Decent shock/springs VS BC coilovers?
- Thread starter KieranEG6
- Start date
i suppose thats up to u, cheap or something that doesnt feel like crap for a bit more. its subjective, everyone's ride quality and handling expectations are different. my handling expectations are high, i expect and want a car to do certain things, like turn in and actually dampen road irregularities. hehe
the bc racings and the like have about an inch or less of travel and make everything feel and drive terribly. but they're cheap
the koni's you can get about 2 inches of travel and more droop travel than the bc racings and the like.
to put into perspective, my setup, 400$ for top hat, 400$ for coilover sleeves and springs, 400$ in custom housings, struts 400$ a corner, spherical bearing rear top hat 200$. my 600/700lb rates feel softer than the bc racings i once had at 392/336lbs.
KieranEG6
Member
In an ideal world where I could easily get this stuff in the UK and had the cash to do it, yeah sounds great but in the real world Thats around £1900 plus postage, plus import tax. So more like £2200-2400 ...... hardly a little more when a set of BCs that are at £700 to my door. Thats over 3 times more expensive.i suppose thats up to u, cheap or something that doesnt feel like crap for a bit more. its subjective, everyone's ride quality and handling expectations are different. my handling expectations are high, i expect and want a car to do certain things, like turn in and actually dampen road irregularities. hehe
the bc racings and the like have about an inch or less of travel and make everything feel and drive terribly. but they're cheap
the koni's you can get about 2 inches of travel and more droop travel than the bc racings and the like.
to put into perspective, my setup, 400$ for top hat, 400$ for coilover sleeves and springs, 400$ in custom housings, struts 400$ a corner, spherical bearing rear top hat 200$. my 600/700lb rates feel softer than the bc racings i once had at 392/336lbs.
If I were to go for your option of budget build thats still around £850 plus postage and tax. So more like £1100, plus that my stock struts are that old and crusty they look like the original 1993 items and top mounts look about the same, so all would be needed aswell. Not really a budget option.
shroom
Active Member
Lol just fried my brain reading all this. For a start I was going to say wow thats alot of money and OTT but then again I have spent well over 2k on my computer system to play soldiers so I cant really comment! Whatever floats your boat.
Danny you need more than suspension to keep your car under control you need a fekin muzzle it bites lol
Danny you need more than suspension to keep your car under control you need a fekin muzzle it bites lol
red reading
Active Member
You can get a lot of the equipment nick r is dicribing in the uk ,so the postage costs will be minimal and as for struts...there were new ones on ebay this year for £40 each, the struts them selves are very generic and I think the Subaru impreza Classic may be the same as ours......
red reading
Active Member
Yeah tom it is an aggressive bugger! But with more suspension things I have been doing it is more controllable than it was.
this is very true, i am a 1bar mong, i dont have any real power adders
in my form of racing i eat up cars with over 300-400hp with my 100hp civic. its a guilty pleasure to destroy a porsche or some turbo beast with 100hp..
but i do crave more power, im just not willing to spend the money on it.. but for some crazy reason i am willing to drop 3-5000$ on shocks
dunno who's crazier
shroom
Active Member
Exactly, the main thing is people are happy with what they have and that's what makes things interesting.
That's why we have Scottish people to make all the rest of us feel better about ourselves.
just pick one that has external adjustment
the sentra spec v koni yellows are valved to handle up to 450-500lb springs and are externally adjustable
and they're similar in weight to the gtir . the sentra spec v setup is to use front strut inserts in all four corners
just search up on the sr20-forum and motoiq and etc for the custom shortened koni's aka CSK
I used to have a Mk2 Golf when I was younger, from a time when hot hatches cornered on 3 wheels as a design feature
Like you say the R can still lift it's back inside to help get around corners. Traits like that are what makes the car fun.I looked into the roll centre/camber correction but found the caster improvement solved my camber problem. It has remained on my list of interesting tweaks but my engine failed and life overtook me.
As already discussed, I decided against lowering the car to keep the geometry and changed the springs to slightly longer versions to give better suspension travel.
Interesting thread, always good to hear how other people approach their setups.
I'd say the same, I had new found respect for the TT racers after our session over the mountain this year. My M3 suspension was running out of ideas above 145mph with the bumpy roads and insufficient rebound damping. I have a CSL setup that was designed for the ring and if the R isn't running next year I might consider throwing that on. I took it off as it works better in the dry but worse in wet and removed the car's playfulness by being stiffer so for me made the car a worse "road" car.
The thing for all us UK based people is the weather is bad so going too stiff or low creates a car that is a handful in the rain. For me a road car needs to perform all year round so I accept compromises with my dry setups.
Either way I would have thought on the Isle of Man you want a fairly forgiving setup as the scenery will spit you out if you make a mistake.
Picking between what Dan and Nick are saying, if you need new dampers and longer term you're interested in Nick's route then get the Koni inserts as a starting point. Alternatively BC coilovers aren't bad, a 6/5kg/mm setup F/R would work year round. BC are better out of the box than tein but in the same league if you fettle the Tein. As you say, you don't want to spend all your money on suspension and fit cheap tyres.
yah it is the pretty standard setup on fwd/awd platforms in north america for SCCA solo racing.I used to have a Mk2 Golf when I was younger, from a time when hot hatches cornered on 3 wheels as a design feature
I looked into the roll centre/camber correction but found the caster improvement solved my camber problem. It has remained on my list of interesting tweaks but my engine failed and life overtook me.
As already discussed, I decided against lowering the car to keep the geometry and changed the springs to slightly longer versions to give better suspension travel.
Interesting thread, always good to hear how other people approach their setups.
max front grip at the expense of rear stability
super fast rear weight transfer for transitions, mainly slaloms as u don't really see it in other forms of racing
the rear can be settled with throttle
the more time you are on throttle the faster you are, waiting for the rear to come around and/or waiting for understeer to go away is the difference between a win or loss.
i came 2nd at a large american national championship in a near stock miata (E stock class) due to a slipping clutch, and understeering setup. had no setup time in the car as it had its motor out before the event. on my datalogger, i got understeer in one section and had to get off the throttle kuz i just came in a little too quick, and lost 1.1 second. i lost by 7 tenths of a second over 2 days, (they take your best lap out of three from each day)
ill be headed back there next year, the koni 2812's on the car are getting revalved (which cost 1200$ a corner just for the shock alone, they're cartridge style valves very trick, 8 settings for compression, 8 settings for compression each with their own valving curve for a possible 64 different shock settings you can actually feel, through low speed, high speed bumps. one click too much changes the car from perfect to nearly undrivable) and some new bumpstops installed to simulate spring rate. the stock class miata is only allowed a catback exhaust, shocks and tires.
Anyways, if you decide to go on the bc racing coilovers, buy some koni progressive bumpstops upgrade to swift springs ( they have a smidge more travel, are actually accurate for their rate over their entire range of travel, and are lighter. the bc springs have been tested to be progressively stiffer as it travels and don't have much spring travel before binding, and r heavy)
but you're going to have to run a fair amount of rate to stay off the bumpstops with only 1 inch of travel.
with about 900lbs over each corner in front, say 3 inches of travel before the suspension is loaded with the cars resting weight, a 400lb spring will compress 2 inches leaving you with 1 inch of travel.. you get the idea.. its a lose lose situation, heavy rates, not enough travel, and poor valving..
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Thanks Nick, are your Koni's rebound and compression adjustable or high and low speed on compression? You don't mention rebound but assume it's a typo?
Interesting discussion, the custom Koni's sound like a good route, the choice for bump and rebound adjustable dampers is limited and expensive for the R.
Also good to hear of other spring choices.
Interesting discussion, the custom Koni's sound like a good route, the choice for bump and rebound adjustable dampers is limited and expensive for the R.
Also good to hear of other spring choices.
on my gtir i run ground control advance design struts, they were used which i had rebuilt at gc (meant for a b13 sentra same one's as mike kojima's on his sentra featured on motoiq), they're bump and rebound adjustable. only 2 way, not 3 way so i dont have specific control over low/high speed. however the strut dyno shows nearly all the adjustment comes in the low speed section with minor change in the high speed
b15 sentra spec v koni sports yellows are rebound only adjustable about 130$ a corner ( you can have koni modify and convert into double adjustable, but you might as well get 8611's at that point)
koni 8611-1257's (the shortest ones) are bump and rebound adjustable about 400$ a corner
koni 2812's are bump and rebound adjustable, however there's about 20 different valving curves you can order from koni but are 1200$ a corner
at the koni 2812 price, you can get into penske, mcs motons, and the like. the car just happened to have come with these from a previous owner
wish someone would mass produce custom housings so that you can drop any strut of choice in
b15 sentra spec v koni sports yellows are rebound only adjustable about 130$ a corner ( you can have koni modify and convert into double adjustable, but you might as well get 8611's at that point)
koni 8611-1257's (the shortest ones) are bump and rebound adjustable about 400$ a corner
koni 2812's are bump and rebound adjustable, however there's about 20 different valving curves you can order from koni but are 1200$ a corner
at the koni 2812 price, you can get into penske, mcs motons, and the like. the car just happened to have come with these from a previous owner
wish someone would mass produce custom housings so that you can drop any strut of choice in
warpspeed
Well-Known Member
On my gti I extended the rear strut housing to take Bilstein inserts, non-adjustable but still a big improvement with the increased travel and seemed to be more consistent.
I have a few sets of coilovers that are leaking etc that I plan to strip and then see what can be fitted..
I have a few sets of coilovers that are leaking etc that I plan to strip and then see what can be fitted..