cbaber

Hey guys. Im a long time member and I love reading peoples build threads so I though I would start my own suspension build thread for my new love, my Milano Red 1996 Integra GSR! Its not some ground-breaking build, just an average "college kid budget" type of build. Post your comments, suggestions, or even constructive criticism. Thanks for reading!

Background info...
I picked up a 1996 Integra GSR back in October. It already had an ITR wing, ITR lip, 99-00 Si wheels, Greddy cat-back (well header-back actually), DC 4-1 header, and some ebay coils on stock (maybe) springs. My plan was to keep the motor stock for now, and hit up the suspension. So here we are.





The parts...
Im on a pretty tight budget. I go to school full time and also have a job, but it doesnt pay that great and I have bills to pay. So keeping that in mind here are my parts that I have acquired to far:

- Progress Auto Series II SS coilovers 350f/350r
- Skunk2 Pro Plus UCA's
- PIC rear LCA's

Now here is the rest of the parts I need to buy:

- ASR 24mm rear sway bar w/spherical endlinks
- ASR subframe brace
- New tie rods
- Energy Susp. front bushing set
- Alignment!

Pictures and progress...

April 9th

I got the skunk2 UCA's and PIC LCA's first. Progress Auto was back ordered on the 94-01 teg kits so I had to wait awhile to get my set. I went ahead and removed the crappy stock shocks and ebay coilovers from the car to make room for my new stuff.



Now here is the old parts. I bent that metal piece. Not sure if these are stock and painted or some other type of shock. Didnt bother looking at them for very long. One of the shocks was completely blown and the sleeves on the coilovers were rusted like crazy. Glad to get these things out!



Now here is my new Skunk2 Pro Plus UCA's compared to the stock GSR ones. The only differences between the Skunk2 Pro and Pro Plus is the type of bushings. The Pro Plus uses polyurethane bushings but Pro uses rubber like stock and other UCA's on the market. Its a bit more expensive for the Pro Plus but worth it for the bushings. You could also save yourself money by just buying the Energy Suspension bushings and use them on your stock UCA's. The camber adjustment is just nice to have, which is why I bought the camber kit, but you dont need one. Another advantage is the BLING it adds lol.



Its pretty easy to install these things. Here they are all installed and ready for the coilovers! I am going to put on new tie rod ends because im pretty sure mine are shot. Im not sure how to tell if they are or not, but they are cheap and its a good idea since its all in pieces anyway.



I didnt install the PIC LCA's on the rear yet because I didnt have my coilovers yet and you cant really install them fully without the coilovers. Plus it started to rain. So I left them for next time.

April 19th

I finally got my coilovers this weekend, and I sat down tonight to sort of put them together to get ready for this weekend. All but the top hats are missing, I still need to take them off the old setup.

I choose the Progress series II kit because of the price. Its one of the cheapest full sets I have seen, but at the same time I have heard some good things about them. Im not going to be racing my car much. Its more of a street car than anything so i didnt want to waste my money buying adjustable shocks like Koni+GC. Just too much money and I wouldnt be using them to their fullest potential on the street. Also, not many people have these that I have seen so its good to be different.

I went with 350f/350r spring rates. They offer 350/250, 350/350, or 350/500. The latter is just too much for street, and the first is too soft in the rear for me. 350/350 is a good balance for my type of driving.







They are easy to assemble. They come with good instructions and you can also look at the instructions on their website. After 15 minutes they are semi-ready. Just need top hats.





Going to put them on this weekend and get more pictures of them installed. Hopefully I can get an alignment this weekend if I get tie rods in time.

I am going to wait a month or so for the sway bar and brace. Not really needed right now and I ran out of money But I will be sure to keep this project going as I get more parts!

Oh and BTW from now on the pics will be better. I have been using my 5 MP phone camera but finally got my real camera back so better quality here we come.

AlphaStatus

Looking good so far, how much did those coilovers run ya?

Subscribed

racebum

skunk arms might cause you more trouble than they were worth. also you'll need a 20ton press from harbor freight to do the energy bushings. i actually did mine before i bought one and it was a total *****. drill, drill hacksaw. seriously sucked donkey ***** backwards. everything else looks fine. drive it, see how it feels, you might wind up going to 400lb/in up front with that rear bar setup. of course drive it first, it may be fine the way it is.

nsxtasy

Don't forget about sticky tires. Upgrading your suspension won't make the car handle any better if your tires can't grip well.

Here are the stickiest street tires you can buy for your car with its Si wheels:

Bridgestone Potenza RE-11 205/50-15
Dunlop Direzza Sport Z1 Star Spec 195/55-15 or 205/50-15
Yokohama Advan Neova AD08 205/50-15
Kumho Ecsta XS 205/50-15
Toyo Proxes R1R 195/55-15 or 205/50-15

cbaber

$579 Shipped from the promotion going on for Honda Tech members. Check out the sponsor forums.

As far as tires go, the Si's have brand new Falken 502's on them so its not cost effective to buy better tires right now. Ill probably just wait until next summer to get new wheels/tires and upgrade to a better tire.

I know I might have more oversteer than I want with the 24mm sway bar plus equal rates, but we will see when I get to driving it. Might upgrade to 400 or 450 in the front if that is so.

fiji

bump good ish

PatrickGSR94

iTrader: (1)

Depending on how much you lower the car, I think you might have serious issues with those S2 arms and only 350 lb/in front springs. When I was on Koni/GC, I had 380 lb/in front springs and stock upper arms and had no problems, but others have 400 or 450 up front with aftermarket upper arms and have dents in their shock towers. I don't think I would go below 400 lb/in up front if I did coilovers again.

PIC rear LCA's, well, the bushings on those don't really look that great, and the sway bar end link hole is in the wrong location for Integras.

I also would not suggest ES bushings or any polyurethane bushing for any load-bearing pivot point in the suspension. They can deform, crack, squeak, and generally wear out much faster than rubber bushings (contrary to their marketing claims).

GagnarTheUnruly

iTrader: (3)

Those PIC arms will be OK if the OP gets ASR endlinks. Looking forward to hearing driving impressions.

S2Integra

nice but the ASR kit will cost over 400, Iv'e been trying to afford that for some time now.
I have now progress coilover the old version. handle better than Mercedes SL55 AMG. Maybe he just sucked a driving. Took the car to MIS, the only thing that could keep with me around corners is a road race built STI, vettes and GTOs and the like were smoked. Agiain these driver probably sucked. Point is Progress make a good setup, very streetable but amazingly responsive. Only as good as your tires though.

cbaber

Only reason I got the S2 kit was because of the massive negative camber I was seeing. Ive lowered 2 EG coupes, an EK hatch, and my del sol all on 15's with stock UCA's and have never seen the camber like I am seeing on this teg. The tires are 205/50/15 and there is probably 1 or 2 finger gap, but everyone who sees my car (non car people) always think there is something bent or broken up front because of the way the wheels tilt in. I know I should get an alignment and then see, but I went ahead and just got this kit anyway.

Im hoping the PIC lca's are decent, I had them on my old EK hatch and they were ok. Im going to be p!ssed if my endlinks wont line up. And thanks for the bushing tip. I probably wont get them just because its a pain to install them all, and like you said they arent that great in some places.

GagnarTheUnruly

iTrader: (3)

I'm thinking about making a LCA buyer's guide to help Integra owners sort through the (mostly bad) aftermarket LCA options.

AlAddiN|502

iTrader: (1)

When I got my car I didn't do research and did exactly what you did, but instead I bought Blox UCA's and Blox rear LCA's. Of course my bushings went bad in like 2 months and also didn't have a spot to bolt up the bar. I also made a mistake by buying the UCA's because I didn't know you can have camber and still not wear down tires. When I got my alignment I only had -2 camber and he told me I can have up to -4 camber but with proper toe alignment it would be perfectly fine and not eat my thread.

PatrickGSR94

iTrader: (1)

Sounds to me like something is bent on your suspension. It definitely shouldn't be that bad with stock UCA's. You really should replace the bent parts instead of doing a "band-aid" fix with adjustable camber arms.

AlAddiN|502

iTrader: (1)

^ Could be the knuckle/spindle, that's what was bent on mine and I had the same problem. Take both sides off and compare them, and if one is bent you can also buy one from a civic (92-95). Also take pics and post them so people can get a view of the problem.

racebum

you mean how they are more or less not needed and function 7 has such a good rep simply because they use quality bushings?

GagnarTheUnruly

iTrader: (3)

I would probably wind up making that point, if only because it's the truth LOL. I won't tell someone not to get aftermarket LCA's if they want to for their own reasons, but I'm tired of seeing Blox and others getting away with selling bad LCAs to ignorant customers.

DA6righthand

Kinda like me? I bought Mega LCA's...junk a*s company... I shoulda saved my money for something else.

cbaber

Hopefully the PIC's arent as bad as some other ones. Like I said I had them on another car and they were fine, so hopefully the teg ones will be ok. Even though the bushings might not be the best, they are still better than stock for awhile, until they wear out lol. Its not like I drive this car much anyway. This car doesnt see snow, rain, dirt, or anything really. Just a summer DD and I drive my rusty del sol in the bad stuff.

As for the suspension being bent, I am going to have a shop check all that out when they do the alignment. Hopefully everything checks out ok and I am just paranoid about the camber issue or something.

Ill post an update on Monday about what I found out. Going to install everything and get it to the shop. If all checks out ok and it gets aligned I can continue to test out my new setup and add the sway bar and brace. If not, well I guess this will become "Fix my bent GSR suspension" thread lol.

GagnarTheUnruly

iTrader: (3)

The PICs come loaded with the PIC/Suja1 SONEM bushings, which are high-quality hard rubber bushings, so they have that going for them. Unfortunately, they also have the endlink mount in the wrong place. You'll need washers and an adjustable endlink to get the sway bar and endlink geometry correct.

cbaber

Ok so here is an update. I managed to install everything this weekend. Of course, I ran into problems which are outlined below.

First off I would like to let everyone know that yes, the PIC lca's wont "100%" line up with the stock sway bar endlinks. The stock lca has the hole above the actual mass of the arm, while the PIC's mounting hole is in the center of the mass. This is about a 1 inch difference in height, causing the endlink connection to be off a little bit in terms of the geometry. I went ahead and mounted it back up even with the weird angle of the endlink. Its still solid, but I need to see if the ASR endlinks and some other hardware will help this problem. Other than that, the PIC lca's fit great, the bushings are good, and they look freakin awesome. So im 85% satisfied with the product.

Now on the the install. I started off in the front. Recall that the UCA's were already installed. The process of taking off the stock top hats and reinstalling them onto my new coilovers was easy except for one stock did not have the allen wrench bolt on top. I needed to use some vice grips to hold the shock in place and eventually got it off.




Now here they are installed. No real issues up front to speak of. I did notice some problems with my pass. axle and lower ball joint, but the actual coilover install went smooth.






Here is my lower ball joint and axle. I think one of these is causing my problem at highway speeds. When I let off the gas at speed, the steering wheel shakes and it pulls to the right. So im thinking lower ball joint? I dont really know if you can tell if they are bad by looking, but here are some pictures. They look pretty messed up, and there was grease all over the pass. suspension components.




We will get to my ride height problem near the end of this post, but for now the rear install...

The rear installs sucked. I honestly spent over 2 hours on the driver rear. I was very careful not to break any of the bolts and everything came off fine, but I ran into some issues when installing my coilovers.

First, the end link issue. The PIC lca's have the sway bar endlink mounting hole in the center section of the lca, while the stockers have it mounted above the lca. Here is a comparison:




This creates issues because it throws off the angle of the endlink after you install everything. Instead of it being pretty flush against the lca mounting hole, it wants to be at a slight angle when fully tightened. They will still mount up, but not really 100% since they are at a weird angle. Hopefully the ASR endlinks will be better.

The other issue I had was a bolt breaking while tightening. For some reason my torque wrench decided not to work and I guess I torqued it a little to much. Luckily I was able to turn the rest of the bolt out of one end. It was a slow process since space is limited in there, and it was hard as heck to turn. Took about 45 minutes to get it out!





After that issue the install went fast on the other side. Here are the coilovers assembled then installed. Looks awesome.








Loading down the suspension to tighten it...


I hate my greddy muffler. Its freaking huge. I need a new one!!



So now onto the big issue. The rear suspension is fine and done, nothing wrong. The fronts, however, are extremely too low. I have the perches set as high as you can go without actually compressing the spring. So now I need to get a spring compressor and then raise up the perches to raise the car to a drivable level? I think that is correct someone tell me if that sounds wrong at all. So due to that little issue, I was not going to drive it or get it aligned. I got stuck pulling it out of the garage because the front frame dragged onto the ground!




So next weekend hopefully I can raise up the front, get it aligned, and then test drive it and give my impressions.

Sorry for all the pics, I got carried away lol. But can someone elaborate on the ride height issue and ball joint/axle issues please? Thanks!

b18c1vtecdc2

regardless if the vibrating problem your having is caused by the axle or lower ball joint they need to be replaced by the looks of them. Btw what a coincidence I also have a 96 milano red gsr with progress coilovers 350/250 i opt to picked them because they were cheap and reputable brand, but I regret not spending more on Ground controls and koni yellows because my coilovers set up is extremely stiff.

cbaber

Well good cause thats the way I like it. The 350 in the rear would be even stiffer ride so good thing you went with 250 rear. BTW, in your experience what would you rather have the GSR or your 5th gen prelude? Been thinking about trying to pick up a prelude if I sell this at the end of the summer.

racebum

gsr all day. the prelude is the weight of a corvette with half the motor and half the tire. it's not a bad daily driver but the weight really kills performance potential.

AcuraLsSE

I would spend some money on fixing that axle and ball joint before adding anymore parts. I went with the ground control and koni set up. Right now I have 350 in the front and 400 in the rear. When I drop my engine back in the car I plan on throwing the 400 in the front and the 350 in the rear.

Spawne32

iTrader: (3)

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/2-LOW...Q5fAccessories

will get your lower arm situation straightened out on the front, i used the whole kit for my car for 200, make sure you check your tie rods for play and the condition of the rack boots as well, as far as axles go, id go with...

http://www.driveshaftshop.com/pdetail.php?pid=32