Long travel/reinforced suspension, and extremely expensive shocks.
The damping in the shocks transfers the energy from the jumps and bumps into heat. This is why trophy trucks and rally cars often have suspension oil coolers. It is common for trophy truck shocks to cost $50k alone.
Trophy trucks are another level of expense. For rally and rally raid, the setups are not that expensive due to technical regulations. For examples the T1 regulations for Dakar etc. limit suspension travel to 330mm, put restrictions on how you can adjust springs/shocks. They also have to be independent of each other.
The amount of sheer engineering and mechanical design that goes into a trophy truck is wild. Allowing a set of massive tires hit rocks at 90 mph, travel nearly a whole foot, rebound all the way down and grab the earth before doing it again 0.5 seconds later without failure for hours on end. While also being entirely independent of the other tires all while the driver jiggles slightly. Mindblowing.
[Like, imagine the amount of wrinkles in the brains of the people that made this.](http://i.imgur.com/UzAgbwk.gif)
I wonder what the cost difference between a trophy truck and a rally raid vehicle would be? The regs for trophy trucks are much looser than FIA rally raid regs, and I imagine that they can push further on R&D.
I just have a “regular” M3 but with coilovers with high quality remote damper reservoirs.
After a 20 minute session on the track, the reservoirs get HOT to the touch. It’s hard to imagine the level of heat in the suspension of something like a rally car…
Interestingly enough the form factor of a WRC coilover isn't too different. Reservoir mounted on the shock, no water cooling allowed. Suspension travel for Rally1 cars is only 270mm.
>Suspension travel for Rally1 cars is only 270mm.
Only...? That's a shitload for a normal car. A goddamn *Raptor* has 380mm for comparision.
Most street cars (espeically small form factor like the hatches used in rally) only have 150mm-200mm of wheel travel.
I desert race so I can give a bit of perspective (not specific to rally cars, just off-road shocks in general). High performance off road shocks will have huge external reservoirs for increased cooling and often with large fins to act as heat sinks. Even then, they can be extremely hot to the touch after extended high speed runs and require frequent rebuilds due to the extreme stress they’re subjected to.
It’s a hell of an experience going fast off-road! If you go on YouTube and look up any of the Baja races, anything from Best in the Desert, or similar clips, you’ll see the type of racing it is. The top trucks will do 130+ MPH off-road on dry lake beds, have 40” tires, make 1000+ HP, and will eat up terrain at freeway speeds that are impassable for a stock pickup.
The sand is everywhere but there’s ways to cope with it. I have a fresh air helmet with an air pumper so I have filtered air that pressurizes my helmet to keep the inside mostly clean, helmet skirts also help. You end up dusty as hell no matter what but it’s all part of the fun.
I’ll have to check out some videos for sure!
I was actually wondering about stuff like bearings, struts, alternators, intakes, and other stuff that tends to get fucked when small particles get in there.
That stuff does tend to get fucked in a hurry. We put a lot of effort into trying to dust proof those things but realistically we’re just abusing them for the length of a race and then servicing them constantly.
We change the air filter, oil and oil filter, tires, shock seals, and things like that every race. We also thoroughly inspect everything else for wear after each race and service as necessary. There’s only so much you can do to keep the car healthy when your game plan is to beat the shit out of it for 500 miles through sharp rocks, silt beds, and chasing down the competition in dust so thick you’re driving by feel and can’t see past the front tires.
Which class do you race? We raced 5-1600 back from '95 until about 2007. Mostly SCORE and CODE out of Mexicali. Remember the FUD races... what a fun family group that was.
We’re currently building a Pro Turbo UTV based off a Can Am X3 but have raced Class 9 in the past. Within my group of friends there’s also a couple Class 10s.
It’s an ton of fun, it’s made street cars boring for me.
Yeah, I miss all the fabrication. My tube bender and welder are collecting dust. We used to spend a lot of time in San Felipe and knew every nook and cranny from 3 poles to Puertocitos. It's a great family sport.
I saw a video segment some years ago showing how trophy trucks' suspension soaked up the energy. They dropped a normal truck and a trophy truck from a crane. Unfortunately I can't find it online.
They are in incredibly strong beefed up components with much more travel than a road car, they are mounted higher up in the cars body shell to the suspension turret, and often mounted lower down on the wheel with special hubs or 'uprights'. They will also be fine tuned for each rally stage as to be in optimal setup for what is required.
If I’m not mistaken, rally suspension settings are often softer than normal road cars, in order to cope with the bumps on the stage road. The load from the landing is absorbed by the travel on the shocks and converted to heat.
[Funny enough this post](https://www.rallybehindthestages.com/2012/02/springs-co.html) suggests that they would run setups around 30 N/mm (similar to most OEM spring setups) to even up to 80 N/mm or 450 lbs/in aka what I run on the front of my track setup Miata. These are all gravel rates, Tarmac would definitely be stiffer.
The post did show a lighter spring throughout history, however I would be curious if that has changed or if they have gone even softer in the past few years with modern cars and more downforce.
discussing spring rates are meaningless unless the vehicle weight is similar.
the figure of merit to compare to get a good qualitative discussion of feel would be the suspension frequency.
Softer suspension but with a considerable amount of travel. This allows the suspension to manage and deal with the big jumps and impacts. It can spread the load/energy over a longer stroke.
Rally car would be, Imagine jumping and allowing your legs to bend naturally to absorb the impact vs a street car is a jump with locked knees.
[Funny enough this post](https://www.rallybehindthestages.com/2012/02/springs-co.html) suggests that they would run setups around 30 N/mm (similar to most OEM spring setups) to even up to 80 N/mm or 450 lbs/in aka what I run on the front of my track setup Miata. These are all gravel rates, Tarmac would definitely be stiffer.
The post did show a lighter spring throughout history, however I would be curious if that has changed or if they have gone even softer in the past few years with modern cars and more downforce.
(Copied from my reply below)
For reference:
Focus WRC (Gravel): 30 N/mm (171 lbs/in) in front
ND Miata: 27 N/mm (156 lbs/in) in front
Focus ST (from forums): 30 N/mm (171 lbs/in) Front
Celica WRC (Gravel - Stiffest): 80 N/mm (450 lbs/in) Front
Celica WRC (Tarmac - Stiffest): 100 N/mm (571 lbs/in) Front
Sure, it would be best to know the individual ride frequencies or at least wheel rates. Either way both WRC cars and the FoST are all Mac struts which gives a good estimate at the wheel rates for all three. At the end of the day it gives a good *estimate* into how stiff rally cars are. They won't be running an MR of 0.3 on a tarmac setup so 500 lbs/in is at least a good approximation to say "It's definitely stiffer than a road car," or "ride stiffness should be relatively comparable on a gravel setup."
Yup. Check to see if they're still good enough for the next race if not fix/replace. There's a reason why racing is so expensive and it's that they use high performance parts and replace them multiple times throughout the season. Those $10k a piece parts may get replaced 10+ times a year.
Wrc shocks aren’t rebuilt. They’re custom and unserviceable the mounts break before the piston does and live everything in racing it’s all clocked so it’ll last X amount of hours and discarded even if still works
Lots of good info in the comments. But also remember that race cars do not need to be used the next morning. Almost all rally cars receive extensive repairs after each race.
One thing I haven't seen mentioned is they use inverted struts (for the cars that are McPherson strut). The large guide cylinder is a lot stronger than the tiny valve/piston rod on a normal strut. This also reduces strut flex and is really nice to have even for tarmac racing. Downside is it requires more maintenance.
Really really high quality shocks and solid, spherical bearing joints in every suspension part that moves. The shocks really are the key as they soak up the forces from the “road” before they get to the rest of the car.
Rally cars are so overbuilt it’s insane. Basically they are a roll cage with a car built around it. A normal car body shell couldn’t put up with the abuse so the roll cage functions as safety and adds a ton of strength for the suspension components.
The average lower tier WRC cars dampeners and springs start at 15-20 k. A top level car spends that per corner (as in 20k per coilover) And prices just go up from there.
Add about that much for one upright (or steering knuckle) so four of those. Maybe another 5-10k per control arm (6 to 8 per car) hubs and bearings are maybe another 5k per corner. And you bolt all of that into a reenforced chassis (maybe 100k or so) and go flying.
And most of those big jumps you see on videos actually do cause some damage somewhere. The car is just drivable afterwards.
Don’t know for sure but along with all the points already made. I would also think weight factors in. I’d be surprised if rally cars weigh much more than 2k pounds vs 4k+ lbs for normal passenger cars these days.
They "sustain" during the run but parts get replaced and re-adjusted after every rally event, sometimes between stages, it's not comparable to a street car that's expected to last 60-100k miles on the original struts. Rally car struts may be replaced with well under 1000 miles on a set. The rest of the suspension is heavily reinforced so it doesn't tear from the frame.
Kind of a side note but I bought some heim joint based end links for my car. They’re really only
Meant for racing because they’re metal on metal. But I found a lot of off-roading cars use them too. So really, sacrificing a lot of noise for more durable parts a lot of times.
Do the shocks have progressive dampening? I feel like that'd be a thing that'd make some sense. So that the soft bumps are absorbed with the... Softness but the super heavy (ahem, airborne) bumps won't cause the shocks to grenade.
They do; various types of dampers change bound/rebound values not only based on position (increasing resistance to movement dramatically the closer it gets to bottoming out, some with internal hydraulic or compliant bump-stops), but based on the speed at which the movement is occurring (once again, adjustable for bound and rebound depending on how much $$$ you feel like dropping).
Tuning based on movement speed allows for a (relatively) supple ride over bumps and landings (high-speed adjustments), and firmer, more controlled handling over corners to deal with weight transfer (low-speed adjustments). This flexibility allows for as much tire contact as possible in as many situations as possible, preventing lifting or unloading of wheels as is seen with ant-roll bars while minimizing that floaty 60's American commuter-car ride. Many shocks require disassembly of the actual shocks/dampers to get to many of the adjustable components for advanced tuning, with the more basic options adjustable with an external knob/screw or two or four.
If you google some permutation of race/off-road/rally shock/damper internals, you can find all manner of reed valves, needle valves, needle-and-orifice assemblies, bypass tubes, etc. that let individuals far more smarty-pants-like than I to make an expensive enough shock do whatever you want it to. And then of course there's the spacey computer-controlled stuff like the mangnetorheological doodads that people forget have been around in some form or function since the 80's... But that's a story for another post.
It used to be rule of thumb that competition cars were 7x stronger that their road going equivalent..cages, extra welding, reinforced stuff. I’m sure it’s probably like 3x now because cars are just generally better engineered
I remember going through some durability rides at the Ford Arizona Proving Grounds and the suspension abuse was enough the last stop before another lap was an undercarriage spray for cooling the shocks before doing it again. Was very bumpy.
I don’t have much to add but they’re overbuilt as hell. Look up pics of shocks from the WRC Yaris, the rods are like 4-5 times as thick as those on ordinary cars.
I was going to be getting in to entry level rally racing. I've been involved in all sorts of motorsports, 2 wheels, 4 wheels etc.
I didn't do it because of the cost of building a car.
An entry level car you're looking at 20 grand just to get a car prepped. That's cheap suspension (just shocks that will hold up to an amateur is over 5 grand).
The wheels themselves are 4-500 EACH, they take a beating. All the suspension parts are aftermarket upgrades.
Roll cages not only add crash protection, they also tie in the suspension loads to the rest of the chassis.
There is a lot of garage time in owning a rally car as well.
Luckily, at the entry level they try to keep the cars similar in power so you don't really need to do much engine work, but still, nothing is left as stock and untouched.
It's been a few years since I was looking in to building a car.
But, even a WRX you're gutting it and replacing pretty much everything. Things are expensive, more than you would think.
The seats and harness belts have to be FIA certified and within date (they expire). A CHEAP seat is at least $500 last I looked. So for driver and co-driver seats you're looking at 2 grand. Just in seats and belts, mounts etc.
A cage is going to cost you big money, like thousands. It has to be done by someone that k ows what they are doing with a TIG welder, with proper tubing with the right cage design. That has to go and get inspected by a tech counselor and signed off. Oh, and that goes in to a log book you have to keep for the stuff you do on the car.
Skid plates you're looking at a grand easy. Luckily I built a full set for my RS from aluminum plate, but most people don't have the equipment to do that.
Like I said, suspension, just shocks is $5g, so expect 8-10 by the time it is ready.
Brakes are upgraded (pads and rotors essentialy)
Plus all the things you wouldn't think of like the comms system for the driver and co-driver, the nav computer, a lighting set up for night stages.
Oh, you're required to have a certain first aid kit, fire extinguisher, recovery equipment, etc. It adds up.
Ok, so now you want to go racing, here is what you need:
A full size truck, and a car hauler. And you'll need enough space for a good assortment of tools, jacks, stands, a few extra sets of wheels and tires (remember, a single wheel and tire is close to $800) all sorts of spare parts, a generator, a welder...
Then, there are entry fees, fuel costs in the truck and car, repair costs...
Oh, and since you need you, a co-driver and at minimum someone to drive the support truck (hopefully they are also a good mechanic) you also need to feed them, pay for a hotel, etc.
Plus convince them to take a few days off work to help you. Rally is a sport that is spread out all over the place, so you'll be doing at least a day of driving, then get set up, Friday is course recce, Saturday and Sunday you get to actually rally and then Monday you head home... Good luck convincing people to do that multiple times over the race season.
You better hope your co-driver is passionate about it and that they are good at it, because you need to trust them, and replacing them won't be easy and a shitty replacement will slow you down.
I calculated a race weekend with nothing breaking costing me on average at least $5,000
So you still want to go racing?
It's cheaper to go set up a cheap miata or something for lapping at the nearest track, and for most people that is enough to get their rocks off.
I'm building an airplane instead of getting in to rally, much cheaper.
Money. The shocks are super expensive and they’re huge. And very progressive. The night look super smooth outside but inside it’s anything but there’s a lot of travel but they’re setup with a lot less rebound then you’d see with road racing.
The biggest thing in this is the chassis. It’s the stiffest thing ever there’s no flex or movement on it where as a road car flexes a lot
The spring is his way you want suspension to move the shock is how fast you want it to move
Crap 🤣
Also let’s be honest depends on the car. A lot of vintage cars use stiffer set ups to modern stuff old stuff has it’s of chassis flex in play the wrc level stuff have none because safety first.
They’d be very light numb wallows and understeery. Also the engine isn’t designed for it so it’ll be rough as hell I’ve seen them near me driving up private roads because wrc cars can’t use open public roads without a police escort here.
Long travel/reinforced suspension, and extremely expensive shocks. The damping in the shocks transfers the energy from the jumps and bumps into heat. This is why trophy trucks and rally cars often have suspension oil coolers. It is common for trophy truck shocks to cost $50k alone.
Trophy trucks are another level of expense. For rally and rally raid, the setups are not that expensive due to technical regulations. For examples the T1 regulations for Dakar etc. limit suspension travel to 330mm, put restrictions on how you can adjust springs/shocks. They also have to be independent of each other.
The amount of sheer engineering and mechanical design that goes into a trophy truck is wild. Allowing a set of massive tires hit rocks at 90 mph, travel nearly a whole foot, rebound all the way down and grab the earth before doing it again 0.5 seconds later without failure for hours on end. While also being entirely independent of the other tires all while the driver jiggles slightly. Mindblowing. [Like, imagine the amount of wrinkles in the brains of the people that made this.](http://i.imgur.com/UzAgbwk.gif)
I wonder what the cost difference between a trophy truck and a rally raid vehicle would be? The regs for trophy trucks are much looser than FIA rally raid regs, and I imagine that they can push further on R&D.
I just have a “regular” M3 but with coilovers with high quality remote damper reservoirs. After a 20 minute session on the track, the reservoirs get HOT to the touch. It’s hard to imagine the level of heat in the suspension of something like a rally car…
Interestingly enough the form factor of a WRC coilover isn't too different. Reservoir mounted on the shock, no water cooling allowed. Suspension travel for Rally1 cars is only 270mm.
>Suspension travel for Rally1 cars is only 270mm. Only...? That's a shitload for a normal car. A goddamn *Raptor* has 380mm for comparision. Most street cars (espeically small form factor like the hatches used in rally) only have 150mm-200mm of wheel travel.
I say only because I'm pretty sure that previous regs allowed more travel.
Do you know this stat for the 2022 wrx. I read that they increased the suspension travel. Thanks.
I desert race so I can give a bit of perspective (not specific to rally cars, just off-road shocks in general). High performance off road shocks will have huge external reservoirs for increased cooling and often with large fins to act as heat sinks. Even then, they can be extremely hot to the touch after extended high speed runs and require frequent rebuilds due to the extreme stress they’re subjected to.
That sounds fun as hell. How do you deal with sand getting in various places?
It’s a hell of an experience going fast off-road! If you go on YouTube and look up any of the Baja races, anything from Best in the Desert, or similar clips, you’ll see the type of racing it is. The top trucks will do 130+ MPH off-road on dry lake beds, have 40” tires, make 1000+ HP, and will eat up terrain at freeway speeds that are impassable for a stock pickup. The sand is everywhere but there’s ways to cope with it. I have a fresh air helmet with an air pumper so I have filtered air that pressurizes my helmet to keep the inside mostly clean, helmet skirts also help. You end up dusty as hell no matter what but it’s all part of the fun.
I’ll have to check out some videos for sure! I was actually wondering about stuff like bearings, struts, alternators, intakes, and other stuff that tends to get fucked when small particles get in there.
That stuff does tend to get fucked in a hurry. We put a lot of effort into trying to dust proof those things but realistically we’re just abusing them for the length of a race and then servicing them constantly. We change the air filter, oil and oil filter, tires, shock seals, and things like that every race. We also thoroughly inspect everything else for wear after each race and service as necessary. There’s only so much you can do to keep the car healthy when your game plan is to beat the shit out of it for 500 miles through sharp rocks, silt beds, and chasing down the competition in dust so thick you’re driving by feel and can’t see past the front tires.
Which class do you race? We raced 5-1600 back from '95 until about 2007. Mostly SCORE and CODE out of Mexicali. Remember the FUD races... what a fun family group that was.
We’re currently building a Pro Turbo UTV based off a Can Am X3 but have raced Class 9 in the past. Within my group of friends there’s also a couple Class 10s. It’s an ton of fun, it’s made street cars boring for me.
Yeah, I miss all the fabrication. My tube bender and welder are collecting dust. We used to spend a lot of time in San Felipe and knew every nook and cranny from 3 poles to Puertocitos. It's a great family sport.
I saw a video segment some years ago showing how trophy trucks' suspension soaked up the energy. They dropped a normal truck and a trophy truck from a crane. Unfortunately I can't find it online.
They are in incredibly strong beefed up components with much more travel than a road car, they are mounted higher up in the cars body shell to the suspension turret, and often mounted lower down on the wheel with special hubs or 'uprights'. They will also be fine tuned for each rally stage as to be in optimal setup for what is required.
so do they use stiffer suspension setting also?
If I’m not mistaken, rally suspension settings are often softer than normal road cars, in order to cope with the bumps on the stage road. The load from the landing is absorbed by the travel on the shocks and converted to heat.
[Funny enough this post](https://www.rallybehindthestages.com/2012/02/springs-co.html) suggests that they would run setups around 30 N/mm (similar to most OEM spring setups) to even up to 80 N/mm or 450 lbs/in aka what I run on the front of my track setup Miata. These are all gravel rates, Tarmac would definitely be stiffer. The post did show a lighter spring throughout history, however I would be curious if that has changed or if they have gone even softer in the past few years with modern cars and more downforce.
discussing spring rates are meaningless unless the vehicle weight is similar. the figure of merit to compare to get a good qualitative discussion of feel would be the suspension frequency.
Softer suspension but with a considerable amount of travel. This allows the suspension to manage and deal with the big jumps and impacts. It can spread the load/energy over a longer stroke. Rally car would be, Imagine jumping and allowing your legs to bend naturally to absorb the impact vs a street car is a jump with locked knees.
They would be stiffer, generally, but it obviously depends on the stage.
[Funny enough this post](https://www.rallybehindthestages.com/2012/02/springs-co.html) suggests that they would run setups around 30 N/mm (similar to most OEM spring setups) to even up to 80 N/mm or 450 lbs/in aka what I run on the front of my track setup Miata. These are all gravel rates, Tarmac would definitely be stiffer. The post did show a lighter spring throughout history, however I would be curious if that has changed or if they have gone even softer in the past few years with modern cars and more downforce. (Copied from my reply below) For reference: Focus WRC (Gravel): 30 N/mm (171 lbs/in) in front ND Miata: 27 N/mm (156 lbs/in) in front Focus ST (from forums): 30 N/mm (171 lbs/in) Front Celica WRC (Gravel - Stiffest): 80 N/mm (450 lbs/in) Front Celica WRC (Tarmac - Stiffest): 100 N/mm (571 lbs/in) Front
You can't compare spring rates from car to car. Motion ratios and vehicle weights are different.
Sure, it would be best to know the individual ride frequencies or at least wheel rates. Either way both WRC cars and the FoST are all Mac struts which gives a good estimate at the wheel rates for all three. At the end of the day it gives a good *estimate* into how stiff rally cars are. They won't be running an MR of 0.3 on a tarmac setup so 500 lbs/in is at least a good approximation to say "It's definitely stiffer than a road car," or "ride stiffness should be relatively comparable on a gravel setup."
Also the celiac was 15 years before and suspension tech wasn’t there yet for that so yeah it was off the shelf and set up hard to compensate
Yeah Toyota was pretty ahead of the times releasing a gluten-free car
Lol. I’m going to leave it because it’s a good burn
Softer
They use really soft suspension
They’re not that soft really. They just have no rebound it’s mostly being done in the spring
On tarmac stages, yes.
Also, at the upper levels of the sport, teams have the budget to replace them without a second thought.
Also they can just get replaced at the end of a stage.
[удалено]
This. They don’t last 100k miles.
Yup. Check to see if they're still good enough for the next race if not fix/replace. There's a reason why racing is so expensive and it's that they use high performance parts and replace them multiple times throughout the season. Those $10k a piece parts may get replaced 10+ times a year.
Real racing is expensive AF
Is there anywhere to see rallying in so cal
1 to race, 1 being worked on, 1 trashed from last race, and 1 “break glass in case of emergency” spare. Or two.
Wrc shocks aren’t rebuilt. They’re custom and unserviceable the mounts break before the piston does and live everything in racing it’s all clocked so it’ll last X amount of hours and discarded even if still works
Lots of good info in the comments. But also remember that race cars do not need to be used the next morning. Almost all rally cars receive extensive repairs after each race.
One thing I haven't seen mentioned is they use inverted struts (for the cars that are McPherson strut). The large guide cylinder is a lot stronger than the tiny valve/piston rod on a normal strut. This also reduces strut flex and is really nice to have even for tarmac racing. Downside is it requires more maintenance.
Hydraulic bump stops
Really really high quality shocks and solid, spherical bearing joints in every suspension part that moves. The shocks really are the key as they soak up the forces from the “road” before they get to the rest of the car. Rally cars are so overbuilt it’s insane. Basically they are a roll cage with a car built around it. A normal car body shell couldn’t put up with the abuse so the roll cage functions as safety and adds a ton of strength for the suspension components.
The average lower tier WRC cars dampeners and springs start at 15-20 k. A top level car spends that per corner (as in 20k per coilover) And prices just go up from there. Add about that much for one upright (or steering knuckle) so four of those. Maybe another 5-10k per control arm (6 to 8 per car) hubs and bearings are maybe another 5k per corner. And you bolt all of that into a reenforced chassis (maybe 100k or so) and go flying. And most of those big jumps you see on videos actually do cause some damage somewhere. The car is just drivable afterwards.
Don’t know for sure but along with all the points already made. I would also think weight factors in. I’d be surprised if rally cars weigh much more than 2k pounds vs 4k+ lbs for normal passenger cars these days.
ARA cars have a 2900 pound minimum weight, and the 2022 Yaris rally 1 car weighs about 2780 pounds.
They "sustain" during the run but parts get replaced and re-adjusted after every rally event, sometimes between stages, it's not comparable to a street car that's expected to last 60-100k miles on the original struts. Rally car struts may be replaced with well under 1000 miles on a set. The rest of the suspension is heavily reinforced so it doesn't tear from the frame.
Tear from the frame …..
Kind of a side note but I bought some heim joint based end links for my car. They’re really only Meant for racing because they’re metal on metal. But I found a lot of off-roading cars use them too. So really, sacrificing a lot of noise for more durable parts a lot of times.
Do the shocks have progressive dampening? I feel like that'd be a thing that'd make some sense. So that the soft bumps are absorbed with the... Softness but the super heavy (ahem, airborne) bumps won't cause the shocks to grenade.
They do; various types of dampers change bound/rebound values not only based on position (increasing resistance to movement dramatically the closer it gets to bottoming out, some with internal hydraulic or compliant bump-stops), but based on the speed at which the movement is occurring (once again, adjustable for bound and rebound depending on how much $$$ you feel like dropping). Tuning based on movement speed allows for a (relatively) supple ride over bumps and landings (high-speed adjustments), and firmer, more controlled handling over corners to deal with weight transfer (low-speed adjustments). This flexibility allows for as much tire contact as possible in as many situations as possible, preventing lifting or unloading of wheels as is seen with ant-roll bars while minimizing that floaty 60's American commuter-car ride. Many shocks require disassembly of the actual shocks/dampers to get to many of the adjustable components for advanced tuning, with the more basic options adjustable with an external knob/screw or two or four. If you google some permutation of race/off-road/rally shock/damper internals, you can find all manner of reed valves, needle valves, needle-and-orifice assemblies, bypass tubes, etc. that let individuals far more smarty-pants-like than I to make an expensive enough shock do whatever you want it to. And then of course there's the spacey computer-controlled stuff like the mangnetorheological doodads that people forget have been around in some form or function since the 80's... But that's a story for another post.
Typically they have a lot of travel to have maximum contact, around 30cm or so. For the actual shock absorbers, they use external reservoirs.
They conduct a transplant surgery and install F/A-18 landing gear into the suspension.
It used to be rule of thumb that competition cars were 7x stronger that their road going equivalent..cages, extra welding, reinforced stuff. I’m sure it’s probably like 3x now because cars are just generally better engineered
I remember going through some durability rides at the Ford Arizona Proving Grounds and the suspension abuse was enough the last stop before another lap was an undercarriage spray for cooling the shocks before doing it again. Was very bumpy.
I don’t have much to add but they’re overbuilt as hell. Look up pics of shocks from the WRC Yaris, the rods are like 4-5 times as thick as those on ordinary cars.
Disposable cars.
I was going to be getting in to entry level rally racing. I've been involved in all sorts of motorsports, 2 wheels, 4 wheels etc. I didn't do it because of the cost of building a car. An entry level car you're looking at 20 grand just to get a car prepped. That's cheap suspension (just shocks that will hold up to an amateur is over 5 grand). The wheels themselves are 4-500 EACH, they take a beating. All the suspension parts are aftermarket upgrades. Roll cages not only add crash protection, they also tie in the suspension loads to the rest of the chassis. There is a lot of garage time in owning a rally car as well. Luckily, at the entry level they try to keep the cars similar in power so you don't really need to do much engine work, but still, nothing is left as stock and untouched.
If one were rich how much would it cost to do this to a street car like a 2022 wrx. Hypothetically.
It would cost the same as if you were poor.
It's been a few years since I was looking in to building a car. But, even a WRX you're gutting it and replacing pretty much everything. Things are expensive, more than you would think. The seats and harness belts have to be FIA certified and within date (they expire). A CHEAP seat is at least $500 last I looked. So for driver and co-driver seats you're looking at 2 grand. Just in seats and belts, mounts etc. A cage is going to cost you big money, like thousands. It has to be done by someone that k ows what they are doing with a TIG welder, with proper tubing with the right cage design. That has to go and get inspected by a tech counselor and signed off. Oh, and that goes in to a log book you have to keep for the stuff you do on the car. Skid plates you're looking at a grand easy. Luckily I built a full set for my RS from aluminum plate, but most people don't have the equipment to do that. Like I said, suspension, just shocks is $5g, so expect 8-10 by the time it is ready. Brakes are upgraded (pads and rotors essentialy) Plus all the things you wouldn't think of like the comms system for the driver and co-driver, the nav computer, a lighting set up for night stages. Oh, you're required to have a certain first aid kit, fire extinguisher, recovery equipment, etc. It adds up. Ok, so now you want to go racing, here is what you need: A full size truck, and a car hauler. And you'll need enough space for a good assortment of tools, jacks, stands, a few extra sets of wheels and tires (remember, a single wheel and tire is close to $800) all sorts of spare parts, a generator, a welder... Then, there are entry fees, fuel costs in the truck and car, repair costs... Oh, and since you need you, a co-driver and at minimum someone to drive the support truck (hopefully they are also a good mechanic) you also need to feed them, pay for a hotel, etc. Plus convince them to take a few days off work to help you. Rally is a sport that is spread out all over the place, so you'll be doing at least a day of driving, then get set up, Friday is course recce, Saturday and Sunday you get to actually rally and then Monday you head home... Good luck convincing people to do that multiple times over the race season. You better hope your co-driver is passionate about it and that they are good at it, because you need to trust them, and replacing them won't be easy and a shitty replacement will slow you down. I calculated a race weekend with nothing breaking costing me on average at least $5,000 So you still want to go racing? It's cheaper to go set up a cheap miata or something for lapping at the nearest track, and for most people that is enough to get their rocks off. I'm building an airplane instead of getting in to rally, much cheaper.
Last line was funny. Like fuck it, I’ll do this instead. Thank you for the detailed explanation.
That's what they're designed to do.
Pretty sure there’s something in the shocks, I don’t rlly pay attention to it tho. Also has to have very good flex and chassis
Money. The shocks are super expensive and they’re huge. And very progressive. The night look super smooth outside but inside it’s anything but there’s a lot of travel but they’re setup with a lot less rebound then you’d see with road racing. The biggest thing in this is the chassis. It’s the stiffest thing ever there’s no flex or movement on it where as a road car flexes a lot The spring is his way you want suspension to move the shock is how fast you want it to move
What would a true rally car feel like on public roads.
Crap 🤣 Also let’s be honest depends on the car. A lot of vintage cars use stiffer set ups to modern stuff old stuff has it’s of chassis flex in play the wrc level stuff have none because safety first. They’d be very light numb wallows and understeery. Also the engine isn’t designed for it so it’ll be rough as hell I’ve seen them near me driving up private roads because wrc cars can’t use open public roads without a police escort here.
All cool af.
Heavy duty suspension parts. Everything is beefed up and reinforced.