Novice requires suspension advice

[Rusty]

Got that too

[orsum]

95% Tar 5% dirt depending on the area I go.

Road car

[Rusty]

May be worth fitting softer front springs then, instead of stiffer rears. Will give the same effect but with a little more ride comfort. You'll never load the chassis up enough to mind a little extra body lean.

[orsum]

I am happy with the ride and I am not speeding on the dirt roads, it’s just when on tar the body roll feels disturbing.

Not all the time it’s just when I push it a bit. Typically on a long left at 100mph 160kph in SA (not doing this on public roads) when the road starts to go straight and I correct the steering to bring the car onto the straight it does this sort of body roll, feels like the tyre walls are flexing and the front right dips and the rear left lifts which causes a bit of a wobble and once on the straight all is fine.

Any faster and I am sure it would do a bit of **** end whipping.

Does that make any sense?

[orsum]

I think I need to do this same speed test on a right hand corner.

Is it possible the new Audi shock are faulty!!

[K Simmonds]

That does sound more like a problem with damping as opposed to springs, are you sure Audi used the correct dampers and primed them by fully depressing them twice and then making sure they stayed upright until fitted. What state are your rear dampers in?

After a year of mucking about with different springs and mounts etc my Coupe's set up comprised of polys bushed everything, I did have solid alloy subframe mounts fitted from when I purchased the car but swapped them to poly. I found the solid mounts made the car skittish at high speed on all but the most perfect of surfaces.

Simple Bilstein B4 front dampers with Sachs sporting rears and stock non air-con springs, stock top mounts.

RS2 front ARB and Whiteline rear ARB.

Got the geometry set up to give max negative camber according to the factory specs all round, as much castor as possible on the front and bang on the factory toe figures.

Car weighed 1350 kg's

I was really happy with the way the car handled until I stuffed it in the wet.

All the parts are now sold.

Just a thought but I wonder if Audi fitted different springs to the cars destined for the SA market as back 20 years ago I'm pretty sure the roads out there would have been quite poor compared to those in Europe. It's probably not the case, just trying to cover all eventuality's

[orsum]

The shocks were new 5 years ago and they done about 2 miles since then.

I recall there was a delay getting the shock as the factory had to have one or more made. I was told they did not have any left.

I have only recently got the car back and have put about 500 miles on it.

I do recall many years ago in the UK I had a shock problem on a Mini Cooper S 1275cc turning left was much more unstable than turning right.

I will have the shocks tested before doing anything else.

It could just be a shock issue. They seem ok when driving straight.

[BorisShakhov]

Is this for road use?

The offset subframe and top mounts improve steering and grip a lot and a decent increase in camber at the front helps too.

I use mine on the road mainly but it's set for track. Sure it's a bit stiff but it's great to drive.

Front

• 2.5 camber
• 4+ castor
• min factory toe in

Rear

• 1.25 camber
• min factory toe in

That's with:

• Bilstein B6
• HnR springs
• 25mm front ARB on the rear
• ally subframe bushes
• poly wishbone and arb bushes
• my own design of top mount.

It'll never handle like a modern car but who wants it to? The quirks of an older car are what make it interesting.

Anyone who's been around a track in this or driven it can comment on what the result is. I'm pleased with it

With KWs in stead of the HnRs and some stiffer rear springs instead of the silly bit RARB, you're on to a winner.

There is too much rebound on b6 for stock or hr springs. I've got a force velocity graph somewhere. And you don't need rarb with properly matched springs.

[BorisShakhov]

Forget making the car handle like the S4 - the S4 chassis is light years ahead and it has multi-link front & rear Vs your coupe's humble mcstruts.

A stiffer rear ARB makes a big difference, as Nip suggests KWs are probably the best bang-for-buck compromise for spring and shocks on a road car, but if you have rough roads they might be a bit stiff.
Poly bushes with sharpen up the feel a lot. All of the above will improve but ultimately you're driving a car with suspension designed in the 1970s.... to make big improvements you need to get quite radical with the geometry

Why Porsche use this kind of a design on gt 3?

[Error404]

I seem to remember there may be a handful of differences between B3 quattro and GT3 setup
- multi-link rear end for starters, and widely different geometry on the front mcstrut. You are right of course, good results are possible, but the OP I believe is looking for simple bolt-on solutions, of which there are none to achieve his goals - unfortunately. As I originally stated you need to make radical changes to make big improvements.

[orsum]

Sir you are correct I am not into radical changes. Basically converting an S2 coupe to perform as an RS2. With a little extra if possible.

I prefer to bolt on and forget. Not into adjusting things to get the last bit of performance. If I cannot get the car to feel right then radical changes may have to happen. A last resort option.

I finished putting the Avus 17"rims on yesterday with new tyres. The look very nice.

I am taking the car on Tuesday to the Dunlop Factory site, they have lots of stuff to check the wheels, tyres and suspension.

It is the official Dunlop factory testing centre and is only used for diagnostic testing of its and others products on all types of vehicles. They have some great kit. They took me round when I was deciding which tyre to go for.

They offered to do all the checks for me but they do not work on the car they only check and report findings against design.

Looking forward to the visit.

[BorisShakhov]

I seem to remember there may be a handful of differences between B3 quattro and GT3 setup
- multi-link rear end for starters, and widely different geometry on the front mcstrut. You are right of course, good results are possible, but the OP I believe is looking for simple bolt-on solutions, of which there are none to achieve his goals - unfortunately. As I originally stated you need to make radical changes to make big improvements. [emoji481]

Totaly agree that bolt-on tuning makes things even more terrible.

I've sold my HR springs, powerflex and whiteline rarb.

KW v3 looks interesting and properly designed but I have never tried it and never measured hard points with it.

Stock busings are too soft but better than powerflex.

[orsum]

90% of the problem solved.

As I said previously Audi did the complete suspension under the Audi Motor Plan about 4/5 years ago.

Well they did a very poor job.

Front top shocks not fastened down 6 mm of thread showing nut hand tight, drivers side rear drop link needs to be replaced.

And the big one they did not do was the wheel alignment it was way out.

Took the car to the shop that Dunlop advised. They did a good job from what I can see.

Still need to take the car to be checked by Dunlop but I am happy

The same left I normal backed off doing 100kph is now an easy 160kph.

I am not saying its as good as it could be but I don't think I need and upgrades to improve the performance.

They also said the right side of the car is 6 - 8 mm lower than the left. They advised they can resolve that but advised I run the car and see if I was happy.

[newsh]

Glad you found the problem!

[orsum]

Yep very happy for now.

Brings on another set of possible work/problems. What else did they not do correctly??????????