What shocks would be a good fit for stock springs? I know 95% of people use lowering springs when upgrading shocks but I'd like to keep my stock ride height.

 

Good shocks would be Koni, Bilstein, Ohlins and the like. Get ground control coilovers to go with the shocks and you can increase springs rate and maintain stock ride height.

 

coilovers should do the job, my slipovers can be adjusted to stock height. Depending on your choice of spring rates, the ride quality will vary. Also bigger sway bars will make a good difference. Either go oem or aftermarket.

 

Koni Yellows/Type-R springs, since you want an oem ride height

 

Well my car is a dx, no sway bars. I just replaced bushings in my rear lca's so I probably won't upgrade to lca's w/ sway bar for a while.

I didn't know of any coilovers that allow you to keep the stock ride height, can anybody recommend some? I would probably go with KYB shocks.

 

illuminas.

and a rear swaybar if you can. im no expert with EK's, but it seems reinforcing the subframe would be beneficially if you are using a sway bar where a swaybar was originally not designed to be used.

and dont forget tires and a proper alignment.

 

Car has been recently aligned after new tie-rod ends. I'm running Azenis for summer and ZE-912's for winter.

 

better tires, sway bars, strut bar mid bar, will beef up your handling more than shocks

 

energy bushings, replaced trailing arm bushings, tokico illuminas, 22mm ITR FSB, 18mm RSB.

 

Just fitting good quality uprated dampers will make a very noticable improvement in handling. I would recommend Koni yellows as by far the highest quality easily available damper, though Bilstein would be equally high quality if they make any for your car. Konis do have rebound adjustment, which makes them very versatile and can be adjusted from quite soft to pretty damn stiff. Some cheaper adjustable dampers don't actually have a very wide range of stiffness adjustment, despite sometimes having a huge number of 'clicks' on the *****.

On my CB7 I have standard springs with Konis set at full stiff on the rear and a little softer at the front (after a lot of experimentation), and the handling is excellent compared to OEM dampers. I also have front and rear strut bars which are definitely a worthwhile improvement so long as you get good rigid units and not floppy cheap ones (pay attention to the attachment brackets, these are often the weakest point, and the strut bar is only as rigid as it' as it's least rigid component).

I'd also reccomend experimenting a lot with tyre pressures, psi can make a huge difference to steering response, grip etc, and some tyres are very sensitive to psi. For example my front tyres (stock size) work very well (considering they are cheapies) at 38psi, but noticably less well at either 36 or 40 psi. Every different tyre will have it's own optimal psi at which it handles / grips best (noting that optimal steering response and optimal grip may not occur at the same psi), and you do need to experiment to find it (e.g. my rear tyres are different to my fronts, and have very soft sidewalls that work best at / near 45psi).

Keep toe very close to zero if you don't want excessive tyre wear. An uprated rear ARB would also be a very good bet, but I feel that good dampers are the first thing you should get, without them the chassis isn't a stable platform. Good tyres are great too, but a well set up chassis can be very entertaining to drive even with cheaper tyres (so long as the tyres aren't truly crap), whereas even the best tyres won't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, i.e. good tyres can't make up for a poorly set up chassis, and in reality are wasted on such a chassis.

 

i would not use koni's with stock springs.

too much rebound, not enough compression. even at the lowest setting.

because tokico illuminas adjust both rebound and compression simultaneously, (i have experienced that) they are better suited for a wide variety of spring rates.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Tyson &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">i would not use koni's with stock springs.

too much rebound, not enough compression. even at the lowest setting.

because tokico illuminas adjust both rebound and compression simultaneously, (i have experienced that) they are better suited for a wide variety of spring rates. </TD></TR></TABLE>
This is simply not my practical experience with Koni yellow on a CB7 with stock springs. The reponse, handling and grip is very much improved over OEM, and the stiffer the damper settings the better the car tends to be. I have no issues with the dampers 'pumping down' (due to high rebound relative to spring strength) or causing the car to be skittish over bumps. Due to the digressive nature of the damping curve the Konis are very supple over severe bumps (high shaft speed inputs) but still firm at low speed inputs (body roll etc) which is what gives the good handling characteristics and a stable platform.

I currently have the fronts backed off a bit from full stiff, but only to reduce harshenss a little. My driving also includes significant dirt road use and the Konis are good even on the rough stuff (if a little harsh).

My only crticism of the Konis is that they are a bit too soft in bump (the fronts most noticably), though an increase in spring rate ought to more suit the softish bump rate. The other option would be to revalve them with a stiffer bump valving, if I knew then what I know now from experience with the Konis I'd have ordered them with a slightly upgraded bump valving from their stock valving.