How to tame a tailhappy SS?

I've recently got into the Solo racing-pylon courses on huge lots. It's a blast but I'm having a hard time keeping the rear end planted on tight turns. If I slow down enough to make the turns smoothly my times suck,If I carry more speed and slide through the corners a bit I do better. Is this normal for street tires? I'm waiting on real tires until I can get within 5 seconds of camaros in my class with them. Anything else I should consider? I've got the suspension pkg on my SS ( bilsteins and progressive rate springs)

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97SS,M6,LT4 Clutch Dynomax UltraFlo Muffler ,Bilstein Shocks,Hurst Short Shifter,FLP Long Tube Headers w/offroad pipes,BMR Subframes& Strut Brace

Rear lower control arms works miracles for my rear end. Stays nice and linear during hard cornering. Panhard bar would help too.

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1993 red M6 Z28; custom control arms; bushings; strut bar; Eibach Pro-kit;17" rims & 275 tires; Mac exhaust; K&N cold air; airfoil; TB bypass; 3.73 gears; KVR pads & rotors; -1 camber alignment

Having as oversteer problem is rare for these cars... the suspension setup generally leads to an understeer condition (where you turn the wheels and the car continues sliding straight).
I think that your overstreer problem has more to do with the driving style than anything... if you smash the gas in a corner, pretty much any RWD car will swing the tail out (this is called power-oversteer).
You could add a larger front swaybar to the car to produce more understeer. Before doing that, take a look at how you are driving, have someone more experianced take the car out for a lap and see if they have an oversteer problem too.
90% of the guys in here are fighting understeer, not oversteer

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1971 Camaro
12" brakes
16x10" wheels
VSE swaybars
350 / M21
Autocross Competitive
'83 FSP GTI (driver)
Administrator; 2nd Generaton Camaro Owners Group (2GCOG)
www.nastyz28.com/2gcog/2gcog.html (http://www.nastyz28.com/2gcog/2gcog.html)
Sales / Tech
"The Speed Merchant" - San Jose, CA
http://www.speedmerchant.com/

Soft springs in back, and firm springs in front. You will have to also have to go to a smaller rear sway bar in the back if you stay with street springs. Look for a v6 rear sway 15-17mm

Mike

Know exactly how you feel. I actually just started too. I use the gas pedal though in tight turns to pop the rear end back just a bit to help make the turn. Also you can brake and turn at the same time to help. Learned this from another guy in a Z who is one of the better drivers. Also I learned modulating the gas pedal on an autocross course is something that requires alot of skill to make sure you got all you can and not too much. Only been to 3 events so I know exactly how you feel. Even got some DOT racing tires and still have to be careful with the throttle. It's a blast though and even though I've run consisitently 3 seconds behind I know I will get much closer. I'm stuck in CP though as I have subframe connectors. Go for a ride with a guy who knows what he's doing in a car like yours or even your car, that's what really helped me the most. I was told be smooth, well that ain't the way it's done. You gotta learn how to bounce that back end around here and there. NOT smooth cause it's not a Miata. Good Luck and have fun.

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95 Z28, SLP Y pipe, Flowmaster muffler, SFC, STB, KYB shocks, Moroso CAI, 1LE front anti roll bar, Hurst shifter, TBB, LT4 KM, LG Motorsports pedals

I have autocrossed my new-to-me Camaro twice, what a blast! I'm planning to do at least five more events this season.

Probably stating the obvious here...

Don't jab the throttle. Rolling onto it steadily helps transfer weight to the rear wheels and improve their traction.

If you have a manual, leave it in 2nd gear more, avoid 1st gear.

Less air in the front tires, more in the rear.

More practice! At first I had trouble telling when the rear was starting to slide. The break-away was gradual enough it was hard to tell. It doesn't help my loud exhaust makes it hard to hear the tire squeal, either. I'm improving on catching the slide sooner.

"Less air in the front tires, more in the rear"

If you're at a good pressure level already that would increase oversteer. It would only make sense if you were running both ends too low to start with.

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2000 Firebird convert, chameleon/tan, M5, Y87, TCS
KBDDs, BMR STB and Panhard, 245/50-16 GSCs

Thanks for the input guys. Good to see other people working out similiar issues. An experienced driver at the last event (albeit in a celica)told me to run max pressure in the front, less in the back, and focus on the apexes. Need to read up on that apex stuff a bit more. Oh and I'm not having an oversteer problem-it slides evenly sideways. I'm just trying to minimize my sliding without losing time which might not be possible. Basically what's the fastest way around a 90 degress turn in a camaro- break hard but smoothly and turn quickly or break late and hard and turn/slide thru it? I've been doing the latter.

Brake, then turn as you will have planted the front end weight on the front tires, then throttle. Makes a big difference on where the body weight is. One of the better drivers has a car like mine and this was a major help to keep in mind is where is the weight at. Also taking a road race class can help significantly, around here they are only 120 for a day and are a super bargain for what you get. Have Fun

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95 Z28, SLP Y pipe, Flowmaster muffler, SFC, STB, KYB shocks, Moroso CAI, 1LE front anti roll bar, Hurst shifter, TBB, LT4 KM, LG Motorsports pedals

I'ev been only to a few autox events and the layout is real tight where i go..

breaking hard, then turning in and quickly rolling back on the gas drasticly improved my time vs going in to hot and messingly slamming on the brakes and cuttng wheels resulting in the car plowing thru. I noticed when I do it all right, while I quickly roll back on the gas, the car relatively wips around the cone and I'm rocketing out ALOT faster.. Rather still be fighting to keep my car between the cones and scrubbing off mad speed. On the last event, my best times were in the middle runs.. The first runs I'm always conservative.. the middle i pick up some speed.. but at the end I get overconfident and try going too fast.

I was watching this guy with consitantly the best times for the day in C4 vette and with the tight layout, his car literally seems to leap and jump bewteen turn to turn. No sliding around. Compeltely differnt from the reallly small cars (wierd OLD imports) right there with him in times where they seem to just want to keep their momentum going..


<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by sspeed:
Thanks for the input guys. Good to see other people working out similiar issues. An experienced driver at the last event (albeit in a celica)told me to run max pressure in the front, less in the back, and focus on the apexes. Need to read up on that apex stuff a bit more. Oh and I'm not having an oversteer problem-it slides evenly sideways. I'm just trying to minimize my sliding without losing time which might not be possible. Basically what's the fastest way around a 90 degress turn in a camaro- break hard but smoothly and turn quickly or break late and hard and turn/slide thru it? I've been doing the latter.</font>

"Basically what's the fastest way around a 90 degress turn in a camaro- break hard but smoothly and turn quickly or break late and hard and turn/slide thru it? I've been doing the latter."

Through the corner? - beats me.

Fastest around the course - Brake hard but smoothly, turn and get on the gas early. See the comment below about the guy in the vette. Watch the guys who win.

A favorite quote of mine - "We don't race through corners - we dragrace between them." - Carroll Smith

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2000 Firebird convert, chameleon/tan, M5, Y87, TCS
KBDDs, BMR STB and Panhard, 245/50-16 GSCs

I know this is a Road Racing site. You might pick up a few tips for auto Xing.

http://www.turnfast.com/

I was taught
"Slow in ... fast out.
Fast in ... reagain control coming out ... then you're late on the gas.
You choose. "

If the corner is real tight you have to take it real slow. If it is open at all you can go outside to inside to outside and widen the radius of the turn, thus allowing a higher speed trough the turn. Try to steer as little as possible through any turn. Steering takes away yours tires' ability to accelerate and decelerate. They will only do one at a time. If you add 2 of these conditions at the same time they have to share the available traction between the 2 tasks you are asking your tires to perform. We know what happens when we ask our tires to too much at once don't we? Those poor little pointy orange things get run over. http://web.camaross.com/bb/smile.gif

Any way, I go with the slow in - controlled turn - early on the gas - fast out theory.

heh, there was this one tight autox course that I got my best time by plowing over a cone with a time penalty!! Luckly there was just one cone there.. If they put a couple more there, the outcome would have been much different..

I'm a novice too, but I've found that if the rear tires are overinflated, it will get very loose. Depending on what tires you're using, 30~32 is as much pressure as you need, and may still be too much.

I've also found that the right rear needs about 2 psi less than the left rear, since under power the driveshaft torque loads the left rear.