A review of my first suspension/chassis setup. All the pros and cons.
 

Greetings

You lost me at the rear strut bar actually making a difference. Many well respected people on here have verified that there is no advantage to have a rear strut bar.

You also don't mention what kind of driving you do, what your experience levels is, etc. Sounds like you made about a thousand changes between your chassis, suspension and driveline within very short periods of time, so I very much doubt you know how it feels from part change to part change.

I guess you haven't seen the Velox rear lca development thread. And it's 6061-T6 not 6061.

lol

Those are great for hard parkers.

1. Grimspeed did testing with their solid(not pivoting like the cusco)front strut bar, deflection was something like 3-4mm total with out it. With all the bushings and soft tires etc, would steering rack bushings done the same thing? The master cylinder brace does help with pedal feel.
2. Look at post above mine. I'd tell you to ask someone to have you take a blind test drive with it installed and not installed. And finally a 3rd time, and you try to guess which is which among the 3 tests. You'll be looking for noise isolation more than actual feel imo. Loss of trunk space sucks too.
3. Hotchkis is known to overbar cars and it creates cross talk associated with it. One side hits a bump, you'll feel it on the other side. They are more autocross oriented than anything. Not sure if they went for a more modest setup for this chassis.
4. $475, I'd would have gone spl or velox for a little more. Or the cheaper route with spc. But it's your money, plus the cool color!! Looking at the pic, they couldn't even get the correct nuts and bolts so they used washers(fits loose) instead. That zip tie in the end... to hold the metal insert in the bushing... those tolerances scream out "made in random chinese factory"
5. Is the added weight worth it? I personally would have gone with firmer bushings or metal inserts to replace rubber parts that are known deflect quite a bit over some bars that supposedly stop metal chassis parts from deflecting(the rubber bushings are still there!). But hey, I'm not an engineer, just a keyboard warrior. Cusco does make like 20 types of bars for this car.

What tires are you using? what alignment? what brakes? what tracking or competitive driving do you do? Stiffer is not always better. The chassis is plenty stiff for street tires and lower(most) skill levels.

struts bar is really good when you hard park at the local car meet with your hood open to show off the engine bay, not sure if it actually made a noticeable difference in handling.

i could be wrong.

Why people will immediately throw a completely new suspension on a car before even getting a decent alignment and some good wheels and tires is beyond me. But, I bet it looks nice.

Another victim of advertising and the 'butt dyno'.

They could be beneficial on a car that lacks a roof for structural rigidity. I know early 1990's GM convertibles had them. That said, the 86 chassis is plenty stiff for the majority of owners.

Actually my first observation in this car was just stiff and "well bolted together" it felt.

I don't want it to sound like I'm against modding the car - there's a rich aftermarket for it, there are lots of good products, and it's your car to do what you want. I'm sure all the parts look cool. But given your choices, I question whether you've got the experience/skill to actually determine that the car has actually improved. I'm sure it feels different, but if you drove an otherwise stock car with a really good alignment, and compared it to yours, I wonder if you'd be able to tell which is which...?

The only change I could ever feel was adding -3* camber up front. Oh, and the changed ride after lowering springs.

This thread just jumped my shark.

This would have been an amazing troll post if the op wasn't serious.

In order to review anything, you have to actually know what you're talking about. You don't know what you were trying to fix. You don't know what change there would be if any. And to make it worse, you did it all together. Realistically, you just paid to make the car "pretty". And I say that with quotes because I personally think Cusco (for this platform) is garbage.

I'm not trying to be an asshole. It is the sad truth though