C63 AMG (W204) 2008 - 2015

Negative camber for track cars

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Old 02-05-2017, 02:23 AM
  #26  
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kinda late to the thread but i also experienced some issues when i tracked my car last once last year with lack of turn in and understeer. Luckily i have a supercharger to help rotate the back of the car, however we're fighting the laws of physics on this one guys. It's a fullsize sedan not a miata lol.

The "crash bolts" not sure who decided to start calling them this. They are simply adjustment bolts will only get you about 20 minutes of extra camber.... 60 minutes in a degree = 1/3 degree. yah! i can do math.

A stiffer front sway bar is possibly the worst thing you could do - saw that mentioned earlier in the thread.

More camber good idea and should help.

More Toe out in the front end should help as well. typically most benz's are running 20-30 minutes of total toe IN. Track prepped cars are running 10-20 minutes of toe OUT. this will kill your tires much quicker on the street but something to consider if you're that hardcore. tire life reduced to say 3k mi rather than 10k mi for the fronts.

Widest front tire possible or since this isnt all that easy - consider running a smaller one in the back to help rotate the car with more throttle.

stiffen the dampening in the rear to promote oversteer, soften front end dampening to allow for maximum grip and traction

Lower isn't always better. This always depends on each individual setup, just because lower center gravity is better and looks cooler, ruining suspension geometry to get super low can make the car handle way worse than it would with stock ride height.

some of this is common sense but i think most of the focus has been solely on camber in this thread thus far. And for you big time track rats- keep in mind if you drive your car to the track and make alignment adjustments to the camber this directly affects the toe! I've seen and known plenty of people that have marks on there centrics/cam bolts for camber and mark where to set them back to for track and street settings. Thats great and you gained your negative camber temporarily for the track day but you totally screwed up the toe settings for it which may make the change to camber negligible, so unless you really know your **** or like playing with tape measures and strings keep that in mind.

Glad to see people actually tracking these beasts! keep it up!
Old 02-05-2017, 09:04 AM
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Originally Posted by Jasonoff
If you go wider in the front you may need to beef up the front sway bar.
Originally Posted by roadtalontsi
A stiffer front sway bar is possibly the worst thing you could do - saw that mentioned earlier in the thread.
That was me and I did said "may" need to. It's normal suspension geometry. He only mentioned increasing the front tire size. If he goes past correcting the understeer with camber and tire width, unwanted oversteer could be a result and a thicker bar may be required to get the balance back.
Old 02-05-2017, 11:37 AM
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i dont really think going too big in the front of our car is even possible - short of an awful rocket bunny kit and running 355 width tires lol, but yes that's true if you somehow corrected the understeer issue and needed to bring balance back. Does anyone even make an upgraded sway for our cars yet? Usually all benz run a nasty stiff sway bar so they can go softer on the overall spring rate to achieve a better ride quality with good cornering feel. Heck, i wonder if anyone has tried to slap on a regular c350/300/c250 sway bar and thrown some different higher rate springs in - that could actually be on the money, even without the springs it might work as long as you have the clearance for wheel travel.

Always keep in mind that stiffer isnt necessarily better. The only reason race cars run insane stiffness is because they have insane downforce and it rides like dog **** at low speeds because at high speeds that 1000lbs of extra down force is being applied to the suspension. My lotus taught me this best, that to handle good it doesnt have to be stiff. The softer it is the more mechanical grip the suspension can use when setup properly. Hence why most of these adjustable electric dampener cars actually have faster lap times in comfort mode rathar than sport or sport plus.
Old 02-05-2017, 11:24 PM
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Originally Posted by Ernst V Bauer
Thanks for the input.

I am running KW V3 with K-Mac plates (Thanks Kevin). My alignment settings are -3.5 front and -3 rear with 0 toe all around, I will try pulling less camber out in the rear. No track time yet but the K-Mac plates really help with turn in and you can definitely feel the difference on how the car rotates - less resistance when dealing with the front heavy bias.

Great to see the front adjustable strut tops have allowed you to achieve the 3.5 degrees Negative Camber!

Do point out that the K-MAC front bushes (replacing the 4 major highest wearing bushes) will allow to increase this to 4.5 degrees plus 30mm increase in track width!

The design also does away with the OEM oil and air voids yet still with 2 axis movement. Result is noticeably improved brake and steering response.

Method is to record both Street and Track (from Toe settings). The 4.5 degree Camber setting can then be easily adjusted from engine bay on track days. Dramatically reducing understeer in the quest to hit those corner apexes every time and allowing to go deeper into the corners with increased traction and braking response - to further lower those lap times!

REDUCING THE EXCESS NEGATIVE CAMBER ON THE REAR:
Unlike upper rear Camber arms that need to move top of tire outwards and are difficult to access – we have designed the K-MAC adjusters to move lower arm inwards and easy access – single wrench. With the aid of tire heat probe at track side can quickly fine adjust settings for maximum traction.
Old 02-06-2017, 10:30 AM
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I ran 255/35-19 MPSC2 fronts on custom offset 9" wide wheels at Mosport for a good three hours (four tanks of gas) with no issues, and on the street for about a month before switching to the winters (put the winters on a tad early as the MPSC2s were shot and on the street worse to drive in colder temperatures than the MPSS). I have a Canadian 2013 APX Coupe, which in additon to the USA P31 + LSD package also retains the track-tuned, 10mm lower & stiffer suspension from the old USA P30 package. The alignment is OEM. Will be running 255/35 F & 275/30 R MPS4S this summer.

I can tell you the whole story about the wheels and try to calculate an approximate offset, but it would be still be approximation because I don't know what the starting offsets were when they were 8.5" wide. I can made an educated guess, but it's still going to be a guess.
Old 02-20-2017, 08:13 PM
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Wobble64, with Black Series front fenders and much wider front wheels and tires, not enough front end grip still. What size tires are you running in the front on the track?
Old 02-21-2017, 05:56 AM
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I am running 255/35/19 and 265/30/19. I have tried both Michelin PSC-2s and Pirelli Trofeo Rs. The Trofeos are even a bit stickier than the PSC-2s. Both, however, were very well balanced with the rears without excessive understeer.

I was running about 3.5-4 degrees negative camber. 4 is a bit much and you can feel front grip while braking, diminish. 3.5-3.7 is probably the sweet spot.
Old 02-21-2017, 01:35 PM
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Originally Posted by Diabolis
I ran 255/35-19 MPSC2 fronts on custom offset 9" wide wheels at Mosport for a good three hours (four tanks of gas) with no issues, and on the street for about a month before switching to the winters (put the winters on a tad early as the MPSC2s were shot and on the street worse to drive in colder temperatures than the MPSS). I have a Canadian 2013 APX Coupe, which in additon to the USA P31 + LSD package also retains the track-tuned, 10mm lower & stiffer suspension from the old USA P30 package. The alignment is OEM. Will be running 255/35 F & 275/30 R MPS4S this summer.

I can tell you the whole story about the wheels and try to calculate an approximate offset, but it would be still be approximation because I don't know what the starting offsets were when they were 8.5" wide. I can made an educated guess, but it's still going to be a guess.
Great to hear that another track guy was successful with fitting 255/35 in front with stock fenders and 9" wide wheels. A local guy has the W212 wheels for sale that another post in this thread mentioned would work. I'm also going to see how much of a spacer would be needed if I used the 9" rear wheels up front. Not too hip on using a spacer unless it was reasonably small. Thanks for your help on this.
Old 02-21-2017, 01:45 PM
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Originally Posted by Wobble64
I am running 255/35/19 and 265/30/19. I have tried both Michelin PSC-2s and Pirelli Trofeo Rs. The Trofeos are even a bit stickier than the PSC-2s. Both, however, were very well balanced with the rears without excessive understeer.

I was running about 3.5-4 degrees negative camber. 4 is a bit much and you can feel front grip while braking, diminish. 3.5-3.7 is probably the sweet spot.
Glad to hear that going to 255/35 in front reduced understeer to a reasonable level. I'm at 245/40 with 3 degrees negative camber now and have too much wear on the outside half of the tire. I'll increase to 3.25 negative camber with 255/35 and see how it goes as its my daily driver.
Old 02-22-2017, 03:29 AM
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Originally Posted by colinamg
Great to hear that another track guy was successful with fitting 255/35 in front with stock fenders and 9" wide wheels. A local guy has the W212 wheels for sale that another post in this thread mentioned would work. I'm also going to see how much of a spacer would be needed if I used the 9" rear wheels up front. Not too hip on using a spacer unless it was reasonably small. Thanks for your help on this.
The OEM W212 E63 fronts are 19x9 ET37, which might be a tad too aggressive with 255s - but there's only one way to find out for sure. I started with 8.5" wide 3-piece rims with 245/35-19 PSS that I guess were around ET48 - made for a non-AMG W204 C class - no rubbing. Got 12mm spacers and longer bolts - pushing the effective offset to ET36 - for a more flush fitment and still had no rubbing withthe same 245 PSS . Figuring that I had 12mm of room to play with, I got outer barrels that were 2" wide instead of the 1.5" outers and slapped on a set of used 255/35-19 PSC2s that I had lying around. Voila - 255s on the front on what should be a 19x9 ET42 rim (assuming that I started with ET48) with no rubbing.
Old 02-22-2017, 10:09 AM
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Originally Posted by Diabolis
The OEM W212 E63 fronts are 19x9 ET37, which might be a tad too aggressive with 255s - but there's only one way to find out for sure.

You missed the earlier post in this string:

OEM W212 E63 wheels on a C63 with 255/275 tires
https://mbworld.org/forums/c63-amg-w...tment-c63.html
Old 02-23-2017, 11:54 PM
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Originally Posted by zcct04
You missed the earlier post in this string:

OEM W212 E63 wheels on a C63 with 255/275 tires
https://mbworld.org/forums/c63-amg-w...tment-c63.html
ZCCT - the link is broken (it has the ... in the actual hyperlink as well, not just the text). Can you please re-post?

Thanks,
Doug
Old 02-24-2017, 09:19 AM
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Doug, try this link.

https://mbworld.org/forums/c63-amg-w...tment-c63.html
The following 2 users liked this post by Mort:
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Old 02-24-2017, 10:50 AM
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Thanks Mort!
Old 03-20-2017, 04:45 PM
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Its not a direct comparison but I track my W212 E63 with the stock 19" wheels and run a 265/35 up front with no rubbing - could probably move up to a 275 but fitting the K-Mac camber plates first and then rechecking fitment.
Old 04-25-2017, 07:48 AM
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Gentlemen, looking to purchase W204 Front Camber and Caster bushing Kit #502616K to do some front wheel correction. Just have a question before I purchase. Hopefully someone who has this already can verify.

1. What range do the bushings alone provide. The listing on the KMAC site does not provide the range. Based on what I read here, it claims 4 times the range of the stock bolts so I'm assuming its 1.2 +/- degrees of adjustment?
Old 04-26-2017, 02:48 PM
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Kevin,
Thanks for the response, kit is ordered.
Old 08-20-2020, 07:40 PM
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Have you been entirely satisfied with the K Mac setup?
Thanks.
Old 08-21-2020, 06:38 AM
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Yes. It did exactly what I needed it to do, get more even wear from my tires.

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