Over or Understeer

On stock tires and suspension, does our Cayman have a natural tendency to oversteer or understeer? I have never driven beyond the critical point of over or understeering. What is that critical point?

Normal tendency is to understear. The cars are set up that way from the factory.

now that this has its own topic, I'd like to ask why do you think its like that? why not make it neutral, as in no over or under steer (if there was such thing) ________________________ "Sir! We're surrounded!" - "Excellent! We can shoot in any direction!" A good car will get you from point A to point B. A great car... will just get you into trouble!

In a word, "Liability". Most people will lift and/or brake when a car understeers into a corner. (The crazy ones stand on the gas and add more steering input! ) Reducing speed will allow the front tires to grab & quit pushing through the corner. So your natural response corrects the problem. An oversteering car from the factory is a class action lawsuit waiting to happen

thanks for clarifying why not oversteer, but can it not be made neutral? ________________________ "Sir! We're surrounded!" - "Excellent! We can shoot in any direction!" A good car will get you from point A to point B. A great car... will just get you into trouble!

To be honest the car out of the box is pretty neutral, in certain circumstances it can push on, (Understeer) but you can also make the car go in ar$e out (Oversteer) if you wanted that, just by pressing a little harder on the loud pedal. The only time I've ever had "Bad" understeer was with cold tyres in horrendous amounts of water at slow speed.!!(PSM OFF) But then in normal circumstances PSM sorts it all out for you anyway. Only last week at a trackday in a downpour after lunch, the only cars NOT to spin were 4 Caymans .....must say something about how good the car and it's PSM is !!

Well you know the PSM button truly is the "Please Save Me" button.

That's good to know LMAO, will make sure I remember that ________________________ "Sir! We're surrounded!" - "Excellent! We can shoot in any direction!" A good car will get you from point A to point B. A great car... will just get you into trouble!

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From my only track day, I would say the car is pretty much neutral and only slightly understeers if you push it too hard. Thats why all of my 4 PS2's took an almost equal amount of beating. Their edges were almost equally worn.

At the AX on Saturday I ran 45 front, 40 rear, on Falken Azenis. Completely eliminated the understeer and as a result dramatically increased throttle oversteer. I particularly enjoyed it. Now this was for AX where the speeds never got past 60. At the track I would definitely run lower in front, at most 42/40 on 245/275 NT01s.

Equal sized tires will decrease the understeer. You see every car with smaller tires in the front because the lawyers want understeer since it is safer. That is also why the tire pressure sticker on the door calls for less air pressure in the front tires . That adds understeer. You can play around with your tire pressures for the best results. I run 35 front 32 rear. YMMV

Too much understeer is dangerous - the driver is cranking the wheel trying to keep their line, fronts are scrubbing badly, then the rears give way while the wheel is over-cranked, and the car spins before the wheel can be adjusted properly. Just a touch of understeer is the ticket, and don't 'over-drive'.

Who was it that said something like: "The only difference between understeer and oversteer is which end of the car smacks the wall." ?

nice one not necessarily true though ________________________ "Sir! We're surrounded!" - "Excellent! We can shoot in any direction!" A good car will get you from point A to point B. A great car... will just get you into trouble!

For a good sports car, there should be a small amount of oversteering. What's the best way of tuning the car to get that?

The Cayman IS a good sports car, and it comes with mild understeer. Mild oversteer may be faster in the hands of a good driver, but harder to control/modulate. Even bringing the front and rear tire pressures closer to one another might reduce push to the point of mild oversteer, but for even more range of over/understeer adjustability, adjustable front and rear sway bars may be the best route. I had adjustable sway bars on a RS America once; spent a lot of time trying to find the perfect settings for me; finally went back to the OEM sport suspension sway bars, which were just right.

Found this a couple of years ago and find it a useful reference. View attachment 5069

Thanks, BonB. I immediately thought about that table (actually a similar one), but couldn't remember where to find it. So there are many things to fiddle with, some easier than others. Just don't try them all at once.

The Cayamn is set up for minor understeer from the factory. If you look at the negative camber, the front has less than the rear. This causes the front tires to lose grip before the rear once the car starts to roll. To get a more neutral Cayman, make the front camber more negative. On my road race mazda I run -2.5 degrees all around as the car is pretty balanced. -Trent

under or over? I just did my first track day and the car felt pretty neutral to me; I ran factory recommended pressures which seems not to be the way to go; could someone clarify what pressures are best for street and for track?

freds - There are many threads that address that issue - try searching for "track tire pressures". I run 40/40 hot, but my instructors all think this is too high, and they're faster than I am!