#1. The Corvette uses leaf springs FRONT and REAR. Actually A leaf spring in front and 1 in back also. But you're totally out of the ballpark for trying to criticize GM on that design. I'm a guy that will rarely defend GM, Like I said before, I personally like Ford better, but there is nothing wrong with a transverse composite leaf spring. It fits neatly underneath the engine and rear tranny, and just has end links like a swaybar, so it's very space effecient.

Ohh noess... F1 cars use torsion bar suspension and so does the F150, F1 cars are so using crap truck tehcnology..... yea, absolutely retarded comparison.

#2. Despite widespread misconception, a solid axle is NOT the best for drag racing. It might be the easiest most thoughless setup, but what are teh chances that the same suspension found on a conestoga wagon would work good for some form of racing..... yup. very little.

The problem is that the driveshaft tries to twist the axle, and the opposite reaction is the car body twisting the other way. The left rear tire plants a lot harder, the left front tire comes off the ground and in a high HP car it's pretty easy to meet Mr. Wall.

The best drag setup would be a double wishbone setup with equal length wishbones at equal angles so there is no camber arc and you set it for zero camber.

There's also a simpler design that has more unsprung weight, but would be easier for the drag guys to dial-in. It's called a DeDion rear suspension. Look it up on google for some pics, but it's basically the solid axle you would see in the back of some FWD vehicles, with a diff mounted to the car's body, and halfshafts connecting the diff to the hubs. It isolates lateral drivetrain torque from the suspension, but you can still set it up as a 4link

Go find some video of the RX7.com drag car form a few years back and watch it run 8's launching straight as an arrow every time, no twist, no drama. it has IRS

#3. Uneven tire wear 'suffered' by IRS cars is from poor setup, just like twist and sideways launches in drag cars. I've crewed a few race teams and at every track we used pyrometers and checked 3 points on the tread width during practice every 10 laps or so. This is to dial in the camber properly. Most drifters have their cars too low for the stock geometry to work properly. Plus they are running way too much baseline camber anyway, but but if they corrected the camber, their camber arc would still be too aggressive for the spring rates (because of the upper control arm angle).

I rocked stock BMW ride height and a single set of tires all day at MiamiSlide1 and at the end of the day I wasn't showing threads anywhere, but I had perfect slicks. But IRS sucks for tire wear??? right...

About the only cool thing about a solid axle is you can go as low as you want and it doesn't change, plus your roll center actually gets higher. (high roll center is good)


-Sean