Coil overs on a classic for the road pointless as its already a gokart

Coil over on a heavier new age STi not quite as bad. especially if you use the tapered rear spring setup for the rear.

On hatch 07-13 Coil overs are improvement to both comfort and handling.

IMHO

Tony

 

I've got BC's on my 2005 STi and i don't think they're as bad as people make out. They were nicer than the worn out standard items and cheaper than replacing with OEM. They've handled trackdays and lots of road driving and i've not found them bouncy like a lot of people say..

However I've only had experience of 1 other set of coilovers on my old Honda DC5 Integra, they were some Ohlins £2k+ jobbies which were absolutely terrible on the road.

 

i had KYB Ultra SR shocks and Tein S Tech springs on my old bug, couldn't fault them

 

I have Ohlins on my S202 and BC's on my classic, no complaints on road or track (comfort is subjective) installed and greased up tidy

 

No mention of the meister r coilovers , not even from jerrick , when I was
Looking for a new suspension set up this is what I was recommended to buy a few guys on here said they were using them and very happy with the meister r

 

All coilovers are not equal! I run some trick ohlins and they are fantastic. Two key points buy the best you can afford and get them setup correctly.

Having said that I ran the Wrx suspension and prodrive springs for many years running close to 500bhp and I was very happy with how the car drove!

For me the key part is good geo and arb setup!

 

I hate that mother f*cking clunk!

 

Bilsteins coil overs on my classic RA. Bloody brilliant on track and smooth roads, far too stiff for regular use on our crappy roads.

 

Think I'm going for this combo

http://www.camskill.co.uk/m10b0s2730..._03_on_WRX_STi

http://www.camskill.co.uk/m14b0s791p...1_2003_onwards

Hopefully a decent set for road use

 

Just to add to the dispute and to ask an honest question, I fitted BC's to my wagon and while they have vastly improved the feel of the car on our pants roads, i agree with the above they do make the car bouncy. Now i also have a set of pro sport off an sti i bought as a donor. now the sti felt a lot more stable and i know this will e a combination of the arbs, drop links etc but i am now wondering are the pro sports any better then the BC's as I can swap them over?

 

I'll never forget driving up the M1 one day behind a Honda lowered on coilovers chuckling as I went by watching him and his bird bobbing along, what a ******* nightmare that must be.

I really wouldn't ever fit coilovers to a road car, I'm going down the roll bar and stiffer spring route when the local council finally tarmac my road, sometime in the next 6 months hopefully, then it being a bit lower wont be an issue.

Another point to remember with coilovers and lowering is to fit a roll centre correction kit and I have heard of something called a bump steer kit I think too, otherwise your just going to screw the handling and ride, oh and apparently lowering increases the amount of roll too, physics is a tricky subject and when added to suspension dynamics you need to get someone that really understands it and knows what they are doing when it comes to setting it all up to get the right set up.

 

Nail on head. It's all about the setting up. No use having fancy coilovers and braces if it's not been properly set up. Properly set up means a full day dialling in geo settings and getting corner weighted. An hour just won't do it.

 

I can't understand why you found them bouncy, I have BC's on my newage wagon with 6/5kg springs and even at 8 clicks from soft they give a very supportive ride, much more so than the sti shocks/ prodrive springs I had previously. I pull a 23ft caravan and with adjustment wound up to mid 20's the car is rock solid when towing.
I just wonder with the variation in results if it could be the pre-load adjustment at install that hasn't been done correctly.
Trev

 

What about the variant 3s I was thinking about buying a set of these anybody use these on a daily driver ??

 

Surely the point about coilovers is the adjustable ride height? I went the 'lowering springs' route. One set made no difference, another set was too low at the rear, too high at the front. Whatever you get when you buy lowering springs you're stuck with.

I've now got Tein Super Street coilovers on my Bug; they're too stiff for the road unless on the softest settings, but they transform the way the car drives and I've got the ride height that I wanted from the lowering springs but never got.

Admittedly the Teins jar a bit on some of our poorer road surfaces, but nothing rides nicely over potholes! In the same conditions the standard Sti set-up could loosen fillings too.

 

While this thread is active do these look a decent buy for a road use alternative to coils?

http://www.demon-tweeks.co.uk/perfor...suspension-kit

These guys are down the road from me so convenient!

 

I think the main problem lies with incorrect spring rate choice for your specific use, if its a road car chose a softer spring rate, its no good having a high spring rate & adjust the damping to fully soft settings, as your spring rate will not allow a soft ride, it also allows the no control over the spring in bumpier road conditions.

 

The correct spring rate should allow full use of the damper adjustments or those of cabin-adjustable cars wouldn't work. I believe that most of these adjust through Comfort/Normal/Sport/Track just by changing the damper settings. No adjustment to the spring rate is possible but perhaps they could be slackened/tightened on the more sophisticated systems.

Presumably the damper adjustments on coilovers should allow the units to function properly through the softest to hardest settings as they work within the parameters set by the manufacturer. But perhaps that's assuming too much?

 

It was for me and my pedestrian style of driving.

I took the car up 10mm after the council installed some shockingly high speedbumps near my house. We managed to get some lowered after my wife phoned up to complain. I then had to take the car up another 5mm after I had a Cobra Sports downpipe fitted as it hung bloody low.

Takes me (wife) 50 mins to do lower the entire car.

 

BC ride good enough for me

 

I only just saw this actually. :loll:

Okay, here is my honest personal opinion:

Coilovers on road car: No problem.
Right, before the world point at me and go I am bias and I am just trying to sell more coilovers…. let me justify myself.

Coilovers is just an adjustable springs / damper combination.
There is NOTHING that a coilovers can do that a springs / damper combo cannot do, and vice versa.
The difference is coilovers are adjustable, so you have a range of adjustment as a user to fine tune the suspension to your preference.
However, if you look at it from a suspension engineer point of view… I can custom build any spring / damper combo to do the exact same thing as any coilover, and vice versa.

The reason people say coilovers are not great for road use because often people bought ABC / XYZ / 123 "Racing" suspension and install them on a road car.
When you have a suspension that are design for race use, it will be harsh on the road.
Often they will be harsh to the point that we will classify it as "dangerous" when looking at the vehicle dynamic.
A properly design fast road suspension should be compliant for uneven road surfaces, because that compliancy is what generate traction, which is what you want on a road car.

So what is the difference, what do should you focus on a road car?

Springs rate is one thing, many people work that out as it is easy to work out.
A 10kg/mm springs will be harder than a 6kg/mm springs…

However, the damper valving is what make the biggest difference in how a suspension "feel".
You can have a very soft springs but a very hard damper, and the ride will still be horrible.
That is very typical of an OEM Bilstein setup, just ask any Mazda MK1 MX5 owners with the OEM Bilstein suspensions and they will tell you.

Damper adjustments can affect this, but more often than not it doesn't make enough of a change at the point you want the change.
Which is why you can find a damper setting that is pretty nice to drive on in the country road, but as soon as you get onto the motorway it feels uncomfortable.
The difference is the internal of the damper, and that is really the heart and soul of the suspensions system.

So back to the original questions if coilovers on a road car.
Personally, I like having coilovers on a road car because:
1. It doesn't have to be uncomfortable at all if it was design right.
2. It will provide better steering / damping response vs. OEM setup (All MeisterR coilovers use mono-tube damper, most OEM application are twin-tube).
3. It will allow the driver (ME) to tune the ride height to my liking (no one like a 4x4 looking sport car).
4. It will allow the driver (ME) to tune the damping response to my liking (it will be different to other people, but what I like and makes me comfortable mean I am more confident when pushing the car, and that is what having adjustable suspension is about… ).

So that is my very long 2p.
But I do find the stigma of "coilovers are bad for road cars" a bit sad because sometime people try a lot of different springs / damper combination and could not find what they want, where a good set of coilovers will allow them to adjust the car to look / behave the way they want it to.

Jerrick

 

well put jerrick

 

I've had BC coilovers on my MY05 for just over 2 years. I got them to solve the rear strut clunk issue but also I hoped that they would improve handling.

First the good:

Price was cheaper than 4 OEM replacements.
Once set properly handling was good
I like the fact that they are height adjustable.
I also like being able to adjust softness and this would benefit track users most.

The bad:

Ride is hard - on smooth surfaces, it's fine but how often do you get that. Speed humps are horrendous, I dread them.
Bounciness is only a problem if you wind up the softness too high. I run at 10-15 out of 31. Turn it up to 31 and the car's almost undriveable. Low settings increase roll.
Quality - initially I thought that the quality was good. Not so sure now. Front left is leaking and will need to be replaced. You've got one chance at changing height. If you leave it few months, then forget it. The adjustment rings will become stuck. And that's with following advice about greasing threads when first fitting.

I would probably go for something else instead.

 

Could be wrong, but I think it was Bren from Apex who was pushing these and, having tried to contact him recently it seems he may have left the company.

As far as I'm concerned, the service Bren gave was way beyond good although the girl I spoke to was very knowledgeable and helpful too.

 

Yep, they work for me. Firm, but still compliant.

 

Show off!

 

Excellent.

I had the "expensive" BC-ERs with the fancy external reservoirs etc.

They were fantastic on track, but a bit of a pain on the road being honest. Ride wasn't great, and I actually drove slower than I did on standard shocks/springs because I feared bouncing off the road. Build quality didn't seem that great either, after barely a year on the car they looked like they had spent 30 years at the bottom of the ocean.

Still, they worked and they would do the job on a track unfocussed car I feel.

After thinking I'd be selling the car, I moved the BCs on - but when I found to actually be keeping the car, I went with KW Variant 3s and they have been absolutely brilliant.

Car drives on the road with comfort, confidence and there are no strange noises... which is a bizarre experience.

On track, they're fantastic too - I've played with the settings a fair bit during a track day and I've genuinely felt measurable differences in a predictable direction.

 

What about this as an option? http://www.demon-tweeks.co.uk/perfor...wers-rear-35mm

If not something like that I think I'll go with KYB's and eibach springs

 

Spoke to BC this week who advised that Bren is indeed still the MD but he doesn't have a customer facing roll anymore. Ive just purchased my third set for a Forester build which I'm undertaking, there appears to be no other alternative adjustable coil over on a cost for cost basis in my opinion. I have had 3 sets of these on various Imprezas over the years and I've only experienced a mishap on one front shock which were on the car when I purchased it and expected to be 5 years old. I'm no racing driver but they have been generally ok for my level of driving including track day events.