I was reading the "Advanced Setup Guide" in the LFS Manual and on suspension, it said this :-

'Q) How do I tune them? A) Thankfully you can get a very good idea of what settings to run very easily. If you open up the Suspension Analyser file for the car you are looking to tune..................'

what in gods name is a suspension analyser and how do i open the "Suspension Analyser File" ?

Maybe it's the box of the suspension? when shift p

http://en.lfsmanual.net/wiki/Links#Setups

Bob Smith also has his Vehicle Handling and Performance Analyzer (VHPA) which is probably a more complete and up-to-date tool.

http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?t=16961
http://www.vehicle-analyser.com/

You'll be wanting Analyze for Speed of LFS Replay Analyser - These handle .RAF files and pretty much give you all the information you'll want.

http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?p=640959#post640959

windy81 - I've not re-written the setup guide in ages. At the time of writing, Colcob's suspension analyser was still the main tool for the job. It has since been superseded by VHPA, which integrates Colcob's suspension analyser, my Gear Ratio Calculator, and adds new functionality too. Once I've finished rewriting the guide (atm, progress is practically standstill), it will of course refer to VHPA, rather than the two outdated tools.

Quote from Bob Smith :

windy81 - I've not re-written the setup guide in ages. ...

Perhaps someone could also change "analizer" to "analyser" in this link. Analizer just makes bump and rebound sound like dirty euphemisms...

Wow, some ancient links there. I've not been hosted by Tiscali for some time. You do know anyone with an LFS account can log in and edit them, though?

A) This is best to set last out of all the suspension options. To get an idea, if you put all your suspension details in the Suspension Analyser and go to the “Suspension Loads and Travel” section, you can see how much travel you have left. Unused travel is making the car unnecessarily high, which raises the centre of gravity, therefore increasing weight transfer and lowering maximum available grip. However don’t forget to set the G forces before lowering/raising your car. See how much is left under both maximum lateral and maximum longitudinal G forces – you should not run out of travel at any point (NB: apply maximum lateral and maximum longitudinal forces one at a time)

How do I apply the maximum lateral/longitudinal g-forces ? Do i just drive around and see if send sparks out on curves ?
I nerver found "Suspension Loads and Travel". I didn't find it in LFS and i didn't find it in VHPA.

When I say maximum G forces, these depend on the car and the tyre choice see the G force tables in the appendixes.
Where are the g-force tables ? Which are the appendixes?

The g-force table can be found in the appendices at the end of the document, assuming you are reading the original file version (found here), and not just the text that got copied to lfsmanual.net. The table is ancient though, as is the guide, and specifics are not very useful.

You can achieve the same effect in VHPA, by setting the steering straight and putting brakes to full, or by setting brakes and throttle to zero, and steering to full.

Gotta really say Thanks!

I've once visited the website, but didn't download the software. Felt at the time i could do without it. But installed it just today and damn suspension setting feels a lot easier then before. Its actually good to drive too Keep up the good work.