absolute SHORTEST throw shifter hardware for FiST??

[M-Sport fan]

Do these cars have any inherent problems with too much rear brake (you've mentioned you have the Wilwood multiple piston fixed calipers on the rear axle, why I ask)??

Even though it is a completely different dynamic, the 4th gen f body people who road coursed their cars did EVERYTHING they could to REDUCE the rear braking forces (i.e.; stock/low level pads, proportioning valves set to ~90/10 front/rear, rear shock rebound cranked up high, etc.) due to BAD, axle and ring and pinion/diff breaking, axle hop/shudder on hard braking coming off of high speed straights into tight turns.

Are the FiSTs exempt from those problems due to no drive on the rear beam axles???

 

[RAAMaudio]

I have purposely added more rear bias in a FWD car, the next FWD I built had a poor ABS setup that would freak out even in an autocross and leave you with no brakes so I deleted the system, added a "bias" adjuster which are really just a pressure reducer as I was then flat spotting rear tires under heavy braking into higher speed turns.

More modern ABS on a car like the ST is so far better I would not remove it.

When searching for a balanced front to rear setup I was not impressed with the WW single piston, cable parking brake, bigger rotor, add more weight...offering so I set out looking for a way to make a better upgrade and found a WW caliper rotor with little ears for some parking brake on the street though I knew it was not going to be a very effective parking brake but better than none.

A 2 or 4, etc piston caliper is going to apply pressure to the rotor more evenly and provide more predictable braking, pad and rotor life, etc.

This is very car dependent, always better to have as the breaking on all four wheels and the front is always more important but when downshifting into a turn, trail braking, etc...having the rear do as much of the work as possible is a good thing when done right to lessen the load on the front that is doing the majority of braking, all the steering and acceleration.

It becomes a bit of a formula when at first sorting it out, rotor diameter and piston area to determine the torque bias front to rear and then what parts are available, mods to the particular car, etc.....I have to admit it was a bit of a guessing game but came out pretty accurately all things considered, just needed a bit more rear weight.

With rear seat delete and other things I took far more rear weight out than on the front and under 130+ MPH hard last moment breaking the rear was getting a bit unstable so I had to fill up the tank and carry the extra weight in the back which really helped.

I just spent a ton of time and serious money to move more weight to the rear of the car, approx 50 lbs less up front, 50 lbs more in the rear now.

 

[RAAMaudio]

I believe the 4th gen had a solid rear axle, that is a major issue to work around as quite a handicap, having a rear beam axle is generally less optimal than IRS as well but since mostly along for the ride not as tough to optimize.

One thing I did right away to my car was cut the rear axle flanges and change the rear camber for two reasons.

Though fun up to pretty decent speeds having a looser rear end on very high speed corners is not safe and my car is build to be pretty fast around such corners so I added more rear camber and set the toe in to zero, it was a very time consuming operation and one I could not do not that rull time RVing. The stock rear camber was very shallow to induce the rear coming around so the car could be driving more like a RWD, I did not agree with that setup so changed it.

BUT, the car can be setup to work really well with stock rear camber via sway bars, etc....but I went a different route.