Tein Flex Z review

[Shady195]

Originally Posted by cocaine_coupe

what is the offset? and how's the inner clearance?

Not bad at all for DD, however when drifting I noticed a little rubbing on the inside wall at full lock.

Offset is +35

[PeterFRS]

In need of some advice here please
my fronts are fine where they are, just wanting 1/2" lower with rears..

the rear bottom "cup" is pretty shallow in our application and it is maxed out currently.
still lots of threads left on the shock body itself I am not right up to the spring perches.

I hope I am explaining this right..
and my question is.. by me "squeezing" or compressing the springs would that result in lower height?
or by "lowering" the pre load rings essentially "releasing" spring preload result in lower height?

thank you.. lol geez reading back what i wrote it's confusing for me too.

[tyler_win_photo]

Originally Posted by PeterFRS

In need of some advice here please
my fronts are fine where they are, just wanting 1/2" lower with rears..

the rear bottom "cup" is pretty shallow in our application and it is maxed out currently.
still lots of threads left on the shock body itself I am not right up to the spring perches.

I hope I am explaining this right..
and my question is.. by me "squeezing" or compressing the springs would that result in lower height?
or by "lowering" the pre load rings essentially "releasing" spring preload result in lower height?

thank you.. lol geez reading back what i wrote it's confusing for me too.

By "squeezing" the spring, aka increasing preload you will lose droop and possibly make your car higher. It isn't recommended to use the preload as a means to adjust ride height. If you reduce your preload too much you're going to get some noise from your coilover.

If you want to lower the car more in the rear you can get a lower control arm like stance or voodoo that lower the mounting point of the rear strut, effectively dropping the rear.

[PeterFRS]

Originally Posted by tyler_win_photo

By "squeezing" the spring, aka increasing preload you will lose droop and possibly make your car higher. It isn't recommended to use the preload as a means to adjust ride height. If you reduce your preload too much you're going to get some noise from your coilover.

If you want to lower the car more in the rear you can get a lower control arm like stance or voodoo that lower the mounting point of the rear strut, effectively dropping the rear.

first of all, thank you
Yup, if I were to "compress" the springs to get the height..I might have done so...
but to "loosen" the spring preload to acheive, would have been a no no.
good to know that compressing would not have helped in this situation
and like you said..
I will be looking for stance, voodoo or PBM LCA's.

Thanks again

[ZX88]

Originally Posted by Shady195

Just an update and some advice:

So I noticed my springs were "loose" in their perches up front (rears were still fine). I decided to look at the tein specs again for initial setup and preload.

Given some searches and talking with people it was advised to just "snug" them in the perches and leave it be unless/until you get a corner balance. Well what i thought was "snug" apparently was not snug enough as their was not enough tension from the spring on the locking collars to keep them from backing off.

I figured id try and do tein's specs and see what that does. SO i started snugging up the preload to teins specs. This takes a bit of muscle with the spanner wrenches, and now i understand what "snug" means.

Adjusted the front preload to teins specs, and now the collars are tight from the tension pushing back and it does not look like they will back off.

I checked the rears, and they did not loosen up at all, I only had to adjust those a few turns to get them to teins specs for the rear.

The only other thing I did after someone else with the Street flex series complained about the coilovers "lowering" themselves (which I have not had this issue after a few thousand miles on these already) is I torqued them with a torque wrench using the 1/4" port on the spanner wrenches and my torque wrench. Tightened them up good just to be safe..

front springs will always eventally loosen. These are spring on perch style correct? or is there a rubber spacer between the spring and the perch?

[Shady195]

Originally Posted by ZX88

front springs will always eventally loosen. These are spring on perch style correct? or is there a rubber spacer between the spring and the perch?

There is a rubber spacer between the spring and the perch

Also, have not had a single issue since I torqued them. Haven't moved one bit.

[zc06_kisstherain]

I just installed mine with Tein's manual front 28mm and rear 35mm along with Cusco LCA
I didnt touch anything on front camber.
I am wondering how you guys set up on front camber and rear.
I don't know what setting is good for street.

[shattered_memory]

Originally Posted by zc06_kisstherain

I just installed mine with Tein's manual front 28mm and rear 35mm along with Cusco LCA
I didnt touch anything on front camber.
I am wondering how you guys set up on front camber and rear.
I don't know what setting is good for street.

I have -1.5 camber and -1 in the rear.

[zc06_kisstherain]

Originally Posted by shattered_memory

I have -1.5 camber and -1 in the rear.

how is it?
I was just wondering what others have.
I heard -1.2 front and -1 is good

[bfrank1972]

-2.7 front -2.1 rear

(toe: 0 l/r front, -1/32 l/r rear)

[zc06_kisstherain]

Originally Posted by bfrank1972

-2.7 front -2.1 rear

(toe: 0 l/r front, -1/32 l/r rear)

dammm

I don't know what setup is ideal...

[strat61caster]

Originally Posted by zc06_kisstherain

dammm

I don't know what setup is ideal...

-Street, DD only, never going to trip traction control: 0 to -1 deg F/R
-'spirited, dd, canyons, memes, maybe one day I'll go to the track' -1 to -2 F/R, more front camber than rear by 0.2 to 0.5 degrees
-Occasional HPDE/AutoX, I don't care about tire wear -3 F, -2 R
-Max performance: buy a pyrometer, learn to make your own adjustments, rent a skidpad


Odds are your best results will come from asking the shop for suggestions and going with that (assuming it jives with what you've seen here). That's assuming it's a good shop though, not a crappy one or like a firestone/tire place that does quick-e alignments (places that sell lifetime alignments are usually a bit lazy about it just going with factory specs which are really loose).

[bfrank1972]

Originally Posted by zc06_kisstherain

dammm

I don't know what setup is ideal...

Yeah, my personal opinion but seems to me there's a lot of 'sky is falling because you're running so much camber' going around. If you think about it, going from -1.5 to -2.5, it's one degree.

Uneven wear - I haven't seen any evidence of this yet. My tread is maybe not low enough yet to see any small differences, so maybe when I run out of tread I'll see it run out on the inside first, but overall no signs of uneven wear. No tram-lining issues, front end is super responsive, rear is nice and planted. I think getting the toe right is important.

Lots of other little factors too, like tire pressure, tire compound, sidewall stiffness, driving style. I'm running GY Asymmetric 2's and happen to be running very slightly stretched which stiffens the sidewalls (235's on 8.75 wide rims). Mostly back roads for me, not a ton of mileage on the interstante, but even when I'm on there doing 80+ it's a peach to drive.

[zc06_kisstherain]

I will try with -1.5 and -1 then see how i like.