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I ran my 89T in GS, too. Regionally competitive in a street tire regional class; ended up in 2nd for the season after having to stop running my stock car (last two events were driving a WRX -- I didn't like it, especially since I blew my points standing). Anyway, you have a heavy car, you can't get the power down, and you have 5.5" rims, so nothing wider than a 205. Plus, unlike most new Macstrut cars, the Celica has good camber adjustability (Neon, too??). The Mini, Neon, and Celica are just better cars for Stock (BTW, Mini gets a LSD next year -- people are pissed about recent changes to GS that will make it a faster class).
You can do some things to get your car to do better. Saab c900 camber can be changed easily -- put a ton of negative camber in and dial out the toe to zero. I've run over -2* on mine; currently have that much and more on both my c900s. I once ran so much neg camber that the tires hit the springs when I jacked the car up. The car had *amazing* grip up front, but tended to oversteer if not carefully driven (this was an 86 S, stock). For a non-daily driven stock car, I'd do this again. Not streetable, really - too darty.
Take off the front bar to help with traction. I did this, and it does help; this is legal in Stock -- "any" front bar includes *no* front bar. I ended up putting it back on, but just yesterday I spoke with a guy with lots (decades) of track experience with double-A-armed Saabs -- he said to yank it and just deal with the roll; the traction gain is, in fact, worth it. Ideally, you'd use stiffer front springs but you can't do that legally. Note that some people have better results by putting *more* front bar in -- this won't work for your car, so don't copy what others are doing to different brands of FWD.
If you are really zealous, have your rear camber measured; you'll have to confirm, but I believe max spec'd camber in the back is -1*. This may be a gray area for legality, but if you have less than that, you have the axle bent to the max spec.
Get some Koni shocks. Koni rips off Saab c900 owners by selling a fairly low-tech adjustable, but it's better than nothing. You can also look into Spax shocks, which are available in the U.S. at nopi.com; they are adjustable and may be better. Again, if you're really zealous, have some custom shocks made -- Bilstein will do custom valving for their HD shocks (available for c900) but they aren't adjustable, so you get whatever they give you. Costs about 60 bucks per shock. This is basically a rebuild service, so if you get some used ones cheap, they are refreshed/revalved at the same time. Cheap way to go.
Get a set of Kumho V710s -- they make a 205/50-15. Many folks feel it's a better tire than the Hoosier, and it's definitely better than the other Kumhos. For pressures, well, I dunno for the V710, but a good rule of thumb is to run the same percentage front/rear as the car's weight distribution--60/40. See sccaforums.com and search.
Learn how to left foot brake so you can keep the boost up and get the car to turn in better. Spend the winter practicing on the street and you'll have it down by spring. Takes practice, but you'll get it. Also learn to be smoother with your throttle input as the boost boils up.
Finally, you have a loophole: the Bentley manual, which was assigned an official, 7-digit factory Saab part number, contains an error: there is a reference to a 16x6.5" rim that appears in the suspension section of the book (something about measuring ride height). Well, the car was never sold with a 16x6.5, BUT, since it's in the book, technically, it's legal for G-Stock. Your call. Another thing you could do is use SPG springs from an 87 or newer SPG. NOT legal, but if you're just running regionally and in a relatively informal region, no one will probably care. Besides, the fastest flavor of SPG (90-91), or was it the Comm. Edition with stock redbox(??) is still a GS car. Again, your call.
Dunno your experience level, but if you're new to the sport, it's gonna take a lot of seat time to get up to speed. Google this: andy hollis top ten tips, and read what you come up with.
Have fun...
Mmmm, camber:
posted by 24.19.252...
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