![]() |
D2 RS/K-Sport Kontrol Pro Coilover Review
Well, I managed to wriggle my way into the first set of production D2 RS Coilovers in the US
and installed them the other night. I am not going to write a complete installation DIY because @GrimmSpeed beat me to it here: http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=12864 JM Auto Racing was my contact for obtaining these D2 coilovers. They arranged for my set to be shipped to me directly from the Taiwanese factory. I have to say, I was not impressed with JM's communication or customer service. When I placed my order in June I was under the impression that my coilover set was going to ship immediately. After payment the shipment was delayed several times, and at two different times I was told that the order had shipped out and tracking information was to follow immediately -- but the tracking number never arrived. The package from Taiwan that eventually showed up nearly six weeks later was a pleasant surprise, but not so much when you thought it would only take about a week. About half of my emails would go unanswered, I was overcharged (by $16) for my set and then it took them five weeks to process the refund while telling me that they processed it a long time ago, and now that they have the coilovers in stock they are selling them for $947.32, which is $77 less than the "promotional" price that I negotiated in return for promoting the product and their business. It's good news for you, though, because you can get these coilovers shipped out to you for under a grand right now! http://www.jmautoracing.com/2012-sci...s-p-85586.html http://i.imgur.com/55NyD.jpg It has been brought to my attention that the D2 RS coilovers are nearly the same exact product as the K-Sport Kontrol Pro coilovers, although they might have different spring rates. This topic will also be used to review those brands as well. Official D2/K-Sport manufacturer links: http://www.d2racing.com/content/products/RS_coilovers (FR-S & BRZ) http://www.ksportusa.com/b2c/proddet...prod=CSC080-KP (FR-S) http://www.ksportusa.com/b2c/proddet...prod=CSB200-KP (BRZ) (The K-Sport part numbers are actually the same identical product) http://i.imgur.com/Uw88z.jpg I'm going to start by comparing the D2 RS coilovers against the current highest-end coilovers available: the KW Racing Variant 3. The retail price of the D2s sits at about $1500 while the KW retail price is about $2300. You will end up paying near retail for the KWs, while the D2s will probably be available at a discount from the retail price... so there is essentially a difference of over $1000 in these two products. I have not installed the KWs, so I cannot attest to the difference in performance, but the following photos will show you the physical difference in the components. http://i.imgur.com/IE7fw.jpg Boxes are about the same size and both are kind of heavy, but the D2 box is slightly heavier. http://i.imgur.com/CFnv8.jpg Front: The D2s are noticeably heavier than the KWs by about a pound. http://i.imgur.com/E36Sj.jpg Front: You can tell that the brake mount tab is rotated slightly differently, but other mounting points are the same. http://i.imgur.com/ApE1C.jpg Front Top: The KWs reuse the OEM strut caps while the D2 comes with pretty camber plates. http://i.imgur.com/su96k.jpg Rear: The rear struts are about the same weight. http://i.imgur.com/cjuMh.jpg Rear: Lower bushing on the D2 can fall out while the KW is a little higher quality http://i.imgur.com/oJI8C.jpg Rear: KWs have helper springs while the D2s use only a single spring What do you get with your coilovers? The KWs came with a small package that contained only the adjustment tools. The D2s come with LOTS of stuff! http://i.imgur.com/vyR1g.jpg Look at all the stuff you get! The four brake brackets (lower left) and four rubber grommets (upper left) didn't get used. Although you only need one shock adjustment tool, they provide four so you could just leave them in. Nice touch! http://i.imgur.com/rkS3Y.jpg Comparison of the old endlinks to D2's adjustables. http://i.imgur.com/hXlym.jpg The camber plate at the top of the front struts is one reason that I chose these coilovers. The included rustproofing gel should be applied to the exposed pillowball up here. http://i.imgur.com/5lGPJ.jpg Uh oh! The bracket that holds the brake line is slightly out of alignment for a perfect fitment. I haven't fully tightened the brake line here, but you can see that the rotation of the bracket favors the inside of the car, which causes some tension on the brake line from the bracket to the caliper. Also, you have to twist the brake line slightly so that you can get the brake line bolt to line up to the bracket. This applies some torsional pressure to the line as well, as you can see in the slight kink at the top of the image. It was fairly simple to bend the bracket slightly with some pliers to relieve some of this stress (not pictured) but I hope that in future production they can solve this slight error. On the plus side, the mounting area for the ABS line was perfect and the plastic ABS line snapped right into the holes as if it were OEM. http://i.imgur.com/oKa2R.jpg Another issue that I experienced was some confusion over mounting the strut to the hub assembly. The OEM bolts are used and the top bolt has a larger collar than the bottom. Easy to match the bolts with the holes that way! As you can barely see in the image because of my thumb, the upper bolt hole is larger. The upper bolt hole in the back of the coilover, which you can also barely see because of the angle of the photo, is slotted instead of round. Hmmm.... http://i.imgur.com/RRdsK.jpg Because the top/back hole is slotted the hub assembly can wiggle in and out when the nuts are loose. There was no instruction on the proper installation technique, so I contacted D2 and they told me that this is to allow additional camber adjustment and that I should push the hub assembly in toward the center of the car and then torque the bolts. This is a nice touch because although there is an upper camber adjustment plate, this will allow for even more extreme camber if it is needed. I would like to see a cam bolt provided that would allow for a more secure fitment, but with the bolts properly torqued I shouldn't see any movement from this setup. @Calum chimed in to let me know this slotted hole is so that an alignment shop can accurately match the true alignment of the front wheels with the marks on the camber plate. http://i.imgur.com/UBdA3.jpg The adjustable swaybar endlinks are a nice touch, but there was no instruction on how to install them. Obviously you just bolt them in on each end like the old ones, but how long should you adjust the endlinks? I guessed with 7.5" front the center of each bolt. I figure as long as each side is equal and there is no mechanical contact between the swaybar itself and the suspension components then it shouldn't really matter what the endlink length is adjusted to. (oops, ended a sentence with a preposition. Bad grammar!) ...shouldn't really matter to what length to which the endlink is adjusted? @Calum noted that the adjustable endlinks are to prevent preloading the swaybar when you corner balance the car. Another nice touch is that the new endlinks come with Nylock 19mm nuts to replace the regular OEM 17mm nuts. In the photo above I accidentally installed the OEM nut, but I pull it back off in a sec. http://i.imgur.com/0X6YZ.jpg Here is the new nut going onto the top of the endlink. Because the bearing in the endlink spins, you must use an Allen wrench in the end of the stud while applying a wrench to the nut. Unfortunately, this is very time consuming and there isn't enough room around the nut to use my Gearwrench ratcheting 19mm wrench, so... http://i.imgur.com/qMYU8.jpg ...an easier way is to use an Allen socket in an air ratchet set on reverse (loosen) This causes the non-rotating nut to quickly tighten onto the rotating stud and then you can give your final torque with the regular Allen wrench again. http://i.imgur.com/XS1tz.jpg The bottom nut seems harder because you can't see it, but it was actually easier. http://i.imgur.com/H6h7X.jpg The ratcheting wrench fit onto the nut this time so combined with the regular Allen wrench you could quickly tighten this combo together. http://i.imgur.com/fOxP4.jpg I installed the passenger side first, so the image of the camber plate earlier showed that the D2 logo was nicely aimed so that anyone standing along side of the car could see the branding. Unfortunately, the driver's side was a different story. It confused me at first, but when I realized that you can only install the camber plate in one obvious direction it caused the D2 logo to be upside down, readable only if you were standing on the engine. Oops, seems like a slight manufacturing glitch, but not one that will affect anything except your OCD twitching. Also, the included rustproofing gel should be applied to the exposed pillowball up here. http://i.imgur.com/Bppr0.jpg I finished up the installation by tightening the two lower spring perch collars at the point where they just make contact with the spring (no pretension, no slack) and the lower collar that secures the bottom of the strut from rotating, which is how you adjust the height of the coilover. It is important that you use a hammer and flat-tipped screwdriver to tighten the collars, not just the fancy little wrenches that are supplied. You don't want these coming loose and making noises! If you want to change the height of your car, you just have to loosen the lowest adjustment collar and then rotate the strut assembly and re-tighten the collar. So my initial settings for the front strut was 1.5" of lower threaded shaft exposure which lowered the car 1 3/4". For the rear struts I measured 8 5/8" from the bottom of the top plate to the top of the lower mounting component (or the bottom of the lower adjustment collar, same thing) for a lowering amount of 1 1/2". The lowering amounts mentioned here are after the springs settled for 24 hours. http://i.imgur.com/a6H5A.jpg |
DOCUMENTATION
http://i.imgur.com/YLPpn.jpg http://i.imgur.com/74ph3.jpg http://i.imgur.com/Q4JvV.jpg [IMG]http://i.imgur.com/S***C.jpg[/IMG] http://i.imgur.com/Zv5AP.jpg NOTE E says there is supposed to be a rubber component between the bottom of the spring and the perch, but there was none. I contacted D2 and they said it was a misprint. No rubber component is supposed to be there. http://i.imgur.com/yk2Ke.jpg http://i.imgur.com/TN94l.jpg http://i.imgur.com/fIrG6.jpg http://i.imgur.com/g7ZIJ.jpg http://i.imgur.com/RC6XH.jpg http://i.imgur.com/e4s9a.jpg http://i.imgur.com/cgK2v.jpg |
So how does the car look now? Here are some before and after shots.
http://i.imgur.com/wFHGS.jpg Non-lowered 4x4-mode with my 19x7.0 +30 Rota Torques installed http://i.imgur.com/JRPWq.jpg Non-lowered showing the wheel poke in the front, quite a bit http://i.imgur.com/WvHvl.jpg Lowered on D2 coilovers with about an inch of additional adjustment left if I want lower http://i.imgur.com/fSSBq.jpg Poke has been nearly eliminated by cambering the wheel to the maximum amount |
EXPERIENCE AT ~50 MILES (August 3rd 2012):
Well, 50 miles is not a lot of seat time to get to know the personality of my new D2 coilovers, but it's long enough to report that nothing bad has happened yet. I've got the front end dropped pretty low and the rear not as low, so the issues that I am running into have more to do with the low front bumper and lower cross-member making contact with the ground than with anything else. It's nice to know that even though the car is nicely stanced, I still have another INCH that I could drop it on the front! I have the compression settings at full stiffness for now so I can feel the road -- and man can I feel it! The stiffer springs and tight compression have the car a little bouncy at the moment, but when I get a few more miles on the car I am going to adjust the compression to the softest setting so I can compare the two. I have no strange noises, no clunks, no rattles, no rubbing at all... overall I am very happy with the value that this product has provided and as long as there are no annoying hiccups (or catastrophic failures for that matter) I will consider this a successful modification. EXPERIENCE AT ~200 MILES (August 20th 2012): All is still well. With 7.4kg/mm rates at the front and 5.0kg/mm at the rear (vs 2.3kg/mm and 3.8kg/mm for the stock springs) you can definitely feel every nuance of the road for better or for worse. Combined with a 40-series front tire, I can tell you if I drove over a penny! This doesn't bother me and it was totally expected based on the specs of the coilover and my previous experience driving lowered cars. Because the car was so low I ran it with the adjustable compression settings at maximum stiffness in order to avoid bottoming the bumper (or lower cross-member) on speed bumps and potholes. I will run at maximum stiffness for another 100 miles or so until I get used to the feel and then move to maximum "softness" in order to feel the other extreme setting, before deciding where in the spectrum I would like to keep it for daily driving. Changing the compression rate is as easy as popping the hood and inserting one of the four included custom allen wrenches. I have been driving with the front end lowered 2 1/4" until I raised it 1/2" yesterday to avoid chewing up my bottom bumper on driveways. Raising the car was a simple affair. I removed the two front wheels, loosened the lowest locking collar and then used the included wrench to turn the entire spring/strut assembly. It took me about five minutes for each side and when I was done I could actually make it out of my driveway without leaving an Asphalt-colored stripe. EXPERIENCE AT ~1000 MILES (September 14th 2012): Still no issues or complaints. I adjusted the compression settings on the front pair to full softness for a trip from Portland OR to Lewiston ID and it's tough to say if there was much of a difference. The springs are very stiff, so the ride is fairly stiff simply because of that -- does the compression setting make much of a difference in a daily driving situation? I do notice that when I go over speed bumps I can barely make out the quiet wooshing sound of the shock oil squeezing through the adjustable orifice... but I really need to drive some back-to-back runs on a bumpy road while playing with the settings to see if much of a difference can be detected. The car sits great and although my maximum camber settings up front can't be doing great things for the performance, I think that my tire choice affected handling more than the suspension. Grippier tires keep the car stuck to the ground better around corners, but the release point of the contact patch is much more abrupt than when I had the car at stock height on stock tires. I think that the car is slightly less predictable as far as when it might let go, but getting to that point (and I try almost daily) has become much harder. Both the suspension and the tires combine to change the handling dynamics, but since I did both at about the same time it's hard to say which had a greater effect. I visual inspection of the coilovers shows them to still look brand new. There are no apparent defects or damage from 1000+ miles of driving. No strange noises, creaks, rattles or thumps. No leaking fluids or loose fittings. All appears well. EXPERIENCE AT ~8000 MILES (September 8th 2013): Well, I still haven't made the time to adjust the coilovers since originally setting the ride height at installation. Visually the coilovers still look virtually new and ride the same as when I installed them. No problems, no issues at all. EXPERIENCE AT ~10,000 MILES (January 2nd 2014): I FINALLY dropped the car even lower recently, which was an easy task because there was no corrosion or damage to the threads on the coilover body. Before attempting to adjust the collars, I soaked the threaded parts of the body down with WD40, wiped them with a rag and blew the threads clean with the air compressor -- just to insure that no foreign matter would have the chance to contaminate the threads. I had zero issues with adjustment and at this point the coilovers ride as well as they did when I first installed them. |
Did you happen to measure the travel of each? the KWs are much longer and use helpers because they have more travel.
|
Nice write-up, but I don't think you need to unbolt the hub to make the adjustments. Simply back the collar off and twist the entire threaded sleeve/coil assembly left or right to the desired location and tighten the collar back up to the lower mount. This is how I adjust my coilovers.
|
jamal, I'm not sure how I would measure the full travel of each. Can you explain that a little better? Do you mean minimum and maximum lowering amounts? Those specs are in the Suspension Options List sticky in this forum area.
duecethemoose... DUH! Why didn't I think of that? Haha... I haven't changed the height yet so I didn't really puzzle it out. I will change my writeup to include that info. |
Certainly beats trying to eyeball camber every time!
|
Quick easy way to measure travel:
Measurement A - the amount the piston rod that can go into the strut body. Measurement B - center of hub to fender lip at your ride height with car on the ground. Measurement C - center of hub to fender lip with the car in the air (both wheels up in the air) total stroke = a droop travel = c - b bump travel = a - droop travel The rear is a little more complicated...you have to use the motion ratio since 1 inch of damper travel does not equal 1 inch of wheel travel. But I'm more interested in the front anyway right now. I suspect you'll find the KW's have a ton of travel, even though they are "only" single height adjustable.... - andrew |
Man look at the stroke on that KW!
Also D2 is another BC/Fortune/Stance style coilover right? |
so on the last picture, you state that the poke is eliminated by setting the camber to the max amount, does that include the slotted hub assy being pushed back as far as it will go, or is the camber max'd out on just the camber plates?
also another q not related to this topic, did u paint ur h/l black? |
Interested in your review! looking forward to hearing more about your impressions compared to stock.
|
in for review.
|
I think I would have to pull the coilover back off to properly measure the stroke. If/when I pull it off I will take that measurement.
Quote:
Yes, I painted my headlights black. Follow the DIY link in my signature to read more about it. |
Thanks for the reply
|
Quote:
|
Yes, much of the manual is poorly translated, but not so much that you can't figure out what they really meant.
Quote:
|
Added a short review...
Quote:
|
The adjustable camber at the hub should be used to calibrate the camber adjustment at the camber plate. You set the camber plate to some arbitrary position, say 1 deg negative, and then put the car on an alignment hoist and adjust the camber via the hub until you actually have 1 deg negative camber.
The adjustable length sway bar endlinks allow you to adjust the sway bar, to avoid preloading it, when you corner balance the car. Nice write up. The car looks great. |
Calum, that's great info... I am going to integrate that info into my review. Thanks!
|
Quote:
At the upright you want to dial in as much camber as you can possibly get. Basically whenever you run out of adjustment or the tire hits the suspension. Then, at the top mount, you want as little camber and as much caster as possible. The reason for this is what's called the steering axis inclination (SAI). Basically, SAI is the angle of the strut - more camber at the top mount means more SAI. More SAI means more loss of camber as you turn the wheel, and is also can result in a greater roll center propagation. Adding camber with plates adds SAI. You want to try to avoid this. Ideally what you will do is swap the plates left to right so they are at an angle. Max them out so they are as far back and inward as they can go, and then do your fine camber adjustment at the upright. On my car I have a set of whiteline com-c mounts and an ALK which give me a good amount more caster and a little more camber. Then to get the camber that I want I slotted the lower strut holes. From a geometry point of view it's the ideal way to do it. |
So it appears that the same factory that builds D2 coilovers also produces the K-Sport product, so this topic is being expanded to cover those as well. K-Sport has two part numbers (CSC080 for Scion, CSB200 for Subaru) but they are the exact same product with no differences.
http://i.imgur.com/55NyD.jpg |
Quote:
By the way... they still aren't truly in-stock. I got a notice saying they're back ordered and not to expect them until September 18. :thumbdown: |
I do appreciate that he pulled some strings to get my coilovers to me before they were available to the public, but still... you gotta under promise and over deliver, not the other way around!
|
Agreed.
BTW, what are the D2 spring ratings that were shipped to you? Joe mentioned that D2 changed the rear spring rate after further testing. I'm curious to see what your kit came with. |
Where the review too lol.
|
Quote:
Stiff does not equal high performance. grip does. And grip comes from quality damper valving that is matched to a spring rate that allows the tire to stay in contact with the ground as much as possible with as little change in force applied to the tread as possible to keep from shocking it loose. Good luck in your selection folks. learning what works for ones self is half the fun. :) Matt |
Try comparing dyno plots between the D2s and KWs instead of just looking at them. :thumbsup:
Streched 19s and slammed :( Its not a VW, you car actually had decent performance at one point. |
Modifying a car is to ones personal preference. to be clear, I'm not bagging on the guy's decisions. Just trying to help educate so people can make the most informed decision they can. He took a lot of time to provide a write up based on the knowledge he had and his evaluation criteria.
Most people will never take their car to the track. So they may not need or want to best performance parts for their car - they want it to look a certain way, or "feel" like its a performance improvement. That's totally fine. Hell, a lot of people won't like my car, because I put little thought into how it looks. I only care about how it goes. Neither is right or wrong. |
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
|
Are you the dos equis man
|
Haha... I am if you are sending me free beer. :)
|
Quote:
|
fair enough, chulooz. :)
|
Quote:
D2 is a manufacturer, D2 makes coilovers for KSport. They also do some other private label stuff. BC is a manufacturer. Largest of the Taiwan suspension manufacturers. They do private label coilovers for MANY big companies. Stance I am not sure where they are made. I am told neither BC or D2 make them. Fortune are made using a combination of parts they pick and choose, in addition they have certain parts made specifically for them. They than spec and assemble the product by hand in the USA. Sort of a premium, personalized "cheaper" coilover. You do pay a price for this service, about $150. This extra spent many not be worth it, if you are just going to lower the car and drive it on the street. It takes a lot of resources, R&D, certifications, and money to build suspension, therefore their are a lot more coilovers BRANDS than their are manufacturers. The brands have the coilovers manufactured to their specification. Nothing wrong with this really, its how a lot of this industry, and the world is. ------------------------------------------------- This part is my opinion, so take it for what it is. As far as them not being motorsports level coilovers that would be open to interpretation, but you will find these brands of coilovers on lower level cars that win the racing series's throughout Asia. Are they AST/Ohins/Moton/JRZ/KW Clubsport? No, but they can perform really well if setup properly. They can be a cheap weapon for the guy who drives on the street 95% of the time and likes to do HPDE's, time trials, and time attack a few times a year. In my opinion the KW V3's are too soft for motorsports use (but make excellent street coilovers). I used to hate on the Taiwan coilovers too, but they really have come a long way over the past 5 years. |
^ This. Also if you are in with the in crowd, and know this type of information... its like a curse.
|
Quote:
referring to high quality dampers as "race" dampers is a bit of a misnomer. Just because the valving has a high degree of precision and control just means they work well - doesn't mean they are a "race" damper. KW v3s are a great example. And so are the soon to be released AST 4150 (disclaimer: I've tested these, and may appear biased) I have set track records on junk dampers before - it can be done, but probably isn't advised. :) The Taiwanese companies you refer to may have come a long way in the last couple years but my concerns are as follows: 1. Common parts bin: several cars share the same damper, with a different screw on mounts. People call this "preload adustment", but a properly designed damper doesn't need this - period. Its marketing fluff to cover an economies of scale decision. The problem with this is that while it might FIT, it doesn't work optimally for every chassis. suspension stroke, valving, etc are dependant on the wheel rates, etc unique to each chassis. 2. marketing features - not real world adjustment: many of the dampers mentioned and I have driven have lots of adjustment knobs...that do basically nothing. I've seen this on track, as well as on the shock dyno. 3. quality control or consistancy - I have admittedly not tested dampers or their springs in about 3 years. But when I did test the aforementioned manufactures, you couldn't get multiple shocks to produce the same damping curve, and the springs they used did not actually reliably measure to the spring rate they were labeled for. When all 4 corners act differently, it is impossible to set a car up optimally. So. I'm not suggesting everyone needs to go out and spend $2-4k on dampers. But I am suggesting that the cost of these "cheap" kits is not a good value for performance. If you aren't going to compete in your car, you don't need threaded bodies to corner balance your car. If I had $1k to spend on a set up, I'd buy a high quality spring (hyperco, Swift, KW, or maybe the ones being made specifically for this car, etc) and I would get a quality set of dampers like a bilstein when they are released. You won't have any of the fancy adjustment knobs (which I would argue don't actually change the shape of a damping curve like they should), and you wouldn't have ride height adjust-ability, but how often are you messing with that anyway? You'd spend less money, and you would have a better performing car. everybody's got 2 cents. Sorry for giving you more than that. |
Quote:
I personally think the BC Racing sets are going to be a better buy over the Ksport/D2. I havent had a chance to check out the Fortune auto stuff in person yet. |
I'm looking for a set of coilovers that will allow me to lower my car more than it is currently on eibach springs. My budget is around $1000-$1500. Are there any coilovers out there that ride like stock but allow you to lower the vehicle 2-2.5 inches? I've heard the KW v3 ride really nice but it seems like way too much money for someone who's not tracking his car.
|
@FML - This is a topic for specific questions/answers about the D2 or K-Sport coilovers. You need to post your question as a new topic in this forum area. Thanks.
|
| All times are GMT -4. The time now is 08:52 AM. |
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11
Copyright ©2000 - 2026, vBulletin Solutions Inc.
User Alert System provided by
Advanced User Tagging v3.3.0 (Lite) -
vBulletin Mods & Addons Copyright © 2026 DragonByte Technologies Ltd.