1.2G lateral... air-ride claims valid??
 

here is a quote from air rides homepage where thet state the folowing:

"Never has a heavy intermediate GM car been able to corner at over 1.2G...until NOW! This Street Challenge package is an unbelievable combination of comfortable ride quality, SERIOUS cornering power and bolt-on installation. "

http://www.ridetech.com/productinfo/...ngesystems.asp

Are these claims valid, or quoted BS and bench racing??
it sounds just alittle too good to be true.. (and havent we discussed this 1.2 G claim before??)

if airride chimes in here with some unbiased documentation ill gladly shut up and buy a setup.. but untill then i dare to question the validity if the claim.. other than that it is, as stated in the quote.. "unbelievable" indeed

If it's true, I could sure adapt that to the Beemer Killer. I think 1.2G would allow me to out corner the M3 for sure. :D

i keep looking at this kit - over and over

really on the fence - starting to like it more every day

Actually, looking at the detials, I can almost believe the claim. What you've got is essentially a really good replacement suspension. Tubular control arms, big sway bars, 4-link in the rear, etc. with hyper adjustable "coilovers" in the form of air bags. With the ability to change the pressure in an almost unlimited number of ways, you could concievably tune a very high lateral g load into the suspension. Of course, you are tire limited at that point, but what else is new?

I won't believe it until I experience it myself, obviously, but the price is pretty good for a front and rear setup, and if the claims are real, it's work very well for my car.

I believe this was discussed before either here or on P-T but I can't find the thread now.

Besides proper suspension geometry and a good surface, a big portion of that number lies in the tires.

1.2G isn't all that impressive if slicks are involved, but it still is somewhat impressive given the platform the number was achieved on.

Member KAA pulled 1.17 G with his '70 Elky, which wasn't on Air-Ride, and also on Sumitomo HTR street tires, and had a honkin' big block in the nose. That's with a bolt-on front suspension setup and stock geometry C4L in the rear, most of the parts pieced together quite inexpensively from various circle-track vendors.

http://www.chevelles.com/forums/showthread.php?t=146629

The fastest lap time at the RTH2 track day was Bret's Buick..

The fastest car on street tires at the RTH3 was Bret's Chevelle.. second place was his other chevelle.

Bret's Mustang on track tires was almost as fast as a fully track prepped C5 Vette at that same event.

ART doesn't have to make stuff up, they've proven that it works.

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However, there are two ways to measure cornering g-force; sustained and average.

When we test we run the skidpad in two directions. Add the two best times and divide by two. This gives the average g. I could be that they used a device (Racepak, g-tech, etc) and got a peak reading of 1.2 g. and so long as it wasn't in a slide (ie, the car was still under control) then saying it handled a peak of 1.2 g is perfectly valid.

A 1.2 reading for "average" is very hard.. I've never seen it done. The ART Vette managed 1.03 g on the skid pad and that car weighs nothing and has a very low COG.

Anyways, I know Bret and he doesn't make empty claims. :yes:

Again, peak and average are two totally different things. This is why it's important to know how date is gathered and put together when a claim is made.

Even so, pulling 1.2 peak on, it seems, street tires is a pretty lofty goal, and a nice number. Kudos if it's true, which it seems it may be.

Just so I know, is Bret one of the Air Ride guys? It's nice to have people with personal knowledge of vendors on board.

I'm going to be talking with these guys at PRI next week for sure. Anyone has anything they want to know, and don't just want to call them, let me know. I always have my notebook with me.

Bret is the owner of ART.. He's a stand up guy and he litterally beats the crap out of his cars.

I don't know what tires that was on.. could have been DOT R-compound tires.. but thier stuff has won enough auto-x events to have me convinced.