Lotus-born suspension on the MKIII Supra?

[NashMan]

well form my under standing of playing wiht both cars modded and stock on both set up i have to say the mk3 out handles the mk2 the mk2 has one down fall it has big prob with under streer and snap over steer when pushed

the mk3 fixed ish the under streer issue with it's new spetion and weight blance and engine placement

the mk2 had great spetion for it time but nothign will beat a duble wish bone spetion

teh biggest down fall tot he mk3 is it's truing radues cause of ti size the mk2 has just as bad but little less cause it's wheel base being shorter

 

[vas85]

From what I understand, Toyota sent Lotus the Mk3 rolling chassis and they setup the suspension. Then, when Toyota got it back, they scratched their heads and said, but, we wanted a GT car... so let's lift the suspension by ~1.5 inches and call it a day.

So, drop the car back down by the same amount and you are back to the way Lotus intended.

I agree except only for the backhalf being dropped by 1.5 inches hehe :naughty:

 

[vas85]

Nick M, do have a link/source to that article?
....and stupid 0-60 numbers? Why, were they way overated? (I've heard the stock turbo is hard pressed to do 7)


Concerning MKII vs MKIII, if they both have Lotus suspensions, I highly doubt the MKII handles better for any other reason than weight. The only fair comparison would be with a lightened MKIII. I'm sure a weight ratio better than 53/47 would help too.

So does a rolling chassis have suspension geometry in place (implying Lotus just tweaked) or does that mean just the axles and that Lotus made the double wishbones? Not that important a distiction, but I was curious.

I really believe given similar weight,or probably not even... the MKIII should outhandle, yes the MKII is lighter probably might 'feel' more agile, but the whole point of a wider bodied car, is a lower center of gravity, and when turning corners that is what helps a lot, a long with wider profile tyres from factory and like some others have quoted. I'm sure the MKII handles (i've got a soft spot for them since seeing Butterfly Effect) but I dont think engineers would be stupid to go backwards with a newer chapter of a car, doesn't make sense...

 

[Tanya]

Many mk2 and mk3 owners on cs.com swear up and down the mk3 handles better, which I'm sure it does. despite the weight, it is a newer car, different setup and all. Mk2 has a lot of bodyroll for being a lighter car too.

 

[ViR2]

i haven't accidentally broken my supra loose yet though...it feels pretty well planted. although i havent broken any fullsize car loose... only time i have was in my car in a wet parking lot with the e-brake.

e-brake sux, u dont need no e-brake when u have RWD car, just play with oversteer, clutch and throttle and u're good to go Driftoooo

 

[ChadMKIII]

i haven't accidentally broken my supra loose yet though...it feels pretty well planted. although i havent broken any fullsize car loose... only time i have was in my car in a wet parking lot with the e-brake.

I did........and it scared the hell out of me. First and only time I've ever had the tires loose in any car.
Freeway cloverleaf entrance, I was going down it about 35 or so in 3rd gear, floored it towards the bottom of it, as soon as the turbo spooled the back in took off on me, sent me flying sideways into the 2 right lanes of traffic........
I was lucky not to have gotten hit, I was able to get back over to the side immediately but it still scared me half to death. There is nothing quite like sliding down the freeway at a 90* angle watching SUV's come flying at you at 70mh.......
I'm actually glad it happened tho, it kinda showed me I'm not invincible, and I could've easily been killed if I had flipped the other direction and had a car hit my driver's side (no one hit me at all, thank God), or it could've happened with someone else in the car and we could've both been killed or injured.
Gave me a new respect for physics

And I thank Gran Turismo, if I had no experience with car dynamics (its a pretty darn good sim) there's a good chance I would've been across the freeway entirely.....


Anyways, compared to my parents Olds minivan and Pontiac Bonneville, they feel like they're floating Buicks compared to my car, and I thought they had taught supsensions before I drove the MkIII.

 

[Cya]

Hehe, that's why the JDM JZA70 Springs are the best! :biglaugh:

Didnt Jdm MA & JZ 70's use Tein shocks? I saw some last year on Ebay that claimed they were JDM stock replacements? That would help explain alot....

 

[Figit090]

I did........and it scared the hell out of me. First and only time I've ever had the tires loose in any car.
Freeway cloverleaf entrance, I was going down it about 35 or so in 3rd gear, floored it towards the bottom of it, as soon as the turbo spooled the back in took off on me, sent me flying sideways into the 2 right lanes of traffic........
I was lucky not to have gotten hit, I was able to get back over to the side immediately but it still scared me half to death. There is nothing quite like sliding down the freeway at a 90* angle watching SUV's come flying at you at 70mh.......
I'm actually glad it happened tho, it kinda showed me I'm not invincible, and I could've easily been killed if I had flipped the other direction and had a car hit my driver's side (no one hit me at all, thank God), or it could've happened with someone else in the car and we could've both been killed or injured.
Gave me a new respect for physics

And I thank Gran Turismo, if I had no experience with car dynamics (its a pretty darn good sim) there's a good chance I would've been across the freeway entirely.....


Anyways, compared to my parents Olds minivan and Pontiac Bonneville, they feel like they're floating Buicks compared to my car, and I thought they had taught supsensions before I drove the MkIII.

woah. yeah i'm glad you posted that. opens my eyes more every time i hear one of those stories. i dont have a turbo so i wouldnt get that sudden burst of acceleration sadly...but i'm sure it could still happen.

have you ever grabbed a steering wheel for Gran turismo and compared it to the "feel" of the real supra? hopefully a newer one beucase they probably have a better physics sim? because i know its not the real thing but to get the feel of how a car reacts to be thrown around like object avoidance would be nice... i know how it all works but i'm talking car-specific feel and reaction. i.e. i cant go out in my gravel driveway w/my gokart and learn how my supra will do on pavement at 40mph. and we dont have any huge parking lots that arent full of people or in a place where a cop wont get pissed.

a long with wider profile tyres from factory and like some others have quoted.

i've been meaning to ask, how exactly do wider tires help? I ask because when i took a basic physics unit in science class we did friction and when you aphave an object with a small surface area in contact with the ground, and one with a large surface area, they both handle the same horizontal forces to break them loose. now i've taken an advanced physics in HS and i'm still not sure what to think. i have conflicting ideas in my head of how this works...(little rusty) can someone clear it up? i know tire wear would decrease...but can someone explain the laws of friction on different sized tires of the same compound on the same road surface? something from gradeschool is telling me it should be the same but something else is telling me that wrong. i know a wider tire will be more stable. but in terms of grip...

 

[OneJoeZee]

Didnt Jdm MA & JZ 70's use Tein shocks? I saw some last year on Ebay that claimed they were JDM stock replacements? That would help explain alot....

you're thinking of the factory bilsteins.

 

[Big Wang Bandit]

stock on USDM is KYB

 

[vas85]

i've been meaning to ask, how exactly do wider tires help? I ask because when i took a basic physics unit in science class we did friction and when you aphave an object with a small surface area in contact with the ground, and one with a large surface area, they both handle the same horizontal forces to break them loose. now i've taken an advanced physics in HS and i'm still not sure what to think. i have conflicting ideas in my head of how this works...(little rusty) can someone clear it up? i know tire wear would decrease...but can someone explain the laws of friction on different sized tires of the same compound on the same road surface? something from gradeschool is telling me it should be the same but something else is telling me that wrong. i know a wider tire will be more stable. but in terms of grip...

I'm no Dr in physics or anything did comp science at uni, never touched physics, but by pure judgement, wider tyres should give for a higher limit of tractive force before it breaks traction... similarly if you put say 165or 185 width tyres on a supra compared to the stock 225s you'll see you are wheelspinning a lot easier, because there is less grip for the car to play with, and when turning corners, say an old car like a Datsun 180B or whatever you guys in America had, with 145 / 165 width tyres, the car at very low speeds breaks traction into understeer or 4wheel understeer, becuase the amount of forces pressing down on the tyres is on a much smaller width therefore making it brake traction as opposied to having wider tyres whcih spread the load more over the width of the tyre to the ground so it can take some more force upon it before it starts to break traction.

It woudln't be no wonder every single supercar is ultra wide... like a truck and all of them have like 295+ wide tyres on the rear.. which they are usually powered through.

Also have you noticed say Drag Cars... if Grip is what you are concerned with, they have like 30''inch width rear tyres... it's whats needed to keep the vehicle planted...

 

[Adjuster]

I've owned both the MK2 and MK3 version of the Supra.

My 82 had Tokicko adjustable dampers, stock springs, and sway bars, and it handled very well setup that way. IIRC, I replaced some of the bushings with urethane ones on the sway bars too. (End links...)

Ok, it was great unless you hit a bump mid corner.. then it wanted to let loose as the rear geometry was not perfect due to the design as you change ride height, you change camber.

Front was fine. Stuck great. Also had the rear shocks setup slightly firmer than the front ones to help control the tendancy to push at the limit.

My 88T handles great, but this car is way heavy compared to the non sunroof 82 I had.

That being said, with it lowered on B&G springs, Tokico TEMS struts, and ST bars, this handles just fine, and it's not upset like the MK2 was by mid corner bumps and supprises.

The MK3 is more comforable on long trips, has a better overall ride, and starts off with more power, and a transmission that can handle it from the start. (Same goes for the rear diff compared to the MK2.)

Love them both, but I'll keep the 88 thank you very much.

 

[7MA61]

ON a track where bumps aren't an issue and weight is a big factor a MK2 would probably come into its own over a MK3. That being sad I've driven some fairly average roads and whilst the MK2 is unsettled by them its still very controllable. Understeer is a big issue as I learnt today on a drift skidpan day. However when doing normal racing its never been an issue because the small amoutn I've had was easily dialled out with the throttle.

But that had a lot to do with me and my shithouse tyres up front. Once I got used to balancing with the handbrake all was good. A MK3 would make a better road car but IMO on the track a MK2 could be made to perform alot better.

 

[Cya]

you're thinking of the factory bilsteins.

Must have been an upgrade set then. Bilstiens you say, hmmm.....

 

[Figit090]

I'm no Dr in physics or anything did comp science at uni, never touched physics, but by pure judgement, wider tyres should give for a higher limit of tractive force before it breaks traction... similarly if you put say 165or 185 width tyres on a supra compared to the stock 225s you'll see you are wheelspinning a lot easier, because there is less grip for the car to play with, and when turning corners, say an old car like a Datsun 180B or whatever you guys in America had, with 145 / 165 width tyres, the car at very low speeds breaks traction into understeer or 4wheel understeer, becuase the amount of forces pressing down on the tyres is on a much smaller width therefore making it brake traction as opposied to having wider tyres whcih spread the load more over the width of the tyre to the ground so it can take some more force upon it before it starts to break traction.

It woudln't be no wonder every single supercar is ultra wide... like a truck and all of them have like 295+ wide tyres on the rear.. which they are usually powered through.

Also have you noticed say Drag Cars... if Grip is what you are concerned with, they have like 30''inch width rear tyres... it's whats needed to keep the vehicle planted...

yeah thats what i would think naturally. but i think another big part would also be tire wear because a drag car would eat up skinny tires in a flash. ok. i've decided in basic basic physics lessons there is a slight misconceptive lesson i had given to me because it didnt really apply to most things in the "real world". it would tell me about thinks like two differently sized blocks of wood with the same mass pulled across cement, but not something like rubber.

a block of wood pulled at one meter per second over another piece of wood might have the same coefficient of friction and opposing force to being pulled as a similar massed block with less contact area...but car tires react much differently, partially because they are rubber (weird stuff in physics) and part because they are inflated and also rubber contorts to surfaces, unlike a block of wood...
i learned that:
basically, aside from the already skewed properties of rubber, a wider tire can more eaisly deal with imperfections in the road, for instance some gravel or a tiny rock gets in the path of the tire, a small tire might be compromised by this, but a wide one has a much greater chance of keeping sufficient surface area to withstand the loss of grip. and theres more crap i wont go into. i just learned this after doing a more extensive search.

i didnt realize that rubbers dont have a linear function for their friction coefficient... and in drag racing especially, tires acutually are sticky which means they have forces higher than gravity holding them to the road and...yeah....makes more sence now. thanks. oh yeah i almost forgot. on a wider tire you can use a softer compound because the larger surface area spreads out the load; in a narrow tire the rubber would "tear" or "ripple"...basically turn to goo and burnout because the surface is liquified because any one piece of the rubber couldnt withstand the amount of force given to it. a wider tire prevents that by giving each 'piece' of rubber a lower force to share.

 

[ChadMKIII]

woah. yeah i'm glad you posted that. opens my eyes more every time i hear one of those stories. i dont have a turbo so i wouldnt get that sudden burst of acceleration sadly...but i'm sure it could still happen.

have you ever grabbed a steering wheel for Gran turismo and compared it to the "feel" of the real supra? hopefully a newer one beucase they probably have a better physics sim? because i know its not the real thing but to get the feel of how a car reacts to be thrown around like object avoidance would be nice... i know how it all works but i'm talking car-specific feel and reaction. i.e. i cant go out in my gravel driveway w/my gokart and learn how my supra will do on pavement at 40mph. and we dont have any huge parking lots that arent full of people or in a place where a cop wont get pissed.

Oh, no, there is no way Gran Turismo can prep you for dealing w/ your own car, but it hels give you the basic idea of what to do in situations. I still ended up in the freeway, remember, but if I hadn't logged countless hours on GT who knows, I might've just floored the brakes and hoped for the best. Which most likely would've really screwed me over.
I have a wheel for it, but the feel is SUPER light, and it only has 270* of rotation, no clutch, and a sequential shifter. But the idea of knowing vehicle balance, car dynamics, all that stuff kinda gives you a better idea of whats going on and how to stop it/keep it from getting too bad.

As soon as I find a place, I want to take my Supra out and push her a bit, see how she responds IRL. But that seems like an elusive place, I have no idea where I could do that, and I can't risk a ticket.

And on your other question, I always thought greater surface area = greater friction, which should help lend to greater grip. But I'm not really sure it would or not, makes sense to me tho

 

[zack_odom]

MK3 FTW!!!!

 

[OneJoeZee]

Must have been an upgrade set then. Bilstiens you say, hmmm.....

yes, I have them on my car.

 

[Nick M]

Nick M, do have a link/source to that article?
....and stupid 0-60 numbers? Why, were they way overated? (I've heard the stock turbo is hard pressed to do 7)

This issue has more technical notes than later models, as their were refinements to the original.

 

[jmanbball]

I'll have to look up that article in the GT library