I was doing some thinking yesterday, and was considering the effects of running relatively little static camber and excessive amounts of caster, vs. the normal -3ish degrees of static camber that we tend to shoot for.

The way I see it, the advantages would include reduced rolling resistance, improved traction under braking, and better grip on the inside front tire. The only disadvantage I can imagine is that because the wheels' camber is dependent on steering angle, you would basically have to decide if you want to set your car up to perform better in tigher turns, or in wider, high speed turns (if you can even generate enough caster to generate enough camber in the first place?)

any thoughts?

 

generally steering angles are so small that a high caster setting wouldn't give enough camber. worse is that caster, particularly large amounts of caster, will change your corner weights dramatically. because of the corner weight change be directly related to steering angle, the weight and feel of the steering feedback is changed. this leads to a car that may feel really good but is actually slower.

if you don't want to run a high static camber setting, make the car stiffer in roll.

nate

 

for sure you would have better straight line braking

 

I've been curious about this as well. I was thinking about trying it next year as I've got 3.3 degrees of camber up front currently. Its great for auto-x but kills the insides of tires on road courses.