'Make or break' your race car with these pro tips.

Suspension dampers (aka shocks) are well-established products, so in this day and age, surely anything you get off the shelf from a high-end brand should be ready to roll, right? Wrong.

Andre Nader of DNA Autosport & Modal Suspension explains some of the variances that generic off-the-shelf products, no matter the price, must operate within compared to dialling in custom bespoke suspension for your car, tyre choice and driving style.

He runs through some key points around ride/suspension frequency and its relationship to spring rates, as well as what a driver might be looking for in order to know that his damper setup is sub-optimal, which includes hopping or skipping on the surface of the race track and instability under braking.

Why remote reservoirs are used, how a 'safe' car balance isn't necessarily fast and how trying to cover up the poor suspension with extreme alignment/setup changes is a slippery slope is also explained.
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TIME STAMPS:
0:00 - Dampers: Omitted Performance?
0:25 - Andre Nader - DNA Autosport
0:38 - Why A Bespoke Damper?
1:10 - Race Suspension
1:34 - Window Of Performance
2:30 - Chasing Tyre Performance
3:20 - Issues To Look For
4:20 - Spring Rate Selection
5:16 - Ride Frequency
6:01 - Tyre Temperature Data
7:05 - Alignment Vs Springs & Dampening
8:18 - Car Balance Vs Spring Rate
9:26 - Ride Frequency Calculation
10:05 - Modal Damper Construction
11:01 - McPherson Strut Vs Multilink
11:43 - Compression And Rebound
13:21 - Why? - External Reservoirs
14:40 - Lap Time Gains: Off The Shelf Vs Custom
15:32 - Where To Spend Your Money?
16:22 - Modal Suspension
16:44 - BUILD.TUNE.DRIVE
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LINKS:
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TAGS:
#highperformanceacademy #buildtunedrive #dnaautosport #modal #wtac #suspension #damper #automotive #timeattack #aero #carsetup

[StreetDreamzTT]

Man this guy just has the answers ready.

[gothicpagan.]

These guys really do know their business. Good products and service by all accounts from other teams in the paddock.

[ltapex]

I wish we had a local expert. We are assembling now. Everyone sells a package but receiving actual assistance with their product is non existent. Just in his comments are things I wish I knew, outside the basics of car behavior.

[mayklll]

😮 what a boat load of info. Thank you to the both of you

[usesap]

Great job by both Andres, very informative interview

[ericschumacher]

I would be great to hear a discussion on sway bars. There is a lot of contested opinions on how much wheel-rate the sway bar should contribute vs the spring itself…..some people go as far to say sway bars are a balance “bandaid” and should be as small as possible / non-existent if all other suspension design & tuning aspects are correct.

I personally think the line between a production based car and a purpose built race car makes some of these contested opinions a bit blurred, due to how significantly different the open class cars at WTAC are from their road going counterparts.

There probably is no straightforward answer though it would be nice to understand why opinions differ so greatly on the topic of sway bars.

[AshLongie]

Hahahah hi Andre it's Andre I'm sorry I'm just immature 😂😂😂😂😂

[AshLongie]

so what i got is try it see if it works lololol

[dynodom]

"the car is made of millions of parts" ????!!