Mild drop and OEM shocks on a new lease
 

Hey all,

I'm getting closer to pursuing a mild drop (~1in) for my '16 FR-S

I'm sure I'll be flooded with "What are you doing, noob?!" comments but I wanted to put feelers out there on your thoughts.

Anyone had long term experience w TRD or similar 1" drop springs & OEM shocks? How long did the OEM's hold out?

How about camber/alignment? Would I want to get bolts? Any other adjustments?

Keep in mind it's a lease so I'm looking for just a slight drop in center of gravity without going too wild.

However, I did read the post about how dropping will cause understeer. Not sure how to feel about that or if it's something I could live with in exchange for sharper turn-in and responsiveness.


Thoughts? Suggestions? Warnings?

I don't think a 1" drop will make your car understeer. Does it understeer now? Every car comes from the factory a little different, so you should decide how your car behaves before making too many changes.

The FRS comes from the factory with a much more 'pointy' spring set-up than the BRZ. Most after-market spring combos are much softer at the back than the front. This will make your car less 'pointy' and more prone to understeer. Lot's of forum members even go with a square spring set-up, and balance the car using a big rear bar and an aggressive alignment. From what I can see, they're very successful, and happy with their cars.

The FRS/BRZ/GT86 seems to gain about a degree of neg camber / inch of drop at the rear, and maybe 1/2 a degree at the front. More camber at the back than the front will also result in more understeer. You can add neg camber at the front easily with camber bolts. Pretty cheap, and easily reversible when your lease is up.

My BRZ understeered like crazy from the factory on the OE springs, -0.1 front camber; -1.5 rear. I now use the stiffer frs rear springs, OE BRZ in front, and -1.5 camber at all 4 corners, and the car is nicely balanced. It may even be a bit loose for my taste in slippery conditions!

There's a wealth of information in the sticky CSG/RCE suspension thread, so that's a good place to start reading for broad-based information.

Based on what I think you're trying achieve (reversible, low-cost, better performance, better looking), I'd suggest looking at RCE yellow springs and getting a set of camber bolts to give you as much negative camber in front as possible. The RCE yellows are designed to be used with the stock struts and dampers and people report pretty decent damper longevity with them. They're also a straight wound spring as opposed to a progressive wound spring like the TRD (which are re-branded Eibach units), so while they may be slightly less comfortable than the TRDs, they're much more predictable at the limit. These simple changes, along with an aggressive alignment, should really bring your car to life.

RCE is active on the forum and I've heard good things about their customer service - give them a shout and they should be more than willing to provide the guidance you need.

What do you mean by "more predictable"? Like, a progressively stronger response as it twists/compresses? If so, would that also help guard against bottoming out more than the TRD/Eibachs?

Sounds like bolt up front will help! I'll be sure to include if/when I pull the trigger. But, and this is a noob question, can camber be adjusted regardless of bolts and without "plates" etc? Can the alignment folks adjust it? And is that what is meant by "aggressive alignment"?

I have Eibach pro kit springs and stock shocks. Put them on myself at 16k, now I have 59k. I drive aggressively, and have blown sets of shocks on other vehicles because of a mismatched springs and shocks. (to low of springs on stock shocks) This is why I chose the Eibach Pro kit, which is basically the TRD springs. My shocks feel good still.

I have not driven on the RCE springs, but I do know no one has posted any bad comments. I would guess that they are better performance wise, they also cost more. They have slightly less of a drop than the Pro kit.

Camber, depends on wheels. Some wheels with a low enough offset will allow camber, others fit so closely, adding camber is impossible. There is tons of info in the wheel gallery. Camber bolts are inexpensive, get some if you want. Though with a mild drop ( combined with conservative wheel specs) they are not necessary.

Unfortunately, camber is not adjustable on the stock FRS. You need bolts, but they're cheap. You also need an alignment shop that understands how to adjust them. Virtually all performance oriented shops will know.

'Aggressive' is subjective. To me an aggressive alignment is one where you make compromises in one type of driving (street) for gains in another (track). For a lowered FRS, I think anything over -2.0 camber is pretty aggressive. The inside of your tires will wear faster on the street, and straight line braking will be compromised. 0 toe makes the car a little less stable, so if you do all your driving droning along the freeway at 70mph, maybe go conservative and add toe in. My car is at 0 toe, and it's just fine. Some guys think toe out is better at the track, but not me.

Just a note that lowered cars should have more camber than those at OE height. At OE ride height, body roll gets you camber when you corner. Lowered cars don't roll as much (at least they shouldn't), they need more static camber so that the dynamic camber is high enough.

For a 1" drop, I would start about -2.0 camber all around, and 0 toe.

Predictable: spring rate changes confuse shocks. If you're driving hard, you'll want straight rate springs. Having said that, I've tried the Eibachs on mustangs and they feel pretty damn good on the road!

RCE yellow are your best bet if you want to keep your OEM struts. Drop is mild, about 0.8 inches. (22mm)

I should have about 17k miles on my TRD springs, on my 37k oem shocks. With constant driving through chopped up forever-under-construction roads filled with dips, bumps, and potholes. So far so good. I dont have anything to adjust alignment with mine. Any drop related understeer people are getting should be mostly a matter of spring/shock combo. Nothing noticeable with the TRD Springs. I dont have any reference for how that is on OEM Wheel/Tires, i was on 245/245 PS AS3's when i got them, and have been on 235/265 PSS's majority of the time ive had the springs.

Wow. Thanks all. Here's a question?

Just yellows
http://www.racecompengineering.com/i...a-yellows.html

vs

"BRZ Lite"
http://www.racecompengineering.com/i.../brz-lite.html

Are "crash bolts" = camber bolts?
What will rear camber bushings do? How important are they?

Crash bolts are camber bolts. Same thing.

Rear camber bushings look like they give you rear camber adjustment. IMO for the amount of drop the yellow springs give this is not strictly necessary, especially on a lease.

Could I achieve -2/similar rear camber w/out these bushings?

Most new cars settle by half an inch to an inch in the first few thousand miles.

Job done?

I am having RCE yellows installed onto stock struts this Monday. I too was looking at the BRZ Lite kit and SPC camber bolts for up front but after doing much research and talking to my installer, I decided to go with the RCE yellows, OEM crash bolts up front and SPC lower control arms in the rear.

The SPC LCA's look just like stock, are easy to install and adjust as opposed to the Whiteline rear camber bushings that come in the BRZ Lite kit.

The price difference is $50 - $70 more for the parts but you will save that (or more) in labor to install and adjust the rear camber bushings. (research installation on those rear bushings, you will see the word PITA a lot!) Hope this helps. :thumbsup:

My Hotchkis 1" springs gave me -2deg camber in the rear with no other adjustment.