The truth about caltracs
The biggest problem that the CalTracs don't address is instant center. On any leaf spring car the IC is the front spring eye. Mopar A bodies have the shortest front spring segment (20") of any car out there, resulting in the IC being too short and high. This makes the car hit the tires too hard, creating the classic Mopar bounce/porpoise problem. The Chevy and Ford cars have 25" front segments that put the IC in a favorable position. Some racers I've talked to have been told by Calvert that if they want to make the car work properly that they would need to run Chevy springs in their car, but most just don't want to do that. A lot of guys in the Drag Radial classes move their spring mounting points just for this reason. Some guys have great results because their track is run by guys that know how to do excellent prep, thus virtually anything will hook well even if the suspension sucks. One of the biggest culprits is VP LC7 lane choice track prep compound. This stuff is ruining tracks left and right. It does not work in the heat period. At the start of the season I was cutting 1.50 60' times in cool over cast weather, now the 60' in the heat are 1.6-?. At the end of the season they will come back down to 1.5 again. Used to never have this problem when the track used PJ1 VHT.
The biggest problem that the CalTracs don't address is instant center. On any leaf spring car the IC is the front spring eye. Mopar A bodies have the shortest front spring segment (20") of any car out there, resulting in the IC being too short and high. This makes the car hit the tires too hard, creating the classic Mopar bounce/porpoise problem. The Chevy and Ford cars have 25" front segments that put the IC in a favorable position. Some racers I've talked to have been told by Calvert that if they want to make the car work properly that they would need to run Chevy springs in their car, but most just don't want to do that. A lot of guys in the Drag Radial classes move their spring mounting points just for this reason. Some guys have great results because their track is run by guys that know how to do excellent prep, thus virtually anything will hook well even if the suspension sucks. One of the biggest culprits is VP LC7 lane choice track prep compound. This stuff is ruining tracks left and right. It does not work in the heat period. At the start of the season I was cutting 1.50 60' times in cool over cast weather, now the 60' in the heat are 1.6-?. At the end of the season they will come back down to 1.5 again. Used to never have this problem when the track used PJ1 VHT.
