Interested in getting some high end rear shocks for my Integra, but most of them come stock with double eyelets. Is there a standard way to ghetto rig them up to fit, or should I just get custom attachments welded to the ends? For example, for the lower mount point, I could buy some ITR LCA's and lathe up some kind of cylinder that would act like a spherical bushing.

 

JRZ, moton, Penske, dynamic, and many others don't have an issue making a mount that will work with the OEM stuff.


Most of the time they have the eyelets because you are looking at a shock for a purpose built racecar, tube framed or formula type car.

 

So instead of doing it the proper way and getting attachments welded on the shocks, I decided to ghetto rig up some double eyelet shocks to fit. The shocks I have are Koni 8211, and the problem is that the base of the shock is too wide to fit into the ITR lca. So I made something like this:


The lower hole mounts to the LCA, the upper to the eyelet, and the side one mounts to the swaybar hole to prevent the whole piece from rotating. I had to recess the shock mount holes because I accidentally made it too close to the LCA hole, so the bolt that goes thru it hits the walls of the LCA. I should have made it only 2 mm higher or so.


Top view of the piece. I put a slit down the middle so the two halves can slightly squeeze together when I clamp the eyelet inside.



Here's the shock mounted inside the LCA. Not shown are the top hat bushings I had to lathe for the eyelet.


Fortunately, on most double eyelet shocks that I know of, the top eyelet screws off to reveal a threaded rod. I decided to stick with the OEM tophats, with the main difference that I had to drill out the inside of the rubber bushings to make the thicker rod fit thru. I also made an adapter that was threaded to fit over the shock shaft, and has another shaft that sticks thru the rubber bushings



I made this doo hickey to give me access to the rebound adjust ****


Here it is assembled, minus the actual top hat


Modified by beanbag at 5:00 AM 5/29/2008

 

Well done! I was thinking about doing something like this myself. How have you figured out the compressed spring length?

 

https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=2062714

 

Wow, that thing looks so complicated. If only I saw this thread earlier, I would have saved you some work. By now, I see you found out the top eyelet mount is just screw on.

if you like to retain both eyelet on the rear, you can make something like what CT Engineering ( http://www.ct-engineering.com ) designed for NSX suspension.


The bottom is a simple spacers/reducer like here:


The front can be designed as an inverted. With the top eyelet unscrewed and now on the bottom, just make a simple stub to screw in for stock fork. Easy lathe work.

I noticed you are in the bay area. Where exactly in bay area? Do you do all machine work yourself?

BTW,

 

Thanks for the heads up, but I don't think something like the kit you showed would have worked for me. I had the additional constraints:

At least one of the mount points should be rubber bushing, to cut down on noise and harshness.

Rebound damping must be adjustable easily (I like to turn this **** a lot).

I used the above two items to determine that I should use the stock top hat mounting system and have the piston shaft stick into the trunk.

As mentioned earlier, the bottom of the shock was too fat to fit inside the ITR LCA, so I had to offset the lower mounting point.

Now as for the fronts, I haven't figured out a good way to mount shocks (if I ever happen to get another set). First of all, twin tubes can't be inverted. And if I did get monotubes, I don't like how the "buckling" force between the fork and shock is put on that skinny little piston shaft.

Yes, I did all the machine work myself.

BTW, it looks like your post got cut off

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by beanbag &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Thanks for the heads up, but I don't think something like the kit you showed would have worked for me. I had the additional constraints:

At least one of the mount points should be rubber bushing, to cut down on noise and harshness.</TD></TR></TABLE>
This, you should not worry. In my experience, the noise is really minimal if you can hear at all.
<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
Rebound damping must be adjustable easily (I like to turn this **** a lot).</TD></TR></TABLE>
I concede this point for street cars. However, with stock top hats, you do loose one advantage of double eyelet mount. With double eyelet mount there is no side loading on the springs.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
As mentioned earlier, the bottom of the shock was too fat to fit inside the ITR LCA, so I had to offset the lower mounting point. </TD></TR></TABLE>
I see, kinda hard to tell from the picture.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
Now as for the fronts, I haven't figured out a good way to mount shocks (if I ever happen to get another set). First of all, twin tubes can't be inverted. And if I did get monotubes, I don't like how the "buckling" force between the fork and shock is put on that skinny little piston shaft.</TD></TR></TABLE>

I forgot, your Koni is twin tubes. Yes, you are right twin tubes can't be inverted.
There is no buckling force on double wishbone suspension. All the side load should be taken by the upper and lower arm. As you can see, even if you take your shock off, the suspension movement is constraint by upper and lower arm.

You can make some contraption like the one you make for the rear. Unfortunately, with that, you will loose a couple of inches of suspension travel. It might be ok, depends on how long your shock is.

Most double eyelet shocks are for Formula cars or cars with inboard suspension and some GT/tube frame car. If yours was from Formula cars, the shock most likely short, and you can get away by adding contraption on the bottom of the shocks.

 

Why did you machine that huge hunk of billet. I just made some small round spacers to take up the space in my 88Civic trailing arms. Weighs a lot less. Its a little annoying when reinstalling the shocks, but didn't take any time to make.

My Carreras actually have a stud adapter that screws on the end of the shock and fits correctly in the stock upper mount. Although I guess you could get a stock upper and weld two tabs into it to mount the top eye. You will have to run a shorter shock so you maintain proper shock travel.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by turboteener &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Why did you machine that huge hunk of billet. </TD></TR></TABLE>

I think he did that because the lower part of the shock wouldn't go low enough in the arm to line up with the hole. Perhaps the body or adjuster hits.

 

Having those big rubber bushings isolating the shocks kind of defeats the purpose of going with a high end race shock.....

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by MightyMouseTech &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Having those big rubber bushings isolating the shocks kind of defeats the purpose of going with a high end race shock.....</TD></TR></TABLE>

Given that the rest of my suspension is bushings as well, I don't think the 0.06" or so of deflection is going to make that much of a difference.

Although it retrospect it would have been a lot easier to make new top hats with a spherical bearing insert


Modified by beanbag at 3:23 PM 6/14/2008

 

TTT

 

i can always count on beanbag to have useful posts in suspension discussions. lol.