Installed eibach sportlines on my 1990 240sx coupe (s13) and it's not much lower

[Black R]

A little background so my dilemna makes a bit of sense:

I bought this s13 from a guy I've known for a few years. He said he originally bought it as a daily from another guy who had TEIN coilovers on it and was into drifting it. He promptly put 'stock' suspension on it and sold the coilovers. He daily drove the car as a daily beater while he worked on his rb20 s14. When he was finished with his s14, he put this s13 up for sale. The car hadn't been well taken care of, but I was hoping to restore it and eventually make it track ready.

It needs a lot of work in many areas, and of course had rotted out TC (tension) rods as well as shredded boots on the tie rods and tie rod end balljoints. I bought those items and am installing them at the same time I have the car up to put on a set of eibach sportline springs. I bought these springs because I wanted to lower the car as much as possible. Yes I've read how low the sportlines are supposed to be, and that's why I bought them. I didn't mind if they would kill the shocks soon, as it would give me an excuse to get some koni yellows. This way I can have a low suspension now, and upgrade to ground control coilover sleeves in the future as I slowly build up the car.

pics of the stuff to be installed:



before:

after:

And a couple of pics showing the rubber crap (dust boot pieces which were demolished) that I removed, as well as the difference between the stock front spring vs the eibach sportline:





so, wtf is wrong? *I only installed the front left to take a look and see how much the drop would be... well it's not much at all! i thought these were supposed to lower the car 2"+ and instead it's maybe 1 finger lower.

So what gives?

Is it possible the previous owner put the wrong parts (tophats, etc?) on the car before he sold it to me.....? (Maybe he put s14 stuff on this s13?) How can I check? Or did I screw up something when I did the install? How are the tophats supposed to be oriented? For example: the front left tophat only has LF stamped on it, but no arrows toward the front or the car or anything.....

*edit*

I just found this in an online search:

http://www.nissanperformancema...shtml

Quote »On the front strut, one side of the top of the strut body is a flat edge. There is a small locating "pin" that uses the flat edge of the strut body to locate it, and there is a hole in the upper spring perch that is used to position the shock body and spring perch, as noted in pictures 9 and 10. Please note the "notch" that is pointed out in picture 9. When properly assembled, the two notches on the left and right struts are supposed to point directly to each other; in other words, the notch faces the engine. If you install it in a wrong direction, not only would the springs be improperly seated, you can also risk damaging the shocks.

Reattach the upper strut rubber insulator, and secure the 14mm bolt at the top of the strut. The now-installed strut assembly should resemble picture # 11. If you tried doing one strut at a time, without completely jacking up one end of the car and removing both struts/shocks at the same time, you will have a very difficult time reattaching the shocks. That is because the anti-roll bar is still attached to the lower control arm and is fighting your attempts at lowering the suspension even more. But, with both sides of one axle up in the air, putting the front struts back together should prove relatively painless. A tip: when installing the two lower bolts, attach the lower bolt and "swing" the strut so that the upper bolt holes line up. Makes the job a lot easier! [/quote]Hrm... maybe I need to press on and see if the front swaybar is preventing the left side from dropping all the way down until I put the other side on?
Modified by Black R at 3:44 AM 5/27/2007

[Black R]

well i finished putting the fronts on, and there's still a 3 to 4 finger gap between the tire and the fender. :/

I'm using 16x7 +33 wheels with 195/50/16 tires btw.....
Modified by Black R at 12:31 PM 5/28/2007

[boznuttz]

195 50 15 tires on a 16 by 7?! You must mean 195 50 16........

Anyway, a 195 50 16 will give you about a half an inch of extra wheel gap. If you are using 195 50 15s on a 15 inch wheel, then, you'd be looking at more of a full inch or so.

Besides all of that, give it some time, springs have to settle after a few days and such.

[boznuttz]

http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html

[RB20DETodd]

not gonna get much lower, just cut them cause springs are gay anyways.

[Black R]

195 50 15 tires on a 16 by 7?! You must mean 195 50 16........

Anyway, a 195 50 16 will give you about a half an inch of extra wheel gap. If you are using 195 50 15s on a 15 inch wheel, then, you'd be looking at more of a full inch or so.

Besides all of that, give it some time, springs have to settle after a few days and such.

yeah sorry, there was a typo.... it's 195/50/16 in the front.

I guess they did lower the car, but since I'm not used to nissan's I expected it to lower it a lot more. Imho, it still needs to drop like another 2" at least. Guess I need to find some coilovers now!

[boznuttz]

S13s have about the largest wheel gap of any stock car that I know of, lol. Lowering your car is really for asthetics, and it really messes with your roll geometry. If you are looking for the slammed look, don't expect any real performance unless you fork out a lot of cash for a decent set of coils, adjustable rear upper control arms, pillowball mounts for the front, and possibly adjustable lower control arms for the front.

Don't expect it to be that great. A dropped car can perform well.....when you drop your pocket as well, lol.

SPL KTS, Megan Street, JIC, Tein etc. They are decent brands, but mostly for looks.

[skydragoness]

yeah sorry, there was a typo.... it's 195/50/16 in the front.

I guess they did lower the car, but since I'm not used to nissan's I expected it to lower it a lot more. Imho, it still needs to drop like another 2" at least. Guess I need to find some coilovers now!

Uhh.. how long have they been on the car? It usually takes a few days to up to a week for the springs to 'settle'

[Dave_Dynamite]

i dont mean to thread jack but...as far as lowering springs go, since the 240 has a lot of wheel gap, how far should one drop his 240? i've seen springs that claim a 1" drop all the way to 2.5". i was thinking of going with a 1.5" to 1.8" drop, but that white coupe in the first post didnt really get much of a drop in his set up. would 2.5 do the trick?

[boznuttz]

For pure asthetics really. If you completely want to eliminate the wheel gap alltogether....you're looking at around 4 or so inches in the rear and 4.5 in the front. Tire size does play an important roll. A 1.75 inch drop on my car looked decent on a set of 205 60 15s I had, but then I bought a set of 15x7s and put a 195 60 15 on there. It looked like I picked up a little more wheel gap.

If you are looking for a cheap and decent drop: Intrax claims 2.2 inches or so in the front and 2 in the rear.Eiback Sportlines claim similar.And if you have around 400 laying around, give Grond Control from Eibach a call and order custom springs.

IMHO, just accept the wheel gap and enjoy the performance. Every coilover system that I have tested out under 1,800 has really been....crappy.....in comparrison to Koni Yellows and Megan Springs. I'll get another set of GCs in a few weeks, because up to this point, it has been the best setup I have ever driven.

If you have any specific questions, feel free to email, or instant message me. I'll be more than happy to guide you in the right direction for whatever you are looking for.

[gumby74]

I have owned the Intrax/ AGX combo until just recently. That replaced a Tein/ AGX and an Eibach/ Tokico set up. The Intrax springs claim a 1.8" drop not 2.2, you are thinking Eibach Sportlines. That was the most decent drop of my 3 spring shock combos. The car drove great, handling for a street car, was quite acceptable. The front wheel gap however was still almost 2" though; and that was with a 225/45 17 tire. That is just under a 25" diameter tire.Lastly, I will take my sub $1800 Tein non-dampening adjustable coilovers over Koni yellow, green, blue or white ANY day of the week.

[Black R]

For pure asthetics really. If you completely want to eliminate the wheel gap alltogether....you're looking at around 4 or so inches in the rear and 4.5 in the front. Tire size does play an important roll. A 1.75 inch drop on my car looked decent on a set of 205 60 15s I had, but then I bought a set of 15x7s and put a 195 60 15 on there. It looked like I picked up a little more wheel gap.

If you are looking for a cheap and decent drop: Intrax claims 2.2 inches or so in the front and 2 in the rear.Eiback Sportlines claim similar.And if you have around 400 laying around, give Grond Control from Eibach a call and order custom springs.

IMHO, just accept the wheel gap and enjoy the performance. Every coilover system that I have tested out under 1,800 has really been....crappy.....in comparrison to Koni Yellows and Megan Springs. I'll get another set of GCs in a few weeks, because up to this point, it has been the best setup I have ever driven.

If you have any specific questions, feel free to email, or instant message me. I'll be more than happy to guide you in the right direction for whatever you are looking for.

For pure asthetics really. If you completely want to eliminate the wheel gap alltogether....you're looking at around 4 or so inches in the rear and 4.5 in the front. Tire size does play an important roll. A 1.75 inch drop on my car looked decent on a set of 205 60 15s I had, but then I bought a set of 15x7s and put a 195 60 15 on there. It looked like I picked up a little more wheel gap.

If you are looking for a cheap and decent drop: Intrax claims 2.2 inches or so in the front and 2 in the rear.Eiback Sportlines claim similar.And if you have around 400 laying around, give Grond Control from Eibach a call and order custom springs.

IMHO, just accept the wheel gap and enjoy the performance. Every coilover system that I have tested out under 1,800 has really been....crappy.....in comparrison to Koni Yellows and Megan Springs. I'll get another set of GCs in a few weeks, because up to this point, it has been the best setup I have ever driven.

If you have any specific questions, feel free to email, or instant message me. I'll be more than happy to guide you in the right direction for whatever you are looking for.

I actually agree with you 100%.

The koni yellow + ground control sleeves is great because you have adjustable height and dampening. AND koni gives a lifetime warranty. AND if you need to run stiffer springs (I think the yellows can only handle 400# to 500# springs.) you can have them revalved and even shortened for higher rates - even 1000# if needed. Now most off the shelf coilovers can't even handle those types of rates, and even the most high $ name brand coilovers have piss-poor shock dyno's.

[Black R]

here's a pic after I installed the eibach sportlines all around.

imho it needs to be about 2" to 2.5" lower.

and yes, it's purely for aesthetics - otherwise I wouldn't be buying 'lowering springs'!