The Triumph Dolomite Club - Discussion Forum

It is more at the rear 30 and fronts 28. Did you mean try lower in rear and higher up front?

Cheers

Tony

Galileo wrote: ↑Sat Jul 21, 2018 10:28 am

tony g wrote: ↑Fri Jul 20, 2018 7:25 pm Pressures are 30 rear 28 front.

Recall Trackerjack saying in a thread to try swapping that around and play with having more pressure in the rear than the front. Seen as we no longer can get the correct tyres and Triumph are in no position to give advice it can't hurt to experiment!

tony g wrote: ↑Sat Jul 21, 2018 5:01 pm Ah was it only front bars that were thin or thick?. Removing the rear and trying that is an option and I had thought about softening the rear damping also . Maybe they need a thicker front bar after all?

Cheers

Tony

Yes mate, only the front bar had a choice (no choice at all really, the factory changed the spec) rear choice is fit it or leave it off!

Initially, only the Sprint had a rear bar, though it was adopted down to the 1500HL before production finished, which MAY be why the first Sprints had a thicker front bar. Reputedly, the front bar was downsized because of feedback from customers about twitchy handling/excessive understeer. For my money, it could just as easily have been cost cutting to use the 1850 one on both models, or am I being too cynical?

All but the very last Toledos had NO antiroll bars at all, though all the mounting points are present so it's a simple upgrade and a bit of a no brainer. When I first built the Carledo, it had none, adding the front one made a HUGE difference, the rear one afterwards hardly made any difference at all, maybe a microscopic improvement, but that was on my specific car.

Steve

I've an odd memory, can't remember people's names but here's that Trackerjack post I was thinking of!

"...I was running my sprint on 185x60x13 and a tyre that was not available back in their day, I ran them at 26 front 30 rear and a well known Dollie guru at Mallory told me to swap them round and have more in the front.
In my case I ran 30f 26r and the car handled a treat,"

Ah ok I'll give it a try

Cheers

Tony

That makes more sense now. Upgrading the front bar may be the best bet if one is available?

Cheers

Tony

Carledo wrote: ↑Sat Jul 21, 2018 6:28 pm

tony g wrote: ↑Sat Jul 21, 2018 5:01 pm Ah was it only front bars that were thin or thick?. Removing the rear and trying that is an option and I had thought about softening the rear damping also . Maybe they need a thicker front bar after all?

Cheers

Tony

Yes mate, only the front bar had a choice (no choice at all really, the factory changed the spec) rear choice is fit it or leave it off!

Initially, only the Sprint had a rear bar, though it was adopted down to the 1500HL before production finished, which MAY be why the first Sprints had a thicker front bar. Reputedly, the front bar was downsized because of feedback from customers about twitchy handling/excessive understeer. For my money, it could just as easily have been cost cutting to use the 1850 one on both models, or am I being too cynical?

All but the very last Toledos had NO antiroll bars at all, though all the mounting points are present so it's a simple upgrade and a bit of a no brainer. When I first built the Carledo, it had none, adding the front one made a HUGE difference, the rear one afterwards hardly made any difference at all, maybe a microscopic improvement, but that was on my specific car.

Steve

Try tyres at 30 front,28 rear ,it worked on mine .makes steering slightly lighter and more grip on rear.

As a long time Triumph owner this is news to me.....

Carledo wrote: ↑Sat Jul 21, 2018 4:01 pm As far as I know, it was only the very early Sprints that had the thicker front bar, may have been the original 2000 cars or thereabouts.
I have VA 2245 AND VA 10224 ( both series 1 cars) in my yard ATM so will measure them and compare them to the Carledo's bar which came from an '80 model Sprint (Series 4 car) and my own '78 series 3 Sprint's bar (VA 26140)

I am sure that the front ARB was the same throughout production (part number 218416).

Dolomites had a back ARB from the beginning of production (in 1972) (part no. 217661).
Sprints have the same part number listed from 73 to 80.
From various Club magazine articles I gather some early Sprints had a thicker ARB on the back than the 1850 one
but this isn't recorded in the parts books.
I had an early Sprint and it didn't appear to have a thicker ARB?

I am thinking that this is something like the use of Toledo/early 1850 steering racks on some early Sprints?



Ian.

My Sprint parts list dated Sept 75 (so series 1 only) only lists 1 bar for front and 1 for rear with the part numbers quoted by Ian above

But i've SEEN a thicker front bar, so they must have come from somewhere! I'll do the measuring tomorrow!

Steve

The thicker ARB may have been a one-off or an ST part?

I do have a ST catalogue here but can't find it (I looked last night),
it is here somewhere I know
As of last night I am very time poor for the foreseeable (long story) so don't think I will be able to find said catalogue,
may be a question for you to ask separately in the motorsport section or Facebook, Steve?



Ian.

Well i've done my measuring! I have 5 bars in my possession (or care) all of known origin and disappointingly, all are within 0.20mm of 20.5 mm diameter. The figure I remember for the larger bar is 24mm, though this is not definitely gospel, my memory is not perfect!

Steve

Thanks for that Steve

Tony

I remember when my Sprint was running it had been lowered a lot and it used to understeer terribly when making progress. Never got round to fixing it.

Mine is more like described by Tony (hence interest in this thread), initial oversteer feel followed by a more neutral response, almost like a weight has shifted. if I commit into a corner it does cling on but very disconcerting, I've suspicions about my suspension overall so I've a lot to check.

Very early Sprint definitely had a thicker rear ARB, VA6 has one. I don't think there were many, but couldn't say when it changed to the thinner one.

Hi Tony, pressures 30 front / 28 rear for me too on 185/60 Yoko's.

Another thing to note is that if your car is lowered too much at the rear, this will cause some adverse characteristics as I 've found out on my Sprint.

I'm led to believe that the lower trailing arm on the outer side (if in a bend) will be under such a negative angle that the outer wheel tends to tuck-in even more than the normal weight transfer would induce, causing a very nervous feel at the steering wheel.

I've since adjusted the rear height to 490 mm measured between the underside of the wheel rim and the wheel arch as suggested by LJColeman on his NAB 755T Dolly and the handling is much more secure, without the nervous twitch.

If you have adjustable suspension platforms, I suggest you experiment what settings suits you best. Of the ca. 23,000 Sprints build, maybe only 100 have the thicker ARB so I'm not convinced that 22,900 Sprints have bad handling

Also I can recommend the shorter/adjustable front tie-bars as supplied by Rob of sprintspeed.co.uk . These give a better turn-in and straight line stability without noticeable heavier steering.


Good luck experimenting