RCR Lola T70 Front Suspension

I finally received my RCR Lola kit. It was worth the wait. I'm mostly getting the lay of the land right now. I have the chassis sitting on 5" blocks (5" ride height) and the front upper control arms are at a angle such that there can be only about 1" of travel before the upper ball joint (which appears to be a tie-rod end) binds. Looking at photos of other RCR Lola-like setups, the angle is not as severe. Hmmm... Am I missing something?
 

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Fran Hall RCR

GT40s Sponsor
Frank,
You need to have the front lower control arm parallel with the ground ...that is the starting point for the ride height. Once you have that there you will be fine...
Feel free to give me a call or drop me a PM on the forum and I can help you further if you need.
 

Glenn B.

Lifetime Supporter
Frank,

Fran will give you great guidance, but if he doesn't mention this, I would also like to suggest that you also check the diameter of your front tires. I had the same issue and when we took all things into consideration, we found that the front tires that were spec'd by the original owner of my car were way too tall, which were not "period correct", but more importantly, raise the upper A arm much too high when the ride height is set correctly.

I found that a tire around 23.5" in overall diameter is the maximum that will allow everything to fall into workable angles. The original Lolas ran with a very wide variance between the front and rear tire diameters, up to as much as 4".

Hope this helps.

Glenn
 
Glenn:
You are spot on. I have Avon CR6-ZZ 225/65 R15 on the front which measure at 26.7 Dia. Studying the photos I took before I disassembled the car it looks like there is plenty of clearance between the front tires and the fenders. So a 5 inch ride height is doable. I'll wait until the body is back on but I may fabricate new upper A-arm mounts. I have a Bridgeport, 2 lathes, surface grinder and all to do-dads that goes with them.
Thanks,
Frank in sunny (today) Newberg, OR
 

Glenn B.

Lifetime Supporter
Frank,

Wow...your fronts are way too tall! Here are the specs you should be targeting. You can source tires close to these from Goodyear, Dunlop or Avon.
I would suggest saving yourself the hassle of fabrication and swap the tires.

(Fronts)23.0X10.5-15 CAN-AM
Rim Diam Sect TW Weight
10.0 23.4 11.8 10.4 16.9lbs

(Rears)27.0X14.0-15 CAN-AM
Rim Diam Sect TW Weight
17.0 27.0 18.5 14.8 25.3lbs
 
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Glenn B.

Lifetime Supporter
Frank,

These shots will give you a sense of the wide tire size variance front-to-rear, and how small the fronts were in comparison.
 

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I'm with Glenn. If you move the upper A arm mounts, but don't do anything with the lower A arm mounts you are going to change the intended role center, bump steer etc. You may end up opening a whole can of worms. Better to use the intended tire size.
 

Ron Earp

Admin
We ran 225-50-15s on our RCR Lola T70. Check my build thread, there are notes including ride heights, suspension settings, and so on. The car had flawless handling once we got it all setup.
 
Frank,

These shots will give you a sense of the wide tire size variance front-to-rear, and how small the fronts were in comparison.

Oh my oh my, I love those rear tires in those pics, so fat :bow:

I hope the rear profile of my 917 looks like that
 
thinking about this thread at work yesterday, so had a quick measure of the Dunlop's on the 3b. Fronts are 4.30/11.6x15 which come out at 23.6" dia. rears are 5.30/16.00x15 which are 25.6" dia. So glenn's 23.5's are pretty much spot on.

Also, remembered this pic in my collection from building the continuation cars. Gives a good view of the tyre size comparison F/R. Plus I really liked this pic:)

Cheers

Darren
 

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