the weight to the front, but the moment u nail the throttle down, the weights shift back to the back and overload the rear and break em loose. Yeah when u lift-off, u start to loose ur spin but u just need to nail down the throttle again to get ur spin once more.

@d3po
I basically just change the Spring Rate and the Shock (Bound and Rebound) to be stiffer at the back, and I'll loosen the stabiliser at the back. Other than that, Camber I'll usually increase by 0.5 with toe = 2. If you want, I'll copy down the setting for my M5 and let u try it. Mind you, it's a beast that really needs taming if u set it this way, but it's fun...

@Suzuki
Thx mate. I'll read up and hopefully be able to try out more.

(Edit) Seems that Tank stops halfway...:S I do realize one thing though. With the Rear Stiff setting, I can do Looooooooong drift with only 1 slight problem, control of the angle. It's harder to control angles with this setting.

 

[Boundary Layer]

woah, that's an old thread suzuki - almost totally forgot about it. I don't know how relevant it is to GT4 though. It's my belief that the way spring rates are used in calculating oversteer has changed considerably from GT3 to GT4.

it's pretty much been known since day one with GT4 that front springs stiff, rear springs loose creates GT4 oversteer. I used to make a lot of miserable settings based on that cheap fact.

On the more recent settings I've made (last two months or so - i dont think I have any posted), I've had the spring rates very similar. The front might only be 0.5kgf/mm stiffer than the rear, or something like that.

I was just comtemplating this subject a few weeks ago infact. There was one setting I made for a '96 240sx fastback that did have the rear considerably stiffer than the front. At first all it did was understeer, but after a lot of tinkering with bound/rebound, camber, stabs, and LSD settings - then yes, it would drift after a lot of longitudinal weight transfer forwards..
Unfortunately, it was such an unbalanced car that holding it in a drift was a bit of a nightmare. The rear of the car was supporting a larger percentage of the car's mass (as result of the stiffer springs), so there wasnt a lot of front end grip available to me for countersteering purposes. <--this relates to the comment you editted into your last post kiukiu

^^This is not to say you cant make a good set of drift settings with a stiffer rear in GT4. My approach was probably a bit radical.

When I tune for drift now, all that I try to do with my spring rates is to balance the load more or less equally on all four tires. It's no exact science - I just try to create a neutral steering car, then having attained that I'll go to work on everything else. If that means the rear is stiffer than the front, as might be the case on an MR car, then fine. Lately for me though, it has often meant the front <1.0kgf/mm stiffer than the rear.

 

[Ske]

After a lot of newbish whining on my behalf earlier on, I hope I can contribute some from now on I started a thread about this same thing in the tunings & settings forum a little while ago..

I've come to the point where I feel I can drift ok with about any reasonable setting now, but there's one point where a loose rear DEFINITELY helps.. and that's braking.
What I've found is that loose rear = braking oversteer and tight rear = braking understeer. Don't ask me why or how, it's just the way it is The same thing applies to liftoff, but that noticeable imo. Soft rear will make a car unstable at high speed though.. so I guess that will have to be tuned according to the track (AR can be run with a very soft rear, while HSR needs more even settings or some rear df).

On tighter tracks with low speeds, I like to go 100%f 50%r when it comes to stiffness.. and that goes for everything: springs, shocks, stabs. It's a very simple formula, but it seems to work wonders in making a car willing to "step out". With this kinda set up, brake drifts may well be the easiest way of entry (for some cars), and it's extremely effective for increasing the angle mid drift. However, if you're having trouble with too much increasing angle, a tight rear may help you lose some angle with braking.. So I guess both ways have their uses.

 

[kiukiu]

Thanks Tank. That IS a problem I faced as well. I'm still trying to tinker with it to see if I can solve this issue. There's promise in this way of setting. I can feel it. For one, I can start the drift way earlier before the corner compared to the Front Stiff setting and maintain the wheel slip even after I exit the corner. This is very helpful in long fast corner. For the slower ones, it can be a pinch since I still can't seem to find a proper balance to the settings. 2 cars I used for tinkering is the M5 for high power and the SLK Kompressor for the lower powered car since both (especially the SLK) seem to go well with the Rear Stiff setting.

@Ske
Yeah I saw ur post but I didn't completely read through. Yeah. initially when I brake, I just wanna continue going straight, but tinkering with the LSD helps out. I lowered it all the way to 5...LOL I can't fix the lift off issue, but I do work around it by way of stamping on the accelarator a few times when I wanna loose speed and increase angle.

As for Brake Drifting, I find this setting to be pretty ok. You just need to turn the wheel after braking then nail the throttle down. Voila. Care need to be taken though as u can easily spin out.

Now if DR is here, I wonder if he has any contribution on the LSD since I'm still a little confused with it as well as with the Toe.

DR, or anyone, If I'm experiencing understeer while braking, do I move the LSD Decel lower or higher? (Just wanna make sure I'm doing the right thing)

Also, Toe setting, I usually set to 2 for the front to promote grip for turn in. Is this correct, or should I set to -2?

 

[Boundary Layer]

Now if DR is here, I wonder if he has any contribution on the LSD since I'm still a little confused with it as well as with the Toe.

DR, or anyone, If I'm experiencing understeer while braking, do I move the LSD Decel lower or higher? (Just wanna make sure I'm doing the right thing)

Also, Toe setting, I usually set to 2 for the front to promote grip for turn in. Is this correct, or should I set to -2?

LSD Decel lower - it will giver a looser feel in throttle off scenarios. Take care not to set it too low however. Too low of a setting will cause you to skate straight across the track surface at corner entry. You do still want some grip available to change your trajectory, so pick a good balance for your own style. You already knew that though.

If you're gonna change toe, then front toe should always positive, IMO. This enables you to turn in sharper in by angling the outside loaded tire inwards just a tad more. I've read posts of people using negative front toe to turn the outside wheel outwards for countersteering purposes, but I never liked this logic. You have to initiate drift before you have to worry about any countersteering. Apart from that, cars in GT4 just feel weird to me with negative front toe They are quite twitchy.
But more often than not, I leave toe at 0, front and rear.

 

[kiukiu]

Thx for the clear up Tank. Good to see that at least I'm doing the right thing...lol. I got the afternoon of so I'll be tinkering about with this other than my usual drifting. If anyone has any feedback or idea, lemme know.

 

[Delphic Reason]

LSD Decel lower - it will giver a looser feel in throttle off scenarios. Take care not to set it too low however. Too low of a setting will cause you to skate straight across the track surface at corner entry. You do still want some grip available to change your trajectory, so pick a good balance for your own style. You already knew that though.

If you're gonna change toe, then front toe should always positive, IMO. This promotes quicker turn in by angling the outside loaded tire inwards just a tad more. I've read posts of people using negative front toe to turn the outside wheel outwards for countersteering purposes, but I never liked this logic. You have to initiate drift before you have to worry about any countersteering. Apart from that, cars in GT4 just feel weird to me with negative front toe
But more often than not, I leave toe at 0, front and rear.

Absolutely correct... You answered it for me, BL... 5 is definitely too low for the LSD decel... I keep it set around 10 to 20 for most vehicles... Lowering the LSD decel (from the stock setting) makes braking drifts considerably easier... Take head to what Tank is saying about lowering it too much... Too far, and you will keep sliding for days when off the throttle... Very counterproductive when drifting heavier vehicles...

The LSD accel I find to be incredibly important in getting the perfect grip balance when on the throttle... Raising the LSD accel (from the stock setting) will give you more available grip (depending on the power to weight ratio) which will allow you to drift farther, and have more control while doing so...

The LSD initial just controls the initial torque put through to the wheels, and effects the strength of both the LSD accel and LSD decel... I usually keep the LSD initial setting between 10 and 20... More often than not, I keep it between 10 and 15...


Also, I tend to use a stronger front spring setup, but as Tank said, there is usualy only a 0.5 to 1.0 difference between the front and rear spring rates... I like to keep it as neutral as possible...

 

[driveanyway =p]

i only new 2 the this chatin an stuff but general mechanics tells u a stiff rear is slippereyer i got with slighty softer front but make my front toe angle -3 and it manouvers quite well a soft rear will make u grip if u got out sidewayz wit a soft rear ull go round in circuls cause the weight distribution is to much or u will tankslap very very hard put a rear wing on and set it on 8

 

[Suzuki]

i only new 2 the this chatin an stuff but general mechanics tells u a stiff rear is slippereyer i got with slighty softer front but make my front toe angle -3 and it manouvers quite well a soft rear will make u grip if u got out sidewayz wit a soft rear ull go round in circuls cause the weight distribution is to much or u will tankslap very very hard put a rear wing on and set it on 8

i beg to differ. alot of drifters(IRL and gt4) use hard front, soft rear. i am one of them(gt4...). all of my setups drift quite well, but different strokes for different folks. some like hard front, some like hard rear. its all a matter of personal preference and style.

 

[Delphic Reason]

i beg to differ. alot of drifters(IRL and gt4) use hard front, soft rear. i am one of them(gt4...). all of my setups drift quite well, but different strokes for different folks. some like hard front, some like hard rear. its all a matter of personal preference and style.

I'm glad you were able to understand what he posted...

 

[Boundary Layer]

^^no joke.

driveanyway =p, learn to use a little bit more english, and proper punctuation when you type, please.

Now I'll cut some slack, as you are new to the forums and all, and possibly a quite novice drifter. But the problems you mention about tankslapping, or over-rotating are not the fault of the settings. It is pure and simple driver error.

I'll agree that mechanics/dynamics may indicate that a stiffer rear might create a 'slidier' rear in RL - but such is not the case in GT4. It takes about 2 mins of experimentation to uncover this fact - try it for yourself.

 

[Suzuki]

I'm glad you were able to understand what he posted...

hmmm
yeah,
i wasnt quite sure if you were meaning one thing or another. and it was the other. lol

 

[Delphic Reason]

Ok, I'm going to say something that should be relatively obvious... A tighter rear spring will make it a tad easier (in some cases) to initiate drifts, but once you are in the drift, a softer rear spring is going to give you loads more control, which is infinitely more important. Initiating is really the easiest part of the whole shabang, and is really only about 10% of the whole drifting process... Besides, there are many other ways of making a vehicle easier to initiate, than strengthening the rear springs... Too many people here think that tinkering with the settings is going to fix all their problems, when in reality, the biggest problem most drifters face is lack of technique... Technique is more important than anything else... Stock vehicles can be drifted just fine if the driver understands good technique... This proves that settings are just to cater to your individual style, not to fix problems that should be tackled by learning the proper techniques... However, there is such a thing as "counterproductive" settings, in which the settings actually make the vehicle harder to drift, than in its stock form... An example would be increasing your rear camber higher than the front, or dropping your car as low as it can go, or wildly offset bound and rebound levels countering the spring rates, and so on... Just use common sense, do a bit of research, and you will figure this stuff out pretty quickly...

We are here to answer questions, but some amount of common sense, and open mindedness needs to be realised when recieving our help... A lot of the time we are going to make you do the research, as that is the best way to learn, but we will give you a shove in the right direction, to make it a bit easier on you...

I beg to differ. Alot of drifters(IRL and gt4) use hard front, soft rear

Very true... It gives you more control over what the rear is doing, and makes the front end of the car a kind of pivot point, for the rear to rotate around...

 

[d3p0]

If the car is set up with toe-out, however, the front wheels are aligned so that slight disturbances cause the wheel pair to assume rolling directions that do describe a turn. Any minute steering angle beyond the perfectly centered position will cause the inner wheel to steer in a tighter turn radius than the outer wheel. Thus, the car will always be trying to enter a turn, rather than maintaining a straight line of travel. So it's clear that toe-out encourages the initiation of a turn, while toe-in discourages it.

I think that needed clearing up, but off the top of my head I can't remember whether a posiive (+) number is toe-out or toe-in. Isn't (-) toe-out?

Anyway, toe can have a major effect on handling and is best left neutral until you are familiar with drifting.

 

[Boundary Layer]

I think that needed clearing up, but off the top of my head I can't remember whether a posiive (+) number is toe-out or toe-in. Isn't (-) toe-out?

Anyway, toe can have a major effect on handling and is best left neutral until you are familiar with drifting.

here's some of Duke's words on toe settings from the Settings and Tuning subforum: Link to post

 

[Droptop_Chick]

Ok, I'm going to say something that should be relatively obvious... A tighter rear spring will make it a tad easier (in some cases) to initiate drifts, but once you are in the drift, a softer rear spring is going to give you loads more control, which is infinitely more important. Initiating is really the easiest part of the whole shabang, and is really only about 10% of the whole drifting process... Besides, there are many other ways of making a vehicle easier to initiate, than strengthening the rear springs...

I wanted to elaborate on this abit. Everyone keeps saying this is easier and that is easier, but nobody's really getting down to why they feel one setup is better than the other. Or what the raw effects of the biases are. So, this is my mini break-down for SPRING settings and their effects...
_________

Basic Weight Transfer

I don't really like the picture, but its simple and explains the basic idea pretty well...
The concept of weight transfer doesn't apply to just forward weight transfer brake drifting, but also heavily on lateral weight movement (feinting), so keep that in mind too.

Throttle Input During A Drift:

Gas On - Retains weight over the front wheels loading the front suspension, producing increased front tire traction.
Gas Off - Transfers weight to the rear, re-loaded rear suspension, producing increased rear tire traction.

Naturally running a bias heavily towards one style of tuning will create a different balance of throttle input. Just keep in mind what happens to your suspension when you're on, inbetween, and off the throttle.

Stiffer Front // Softer Rear

Pros:
Quick & forcefull forward momentum weight transfer.

+ Main by-products:
Increased front tire traction sooner, unloading of the rear suspension at a rate heavily dependant on forward weight transfer.

Cons:
Increased under-steer tendancies, heavily reliant on larger shifts in forward and lateral mometum.

What does all that mean?
With traction on the front wheels more readily available, you put yourself in a position for a large increase in control capacity. Increased front tire grip at an earlier stage of the drift opens up room for early entries, and increased entry speeds. Running a softer rear setting, your throttle input becomes more of an issue. The balancing of throttle to retain wheel-spin, but also maintain a foward push requires more sensitivity. With this broader range of acceptable throttle input, you increase control capacity for choosing your own speed, line, and angle. Running too soft of a rear setting will cause an excess of wheelspin, which in turn causes deterioration of forward momentum. With a softer rear setting, you also come at a slight disadvantage during exiting where regaining rear traction is more difficult to balance while trying to maintain optimum exit speed.

Softer Front // Stiffer Rear

Pros:
Progressive forward momentum weight transfer.

+ Main by-products:
Progressive increase in front tire traction, rear suspension easily unloaded creating an easier loss in traction.

Cons:
Greater chance of weak front tire traction, quick re-loading of the rear suspension increases rear traction.

What does all that mean?
With a softer front/stiffer rear setting, the rate at which you force weight on the front wheels is more controlable. Positives from a more progressive weight transfer all stem from greater predicatabilty or increased "feel" for what your weight movements are actually doing, as it does take longer to fully load the front suspension. Stiffer rear settings will increase traction under load, so your throttle input is important. If you let off the throttle too much, you'll re-load the rear suspension much faster than running a stiffer front/softer rear setting. Re-loading the rear increases rear traction, and in turn will un-load the front suspension causing a decrease in front tire traction. This could leave you in a position for heavy understeer mid-drift and can result in "snap-back." So throttle work with this style of setting is more "numb" because it does require more throttle to maintain wheelspin and forward momentum. This limited range of acceptable throttle input inhibits your ability to adjust your line and angle purely on throttle input. MR is more of the exception to this rule though...

Tuning Tips:
Try turning off the aids and driving it stock. Take note of any tendancies you see for the car to understeer under certain conditions (certain angles/speeds/lines). Take into consideration the weight of the car when setting your springs/shocks/stablizer bars. You want to be able to move weight aruond freely, but not to the extent it's uncontrolable, so keep your settings of stiffness within reason. A lighter car like a Trueno or Silvia won't require a combo as stiff as say a Chaser or Corvette. Stiff = Traction, flat out. Tune springs rates to make the wheelspin comfortable for your ability of throttle control.


Everyone keeps saying tuning is subjective to your style, and it is very much so a personal preference game. But without the understanding of the results of your actions, it makes it even harder to fine-tune to perfectly fit your style. Because one style of tuning works well for one drivetrain layout doesn't mean it will work well for another. Always think about what the car is doing, and what you want it to do, look back and think about how you can make that possible from a common sense perspective. The physics of drifting and suspension tuning in general is all common sense, simple move this here and that there type thinking can get you a long way.

 

[rsmithdrift]

The thing with softening the front is that it increases your front roll couple. (more body roll) also it will make the front drop more during braking and lift more duing acceleration. If the rear is stiffer that will mean that you have the front tires carrying more load during deceleration and less load during acceleration because the front will roll more than the rear. Essentially meaning that you have two wheels with grip in the front, and only one wheel with grip in the rear under braking, the opposite will apply during acceleration. This will make a car that likes the opposite extremes. NOT STABLE! It will be loose as crazy under braking want to understeer on the throttle. Sway bars and shocks will do the same thing.

The softer a car is the more it will grip, so theoretically a soft front end and stiff rear end should be the best drift set up because while cornering you will have more grip up front and less in the rear, BUT (and this is a BIG BUT) you will lose so much stability and responsiveness that the car will be nearly undrivable and will limit your ability. THEREFORE, a good driver will be able to drift better with a more stable and responsive car, you do this by having a siff front end and soft rear end, but this will make a understeering car, so you cant make it too stiff up front and soft in back or you won't be able to drift it as well.

In real life a stiff front end will let you "lock" into a drift, meaning you can hold it longer than if you lacked stability. GT4 does this but not as much as it should.

 

[kiukiu]

Wow. I'm learning a lot here and getting to understand more and more... Sorry everyone but I've been busy wz RL so have so far been unable to do some testing on the M5. I should get some free time tonite so I'll be concentrating mainly on it.

@DTC

Throttle Input During A Drift:

Gas On - Retains weight over the front wheels loading the front suspension, producing increased front tire traction.
Gas Off - Transfers weight to the rear, re-loaded rear suspension, producing increased rear tire traction.

Sorry but I don't quite understand this part. Logically when you Gas On, your weight should transfer to the back, thus reloading the rear suspension. In the case of Front Stiff setting, I would understand that when we Gas On, the wheel would spin BEFORE the car's weight has fully settled on it and would continue to spin until throttle has been modulated (reduced) to cut down the wheel spin.

In the case of Rear Stiff, Wheel spin is achieved during Gas On because we have OVERLOADED the "grip", causing the tyres to slip and start spinning. In both case, reduction in throttle WILL kill the spin and depending on the set up, increase or decrease of angle.

Mainly, thanks to your wonderful description on the happening of the cars before, during and after the drift. I'll keep an eye out tonight to see if I can work out something.

Stiff = Traction, Soft = Grip? I think those are correct. But I DO know that a balance need to be struck between stiff and soft.

In case anyone is wondering what I'm trying to do, I'm trying to tune a car in GT4 that would be rear stiff and driftable and controlleable to a certain extend. I think it's possible. Just a matter of finding the right balance and method of drifting.

p.s. Thx DR. I know what you mean. My setups are mainly front stiff. This is kinda like a side project for me to see if I can make a setting and method that will be productive in a negative sort of way... Wish me luck:tup: I'll try to post up the setting if I get to my PS2 tonite..