Might be useful to anyone who was thinking of putting IRS into a car that originally has live axle (ie KE Corolla)

 

RA40 with IRS

would have been a GZ## soarer or GX7# cressida but who cares :P

 

I don't really like IRS personally. well I'm only looking from a drift point of view where it has no benifits but for circuit etc I can see it's advantages.

he makes it look so easy!

 

i've seen an ae86 in an old japanese magazine where they cut the ass end out of the floor and welded in s13 irs. it looks like a total abortion compared to the clean job on that ra40

well I'm only looking from a drift point of view where it has no benifits

yeah, adjustable rear camber and toe would totally suck and be utterly useless when you're trying to control the rear end of the car when it's exceeded the grip limit of the tyres

 

just stick to retracting bids on ebay, at least you've got experience at that

rear camber is the enemy of drift. lower and IRS car and the wheels are like / \

Apparently you can't drift with leaves in the back, either......

i'll make sure i go tell all the people drifting silvias and rx7s and skylines that they should convert to live axle. top idea

well I'm only looking from a drift point of view where it has no benifits

 

Umm... Should I laugh now, or should I laugh later?

Edited August 1, 200521 yr by demuire

... and again I wonder, why is it that so many people who participate in the "drift" scene seem to be of the opinion that no logic, suspension theories, or laws of physics apply to them?

... and again I wonder, why is it that so many people who participate in the "drift" scene seem to be of the opinion that no logic, suspension theories, or laws of physics apply to them?

because they base their driving potential on a cartoon

that is some of the best fabrication i have ever seen. The hard work looks like it paid off. Good job :P

what the f@$k are you guys on about?

 

how is IRS an advantage for drifting?

 

why would the guys with FD's, S15's etc change diffs when theirs is perfectly fine? I am not saying that IRS is a disadvantage... I am saying that it offers no advantage in Drifting.

 

Super Jamie: you are a f@$kwit. saying that shit about Initial D. I don't even watch that shit, I hate it.

 

 

demuire: what exactly do you mean by that? how do we not thing that those laws apply?

IRS is an advantage in almost all ways, to a live axle. Whether you opt for a dedion setup or a true IRS, they both offer advantages. Among others: less unsprung weight, ability to adjust *dynamic* toe and camber, just to name a few. Live axle diffs are only good because they are simple, they are tough (since they are essentially a big metal tube), they are cheap.

 

Anyone who replaces an FD or S15 diff with a live axle is just pure weird.

 

What I meant by that? People who recon that running -30 degrees camber is "great for drifting", etc etc. Seriously though, the number of times a "drifter" has come up to me and told me that I'm wrong because I'm not a drifter and I don't know jack shit about setting up a drift car (because apparently all the suspension theories don't apply to drift cars), or said something along the lines of "what do you know, I'm setting up a drift car, not a rally/race/track/sprint etc car", it's just bloody amazing.

 

Drift cars are still cars. They still have 4 wheels, they still have to go around a track. Yes, they typically are set up differently because the style of driving is different, in the same way dirt rally cars are set up differently to tarmac rally cars. But some logic still applies. Most "drifters" I know don't realise this.

hahahaha -30 degrees... I don't think even the time machine with its wheels folded under the car could get -30 :P

 

anyway possibly the biggest problem I see with IRS is when you lower the car (as I said) the back wheels get massive camber on them which you don't want (a pain to fix this problem when lowering your car a lot). you want maximum tread on the road at all times. live axles does this.

 

every drift car i've seen with IRS (in australia) gets massive tread wear on the inside of the rear wheels which means reduced tyre life (not that they last long anyway)

 

whereas after looking at sprinters/KE's etc that drift they all get even tread wear.

That's because factory cars are designed with "normal" ride height in mind, and dynamic camber (ie, as car rolls over, gets more neg camber). This can all be fixed, and still give you a much better result than you'd ever get in a live axle.

 

If you're so concerned about dynamic camber, then use a dedion setup, and voila. From what I can tell Bill Sherwood swears by dedion setups.

 

I think in most cases you'll find that most cars with live axle that are driven hard (ie, drift) will get more thread wear on the outside of the tyres, due to the tread blocks rolling over under load. I know this is the case in my car, and most other cars I've seen with live axles. In fact if I'm not mistaken people sometimes bend the axle housing to get negative camber out of live axles to fix this, but you can only put so much in before you start to wreck things.