I tend to be a big leaner while taking corners. Do you guys think this hurts performance at all? Any tips to stop?

 

umm.. what car do you have? what suspension mods if any?

 

are you talking about body roll of the car? or you leaning your body?

body roll has minimal affect on cornering performance. according my autox guru/god.

 

yeah, body roll can negatively affect handling in a number of ways. First, steering response is hurt because you must wait for the suspension to load up before the car actually changes direction. Also, the more body roll you have, the more likely your tires are to have poor contact with the pavement. Ideally, you want the tire flat to the ground during a turn, but if the car is leaning over 5 degrees, only part of the tire is doing its job. Of course, its impossible to totally illiminate body roll in cars like ours, but limiting it will improve your handling.

What is your suspension setup? good ways to reduce body roll are swaybars, higher spring rates, and better dampers. You'll also find that a bit of negative camber will improve tire/pavement contact too.

 

Where do you guys get this crap from? You are driving a 2500+ lb mass - there is going to be weight transfer no matter what, and there's nothing you can do to stop it.

My car @ VIR - no at all problems from the "lean"

 

I'm not saying your car shouldn't lean at all... its got suspension travel, thats impossible. What I'm saying is that excessive lean can be detrimental to handling in the ways I just mentioned. And yes, for the tire to be most effective, it should be more or less flat to the ground during a corner, so the entire contact patch is being used (precisely why increased negative camber results in better grip). If the car leans over 5 degrees, and you've got 0 degrees static camber, the tire isn't working to its full potential. This problem can be adressed both via allignment and via a reduction of body roll.

 

You want to see lean?

 

Body lean is not the problem. Controlling weight transfer and suspension is.

That is why you run more static camber, yes. There are so many factors when you start making changes to the suspension - just reducing body lean isnt really a goal, its usually a byproduct of positive changes. By itself its a pretty poor benchmark, and you're going to have plenty of it until you start getting into springs that are too stiff for the street. I still had alot of roll (or lean?) in my 91 on track when I had 475/600# springs.

 

I guess thats a better way to put it... my problem comes from weight transfer and body motion being so interlinked. So by controlling weight transfer, you're also effecting (and usually reducing) body roll. :thinking: I guess your description makes more sense.

 

I am talking about me leaning. I can fix car body roll.