Some photos of the steering at FULL lock this time:
In the photo just above, you can very much see the Ackerman effect created by the angle of the knuckle arms. This is the effect where the wheel on the INSIDE of the turn actually turns tighter that the outside wheel, because when travelling around a corner, it actually travels on a tighter circle than the outside wheel.
However for drifting, when the wheels are at full lock, we are NOT actually turning in a tight circle. In fact we are usually going in a straight line, sideways, with the wheels at, or close to, full lock. So the ackerman effect is definitely NOT desirable for drift, and ends up scrubbing out your tyres more, and reducing traction. To correct this for drift, you actually need to either have some custom knuckles made, with the knuckle arms to the tie rods actually IN LINE with the car and pivot point of the steering strut (lower ball joint), INSTEAD of angled in like a normal car.
Here is a picture of how it is in a normal car:
And here, showing when turning how the angled in knuckle arm actually makes the inside wheel turn tighter:
SO, hopefully now you can see how if I made the knuckle arms straight, this gets rid of the Ackerman effect. I haven't done this modification yet, but will hopefully be taking out the knuckles again shortly, and cutting them and carefully re-welding them straight in line with the ball joint to remove the ackerman effect. This is a common practise on drift cars, and I have some modified nissan ones for another car already as well.
Here's more photos of the lock, and details of how I did it on the Starion.
There you go people!! The full story so far on getting good steering lock!
I will post more updates once I modify and re-weld the knuckles.
