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From my limited knowledge, those design objectives sound very nice. It would be cool to hear from a few of the engineers on the forum though. If they are as nice as they sound like they are going to be, I will definatly pick up a set.
I do have a question though, how much do you need to lower the ball joint if you are say, one inch lower then stock? Does that mean you would want it one inch lower? Or lets say your lowered two inches, does that mean you want the ball joint down 2 inches? What is the relationship?
Rob, to expand a little bit on why these are good. Basically, there are three reasons.
1. Help correct the camber curve. The wheels go into a bad part of the camber curve when lowered and the camber goes positive which is bad for traction. With a better camber curve you could run less static negative camber to help with braking and tire wear.
2. It prevents the axles from bottoming out, extending axle life.
3. It raises the roll center back up. The roll center is a real or imaginary line that the car rolls on. On a Macpherson strut car it is found by drawing a line out parallel from the lower control arm and then parallel to the top of the strut tower. Where those lines intersect is called the instantaneous center. You then draw a line from the tire contact patch to where those lines intercect. I believe you do that on both sides and then where the lines coming from the contact patch intercect is the roll center. To find the roll axis you connect the front and rear roll centers. When you lower the car, the front roll center drops fast, it can drop below the ground. This creates a large roll couple and a steep angle for the roll axxis, niether of which are good.
People that know more then me, please correct any of that if its wrong.
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