Practical Corner Weighting: Adjustable Levelling Pads
Adjustable Levelling Pads
02.23
00:00 | - One of the key considerations when corner weighting your car is to make sure that you're working on a flat and level patch during the process. |
00:08 | Sadly the majority of workshop floors are much less flat than you might imagine. |
00:13 | This goes for setup areas at the racetrack too. |
00:16 | While there are cost effective options for getting around this and creating our own flat patch which we'll see in the practical skills section, the other option is to use an adjustable levelling pad. |
00:28 | These are a frame that's designed to support the scales at each corner of the car and each pad has a set of adjustable legs that can be wound up or down in order to level the scales. |
00:38 | Using these levelling pads, it's easy to ensure that each scale is levelled in both planes and that all four scales are level relative to each other. |
00:47 | The process of levelling the pads can be achieved relatively easily using a long piece of aluminium extrusion and a digital level or alternatively a laser level if your budget allows. |
00:59 | Levelling pads like this can take a little time to set up at the start of a race weekend however once set up, their location within the workspace can be marked on the ground, meaning that for further corner weighting sessions, they simply need to be laid out in the correct location and you're good to go. |
01:14 | Given that a levelling pad will usually raise the car higher than it would be if it was just sitting on the scales on the ground, this also means that we need to give some further consideration to getting the car on and off the scales. |
01:28 | Ramps can still be used however the ramp height will need to suit the levelling pads. |
01:33 | Often professional teams will use these levelling pads along with the setup hubs which we'll discuss shortly. |
01:39 | This means that the car doesn't need to be lifted and dropped to make setup changes and hence the suspension doesn't need to be settled after the change. |
01:46 | This means the car can be lifted onto the air jacks and lowered directly onto the pads. |
01:52 | Some of these levelling pads also include a flat section behind the scale location which is referred to as a roll off. |
01:59 | As its name suggests, this is a flat area that the car can be rolled back onto for the purposes of settling the suspension or making changes. |
02:08 | These levelling pads make it much easier for us to precisely level the scales prior to weighing but this convenience comes at a price and they certainly aren't an essential addition to your corner weighting toolbox. |