I just wanted to know if leaving Konis on full stiffness for the dampening will wear them out faster or if it even makes a difference ? This is with Konis and Ground Controls.

 

I just put my front shocks to full stiff again. Not sure if they will wear out faster but koni have a lifetime warranty.

 

no, won't hurt ****. not sure why you would unless your rates are weird. most hondas wind up being quicker with the front somewhat loose and the rear stiff.

 

Just make sure they aren't ever at FULL stiff. Turn the adjuster till it stops and then turn it back a smidge.

 

Why

 

It completely closes off one of the valves internally and the strut doesn't work correctly.

We tried it once on a shock dyno just to see if it was true. It put a bunch of nasty squiggles in the graph!

 

Why would you want to run FULL stiff anyway? That is just absurd for Koni/GC's. Take your time and tune your suspension man...

 

**** i have mine for about 2 months havnt really messed with it but cant get a good settin so i keep the front stiff and the rear half way

 

hey you telling secrets?? lol.

 

sorry

 

If your spring rates are on the stiff end of what the shock can correctly damp (or even stiffer than they can adequately damp), then you achieve both the best ride quality and performance possible (with those springs) by running full stiff on the shocks.

If your rates are softer than that, cranking up the shocks is a band aid hack, but can be useful under some circumstances. For auto-x courses that have many sweepers, I deliberately overdamp the rear of my car by turning my Konis all the way up, to induce additional rotation on corner entry.

Outside of that, there really is no benefit to doing it. Though, some people seem to (mistakenly) think that overdamped helps cornering traction, when it only improves feel and actually hurts the cornering itself (in the real world where the road surface isn't perfectly smooth).

But, as stated above, go full stiff, then back off ever so slightly. That is what most would call "full stiff", as it is as stiff as they can be and still be useful.

 

My spring rates are 330 front and 380 rear right now and compared to my H&R race springs I had with the konis, its too soft. I want to move the 380 spring to the front and thinking between a 430 or 450 for the rear. Any ideas ? This is my second car I use only 2-3 days a week for around town only. Occational autoX and drag.

 

Slightly off topic, but I have always heard this as well and wondered if this logic applies to both rear & front biased spring rates.

Previously, I ran 350F/450R with the rear Koni's slightly stiffer to accommodate the higher rear rates.

Just experimenting, I swapped to 450F/350R. Should I still be running the rear Koni's stiffer than the fronts?

 

What car?
Assuming a DA Integra (as your name implies, but many people change cars without changing their user name), sounds fine to me.

Running 400/400 on my DC2 for daily and auto-x use, and have found it to bit a bit too soft overall during auto-x and HPDE use, but also on the stiff side for street use. Since street use will be limited, consider going even stiffer, as 330 to 380 and 380 to 450 isn't that much of an increase and might not provide the change you're looking for.

No clue on drag use. Depending on power made, might be too soft in the rear, but I am certainly no expert on FWD drag cars.

Probably not. Repeat whatever procedure you did before to find out what setting works best for your car, your driving conditions, and your driving style.

I start full soft, and work up one end until it is obviously over damped, then back off and leave it alone, then repeat for the other end of the car.

I'm a believer in "use springs to control the car, use shocks to control the springs".

If you were correctly damped before the spring swap, and then swap front and rear springs, the front would then be under damped (spring rate went up, shock damping stayed the same) while the rear would be over damped.

Though, as I wrote before, deliberately over damping shocks can be used as a band aid hack if the situation calls for it.

 

I understand what you are saying. I just don't see why he'd want to leave it on full stiff. I have 450f/550r with 4 top hats that I've yet to install. Should be a fun setup! Very excited to finally feel a BANG for the buck setup.

 

kevin brown.s last post cleared up what to me was foggy about his last post. yeah for a dd car maybe turning them up "all" the way might overdamp and make the feel as if it were "hugging" a corner but is not due to road irregularities etc...but me tunernoob and sidewayzdriver post mostly based off track thinking for the most part. also too...i do go full stiff because i dont know if my dampers are both from the same batch. :/ yiiikes.

 

The majority of people have recommend turning the rear shocks to be stiffer, run a front biased spring setup. This always struck me as odd, but makes more sense after reading your "band-aid hack" explanation.

They swear by a front biased setup, but they are effectively manipulating a rear biased setup by overdamping. What a contradiction..

I assume overdamping will also cause your shocks to wear out prematurely...

 

That is another variable to consider. No two shocks perform the same (in OTS form anyway). The best way to compensate for this is with a shock dyno, or possibly by having them re-valved.

There was a long article about that a few years back, i'll see if I can find it.

 

this really is relative. it's not that the shocks will wear out faster, it's more that the car will be slower. the whole under/over damp talk really is car specific and should be something the driver addresses either by himself or who's working on his car. over basically feels like the tires are skipping and the suspension isn't rebounding fast enough to follow the road. under has the feeling that your cycling, bouncing around and the car is so loose that it takes effort at the wheel, brake or gas pedal to get it back in line. you're almost always faster going too loose than too tight. what i discovered is that running a front bias 500/450 rate the car is floaty with the konis on soft. crank both ends and you're slow because there isnt as much front brake drive or weight transfer on turn in. after reading about a civic that won more than a few races with the same rates i noticed he was in the middle up front and full stiff out back. this is exactly the direction that i was going. keeping the rear stiff not only promotes rotation, it helps balance the car when you're going over uneven terrain at 100mph. if the front is too stiff in the shock dept you wind up having a reduction in traction. of course this effects braking as well as cornering. i actually stumbled upon this by running the front full stiff and braking from 60mph, chirp chirp chirp. basically every wave in the road was causing tire chirping. after cussing awhile & thinking i may have too much spring for my tire i decided to back off, no more chirp, tracking was better, car was faster. this is more or less what's led me to running the fronts in the middle and the rears near full stiff. the front has enough rebound to control the spring but not enough to hinder traction

 

Just installed my Koni/GCs today. 450F/550R with 4 extended top hats and JDM LCAs. Rides and handles VERY well compared to what I was expecting. Bumps are barely bouncy. Nowhere near ebay coilover bouncy. Got them down to half a finger gap front and rear. With 350-400 rears, I'd be very very satisfied.