Suspension newbie.

[phongtphan21]

Whats up guys,

I had a question about suspension , I'm currently thinking about getting Coil overs since I'm on TRD springs with OEM shocks. I was looking into certain ones to get for Daily driving and some mountain roads, maybe track in the near future.

The coilovers I had in mind was

Kw v3 [ Don't really think ill need to go this crazy ]

St suspensions

Tein Flex z

Or just like a few other Frs i know in town , BC racings.

I don't really want to lose handling or comfort since it is my daily.

what would you guys think? Reasons why I chose those three was Tein and ST has great reviews throughout forums and KW was due to tracking later in the future. if you guys can suggest some other coilovers for me to look into that will be great before I do set my mind onto something and buy it.

In the end , At the moment I'll probably will lower my car 2 inchs, get some 18s gram lights wheels, LCA and Camber and make it look like a show car until I learn more about tracking and such to get into that.

Thanks in advance!

[Tcoat]

Originally Posted by phongtphan21

Whats up guys,

I had a question about suspension , I'm currently thinking about getting Coil overs since I'm on TRD springs with OEM shocks. I was looking into certain ones to get for Daily driving and some mountain roads, maybe track in the near future.

The coilovers I had in mind was

Kw v3 [ Don't really think ill need to go this crazy ]

St suspensions

Tein Flex z

Or just like a few other Frs i know in town , BC racings.

I don't really want to lose handling or comfort since it is my daily.

what would you guys think? Reasons why I chose those three was Tein and ST has great reviews throughout forums and KW was due to tracking later in the future. if you guys can suggest some other coilovers for me to look into that will be great before I do set my mind onto something and buy it.

In the end , At the moment I'll probably will lower my car 2 inchs, get some 18s gram lights wheels, LCA and Camber and make it look like a show car until I learn more about tracking and such to get into that.

Thanks in advance!

If you have already read the reviews here and other place and have an idea of what it will all take then there is probably not a whole lot more to be said. Asking again is just going to get 20 different answers and you will be no further ahead. Pick the ones you like the most and go for it.

[Cole]

I'd recommend staying on springs until you know what you want out of your car. You can't drive a show car properly hard, which is how you'll have to drive if you want to learn anything about driving your car.

Also, go with the Flex Z or the STs, but if you really have the budget, ball out and get the V3's

You mention getting BCs but also mention wanting comfort. News flash: BCs are not comfy, and they make tons of noise.

[phongtphan21]

Originally Posted by Cole

I'd recommend staying on springs until you know what you want out of your car. You can't drive a show car properly hard, which is how you'll have to drive if you want to learn anything about driving your car.

Also, go with the Flex Z or the STs, but if you really have the budget, ball out and get the V3's

You mention getting BCs but also mention wanting comfort. News flash: BCs are not comfy, and they make tons of noise.

Thank's Ill keep that in mind, I'm guessing Camber plates will be needed if I go with Kw or St correct? Is there any difference between kw v1 and St or is it identical ?

[cjd]

I'd add the RCE T0 to Cole's recommendations.

[Cole]

Originally Posted by cjd

I'd add the RCE T0 to Cole's recommendations.

For some reason I always forget about those!

[wparsons]

2" of lowering will leave you wanting to correct roll center for track use, so plan ahead for what you really want out of the car.

If comfort is higher on your list than all out performance, look at the Ohlins or the KW V3's. Otherwise the ST and RCE T0 are great options.

[D_Thissen]

Making a show car work on the track (and vice versa) might prove difficult. I'm not sure how your roads are, but daily driving a car that's two inches lower than stock might also be a pain. That said, I've heard good things about RCE's products

[mclovin85]

Originally Posted by phongtphan21

Whats up guys,

I had a question about suspension , I'm currently thinking about getting Coil overs since I'm on TRD springs with OEM shocks. I was looking into certain ones to get for Daily driving and some mountain roads, maybe track in the near future.

The coilovers I had in mind was

Kw v3 [ Don't really think ill need to go this crazy ]

St suspensions

Tein Flex z

Or just like a few other Frs i know in town , BC racings.

I don't really want to lose handling or comfort since it is my daily.

what would you guys think? Reasons why I chose those three was Tein and ST has great reviews throughout forums and KW was due to tracking later in the future. if you guys can suggest some other coilovers for me to look into that will be great before I do set my mind onto something and buy it.

In the end , At the moment I'll probably will lower my car 2 inchs, get some 18s gram lights wheels, LCA and Camber and make it look like a show car until I learn more about tracking and such to get into that.

Thanks in advance!

image hosting websites
go with the flex z bro just installed mine last night and they feel like stock suspension... very smooth ride

[Lynxis]

I'll give more generalised advice than what you are seeing here and generally things that you want to look for.

A lot of people get hung up on spring rates and adjustability but they are generally inconsequential compared to the other more important aspects of the suspension. First, look for a suspension design with inverted front struts. This design puts the heaviest part of the strut at the top, connected to the body of the car where it is sprung weight. This lowers the unsprung weight on the suspension. The OEM design uses inverted fronts and so should any quality aftermarket suspension for our cars.

Next, there are 3 types of struts. Twin tube, mono tube and external reservoir. It is important to know the differences of each type.

Twintube - Usually cheap, comfort level ranges from very comfortable to very harsh, depending on strut design. Doesn't hold up to track use.
Monotube - Usually more expensive. Street comfort levels vary from acceptable to terrible. Will hold up to track use. OEM is a Monotube design.
External reservoir - Very expensive, reserved for high end. Comfort level depends on how it's set but can be configured to be very comfortable on the street and great on track.

If you are going to track your car, avoid twin-tube suspension designs because they generally don't hold up to the abuse. I'm sure there are exceptions but I'd stick to the rule. If the car won't ever see a track, then a twin-tube design will be great. As mentioned, external resevoir types are generally reserved for high end suspension due to cost.

Next you can think about adjustability. If you are new and not very good with suspension, you might want to stick to single adjustable to start with and maybe later upgrade to double adjustables as you outgrow your single adjustables. The fact is, you will probably already know if you need double adjustable suspension when you actually could benefit from it.

Finally, spring rates. It's important to choose spring rates that will work with the tires that you are running. The OEM suspension setup is designed to be used with UHP summer tires. 4k-6k spring rates are generally good for extreme performance summer tire category and 7k and up for R-Comps and slicks. For example, I can feel that my 6k/4k spring rates overwhelm my street tires (Continental DWS) on track but they seem well suited to my BFG Rivals.

I'm sure more experienced people can elaborate/correct these points but these are just the general guide-lines to look for when purchasing suspension.

[Racecomp Engineering]

If I may....

Originally Posted by Lynxis

First, look for a suspension design with inverted front struts. This design puts the heaviest part of the strut at the top, connected to the body of the car where it is sprung weight. This lowers the unsprung weight on the suspension. The OEM design uses inverted fronts and so should any quality aftermarket suspension for our cars.

The OEM shocks do NOT use inverted front struts. Inverted dampers do slightly reduce unsprung weight and improve durability against heavy side loads. They are far from a requirement though and the majority of high end suspension for this car do not use inverted front struts (JRZ, Penske, Moton, etc). It is a nice to have, but not a must have for anything but a rally car.

Originally Posted by Lynxis

Twintube - Usually cheap, comfort level ranges from very comfortable to very harsh, depending on strut design. Doesn't hold up to track use.
Monotube - Usually more expensive. Street comfort levels vary from acceptable to terrible. Will hold up to track use. OEM is a Monotube design.
External reservoir - Very expensive, reserved for high end. Comfort level depends on how it's set but can be configured to be very comfortable on the street and great on track.

Twintubes can absolutely hold up to track use. There are advantages and disadvantages to either design...but by far the most important thing is the actual valving of the damper. There are crappy twintubes and crappy monotubes. There are great twintubes and great monotubes.

The Ohlins TTX dampers used on LMP cars are twintube. They hold up to track use fairly well. This is one example, but there are many others out there as well. KW makes excellent twintubes and a twintube-monotube hybrid. JRZ has a twintube as well.

I'd also argue that the majority of the "cheap crappy junk" coilovers out there are monotube.

People get too hung up on a "feature list" such as monotube, inverted, how many clicks of adjustment, shiny colors, and never really get into how the shock actually peforms. You can have all those great features and still have a crappy shock that's worse than a non-adjustable twintube. That goes for the track or street driving.


- Andrew

[wparsons]

Originally Posted by Lynxis

First, look for a suspension design with inverted front struts. This design puts the heaviest part of the strut at the top, connected to the body of the car where it is sprung weight. This lowers the unsprung weight on the suspension. The OEM design uses inverted fronts and so should any quality aftermarket suspension for our cars.

Two comments on that:

1) Stock struts are not inverted, and they're twin tube IIRC.

2) It doesn't matter where the weight of the shock is, if the overall weight of the shock is the same, then the unsprung weight is the same. The strut is bolted to the body and the knuckle, and the amount of weight hanging on the knuckle is the same either way.

[totopo]

Originally Posted by phongtphan21

Whats up guys,

I had a question about suspension , I'm currently thinking about getting Coil overs since I'm on TRD springs with OEM shocks. I was looking into certain ones to get for Daily driving and some mountain roads, maybe track in the near future.

The coilovers I had in mind was

Kw v3 [ Don't really think ill need to go this crazy ]

St suspensions

Tein Flex z

Or just like a few other Frs i know in town , BC racings.

I don't really want to lose handling or comfort since it is my daily.

what would you guys think? Reasons why I chose those three was Tein and ST has great reviews throughout forums and KW was due to tracking later in the future. if you guys can suggest some other coilovers for me to look into that will be great before I do set my mind onto something and buy it.

In the end , At the moment I'll probably will lower my car 2 inchs, get some 18s gram lights wheels, LCA and Camber and make it look like a show car until I learn more about tracking and such to get into that.

Thanks in advance!

Dropping the car and comfort are pretty diametrically opposed. tl;dr: Your best bet is to get the LIGHTEST wheels possible, downsize to 16"

to make an insanely complicated topic as simple as possible, there is basically an ideal shock setup (or small range of ideal setups) for any given spring rate that surprisingly gives both the best traction and the best comfort. The problem is spring values are dependent on a lot of factors including sprung weight, unsprung weight (which varies in a street car by how many people/cargo you have), tire stickyness, and probably most importantly ride height.

Because of all these issues, and because good shocks are expensive, various aftermarket companies have taken various paths to develop a product.

you probably want to stay away from japanese (tein) and taiwanese (bc) shocks because traditionally, they have not been digressive. They tend to be underdamped at low speed and overdamped at high speed. The reason they do this is because it's cheaper, and novice drivers (which 99.9999999999% of people are, and where vast majority of even sports car enthusiasts are, unless you are like csg_mike) cannot tell what correct damping is and likes how it feels.

The bread and butter german brands are probably what you want, like kw, bilstein, koni. those generally are valved properly with the springs that come with them and won't brake the bank like penski, ohlin, moton, jrz. what you want to do is look at the various spring rates, and choose the one that fits the best. If you want to be real scientific about it, go look up values and use http://www.racingaspirations.com/app...ncy-calculator and keep plugging in higher spring rates until the static deflection is less than your bump travel and that's what you want. I think you will never get there with a 2" drop and off the shelf coilovers; they are all undersprung for such a drop. From the calculator, you can see that one of the ways of controlling is unsprung weight. The best option is to get the lowest number for that possible, which includes downsizing to 16".

Other thing to improve handling with a drop are roll center adjusters.

edit: feel like I forgot to tie a couple things together. Lower spring rates are generally better for comfort AND traction, but too low of spring rates leads to bottoming out which is super badness. Lowering COG is better for the vehicle as a whole in terms of cornering, but worse on the suspension. There is a point where lowering COG of a car no longer nets you benefits because the benefit from weight transfer is negated by the fact that your suspension doesn't work well anymore.

for further reading: http://farnorthracing.com/autocross_secrets.html

[Lynxis]

Originally Posted by Racecomp Engineering

If I may....



The OEM shocks do NOT use inverted front struts. Inverted dampers do slightly reduce unsprung weight and improve durability against heavy side loads. They are far from a requirement though and the majority of high end suspension for this car do not use inverted front struts (JRZ, Penske, Moton, etc). It is a nice to have, but not a must have for anything but a rally car.



Twintubes can absolutely hold up to track use. There are advantages and disadvantages to either design...but by far the most important thing is the actual valving of the damper. There are crappy twintubes and crappy monotubes. There are great twintubes and great monotubes.

The Ohlins TTX dampers used on LMP cars are twintube. They hold up to track use fairly well. This is one example, but there are many others out there as well. KW makes excellent twintubes and a twintube-monotube hybrid. JRZ has a twintube as well.

I'd also argue that the majority of the "cheap crappy junk" coilovers out there are monotube.

People get too hung up on a "feature list" such as monotube, inverted, how many clicks of adjustment, shiny colors, and never really get into how the shock actually peforms. You can have all those great features and still have a crappy shock that's worse than a non-adjustable twintube. That goes for the track or street driving.


- Andrew

Rather than edit my original post and confuse people who see your reply, I figured I'll just reply here.

Guess I am completely wrong about the OEM suspension design. I was quite sure it was inverted monotubes. Of course, I can't remember where I got that information and I can't find any sources that go into OEM suspension design beyond mentioning that it uses a Macpherson front struts and multilink rear designs.

Regarding the strut types, I did mention that everything is a generalisation and included qualifiers for everything I said, implying that the trend isn't definite. It was all based on information I gathered while searching for suspension options for my own car and I should mention that I was specifically looking in the lower-mid range segment and there are definitely patterns there like the lower end street coils were usually twin tubes and performance/track focused coils were usually monotubes. I didn't spend much time looking at higher end products where it looks like these patterns disappear.

Originally Posted by wparsons

Two comments on that:

1) Stock struts are not inverted, and they're twin tube IIRC.

2) It doesn't matter where the weight of the shock is, if the overall weight of the shock is the same, then the unsprung weight is the same. The strut is bolted to the body and the knuckle, and the amount of weight hanging on the knuckle is the same either way.

1. I could have sworn the fronts were inverted monotubes but my memory is terrible so I'm probably wrong. I can't find any sources that say either way on short notice.

2. I have to disagree here, it does make a difference although I definitely overstated it's importance because we're talking about less than half a pound per corner. The parts that move with the body of the car (sprung) are moving separately from the parts that move with the knuckle (unsprung) so you'd prefer to lower the weight on the knuckle as much as possible.