ANY higher LINEAR rate lowering springs out there with MORE rate than the Swift Spec Rs??

[KKaWing]

Progressive springs behave differently with different loads. As one gains more confidence and skill on the track, the faster they would end up being, and result in higher suspension loads. A car with a suspension setup that keeps changing is not something you want to deal with while learning. Sidenote: The BC Racing springs (the black ones they make themselves) are technically progressive (due to cheap material and construction) as they get massively stiffer as they're compressed even though the coil spacing is even, it's all in materials and design.

 

[Dpro]

OK, I fully agree with the above, but, I do NOT carry more than one passenger in mine, EVER (the back seats are out, permanently if I can help it!), nor ever use it to haul anything heavy.

I have always heard, for 40+ years, from most suspension experts, that linear rate springs are MUCH MORE accurate over the full suspension travel stroke, and that there are NO mid-corner/apex rate change 'surprises' from them at all, unlike progressive rate springs.

I am leaning more and more to the pretty much indestructible M-Sport R1 rally spec, Bilstein Motorsport coil over setup (linear all around), despite it's higher than most co$t.

Ironically, last time I checked when I had a coil over setup on my 4th gen Z28, Hyperco themselves did not make/offer ANY actual progressive rate springs, unless one counts their 'tender/helper' coil over spring options as a progressive rate.

And specifically you see this on coilover setups for the mainly two reasons that I stated which is why Hyperco provides linear coils road going coilovers . The ability to qucikly calculate and tune per track, and the limited travel length.

They go more in depth on thier site about the differences and the multiple types of progressive springs as well.

You seem to be oriented towards a very specific goal with your car. I get that. If you are doing a lot off road or Rally type things I xcan so going longer raised height susepension and approaching it differently.
Hypeco actually does make and sell progressive coils for off road vehicles.

I just wonder if you are taking this to an extreme? Perhaps not, I know with myself I have recently started re thinking my own suspension plans as I wonder if I will go farther than nescessary because can.

Fact is straight of the assembly line out cars are pretty amzing all ready. Do I really have to go super nuts on the suspension? Damper change sure, a little ride height ya but do I need more?

i just finished reading one of threads from St nation of a guy with a White FiST who was placing high SCCA Nationals with Koni’s a custom doible adjustable insert setup .Who switched back to stock fronts on his 14 amd ran the same if not faster times.
It clearly shows that perhaps a lot of us go way overboard on our suspension setups because manufacturers make parts to do that.

I am just thinking out loud here but the thoughts bear some validity and I do not think anyone has hazard to ask it on the forums of late.

Progressive springs behave differently with different loads. As one gains more confidence and skill on the track, the faster they would end up being, and result in higher suspension loads. A car with a suspension setup that keeps changing is not something you want to deal with while learning.

Somewhat true but not hard and fast. You make,this sound like there are no exceptions. Yet dual rate progressive springs work quit well in road racing and even Hyperco cites that fact.

“The second type of progressive rate suspension springs, the dual-rate spring with two linear rates connected with a rate transition range is a much more sophisticated suspension spring. The design is much more focused on the specific use for the spring. These types of springs are used primarily in road racing and high performance street and GT applications where the vehicle trim package will stay in a very predictable range. These springs are easily identified by having a few closely wound coils at one end and then wider, equal spaced coils at the other end. They have rates described as 200/425lb/in. This means that the spring has an initial rate of 225lb/in through some range of deflection and then the rate transitions to 425lb/in through a deflection range of 1”-1.5.” The big advantage of these springs is that they can provide “roll control” in addition to roll control provided by sway bars.”


I am just being a devils advocate for the sake of people realizing one shoudl not immediately demonize or take peoples handed down words against things that actually might be benificial.

One needs to realize that just becuase something is stated as conventional wisdom it may not always be the whole truth and nothing but the truth so to speak.

Depending on application both things work.
Also one should not assume all people discussing this stuff are A: beginners or B inexperienced.
You don’t know.

 

[Nate489]

Get Ground Control Sleeves and have Eibach make a set of their ERS springs for you

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

 

[Dpro]

Get Ground Control Sleeves and have Eibach make a set of their ERS springs for you

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

Even better get sleeves and use Hyperco. Its really easy to get sleaves for our struts they are standard 2 inch diameter which is used on lots of cars.

 

[M-Sport fan]

Get Ground Control Sleeves and have Eibach make a set of their ERS springs for you

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

Ground Control bitched out on making a complete coil over conversion kit for our rides (low FiST sales overall in U.S./now a 'dead' car), and they were actually developing one a couple of years back (what I was holding out for over Koni Sports).

Eibach (OR Hyperco) have many different rates and spring heights available right on their shelves, so no need for them to build any specially/specifically for me.

I do not feel like experimenting with all of the hundreds of spring caps, and top mounts out there (to find the ONE that works) to try and 'engineer' my own coil over conversion setup.

 

[M-Sport fan]

Fact is straight of the assembly line out cars are pretty amzing all ready. Do I really have to go super nuts on the suspension? Damper change sure, a little ride height ya but do I need more?

i just finished reading one of threads from St nation of a guy with a White FiST who was placing high SCCA Nationals with Koni’s a custom doible adjustable insert setup .Who switched back to stock fronts on his 14 amd ran the same if not faster times.
It clearly shows that perhaps a lot of us go way overboard on our suspension setups because manufacturers make parts to do that.

I hear you on that above!

I was more than impressed with the factory setup on our rides, and how they handled the 'baby's head' imbedded rocks, ruts, compressions and bumps/rough roads/gravel of the New England Forest Rally last year when I was working it, and going down the stages at half+ the speeds of the competition cars.

I also do NOT feel it is as 'bouncy' as everyone else on here claims it is.

But, I do want a little more out of it handling/roll/response wise, and I KNOW that the factory dampers will not take any really BIG hits without failing, whether they are out on a rally stage, OR hitting a HUGE hidden/invisible crater out on the totally unlit public roads at night (this year seems to be especially bad for these around here on bombed out RT. 202! )

JRI will build me a custom, 2 way adjustable coil over setup for ~$5K, whereas the non adjustable (for compression/rebound) M-Sport R1 spec Bilstein coil over setup is ~$2500, but will handle much more abuse than anything else out there (including those JRIs, and all of even the BEST of the Taiwan specials, regardless of all of the 'top quality' claims they all make).

After that one gets into the Reiger 2 and 3 way adjustable setups starting at ~$11K, which are the 'ultimate' for our rides, but most certainly extreme overkill at almost the value of the whole car.

 

[Dpro]

I hear you on that above!

I was more than impressed with the factory setup on our rides, and how they handled the 'baby's head' imbedded rocks, ruts, compressions and bumps/rough roads/gravel of the New England Forest Rally last year when I was working it, and going down the stages at half+ the speeds of the competition cars.

I also do NOT feel it is as 'bouncy' as everyone else on here claims it is.

But, I do want a little more out of it handling/roll/response wise, and I KNOW that the factory dampers will not take any really BIG hits without failing, whether they are out on a rally stage, OR hitting a HUGE hidden/invisible crater out on the totally unlit public roads at night (this year seems to be especially bad for these around here on bombed out RT. 202! )

JRI will build me a custom, 2 way adjustable coil over setup for ~$5K, whereas the non adjustable (for compression/rebound) M-Sport R1 spec Bilstein coil over setup is ~$2500, but will handle much more abuse than anything else out there (including those JRIs, and all of even the BEST of the Taiwan specials, regardless of all of the 'top quality' claims they all make).

After that one gets into the Reiger 2 and 3 way adjustable setups starting at ~$11K, which are the 'ultimate' for our rides, but most certainly extreme overkill at almost the value of the whole car.

Ya people complained about the ride and I felt my ride was not bad. The places where I see fail is expansion joints and oscillation on some of our less than once stellar freeways that are badly in need of repair. That is where I noticed a lot of the over dampened situations. In fact those are classic examples pf places one can notice over dampened suspension. I am sure seeing as mine is an 18 its a little less harsh than your 14-15.
Though not unlivable not ideal.
I was having this discussion with my buddy last night. I came from a world where going springs and shocks improved over stock as far as moving away from a plush ride into a more sporting ride but discovered that being stuck with a particular ride height according to the spring kinda sucked. Either you got not enough drop or on the flipside extreme drop.
Plus you had to gamble with matching the shock as again you were stuck with a fixed spring rate.
This is really what lead to the rise of coilovers the freedom of choice, the matching of springs to shocks etc.

So this leads with our cars to a very unique dilemma. Not often does one get a car from the factory that handles so well and is over damped. We change to stiffer springs and it helps . Though stock shocks are just that stock shocks that will not last a long time. Especially for the cost of building our cars.
So we sit there and go uprated springs and Koni or Bilstein neither a real bad choice with Koni giving us adjustability. Though then we are stuck with the bugaboo of a fixed predetermined ride height with aftermarket springs. So we think coilovers ya but then its does this car really need it?

Its a conundrum I could keep my Whiteline sprigs ( new in box ) and get koni Yellows or I could sell them and go get brand new ST XTA ( KW ) coilovers that are basically the same kind of shock as a Koni as Koni supplied KW with internals for a long time. I would then have ride height choice, adjustability and pillowball camber plates.
Do I need all that though?
Oh and my other buddy will whisper uder his breath Meister R British touring championship coilovers. Lol

One could have a worse dilemma than this in the since of not having the dliemma becuase less choice.

 

[M-Sport fan]

After speaking to one of the founders of JRi dampers, now out on his own, I may still consider the ST XTAs, or Bilstein B14s, only because he says that both of those companies' dire warnings of not putting a linear rate coil over spring onto their valved for progressive spring dampers is BUNK, as long as one does not go too far (like more than 15% higher) in spring rate over what comes with those kits.

He claims it is NOT all that precise on their parts, as far as valving goes.

Even though koozy claims that the ST lowering springs for our app are linear, EVERY vendor which handles them, (and ST/KW themselves) claim that it is in fact a progressive rate spring.

Time to break out my old Hyperco catalogs, and try to find a higher rate, close to factory height, factory fitment, linear spring to use over Koni Sports if I go that route.

 

[Dpro]

After speaking to one of the founders of JRi dampers, now out on his own, I may still consider the ST XTAs, or Bilstein B14s, only because he says that both of those companies' dire warnings of not putting a linear rate coil over spring onto their valved for progressive spring dampers is BUNK, as long as one does not go too far (like more than 15% higher) in spring rate over what comes with those kits.

He claims it is NOT all that precise on their parts, as far as valving goes.

Even though koozy claims that the ST lowering springs for our app are linear, EVERY vendor which handles them, (and ST/KW themselves) claim that it is in fact a progressive rate spring.

Time to break out my old Hyperco catalogs, and try to find a higher rate, close to factory height, factory fitment, linear spring to use over Koni Sports if I go that route.

I have looked at pics pf the ST springs and in fact they are not completely linear. As they appear to be be dual rate progressive with coils at either end being closer together compared to coils in the middle being father apart. That is acrually the flip of Whitel that is a dual progressive with coils on the ends being farther apart amd coils in the middle being closer together. Whiteline also says their spring is a dual progessive.

Though I do find it interesting your so sold on running linear on your car as progressive is condsidered a better choice for off road rally type driving , canyon type driving and occassional track. As the springs will work better with different deflection and terrain points.

Thing about linear is when it loads up t a certain point it losses deflection capabilities and stops working. On a smooth road course or autocross setup that is not a problem. Againbeing able to calculate height, spring rate and damper rate matches on the fly is what is one of the principle advantages for linear springs as they allow tuneabilty from course to course. Though outside of that one can run progressives all day long and stil, be very competitive.

Its kind like running Bilsteins or inverted Monotube on the steeet vs a dual tube Koni or Koni style.
On the track which is a smooth surface an inverted Monotube can perform fantastic it will usually ride stiffer than a dual tube Koni but does not feel bad bacuase smooth road.
The minute you get it into rougher surfaces that ride feel gets harsher, i.e. street driving and a Koni will always feel a bit nicer on the street with its uneven surface changes and bumps and whatnot. Provide one does not lower the car so much that it is not ideal to the shocks stroke range.
Then it does not matter what you run they will all react poorly.

You do have your Monotube fans vs your dual tuber fans again its not what’s better its what’s better suited to the application you are using it for.

 

[M-Sport fan]

Its kind like running Bilsteins or inverted Monotube on the steeet vs a dual tube Koni or Koni style.
On the track which is a smooth surface an inverted Monotube can perform fantastic it will usually ride stiffer than a dual tube Koni but does not feel bad because smooth road.

IF the above is the case, then WHY does M-Sport spec an inverted monotube Bilstein damper with a linear rate main spring and a tender spring, for it's R1 class spec, GRAVEL (and tarmac as well) front suspension setup?

Do they have no clue as to what they are doing??

 

[Dpro]

IF the above is the case, then WHY does M-Sport spec an inverted monotube Bilstein damper with a linear rate main spring and a tender spring, for it's R1 class spec, GRAVEL (and tarmac as well) front suspension setup?

Do they have no clue as to what they are doing??

Several possible reasons . 1. Sponsorship from Bilstein= free suspension setup, 2. They are tuning it per course,
3. How groomed are those gravel and tarmac tracks. Well groomed can mean still pretty smooth.

4. There are always exceptions and people who do things outside of convention rule of thumb or what may be considered ideal.

5. Just because a winning team you love does it does not make it a rule of thumb. See above on 4.

6. Racing has always been winning and doing so trying ideas and making things work that sometimes should not. Nothing is absolute but somethings are ideal and some are not.

You see unconventional stuff in F1 all the time, they turn shit on its head sometimes jist to try amd get an advantage . Not only that but everytime the restrict the cars to slow them down the teams figure out a way to go faster. Lol

So do not lock yourself into its one way or the highway just because a team wins with it. Racing thrives on innovation don’t follow try things out.
Its part of why I have not made a hard and fast decision on my suspension setup. I want to do what I figure will work best for me not doing something just because a team wins with it professionally.

If I had followed team winning ways in the 240sx world I would never have realized how bad most Japanese coil overs suck. Why because HKS,Tein, Tanabe etc.. are all on JGTC winning cars and D1 cars. So gots to rum them its way they do.

 

[Plainrt]

....

 

[dmb]

Several possible reasons . 1. Sponsorship from Bilstein= free suspension setup, 2. They are tuning it per course,
3. How groomed are those gravel and tarmac tracks. Well groomed can mean still pretty smooth.

4. There are always exceptions and people who do things outside of convention rule of thumb or what may be considered ideal.

5. Just because a winning team you love does it does not make it a rule of thumb. See above on 4.

6. Racing has always been winning and doing so trying ideas and making things work that sometimes should not. Nothing is absolute but somethings are ideal and some are not.

You see unconventional stuff in F1 all the time, they turn shit on its head sometimes jist to try amd get an advantage . Not only that but everytime the restrict the cars to slow them down the teams figure out a way to go faster. Lol

So do not lock yourself into its one way or the highway just because a team wins with it. Racing thrives on innovation don’t follow try things out.
Its part of why I have not made a hard and fast decision on my suspension setup. I want to do what I figure will work best for me not doing something just because a team wins with it professionally.

If I had followed team winning ways in the 240sx world I would never have realized how bad most Japanese coil overs suck. Why because HKS,Tein, Tanabe etc.. are all on JGTC winning cars and D1 cars. So gots to rum them its way they do.

GRAVEL= 30% of the roads in L.A.

 

[M-Sport fan]

Several possible reasons . 1. Sponsorship from Bilstein= free suspension setup, 2. They are tuning it per course,
3. How groomed are those gravel and tarmac tracks. Well groomed can mean still pretty smooth.

4. There are always exceptions and people who do things outside of convention rule of thumb or what may be considered ideal.

5. Just because a winning team you love does it does not make it a rule of thumb. See above on 4.

6. Racing has always been winning and doing so trying ideas and making things work that sometimes should not. Nothing is absolute but somethings are ideal and some are not.

You see unconventional stuff in F1 all the time, they turn shit on its head sometimes jist to try amd get an advantage . Not only that but everytime the restrict the cars to slow them down the teams figure out a way to go faster. Lol

So do not lock yourself into its one way or the highway just because a team wins with it. Racing thrives on innovation don’t follow try things out.
Its part of why I have not made a hard and fast decision on my suspension setup. I want to do what I figure will work best for me not doing something just because a team wins with it professionally.

If I had followed team winning ways in the 240sx world I would never have realized how bad most Japanese coil overs suck. Why because HKS,Tein, Tanabe etc.. are all on JGTC winning cars and D1 cars. So gots to rum them its way they do.

Actually, M-Sport Ford WRT's damper 'sponsor' is Reiger (now exclusively ZF Motorsports for the actual WRC spec cars), and NOT Bilstein at all.

The inverted Bilstein coilovers are ONLY used for their R1 rally class setups, so as to make that class's spec more affordable than a suspension setup worth WAY MORE than the car itself!

Regardless of whether or not you consider it 'ideal' for what you label as 'smooth' roads, I do know that this setup will be NUKE PROOF for our bombed-out Pennsyltuckey roads (especially if I use the Team O'Neil Motorsports top mounts with them), and most certainly outlast all of the Taiwanese/whatever 'affordable' all-in-one adjustable, coil over setups.

With very few exceptions, even the TARMAC WRC/Euro championship rally rounds are NOT held on glass smooth, perfect condition roads, hence WHY the cars NEVER look 'slammed' down to the lowest height adjustments on their suspensions.

Also, with the possible exception of the Finnish Rally (which DOES have many 'yumps'/jumps/compressions/major dips on even it's most high speed straight sections), most of the gravel rounds are on VERY rough, rutted, embedded rock type forest roads, which require MAJOR suspension travel, AND strength.

 

[Dpro]

Actually, M-Sport Ford WRT's damper 'sponsor' is Reiger (now exclusively ZF Motorsports for the actual WRC spec cars), and NOT Bilstein at all.

The inverted Bilstein coilovers are ONLY used for their R1 rally class setups, so as to make that class's spec more affordable than a suspension setup worth WAY MORE than the car itself!

Regardless of whether or not you consider it 'ideal' for what you label as 'smooth' roads, I do know that this setup will be NUKE PROOF for our bombed-out Pennsyltuckey roads (especially if I use the Team O'Neil Motorsports top mounts with them), and most certainly outlast all of the Taiwanese/whatever 'affordable' all-in-one adjustable, coil over setups.

With very few exceptions, even the TARMAC WRC/Euro championship rally rounds are NOT held on glass smooth, perfect condition roads, hence WHY the cars NEVER look 'slammed' down to the lowest height adjustments on their suspensions.

Also, with the possible exception of the Finnish Rally (which DOES have many 'yumps'/jumps/compressions/major dips on even it's most high speed straight sections), most of the gravel rounds are on VERY rough, rutted, embedded rock type forest roads, which require MAJOR suspension travel, AND strength.

I was only basing my response on what you wrote . That said I am not sure especially on public roads one can find anything idea. Lol Fact is most car markers setup their suspensions as a general comprimise tending to lean one way or the other so to speak. In our case Ford pushed it towards Sporty fun stiff because go fast fun car.

Its easy for them to design something on the test track and say thats good enough without taking absolutely everything into consideration.

Its trickier for us as enthuisists to figure out what will suit us. It also varys per driver. Some FiST owners loudly proclaim they would never lower the car. Others tend to look toward lifting to make more Rally car that its sporting pedigree seems to be derived from.
In a lot of ways it does remind of the Datsun 510 regardless fwd vs the rwd,.

The car is at home on the offroad as it is on the track or autocross course. The 510 shared a lot of FiST ashetics a cheap affordable ecomony car with the right underpinnings to be turned into a monster little sports car that won inn road course championships, Pro Rally champions and Autocoss.

While we never got the sports version of the 510 it was a SSS Bluebird that sported a twin Su carbureted large port high combustion head 1600cc engine putting out close to another 30-40 hp over the stock L16 we were stuck with

I digress though in making my point. My point mainly is no suspension choice for our cars is the must be all end all.

Progressive springed vs linear one can get the car to perform. I only point it out for the sake of your hard and fast assumed stance no pun intended towards linear springs or else.
I also only point out general suspension spring design reasons for different applications.

Like I said previously take the knowledge make the choice dare to be different. Don’t stick with because is.
I try not too. Lol

Been a good discussion and I think we have run its course. YMMV

 

[M-Sport fan]

Yeah, we also never got the early, RWD, Cosworth headed, Escort RSes either, as they would have been major competition for even the pedestrian 510s we did get here.

What is perplexing to me is WHY Suspension Techniques does NOT list their progressive lowering springs for our car with a 'range' of rate (i.e.; 100#-245#, or whatever) like most other manufacturers of that style spring do for theirs, and ONLY show their maximum, fully compressed rate of 245#.

It does falsely lead one to believe that they are, in fact, linear rate.

 

[Dpro]

Yeah, we also never got the early, RWD, Cosworth headed, Escort RSes either, as they would have been major competition for even the pedestrian 510s we did get here.

What is perplexing to me is WHY Suspension Techniques does NOT list their progressive lowering springs for our car with a 'range' of rate (i.e.; 100#-245#, or whatever) like most other manufacturers of that style spring do for theirs, and ONLY show their maximum, fully compressed rate of 245#.

It does falsely lead one to believe that they are, in fact, linear rate.

Actually I have found that when it comes to aftermarket lowering springs overall its not eactly easy to get the rates period. A lot of the websites selling them and even the manufacturers sites aren’t always forthcoming with that info.
It could also be why a lot of people wind up going coilovers these days because not only status quo but lots more information on spring rates and what not.

If I can get a set of Koni’s for a good deal I will probably bolt my Whitelines on them and give them a run otherwise I will probsbly drop dime on coilovers.