Anyone ever had this happen to them or seen it? I'm talking about during track or autocross driving, has anyone ever had a spring dislocate off a perch (or top mount for that matter)?

This question really revisits the ots koni vs. neuspeed koni. Yes, I have searched. I know the differences. I understand that the neuspeed version keeps the spring under preload so that the springs won't fall out when the car is jacked up. But I've certainly seen cars lift inside rear wheels on the track. Heck, I probably lift my inside rear wheel all the time--I've just never seen myself do it. So....would that be enough to cause a spring to fall off a perch? I've never seen this happen to anyone.

I like the idea of ots konis and being able to run at a normal ride height on the street if I want, but I'd hate to have a spring fall out when I'm on the track. This setup will include GC's with some to-be-determined spring rates in a '95 Integra.

Anyone? Thanks.

 

You need more preload.

 

Only once have I heard a guy say that his spring actually dropped out of position when he was on track and that was on an ITA CRX with very short stiff springs and very little rear sway bar. This was back in the day before SCCA allowed the use of a zero rate or helper spring to fill that gap. He said he was at Road America and the corner would clunk as the spring reseated itself on top. To be honest, I am not really sure that is what was happening and that he didn't have something else clunking on his recently and not really well built car.

Remember that when you are lifting a rear wheel of the ground in the heat of competition, most likely it is the sway bar that is stopping further droop instead of the shock going to full travel. When you jack the car up by the end, the springs may easily drop out of position but both wheels will be off the ground and the sway bar is not working. When you are driving and lifting a wheel, the load side is compressing and the unloaded side is not so the sway bar is twisting and regulating travel.

If you have short and really stiff springs that use very little preload when the car is at ride height and you don't have much in the way of rear sway bar stiffness, then I can see it potentially dropping out if the car is really hiked over on a long sweeper but I'd think this is a very rare situation when a lot of things need to come together for the effect. Remember that the stiffer your rebound damping it, the longer it wil take to extend out anyway thus buying you more time.

I wouldn't be (and frankly am not) too worried about it and if you are, just get some flat wire helper springs if it bothers you. I did that on my lapping day set-up for my street CRX just to see what happened (answer: nothing) and put the helper spring on the bottom then bought for PVC sleeves from Lowes for about a buck each to be guides to let everything to stay centered when they go up and down loaded and unloaded.

 

After co-driving a 1990 Civic Si for most of last year's autocross season with stock sway bars and GCs/Konis with rates of 550f/500r, I honestly never noticed a problem on-course with the springs falling out of the perches. This problem was only noticeable to me on severely broken (or no) pavement with harsh bumps.

 

Where can I buy some zero rate helper springs for a GC/koni setup? Never seen em for sale before.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by mos &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Where can I buy some zero rate helper springs for a GC/koni setup? Never seen em for sale before. </TD></TR></TABLE>

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