[Patricko]

This car "was" owned by a distant relation of a friend of mine. You should be very careful of changing things on the suspension of the Elise or adding wider wheels to the front of a standard car.

This is his story:

Well, I am sure most of you will probably say I had this coming, and you are probably right. This is what happened to me on my way home after playing golf Saturday morning. Of course I was going too fast, but the main culprit was a change I made to the car two days prior. The car was already setup to handle very neutral, meaning no under-steer or over-steer. Well, in an unending quest for improvement, I had a larger diameter rear anti-sway bar installed, which was supposed to induce a "little" over-steer. Well, as I was coming home, speeding a bit through this turn on Baseline (about a mile from home), the tail snapped around too fast for me to catch, and the car hit the curb and barrel rolled 3 times before coming to rest upside down on this guy's front lawn. I guess I am lucky because I was not hurt, I didn't hit any other cars, or any pedestrians on the street or anyone living at that house. Live and learn. Golf is bad!! But seriously, I guess I need to slow it down a bit or get it out of my system by taking it to the track. Also, I guess I need to learn to leave something that is well enough alone. Here are some pictures of what I did to my poor baby.

 

[Patricko]

and again

 

[Patricko]

and another

 

[Patricko]

He was driving too fast but if not for the changes he may have not crashed

 

[The Stig]

Damm... that looks like Shinoo's car. that F#cking sucks. Is the passenger(s) ok? I agree do not make any unnecessary changes to a suspension that is already near perfect for the road. I don't think there are many drivers that can get the full potential out of the standard suspension.

Neil

 

[Genjuro]

I would say that driving to fast is an understatement. For the car to end up in an elevated position when compared to the road is really crazy. I'm glad he didn't get hurt. Looks like a couple more feet would have made the accident much worse.

My elise will not have a single suspension change. I need to learn how to drive the car as Lotus intended it to be driven first.

 

[NMRJock]

Damm... that looks like Shinoo's car. that F#cking sucks. Is the passenger(s) ok? I agree do not make any unnecessary changes to a suspension that is already near perfect for the road. I don't think there are many drivers that can get the full potential out of the standard suspension.

Neil

That's one of those arguements that I've never liked. If I can get 85% (or whatever) out of the stock suspension, I'm likely to get 85% (or nearly that) out of a better suspension. Which means that I'll be faster (although still not driving to the limits of the vehicle). Even a bad driver tends to be faster in a better car...

 

[TripleBlack_NJ]

I think the bigger rear bar had nothing to do with it. Your friend just ran out of skill. With 60% of the weight up front and an open front differential there is no way that car can be made to have an oversteer bias even with a 22-24mm rear bar.

Just because you make a car more likely to come around when you lift or brake mid corner, doesn't mean it has an overtseer bais.

My STi is setup with a 20mm rear bar and no front bar at all. Still does not have an oversteer balance. It is just more sensitive to throttle steering and trailbraking.

 

[Patricko]

That's one of those arguements that I've never liked. If I can get 85% (or whatever) out of the stock suspension, I'm likely to get 85% (or nearly that) out of a better suspension. Which means that I'll be faster (although still not driving to the limits of the vehicle). Even a bad driver tends to be faster in a better car...

I don't think making changes is a problem but if you don't know what you are doing...I trust Lotus

 

[khamai]

Even a bad driver tends to be faster in a better car...

Yes, true... BUT... They still aren't any better STOPPING!!!

I have always said "Speed doesn't kill - STOPPING does!" No one that I know of has died because of speed. We're spinning around the sun at some thousands of miles an hour & we aren't dead! No... it's about stopping, or more correctly HOW you stop. Hitting something hard and immovable is the worst way to stop.

Unfortunately "bad" drivers or inexperienced drivers haven't learned how to stop or avoid stopping by hitting something. So, while it is perfectly logical that an inexperienced driver can go faster in a better car, it may not hold that that an inexperienced driver can stop any better in a better car.

 

[zvezdah1]

As I recall, the S1 Elise had a lot of oversteer dialed in straight from the factory, apparently lots of these cars were toasted by inexperienced drivers, reason they put in understeer in the series 2 cars.

Not car expert, but would equate an inexperienced driver with a car setup for oversteer, with a newbie learning to ride buying an R1!

Chris

 

[Randy Chase]

That's one of those arguements that I've never liked. If I can get 85% (or whatever) out of the stock suspension, I'm likely to get 85% (or nearly that) out of a better suspension. Which means that I'll be faster (although still not driving to the limits of the vehicle). Even a bad driver tends to be faster in a better car...

In just about any other car I would agree with you, but not the Elise if the issue is non-LSS vs LSS.

 

[Stan]

I've seen EVO's at autocrosses and stock they can lift an inside rear tire at corner entry / mid corner. Adding more rear bar won't change the behavior of the car when one tire is off the ground already at that end.

Looks like the car was not driven very well, not to mention very irresponsibly for the conditions.

Stan

 

[The Stig]

That's one of those arguements that I've never liked. If I can get 85% (or whatever) out of the stock suspension, I'm likely to get 85% (or nearly that) out of a better suspension. Which means that I'll be faster (although still not driving to the limits of the vehicle). Even a bad driver tends to be faster in a better car...

I am sorry you don't like the argument. Most of us on this forum are enthusiast, and better drivers than the norm (I hope). I was speaking about the norm. People who buy race/sports cars like the Elise who are used to driving honda Accords. They couldn't get 30% out of a good sports car. But whats the first thing they do lower it or boost the power.:no:

Not many of us here are race pilots, it takes one to get 85% out of an EVO or an Elise. When you start thinking that you are better than the car, that's when **** hits the fan. IMO.

Neil

 

[amcmahon]

That makes me sad to see another Evo gone down. I can totally believe the change he made caused part of the accident. He may have been used to taking that turn at a certain speed before.
Since I used to own an Evo I know it has a tendency to understeer. If he got it to snap oversteer than he did something uncharacteristic to the car. I'm glad no one got hurt. Common streets aren't prepped like tracks and you should never think you can push your car like you might be able to on a track. Lesson learned I hope.

 

[Stan]

>>>That makes me sad to see another Evo gone down. I can totally believe the change he made caused part of the accident. He may have been used to taking that turn at a certain speed before. Since I used to own an Evo I know it has a tendency to understeer. If he got it to snap oversteer than he did something uncharacteristic to the car. I'm glad no one got hurt. Common streets aren't prepped like tracks and you should never think you can push your car like you might be able to on a track. Lesson learned I hope.<<<

Sway bars don't lead to snap oversteer. Especially on cars which lift an inside wheel outback anyway. Less understeer / more oversteer yes, but not of a snap nature.

And the car could not have gone up the wall and hill, flipping three times without being very extremely past safe, legal street speeds.

Thankfully only a car was lost. Hopefully someone will have learned an important lesson.

Stan

 

[James A]

At least where the picture was taken the curve is very gradual, how in the world did he lose it so bad? And yes increasing rear roll stiffness likely made the car understeer less/oversteer more but that does't look like the main problem here. The main problem was the dreaded red fog/haze you hear about at driving schools.
The one thing I would strongly recommend when making suspension changes is try them out in a safe environment like an autocross, NOT ON THE STREET!
Can you say preferred risk insurance?

 

[Derek]

My STi is setup with a 20mm rear bar and no front bar at all. Still does not have an oversteer balance. It is just more sensitive to throttle steering and trailbraking.

STIs are far more likely to understeer than EVOs... Common knowledge. Check out the TopGear video that compares the two on the track.

 

[Derek]

That's one of those arguements that I've never liked. If I can get 85% (or whatever) out of the stock suspension, I'm likely to get 85% (or nearly that) out of a better suspension. Which means that I'll be faster (although still not driving to the limits of the vehicle). Even a bad driver tends to be faster in a better car...

You would more likely need to get 95% out of the stock suspension to see any benefit of the LSS setup. Even then you would only be able to test it’s limits on a racetrack. On the street, the street setup would likely have the edge over LSS.

Both are excellent setups; however they are focused on different applications.

PS: Speed - Experience/Talent = DEAD!

 

[TripleBlack_NJ]

STIs are far more likely to understeer than EVOs... Common knowledge. Check out the TopGear video that compares the two on the track.

I agree, the STi does have more understeer than the EVO. My point is that either car with an inside rear wheel off of the ground still does not oversteer.

I've raced against many EVOs and STIs and it takes pedal imput to make either car come around no matter how much rear biased the roll stiffness is.