rear cantilever suspension.

[v1c10us]

I remember reading a magazine and someone had put a cantilever suspension in either a fit, ep3, or ek.
now for those of you who don't know what this is, although you all probably do, the simplest(and not the way I would do it, i would probably use thick billet aluminum) way to do this would be to replace the spring with a rod, attached to another rod, making an upside down L, the stick of the l would go into the car where it would be attached to a pivot point with the strut/shock on the other end, with the end of the strut attached to some sort of joint allowing it to change angles.
in theory you could go as low as possible with this by just adjusting the length of the fabricated piece that would go where the strut/shock were without running into camber issues if you made the point that the strut/shock replacing rod mounts to the pivoting rod adjustable, such as by using several holes that could be chosen at any given time.
This would also allow you to adjust the stiffness if you used a progressive spring since changing the mount point would compress or uncompress the spring
I'm very tempted to do this in the rear of my ep3.
excluding shocks and springs I'm fairly sure I could get this done for under 1500 bucks total.

It would just be a matter of measuring everything out very well and then sending it off to be machined out of a massive block of aluminum, this would bolt up to the remaining stock suspension with no modifications. You would then need to find a place to mount one end of the shock/spring and you would also need to reinforce its mount points because I wouldn't feel comfortable just having it bolted to the thin chassis metal.



something like that, but with the pivoting piece longer and with adjustable mounting locations on both sides.
instead of a triangle I would use something long like an LCA and have it mounted further away from the hole the stock tophat mounts to. and the springs would be mounted vertically instead of at an angle such as these.
I do understand that these diagonal springs would serve to make the suspension stiffer and have less travel though.

I'm under the impression that you could run ridiculously stiff springs but due to the amount of leverage you would have on them you're travel could still be fairly significant.
input?

edit: i would end up elongating the hole that the rod comes out of into a rectangle to allow it to pivot to mount into a new hole, if you look at the last pic, it has 3 holes on each triangle, you could move it to a hole closer to the pivot point, and then on the opposite end, mount the spring on either a further or closer hole to the pivot point, allowing the suspension to be adjusted in stiffness and travel.

[MugsyTheGr8]

for a race car go for it, but i dont think that re-engineering a cars suspension will be that simple.

[v1c10us]

it isnt that complicated, a guy on honda tech did it quite simply

replaces shock/strut




fabricate those other pieces but with my modifications in mind and mount the shocks/struts.
I mean I know i could do it with the help of a few companys and welding shops etc.

[twep]

that piece of rod holding the calipers doesn't look too strong lol

but it looks SO cool in the hatch

[Drew1d]

It looks like a lot of work.

[civiKSiborg]

Also looks like a good way to protect your shocks and springs from corrosion.

[civictype_r04]

That is a crazy set up! I have never heard of or seen this before.

[Tnhatch03]

wouldn't be hard to steal.

keep that in mind. haha

but anyways, i think it would be dope. go for it and let us know how it turns out.

[!@#$%]

I think what mugsy meant by "not be so simple" is that the suspension that is manufactured is made at certain length to be a replacement for a car that is weighed to have support at each corner in different ways.

I'm sure when the Ford GT was made they didn't just say, "We'll take the mustang gt suspension and move it into the upper rear."

[MugsyTheGr8]

I think what mugsy meant by "not be so simple" is that the suspension that is manufactured is made at certain length to be a replacement for a car that is weighed to have support at each corner in different ways.

I'm sure when the Ford GT was made they didn't just say, "We'll take the mustang gt suspension and move it into the upper rear."

exactly. there is a lot of complex geometry that goes into designing a suspension, and you would be hard pressed to design something that would be higher than the factory standard. im not saying don't do it, in fact i hope you do. it would be interesting to see what your feedback on it is when you complete it.

[v1c10us]

well the guy on honda-tech did it and he said it was the nicest suspension he had ever driven.
It would be alot of work, but no more than an engine build, in fact probably less.
Installing all of the parts could be done quicker than swapping an engine provided you had all the materials and welding gear right there with you.

The reason I would make it adjustable is because as you said, I don't know about the suspension geometry, and allowing different mount points would make up for camber and stiffness and travel, which are the only things im concerned with since the rest of it would still be stock.
I think instead of that pushrod type thingy I would use a thick rectangular piece of billet with similiar mounting options at the top, basically it would be like the skunk2 LCA's cept a different shape.
When I get some funds and my streetbike I'll do this because In the event I fuck something up I cant be without transportation.

When/if I do ever get this underway I'll be sure to do a step by step of every stage of the build..
And I'll also do a before and after autoX time; haha!
see how much I improve without any additional practice just by changing the suspension to this wacko suspension.

[Lucid Moments]

Interesting concept. It could work out to be pimp as hell, or it could suck enormously.

As you say the actual fabrication involved doesn't look too complicated. But getting the geometry right could be interesting. This would do all sorts of interesting things to your motion ratios and thus to your spring rates and damper rates.

One other aspect that might be worth thinking about is isolating the cabin from road noise. Not an issue in a race car of course, but in a daily driver you might want to think about it.

[v1c10us]

yeah thats a good point on road noise.
I know that I could increase and decrease my motion ratio's by simply adjusting the point that the rod and springs are mounted to on the pivoting bar.
if you put the spring on the point closest to the pivot point and the push rod on the furthest point away from the pivot point you would have a large amount of torque on a very small area of motion. This would allow you to set it so that for every 5 inches the wheel travels up or down the opposite end could possibly move as little as 1 or 2 inches.
That would make the suspension very soft because you wouldn't have to compress the spring much for plenty of travel.
you could then do the opposite and require the spring to compress 5 inches for every 1 inch the wheel travels; thus making the suspension incredibly stiff regaurdless of the spring used.
Im fairly confident that with the adjustability I have in mind that I will be hard pressed to make the suspension worse than it is now.
Combine all this with adjustable shocks and adjustable height springs as well as possibly a threaded pushrod to replace where the shock/spring was to adjust the height and camber to make up for any modifications to mounting positions and you could have yourself a wicked track car that would only need to be jacked up for 20 minutes to be set back to soft and moderately low for daily driving

[Tnhatch03]

go for it man.

i think it would be sick!

[JCEM]

Huge props to whoever has he balls to do it...even bigger props if it actually handles decent.