I got mine through a Nico group buy held by a member named "mark". The overall experience was pleasant and he did a good job at keeping up confidence in the deal.
Received the coilovers excellently packed:
The pillowball mounts look real nice:
And the brackets are machined and beefy:
Install:On installation, we realized the pistons dont extend long enough to mount the coilovers while in the stock relaxed position. Once we extended the lower mounts out as far as possible, we just pre-compressed the lower arms with a jack to meet the lower shock mounts. On my S14, the fronts then sat waaay too high, so we redid it and virtually compressed the suspension to ride height levels. With it like that, it settled at about what my sportlines sat at. The rears, on the other hand, dumped with the lower mounts fully extended. I haven't checked to see if the springs were seated to begin with though, so I can still raise the rear by raising the spring collars. No biggie. With stiff *** springs (9 7 combo) the springs don't really compress much when the car is on the ground, which may be why the fronts are the way they are.....
Performance:With the dampeners set on 3 turns out of 6.5, they're very smooth. I thought that the 9/ 7 springs would be stiffer, but so far they're very bearable. I'd have to say that it might be in part due to the dampeners being able to handle the bumps, potholes, and dips with the 9/7 springs, because there's very little shock from any of those. I'd still like to tweak the rear end ride height and raise the dampening a little bit. I haven't even gone past halfway yet so it's looking pretty good for now.
Overall:If you get the 7/5 springs, expect a comfortable ride. The 9/7 springs on my car are far from teeth chattering (although I DO have snow tires on still... the stiffer sidewalls of my summer tires may change that). I would have to say at the moment that the D2's are worth the price they're going for. As time goes by I'll be able to say more about them. Right now I have yet to see how hard the dampening can get..... so it can get a lot better from here, hopefully.
D2/ KSport coilovers
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Tomcat5678
- Posts: 24
- Joined: Thu Feb 19, 2004 7:58 pm
Ace,
What do you think I should get for my 200SX (B14)? I was going to get the 7/5 but would order the 9/7 like you received if they aren't too bad. Right now I am on coilovers on Tokiko's and the springs suck and I bottom out all the time so as you put it right now I have a teeth chattering ride. Or do you think my car is lighter so go with the 7/5's? Thanks for the input.
-Erik
What do you think I should get for my 200SX (B14)? I was going to get the 7/5 but would order the 9/7 like you received if they aren't too bad. Right now I am on coilovers on Tokiko's and the springs suck and I bottom out all the time so as you put it right now I have a teeth chattering ride. Or do you think my car is lighter so go with the 7/5's? Thanks for the input.
-Erik
Tomcat5678 wrote:Ace,
What do you think I should get for my 200SX (B14)? I was going to get the 7/5 but would order the 9/7 like you received if they aren't too bad. Right now I am on coilovers on Tokiko's and the springs suck and I bottom out all the time so as you put it right now I have a teeth chattering ride. Or do you think my car is lighter so go with the 7/5's? Thanks for the input.
-Erik
I wasn't sure how their springs or dampening would be, so I ordered a spare set of 5's just in case. It's only like $50 more with the order... I just measured the spring inner diameter and it came out to be 2.5", so i might see about getting more springs through ground control or even maybe through the 2nd group buy currently going on
VitaminT wrote:Cool, can't wait to get mine in a few weeks. It looks like there is an extra spring in your box did you order extra spring rates?
the extras are 5's. wasn't sure if i wanted to daily drive a 9/7 combo.
the springs are all different lengths, though, and they seem to coincide with the rates (9's are longest, 5's are shortest). with adjustable spring perches it shouldn't be a problem, though.
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Tomcat5678
- Posts: 24
- Joined: Thu Feb 19, 2004 7:58 pm
Tomcat5678 wrote:Hate to be pushy but do you think the 9/7 setup would be fine on my daily driver B14?
depends on what "fine" is.... "fine" for me is "i'm not gonna die from this... am i??"
This is how I described the 9/7 to my friend: "You feel everything on the road. If a mouse took a **** on the road and you drove over it, you'd know what the mouse had for dinner."In retrospect, however, there is MUCH worse....
Quote »At last, an answer to my question...
You should be able to get 2.5" ID springs from any good motorsports retailer.....you can over here in the UK.... 2.25" or 2.5"[/quote]Yup. I actually measured the 5kg/mm spring to be just a bit over 7" tall (unloaded, of course) as well. GC's website lists 2.5" ID springs in 7" lengths from 275 to 650 lbs/ in in 25 lb increments. That's a whole lot of variety!
AceInhole wrote:depends on what "fine" is.... "fine" for me is "i'm not gonna die from this... am i??"
This is how I described the 9/7 to my friend: "You feel everything on the road. If a mouse took a **** on the road and you drove over it, you'd know what the mouse had for dinner."In retrospect, however, there is MUCH worse....
Yup. I actually measured the 5kg/mm spring to be just a bit over 7" tall (unloaded, of course) as well. GC's website lists 2.5" ID springs in 7" lengths from 275 to 650 lbs/ in in 25 lb increments. That's a whole lot of variety!
Good reporting.
One question: Did you happen to get any length measurements for the remaining springs? meaning the "stock" 9 and 7s. Strange thing is you said the 5s are 7" and the others are longer... It should probalby be the other way around..
Chris
Re: D2/ KSport coilovers
For starters, thank you VERY MUCH for the fast feedback, we all appreciate it!!!
Usually, shock manufacturers try to design their shock/shaft lengths so that they work from minimum desired travel (where it hits the bump stop) up to full droop. Of course, with shortened shocks/struts and lowered cars this may not be possible so it is up to the manufacturer to ensure that the shocks/struts are designed so they can limit the droop without being damaged from the repeated "toping" (as opposed to bottoming) of the shaft. KONI even states so in their documentation (.."...all Koni dampers are designed to withstand the loads of limiting suspension droop etc., etc.").
So, assuming the D2 coilovers also take care of the limited droop, the real question would be how much available travel they have. I took the liberty of "annotating" one of your pictures for "measurement purposes".
The green lines on top of the springs are of equal length. All springs appear to be roughly of the same length. Tthe only exception is the top coilover where the spring appears much shorter but this is a photo-aberration, the shock body also appears to be shorter than the bottom one so I assume we should discount it. This would mean that all the springs are of the same length and all close to 7". I do not think that D2 would intentionally preload the springs on the coilovers any more than necessary for them to be seated properly. However, you stated that the harder springs were longer (???). I cannot really see why they would do such a thing (as in my previous post, common sense would indicate that softer springs wouild need to longer to ensure an even ride height everything else being equal).
So, visual clues and assumptions indicate that the shock/strut design puts a limit to the maximum travel available and it is 7". Now, can you give us an indication of the size of the bump-stops?
Furthermore, we can infer available travel from general information regarding springs. Assuming that indeed the springs are not preloaded on the coilovers any more than for proper seating, and assuming again 9Kg/mm fronts (this is 503 lb/inch), 2640 lbs for the S14 and a 50/50 wieght distribution (maybe off but I do not know the real one) we get 1320/2=660 lbs on each front wheel. Your spring would compress by 1.3" leaving 5.7 inches of travel remaining.
Now, I do not know what the exact specs of the 9Kg/mm D2 spring are but I will use the equivalent one from Eibach (ERS): this would be the 0700.250.0500 meaning 7 inches long, 2.5 inches ID, 500 lb/inch. In their catalog they say that it has a spring travel of 4.06 inches before coilbinding (their coilbinded -block- spring length is 2.94 inches so if you subtract this from the 7" free length you get to 4.06).
Subtracting the already used-up 1.3 inches (from the static car laod) we are left with 4.06-1.3= 2.76 inches of available travel before coilbinding.
Now, I may be off in the weights/distribution, etc. but not by much. Since the coilovers are already mounted we have no way of getting measurement now so this is just food-for-thought!!! Be carefull though with raising the lower spring perches!!! It may lead to coilbinding problems that I actually have faced in the past with seriously detrimental results in the performance of the suspension.
problem Example in the rear section below.
Quote » The rears, on the other hand, dumped with the lower mounts fully extended. I haven't checked to see if the springs were seated to begin with though, so I can still raise the rear by raising the spring collars.[/quote]I assume you mean here that with the lower mount fully extended the rears were still much lower than "sportlines ride". This can definitely be an issue since not all of the GB participants may want to start from that low and only be able to go lower via the lower mount adjustment!!!
I can assume that raising the lower spring perch may be a solution but the adjustable shock/strut body was a big plus for the D2s and was supposed to let you use the maximum available spring travel. Now, lets give an example.
Hypothetical example:
You have 7" 5 Kg/mm (280 lb/inch) extra springs that will presumably be used on the rear coilovers. Again, from Eibach's site the spring travel before coilbinding for similarly speced springs (0700.250.0275 aka 7" - 275 lb/inch) is 4.46 inches. At 280 lb/inch the rear 5Kg springs will compress by 660/280= 2.36 inches by the weight of the car. This means that you will be left with only 4.46-2.36 = 2.1 inches of travel before coilbinding and this assuming you will have the lower spring perches at their lowest possible setting to keep the springs captive. If you raise them by 1 inch to adjust the ride-height, you will effectively remove 1 inch from the availalbe spring travel and be left with only 1.1 inch of travel!!!!
ACE, can you check you rear coilovers and see how much is the total available range of spring perch adjustement on them as well as where they are now? I ma asking because the solution to issues like that is to go to the longest posible springe that can fit in there at the spring rate you desire. If there was enough lower spring perch adjustement range to fit 10" 5 Kg/mm springs in there without compressing them, then you would have 5.99 inches of available travel, 2.36 inches of static car weight compression leaving you with 5.99-2.36= 3.63 inches of availalbe spring travel (instead of 2.1 in the prior case).Quote » No biggie. With stiff *** springs (9 7 combo) the springs don't really compress much when the car is on the ground, which may be why the fronts are the way they are.....[/quote]Do you have your car's weight and weight distribution handy? Just want to put actual numbers on the hypothetical examples to see what is going on.Quote » Performance:With the dampeners set on 3 turns out of 6.5, they're very smooth. I thought that the 9/ 7 springs would be stiffer, but so far they're very bearable. I'd have to say that it might be in part due to the dampeners being able to handle the bumps, potholes, and dips with the 9/7 springs, because there's very little shock from any of those. [/quote]THis suggest that as they are currently set-up D2 is right on the ballpark with their "default" settings. As a side note, they suggest there are 36 points of adjustment so coupled with your 6.5 total turns it would mean something like a adjustment point every 67 degrees of rotation.Quote » I'd still like to tweak the rear end ride height and raise the dampening a little bit. I haven't even gone past halfway yet so it's looking pretty good for now.[/quote] Again, be carefull with this. The hypothetical example I gave above has actually happened to me under very similar conditions. Had 7" 200 lb/inch Eibachs from a GC set on the rear of a B13 and it was too low for my taste. Raised it to stock ride-height and uner medium hard conditions the suspension was very abrupt and jumpy (teeth-griding and all) so I got rid of them. Later on I realized that I had effectively reduced the available rear travel to 1.25 inches and was coilbinding every chance I got!!!Quote » Overall:If you get the 7/5 springs, expect a comfortable ride. The 9/7 springs on my car are far from teeth chattering (although I DO have snow tires on still... the stiffer sidewalls of my summer tires may change that).[/quote] Quote » I would have to say at the moment that the D2's are worth the price they're going for. As time goes by I'll be able to say more about them. Right now I have yet to see how hard the dampening can get..... so it can get a lot better from here, hopefully. [/quote]I know it is a looong-looong-longshot but if you get a chance to "play" with the suspension soon, try to measure the free spring lengths and the available range of adjustability (both shock body and spring perch). From their answer "the range of the length adjustable is 120mm"to my question "Is there a specification available for the free length of the springs? " I assume that they misanderstood and actually replied that the lower spring perch has a range of adjustment of 120mm (roughly 4 inches) but you never know...
Regards,
Chris
This might be an issue or it may not be one.AceInhole wrote:Install:On installation, we realized the pistons dont extend long enough to mount the coilovers while in the stock relaxed position. Once we extended the lower mounts out as far as possible, we just pre-compressed the lower arms with a jack to meet the lower shock mounts. On my S14, the fronts then sat waaay too high, so we redid it and virtually compressed the suspension to ride height levels. With it like that, it settled at about what my sportlines sat at.
Usually, shock manufacturers try to design their shock/shaft lengths so that they work from minimum desired travel (where it hits the bump stop) up to full droop. Of course, with shortened shocks/struts and lowered cars this may not be possible so it is up to the manufacturer to ensure that the shocks/struts are designed so they can limit the droop without being damaged from the repeated "toping" (as opposed to bottoming) of the shaft. KONI even states so in their documentation (.."...all Koni dampers are designed to withstand the loads of limiting suspension droop etc., etc.").
So, assuming the D2 coilovers also take care of the limited droop, the real question would be how much available travel they have. I took the liberty of "annotating" one of your pictures for "measurement purposes".
The green lines on top of the springs are of equal length. All springs appear to be roughly of the same length. Tthe only exception is the top coilover where the spring appears much shorter but this is a photo-aberration, the shock body also appears to be shorter than the bottom one so I assume we should discount it. This would mean that all the springs are of the same length and all close to 7". I do not think that D2 would intentionally preload the springs on the coilovers any more than necessary for them to be seated properly. However, you stated that the harder springs were longer (???). I cannot really see why they would do such a thing (as in my previous post, common sense would indicate that softer springs wouild need to longer to ensure an even ride height everything else being equal).
So, visual clues and assumptions indicate that the shock/strut design puts a limit to the maximum travel available and it is 7". Now, can you give us an indication of the size of the bump-stops?
Furthermore, we can infer available travel from general information regarding springs. Assuming that indeed the springs are not preloaded on the coilovers any more than for proper seating, and assuming again 9Kg/mm fronts (this is 503 lb/inch), 2640 lbs for the S14 and a 50/50 wieght distribution (maybe off but I do not know the real one) we get 1320/2=660 lbs on each front wheel. Your spring would compress by 1.3" leaving 5.7 inches of travel remaining.
Now, I do not know what the exact specs of the 9Kg/mm D2 spring are but I will use the equivalent one from Eibach (ERS): this would be the 0700.250.0500 meaning 7 inches long, 2.5 inches ID, 500 lb/inch. In their catalog they say that it has a spring travel of 4.06 inches before coilbinding (their coilbinded -block- spring length is 2.94 inches so if you subtract this from the 7" free length you get to 4.06).
Subtracting the already used-up 1.3 inches (from the static car laod) we are left with 4.06-1.3= 2.76 inches of available travel before coilbinding.
Now, I may be off in the weights/distribution, etc. but not by much. Since the coilovers are already mounted we have no way of getting measurement now so this is just food-for-thought!!! Be carefull though with raising the lower spring perches!!! It may lead to coilbinding problems that I actually have faced in the past with seriously detrimental results in the performance of the suspension.
problem Example in the rear section below.
Quote » The rears, on the other hand, dumped with the lower mounts fully extended. I haven't checked to see if the springs were seated to begin with though, so I can still raise the rear by raising the spring collars.[/quote]I assume you mean here that with the lower mount fully extended the rears were still much lower than "sportlines ride". This can definitely be an issue since not all of the GB participants may want to start from that low and only be able to go lower via the lower mount adjustment!!!
I can assume that raising the lower spring perch may be a solution but the adjustable shock/strut body was a big plus for the D2s and was supposed to let you use the maximum available spring travel. Now, lets give an example.
Hypothetical example:
You have 7" 5 Kg/mm (280 lb/inch) extra springs that will presumably be used on the rear coilovers. Again, from Eibach's site the spring travel before coilbinding for similarly speced springs (0700.250.0275 aka 7" - 275 lb/inch) is 4.46 inches. At 280 lb/inch the rear 5Kg springs will compress by 660/280= 2.36 inches by the weight of the car. This means that you will be left with only 4.46-2.36 = 2.1 inches of travel before coilbinding and this assuming you will have the lower spring perches at their lowest possible setting to keep the springs captive. If you raise them by 1 inch to adjust the ride-height, you will effectively remove 1 inch from the availalbe spring travel and be left with only 1.1 inch of travel!!!!
ACE, can you check you rear coilovers and see how much is the total available range of spring perch adjustement on them as well as where they are now? I ma asking because the solution to issues like that is to go to the longest posible springe that can fit in there at the spring rate you desire. If there was enough lower spring perch adjustement range to fit 10" 5 Kg/mm springs in there without compressing them, then you would have 5.99 inches of available travel, 2.36 inches of static car weight compression leaving you with 5.99-2.36= 3.63 inches of availalbe spring travel (instead of 2.1 in the prior case).Quote » No biggie. With stiff *** springs (9 7 combo) the springs don't really compress much when the car is on the ground, which may be why the fronts are the way they are.....[/quote]Do you have your car's weight and weight distribution handy? Just want to put actual numbers on the hypothetical examples to see what is going on.Quote » Performance:With the dampeners set on 3 turns out of 6.5, they're very smooth. I thought that the 9/ 7 springs would be stiffer, but so far they're very bearable. I'd have to say that it might be in part due to the dampeners being able to handle the bumps, potholes, and dips with the 9/7 springs, because there's very little shock from any of those. [/quote]THis suggest that as they are currently set-up D2 is right on the ballpark with their "default" settings. As a side note, they suggest there are 36 points of adjustment so coupled with your 6.5 total turns it would mean something like a adjustment point every 67 degrees of rotation.Quote » I'd still like to tweak the rear end ride height and raise the dampening a little bit. I haven't even gone past halfway yet so it's looking pretty good for now.[/quote] Again, be carefull with this. The hypothetical example I gave above has actually happened to me under very similar conditions. Had 7" 200 lb/inch Eibachs from a GC set on the rear of a B13 and it was too low for my taste. Raised it to stock ride-height and uner medium hard conditions the suspension was very abrupt and jumpy (teeth-griding and all) so I got rid of them. Later on I realized that I had effectively reduced the available rear travel to 1.25 inches and was coilbinding every chance I got!!!Quote » Overall:If you get the 7/5 springs, expect a comfortable ride. The 9/7 springs on my car are far from teeth chattering (although I DO have snow tires on still... the stiffer sidewalls of my summer tires may change that).[/quote] Quote » I would have to say at the moment that the D2's are worth the price they're going for. As time goes by I'll be able to say more about them. Right now I have yet to see how hard the dampening can get..... so it can get a lot better from here, hopefully. [/quote]I know it is a looong-looong-longshot but if you get a chance to "play" with the suspension soon, try to measure the free spring lengths and the available range of adjustability (both shock body and spring perch). From their answer "the range of the length adjustable is 120mm"to my question "Is there a specification available for the free length of the springs? " I assume that they misanderstood and actually replied that the lower spring perch has a range of adjustment of 120mm (roughly 4 inches) but you never know...
Regards,
Chris
Re: Re: D2/ KSport coilovers
That actually isn't that bad, but from a guess I'd say that pretty much matches the available piston travel.hpro123 wrote:. However, you stated that the harder springs were longer (???). I cannot really see why they would do such a thing (as in my previous post, common sense would indicate that softer springs wouild need to longer to ensure an even ride height everything else being equal).But remember the spring doesn't act directly on the wheel. Shock angle and in my case swaybar preload (which i desperately need to get rid of, as well as my LCA ES bushing preload....) will reduce that figure.I'm almost 100% sure the harder springs are slightly longer. I'm wondering if they adjust springrate by the coil angle (meaning, given the same number of coils per spring, the harder springs would be "extended" a bit more). I'll try to get a set of calipers to measure the spring thickness, though.
I'll try to get better pics of every part of the coilovers. I would've had a lot more last night but i'm out of battery power. From the looks of it, there's a lot of travel in the piston available since the coilovers barely compress (hard *** springs, though).
Quote »Furthermore, we can infer available travel from general information regarding springs. Assuming that indeed the springs are not preloaded on the coilovers any more than for proper seating, and assuming again 9Kg/mm fronts (this is 503 lb/inch), 2640 lbs for the S14 and a 50/50 wieght distribution (maybe off but I do not know the real one) we get 1320/2=660 lbs on each front wheel. Your spring would compress by 1.3" leaving 5.7 inches of travel remaining.
Quote »Subtracting the already used-up 1.3 inches (from the static car laod) we are left with 4.06-1.3= 2.76 inches of available travel before coilbinding.
Quote »Now, I may be off in the weights/distribution, etc. but not by much. Since the coilovers are already mounted we have no way of getting measurement now so this is just food-for-thought!!! [/quote] I'll get one of the shocks off to measure everything more accurately if i have time later today or early tomorrow. I want to do a little more tweaking, anyways.
Quote »Be carefull though with raising the lower spring perches!!! It may lead to coilbinding problems that I actually have faced in the past with seriously detrimental results in the performance of the suspension. [/quote]LoL.... when you have coilbind, you hear it. I don't think the springs are fully seated, though. If i had to take a guess I'd say the rears could still be lifted another inch or so without preloading the spring. I also didn't want to FULLY extend the lower mount, as I didn't want to chance having too few threads on the lower mount. I definitely think the car could be higher, but if you want a stock ride height.... well.. these are probably not your best bet.
Quote »I can assume that raising the lower spring perch may be a solution but the adjustable shock/strut body was a big plus for the D2s and was supposed to let you use the maximum available spring travel. [/quote]like i said previously, i don't think the springs are fully seated right now, which may be why i get some clunking/ squeaking. I'll raise the lower spring collars to find out.
Quote »ACE, can you check you rear coilovers and see how much is the total available range of spring perch adjustement on them as well as where they are now?[/quote]I left the lower seats as they were when they came. The fronts look pretty much how they are on the car, and the rears obviously have a lot more threading below the perch right now.
Quote »Do you have your car's weight and weight distribution handy? Just want to put actual numbers on the hypothetical examples to see what is going on.[/quote] i'll have them when i corner weight the car later this week.
Quote »THis suggest that as they are currently set-up D2 is right on the ballpark with their "default" settings. As a side note, they suggest there are 36 points of adjustment so coupled with your 6.5 total turns it would mean something like a adjustment point every 67 degrees of rotation.[/quote] every turn seems to be 6 points of adjustment, so the extra .5 turn may just be some "extra" room on the adjustment dial. I wouldn't want to go all 6.5 turns to stiff anyways, yet :p Quote »Again, be carefull with this. The hypothetical example I gave above has actually happened to me under very similar conditions. Had 7" 200 lb/inch Eibachs from a GC set on the rear of a B13 and it was too low for my taste. Raised it to stock ride-height and uner medium hard conditions the suspension was very abrupt and jumpy (teeth-griding and all) so I got rid of them. Later on I realized that I had effectively reduced the available rear travel to 1.25 inches and was coilbinding every chance I got!!![/quote] there's definitely enough travel in the rear.... especially with the much stiffer springs which won't settle as low. Even 5kg springs are just about 300lb/in.
Quote »I know it is a looong-looong-longshot but if you get a chance to "play" with the suspension soon, try to measure the free spring lengths and the available range of adjustability (both shock body and spring perch). From their answer "the range of the length adjustable is 120mm"to my question "Is there a specification available for the free length of the springs? " I assume that they misanderstood and actually replied that the lower spring perch has a range of adjustment of 120mm (roughly 4 inches) but you never know...
Regards,
Chris [/quote]
All I have to do is measure the spring as it is with the car settled, and raise the car and measure the spring again. Pretty sure it's less than an inch of deflection due to the reasons i listed above, but i guess we'll see.
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barrigas14
- Posts: 326
- Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 7:53 am
so do they come with adjustable perches? there was a lot of stuff i didn't want to read through. i am debating if i should keep the ones i ordered or sell them. the main thing is if they are adjustable perch then i will 75% keep them. if not then i will sell them. i have a S13 now sitting in my garage so i might want to sell all my performance parts on my S14 so i can get that car running.
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barrigas14
- Posts: 326
- Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 7:53 am
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dreamsOfSkylines
- Posts: 254
- Joined: Tue Dec 31, 2002 11:29 am
for the rear camber i'm adjusting the ghetto way: slotted bolt holes. as for autocrossing, i may raise the car a bit as the added G-forces will create more body roll (R-compounds will do that) and scraping the fender will not be a good idea. i haven't checked the lower control arms just yet, but I've got subframe spacers to compress the rear subframe to the chassis, which "raises" the rear LCA mount anyways.
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dreamsOfSkylines
- Posts: 254
- Joined: Tue Dec 31, 2002 11:29 am
Thanks for the review though man, I can't wait to get mine. I'm still a bit confused as to why the stiffer springs are longer but I'm sure theres still plenty of room for adjustment. What other suspension mods do you have? I'm thinking with so much extra stiffness I'm going to have to get some poly bushings and perhaps new TC rods.
