CSG Spec Tein Flex A Owners Thread

[itschris]

Originally Posted by CSG Mike

That is not correct. Your damper is lowering the car (even at the raised-from-recommended height), and your wisefab is further lowering the car. You've double-lowered (two lowering elements) the rear, while the front is single lowered (one lowering element).

This is evidenced by your front also being correct. If the rear was correct, it would be even with or slightly higher than the front. We can correct this with a longer body.

Per your product page - isn't the wisefab kit deisgned for coilovers/a drop? Wouldn't going to a single lowering element, i.e. stock height suspension + wisefab, be a compromise itself?

Var - I'm sorry that this happened to you, it's never a great feeling to be unsatisfied with any investment. My suggestion, if you're willing to invest the effort, is to model the wisefab kit as it sits with a tool like vsusp. It may be that the jacking effects from raising your rear with a longer bottom shock mount are less pronounced than expected.

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by itschris

Per your product page - isn't the wisefab kit deisgned for coilovers/a drop? Wouldn't going to a single lowering element, i.e. stock height suspension + wisefab, be a compromise itself?

Var - I'm sorry that this happened to you, it's never a great feeling to be unsatisfied with any investment. My suggestion, if you're willing to invest the effort, is to model the wisefab kit as it sits with a tool like vsusp. It may be that the jacking effects from raising your rear with a longer bottom shock mount are less pronounced than expected.

Yes, the Wisefab is designed for coilovers and a drop, but not necessarily a drop by the coilovers unless you specifically want to be lower. The knuckle drop is mandatory; additional drop is not.

The kit assumes coilovers not for a drop, but for clearance.

[Var]

Originally Posted by itschris

Per your product page - isn't the wisefab kit deisgned for coilovers/a drop? Wouldn't going to a single lowering element, i.e. stock height suspension + wisefab, be a compromise itself?

Var - I'm sorry that this happened to you, it's never a great feeling to be unsatisfied with any investment. My suggestion, if you're willing to invest the effort, is to model the wisefab kit as it sits with a tool like vsusp. It may be that the jacking effects from raising your rear with a longer bottom shock mount are less pronounced than expected.

Don't worry about me. I'm not here for a pity party. The money issue will get resolved in private. I'm just trying to sort out the actual physics of the problem for others to not make the same mistake. And Mike is just defending his ego or David's company rather than being genuine and addressing the issue, and literally would rather give out bad advice to the public rather than admit that a sleeve solution would ruin the geometry in my particular situation. And I'm definitely not going to use that as my solution. Others can feel free to try

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by Var

Don't worry about me. I'm not here for a pity party. The money issue will get resolved in private. I'm just trying to sort out the actual physics of the problem for others to not make the same mistake. And Mike is just defending his ego or David's company rather than being genuine and addressing the issue, and literally would rather give out bad advice to the public rather than admit that a sleeve solution would ruin the geometry in my particular situation. And I'm definitely not going to use that as my solution. Others can feel free to try

Have you... actually visualized, modeled, or articulated what the longer damper would do, and how that plays into the arms?

I'm not working with conjecture or opinions here, only hard science.

Also, you respond an awful lot for someone appearing to want to end a discussion.

If you think my logic is flawed, please, illustrate or demonstrate for me where the error is.

[Var]

Originally Posted by CSG Mike

Have you... actually visualized, modeled, or articulated what the longer damper would do, and how that plays into the arms?

I'm not working with conjecture or opinions here, only hard science.

Also, you respond an awful lot for someone appearing to want to end a discussion.

If you think my logic is flawed, please, illustrate or demonstrate for me where the error is.

You're just going to deflect again but here we go. The The rear of the car as it sits right now has what seems to be a fairly level, parallel control arm.

If I was to get an extended sleeve and raise the rear up from where it is now by around an inch, what would the control arm angles look like?

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by Var

You're just going to deflect again but here we go. The The rear of the car as it sits right now has what seems to be a fairly level, parallel control arm.

If I was to get an extended sleeve and raise the rear up from where it is now by around an inch, what would the control arm angles look like?

From your over-lowered state? It would move the rear control arm angle to be closer to stock. That's the roll correction.



Again, you're dropped twice, once by your wisefab, and again by your coilover. Adjust the coilover to stock height, and use the wisefab drop only. Enjoy the extra grip of a proper drop with corrected geometry.

[Var]

Originally Posted by CSG Mike

From your over-lowered state? It would move the rear control arm angle to be closer to stock. That's the roll correction.



Again, you're dropped twice, once by your wisefab, and again by your coilover. Adjust the coilover to stock height, and use the wisefab drop only. Enjoy the extra grip of a proper drop with corrected geometry.

I don't know why you keep ignoring what I'm telling you. My geometry is correct at the current rear ride height. Mine looks most similar to the third example in that pic. That means i'm sitting at the correct ride height FOR the wisefab kit, yes? And if I raise it, an inch or whatever i need to get 1/4 to 1/2 inch of rake, you're telling me it's not going to go out of correction the opposite way?

Raising the rear end with this setup is clearly not the right answer. It either has to be uninstalled or the front has to be lowered to a complimentary ride height

[Var]

Unrelated to the topic of the day, does anyone know if these are the correct spring dimensions for this coilover if I wanted to bump it up by 1kg/mm in the rear?

Also, should I avoid changing the brand of spring in the rear only and just get ones made by tein instead?

[timurrrr]

Originally Posted by Var

... My geometry is correct at the current rear ride height ...

Originally Posted by Var

... my control arms are currently parallel to the ground ...

Million dollar question: why are you assuming this is the correct geometry?
I can't imagine the Wisefab kit to be optimized for such a low ride height.
On the picks Mike shared above the LCA is clearly not parallel to the ground on the "correct" pictures.

[timurrrr]

Originally Posted by Var

if I wanted to bump it up by 1kg/mm in the rear?

Why do you want just a +1 kg/mm bump?
I believe the common track-oriented pairings are 6k F / 8k R and 6k F / 9k R.

I honestly don't understand why the CSG spec FLAs use 6k/6k everywhere.
At "street" damper settings the car rocks front-to-back on the highway all the time.
8k or 9k in the rear would be a lot closer to "flat ride", which should also be beneficial at the track.
I wish I knew that before ordering, and ordered custom springs/valving in the rear.

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by timurrrr

Why do you want just a +1 kg/mm bump?
I believe the common track-oriented pairings are 6k F / 8k R and 6k F / 9k R.

I honestly don't understand why the CSG spec FLAs use 6k/6k everywhere.
At "street" damper settings the car rocks front-to-back on the highway all the time.
8k or 9k in the rear would be a lot closer to "flat ride", which should also be beneficial at the track.
I wish I knew that before ordering, and ordered custom springs/valving in the rear.

You'd have a car that's trying to kill you with a 6k/8k or 6k/9k setup, as the rears would load too fast relative to the front, and break loose all the time.

If you want neutral spring frequency, use 8/8 clicks or 7/8 clicks. The adjustment knob is there so you can customize oscillation damping frequency to taste.

[timurrrr]

Originally Posted by CSG Mike

You'd have a car that's trying to kill you with a 6k/8k or 6k/9k setup, as the rears would load too fast relative to the front, and break loose all the time.

Can you elaborate on why you think so?
With the ~0.75x motion ratio in the rear, 8k or even 9k are effectively not that much stiffer than 6k in the front with ~0.95x motion ratio.

Some of my friends are running 6k/8k and 6k/9k with no problems.

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by Var

Unrelated to the topic of the day, does anyone know if these are the correct spring dimensions for this coilover if I wanted to bump it up by 1kg/mm in the rear?

Also, should I avoid changing the brand of spring in the rear only and just get ones made by tein instead?

70mm is the correct ID.

Spring rate only defines spring constant rate, k, how much energy is stored. It doesn't describe the rate at which energy is absorbed or released.

You should choose spring brand and composition based on the behavior you want.

[CSG Mike]

Originally Posted by timurrrr

Can you elaborate on why you think so?
With the ~0.75x motion ratio in the rear, 8k or even 9k are effectively not that much stiffer than 6k in the front with ~0.95x motion ratio.

Some of my friends are running 6k/8k and 6k/9k with no problems.

Factor in sway and tire grip load, and you'll have a car trying to kill you.

You should ask @sw20kosh about the time I tried 10k/12k on 17 factory sways; it was a death machine and I literally spun out on the first turn at Laguna.