Tein SS with camber plate or Flex with EDFC or HKS Hypermax 2 or RS or Jic Fat2

 

The thing about lowering a car is that it changes your camber. The wheels are further up in the wells, so they aren't sitting at the normal suspension angle. You have to adjust for that, using camber bolts or camber plates.

Coil-overs with camber plates will give you a completely adjustable suspension -- probably more than the average "paint by numbers" alignment shop will be able to deal with.

I put DMS coilovers with Cusco plates on my old Celica AllTrac, because the dealer completely messed up the alignment, and the springs were getting old anyway.

If you're mechanically inclined, have a full tool kit, and a bit of patience, you can install coilovers yourself. Even "plug and play" coilover kits require a little ingenuity, though, as there are fiddling details to cope with. For example, the stock Celica struts had brackets for the brake lines. I had to fabricate brackets out of sheet brass to clamp to the DMSs to hold those lines.

Also, you'll have a job trying to install one at a time with jack stands. The anti-sway bar will interfere with the suspension if you only have one wheel up. I used a low-rise floor lift (Eagle Equipment, $1500 delivered) to install mine. (Also comes in handy for swapping tire/wheel sets for winter/summer, and for DIY fluid changes.)

With a little web research and an understanding of the geometry involved, you can do a pretty good alignment on your own. The home alignment I gave the Celica was way better than the minimum wage wrenches at the Toy dealer gave it with their $70K Hunter machine. I used a t-square, a plumb bob, a piece of chalk, a tape measure, and an angle gauge I got at Ace Hardware. (Total cost, about $10.) And I got the handling I wanted, rather than the conservative, understeer-oriented handling most places give you. (But neutral handling is not for inexperienced drivers.)

High price gimmicks don't go as far as caring about results. If you have the time and patience, you'll probably do a better job than all but a few rare mechanics.

Also be careful of local supplies. The so-called "grade 5" bolts I got from a local hardware store sheared off well under 100 Nm torque. The ones from Ace were much better.

 

I've just got my Zero 2R's installed and so far, they're really good for me. I don't track my car too often and so had similar requirements - good handling, and acceptable ride comfort.

Of course "acceptable" is subjective but when my rear passengers' heads aren't bobbing around too badly I reckon I'm ok with that.

Decided on the Cusco's for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the height adjustment is independant of the spring pre-load which is a big factor. I'm running 7kg in the front and 5kg springs in the rear (sorry, don't know the conversion) - these are out of the box. Also, its pre-adjusted to lower your car quite a fair bit.

Alignment. You'll definitely need to get these done. Suggest you leave it a couple of days to let the coilovers "settle down" a little. I'm no expert on camber / toe / caster settings so I won't comment. Alot of it is driver preference based on your style of driving so hopefully you can sort that out.

Btw, this is my 2nd set of coilovers in 6 mths because I had to raise the ride height which affected my spring pre-load and just made the ride unbearable for me.

Ok, I like the Cusco's because its simple. 5 settings for street (#1) to competition (#5) performance. I used to have the Tein RA followed by the Ohlins in my Honda before and both were harsh (not sure if the Ohlins for the Evo are better though). Also, with over 30 settings that was just way to complicated for me.

I'm experiencing some bodyroll at this "comfort" setting and I've got an adjustable lower swaybar (23mm, 'softest' setup) to try to minimize this. Looks like I'll need to move it a notch towards the stiffer end.


Good luck with your selection!

 

The short answer is "no." Coilovers are definitely not plug-n-play...they need to be set up properly otherwise handling will be worse than you can imagine. You'd be surprised how many cars with "professionally" installed coilover systems actually handle worse than stock.

Anyway, the whole idea of coilovers are that you can fine-tune your suspension settings to optimize performance at specific racetracks. They are designed to NOT be plug-n-play!


You've answered your own question! If your primary goal is to eliminate the fender gap, then go with lowering springs. These are cheap, don't require specialized set-up skills (you'll just need a good alignment, since camber and toe will get thrown off). You certainly don't want an axpensive, delicate, fully-adjustible suspension just to lower the car an inch.

BTW, coilovers are REALLY short-lived in daily-driven cars...especially in the snow belt. Coilover dampers have no dust boots, so at the salt and crap will contaminate them. I really don't know why people insist on putting race suspensions on street cars...

Emre

 

Thanks for all the info guys, I appreciate it a lot. I'm still trying to decide what I want to do. Since I have a buddy here that is an expert greasemonkey, I'm not too concerned about alignment. He's been installing stuff and working on cars and racing them since the '60s. I'm sure he can help me install them and align them properly.

 

But if you know you're in the snow belt, that's one of the "tweaks" you give them. The DMS had pretty good boots on the dampers, and I went over the other exposed parts with a wax crayon. Of course, swapping tires twice a year on a lift also gives you a chance to wash them down.

But all that being said, the coilovers weren't as "hefty" as the stock struts. But I got 14 years out of the stock struts. How many people will keep EVOs that long? (I guess it depends on whether the WRC drop-outs results in another "dry spell" like we had in the '90s.)

 

I'm really thinking now.....One thing's for sure, I'm nowhere near the snowbelt. I live where people escape from the snowbelt, sunny SW Florida. It got down to 30 once, and all us Florida natives were about to die.....

Anyway, hearing that coilovers have a short life span really has me confused. I've never heard that. I have heard that lowering springs on stock struts would lower the life span of the stock struts to under 2 years. How true is that?

Were the 14 years on your stock struts 14 lowered years, or 14 years at normal ride height? I plan on keeping my car as long as I can. I want to retire it to weekend track duty once I'm done with it as my daily driver. So, longevity is a concern for me too. I'm sure in the time I have it that I will change out suspension parts more than once though.

I just need to know how long stock struts will last with lowering springs only?

Thanks again guys.

 

Well, it's a fact. Race suspensions are for race cars. You can't slap them on a daily-driven car and expect them to withstand years of street driving. Race teams rebuild their dampers every season or so and the springs are changed constantly. Like I said, racing coilovers don't even have dust boots.


That's also true. Sticking stiff, short springs on a damper that's designed for softer, taller springs will certainly accelerate wear. However, the Evo is rather overdamped as it is, so lowering 3/4 of an inch (like the Works Ride springs) or even 1 inch should not seriously compromise damper life. And, anyway, you'll have enough money left over to eventually replace your dampers with MR Bilsteins if they ever go bad.

The alternative is spending a huge amount of money up front for a quality coilover kit. Or spending a lot of money on a cheap coilover kit and rebuilding it every couple of years. Unless you're a serious track junkie and need the adjustibility of coilovers, neither option makes as much sense as quality lowering springs.

Emre

 

both are good ways to go you could get a nice set of springs and some shocks and it would give the car a nice drop look and still have good suspension for driving and racing unfortunately springs are not very plyable where as coilovers you have more adjustment options and better handling in different areas the TEIN kits are good as well as OMNIPOWER HKS also makes good kits as far as suspension goes if it were my car id put a nice set of coilovers on it but its based on budjet and personal preference good luck with your car man

 

Wow! All in 1 sentence

 

Well, that was a different era. The ST-165 was the homologation of the car Carlos Sainz took to the 1990 WRC Championship -- in an era of much tighter homologation rules. The car didn't need lowering for street use (especially in snow country). (And I have the Italians for track duty.)


You've answered your own question again. Good quality struts can be rebuilt periodically, but it's a large investment up front. (My DMS setup ran about $3K in parts. Ohlins are even more.) But by the time you're ready to shift the car to track use, you'll probably want to make some upgrades. So whether you go for lowering springs (and camber plates) or for entry level coilovers, plan to go for a higher grade set of coilovers for the track.

Either way, you'll need to compensate for the camber change when you lower the car. You have some adjustment in the stock wheel hub, but it probably won't be enough to get the alignment just right ... and leaving the alignment a bit off will give you worse handling than just leaving the stock setup alone. So look into camber plates as well, as that will let you adjust camber and SAI (steering angle inclination) separately.

Coilovers will likely give you better handling, because they can be adjusted spot-on, just the way you want it. Lowering springs are a compromise. Like everything else on a performance car, it's that last 2% of performance that really costs.

Playing with the suspension now will give you experience that will come in handy when you start setting the car up for the track. Coil-overs have a lot of adjustments, and it takes experience to translate adjustments to seat-of-the-pants handling. But the street may not be the best place to experiment.

 

DGS, thanks for your input. I guess I'll just have to research a little more before I decide what to do. I'll overlook the fender gap for now, because the car handles more than fine for a daily driver out of the box. You're right about that last little 2% that really costs. Since I DO plan on making this car a track project after it's daily driver duties are over, I'll leave the more intricate coilovers to that situation when it arises, probably in 2-3 years. Until then, it will probably be a more simple coilover solution.

 

Most coilovers do require rebuilds every 2-3 years (sometimes less or more, depending on your use). But the thing is that all struts are wear items. Coilovers you just get rebuilt instead of throwing away

 

So how much are we looking at for rebuilding coilovers? Brands Tien do offers this service in the USA, but do you know how much it will cost?

 

Just out of curiosity, what are you basing this off of?