Front Tire Stagger?
There really is not such a thing as front tire stagger. Each front wheel is independent upon the other tire. They are not linked together turning at the same time as the rear which is tied together on a common axle. A circumferance change on one tire will not effect the other,You will notice the size difference and a difference of your corner height on the side of the larger tire. This is the same as weight jacking. More than often you will hear racers refer to this difference as stagger and a smaller left side tire by one inch is often used on racing chassis.
This Tire size difference does however, effect the breaking torque applied to both the front tires during entry into the turns. As brake torque is applied to the front tires, the left front tire has more brake torque applied to it due to the size of the tire and will apply more brake pulling the car to the left into the corner. This is the same as effect as caster split.
A good starting point is to use 1"-1.5" stagger in the front and use less caster split 1.5 deg - 2 deg. What this will allow you do do is to use less caster split with the larger stagger size of the front tires, so you do not have to make a large caster split allowing little steering effort to steer to the right. With the larger right tire it adds more wedge to the left rear........
When you increase your tire size on the right rear by a circumference of 2" over the left rear, you gain turnability, Most chassis require atleast 1.5" - 2" of stagger in the rear to help the chassis to turn.
One other way of making your car wanting to turn is to change the length of your trailing arm on either side by 1/8". If you shorten the right rear or lengthen the left rear you are making an adjustment to the rear axle in the way it tracks to the chassis. The rear wheels will always be turning to the left by a small amount. The benefit is better turning in the corners. the down fall. Your car will drive sideways down the straight away.
One aspect you will want to look at is the type of suspension you are using, depending upon using a 2 link, 3 link, 4 link, Mono Leaf suspension as your car leans in going into the turn your chassis will develop what is known as Roll Over steer, Roll Under steer, or it will have a Neutral Roll as it goes through the corner, What happens with the suspension is that trailing arms and leaf springs are only one lenth which is non adjustable when your driving down the track. as you go into the corner, the left rear trailing arm is moving upward and the right rear trailing arm is moving downward. This is causing the axle to steer to the left or to the right depending upon how your car is set up. The best way to find out how your car is roll steering is to set it up like your ready to race. Measure from the center of the left front tire to the center of the left rear tire, then place a jack under the chassis to simulate the left rear coming up in the turn and measure it again. Then measure the right side, you will want to compress the right rear , you can do this by placing the jack under the axle on the right side as close to the outter end of the axle and jack it up..Measure the right side again.
Now take your two measurements and minus them to get your roll steer, if the right rear has a greater distance than the left rear then you are in Roll oversteer, if the left has a greater distance than the right rear your in Roll understeer. If you have equal distance between both tires then your Roll neutral.
Now doesn't your car steer better?
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