Hi, I am currently upgrading my suspension. I have decided to go with bilsteins and ground-controls, as this setup has received a good bit of praise in the ITR forum. I already ordered the bilsteins, but I have yet to order the ground-controls. If possible, I would like some feedback on some prospective spring rates that I should choose for the car. Keep in mind that this is a daily driver, and a sedan, not a hatchback. Im not sure if the latter variable matters much. The car will be seeing occasional autocross duty, but it is very far from a dedicated race car. I will also talk with ground control about setting the car up, but I would like some ballpark figures so I can act like I know at least a little bit on this topic.

thanks

 

GC uses Eibach ERS springs.
Maybe 300 up front, 350 in the back.

 

350-400F and 450-600R.

350F 400R will a nice streetable setup, but if you get serious about autox, you will find you want stiffer springs. Of course, the nice thing about GC, is they use standard size Eibach springs, so you can swap them later if you feel so inclined (I think springs are $100-$150 pair).

 

I have 350f/400r on my Civic. I think that's about as far as I'd want to go with a daily driven car. Like CM says, the advantage of the coilovers is that new springs are pretty cheap, and you can swap them out without too much trouble.

 

400#F/600#R is still liveable - but it depends on the road surfaces in your particular area

 

When messing with spring rates, do the spring rates, given by you guys, matter on the car? Also, when purchasing a set of shocks such as Bilstein's wouldn't one want to have them revalved? Who revalves? Sorry for the stupid q's but I just wanted to be certain.

-J

 

1. Not sure what you mean by "matter on the car."
2. Much more spring rate than 500 to 600 and you really need a revalve
3. Not sure there's anyone still in business who revalves Bilsteins.
4. If you have Konis, Koni North America, Truechoice and ProParts all revalve them. Figure a little bit under 100 per shock for the revalve...more if you get the fronts shortened.

 

Well, you're a better (or younger) man than I am. Besides, I have to drive Madame Geezer in the Civic sometimes, and she prefers not to be bounced around...well, in the car, anyway.

 

Is there any way of telling the rates by the numbers printed on the springs?

 

Which springs? Eibach ERSs numbers are strait-forward and real easy to decipher.
Other springs are totally cryptic.

 

Tweaked Accords are rare, but why does every Civic/Integra driver use higher spring rates than Accord drivers (of course it's all just personal preference)? I would think the heavier car would require the higher-rate spring. I guess us Accord drivers are sticking the the family-car nature of the platform?

 

I just ordered my Ground Controls for my Koni Yellows this past Monday. Ground Control as well as Mike (from Diabloautosports) recommend 400F and 350R. This is what was recommend for a good street/auto-x setup. Even though the front will be stiffer, if I want to dial in a little bit of oversteer all it takes is a few turns of the rear shocks. I'll let you know how the new setup feels once I install it (hopefully Saturday).

 

I have 380F and 350R, with Koni shocks, and it is a very good compromise, IMO. It is definitely stiffer, but very bearable on the street, and combined with the TypeR rear sway bar, the car is quite neutral in steady state cornering, and easy to rotate when necessary.
If I didn't have the 22mm rear sway bar, I would have gone with a stiffer rear spring, as was recommended earlier. (so something around 400F/450R)

 

When you get the Ground Controls, remember to tell them that you are using Bilstein shocks, 'cause they had to do a little redesign for the Bilstein and Koni shocks 'cause the springs were coming off the top hat. The new design is supposed to have fixed that problem though, but you have to specify that you are using Bilsteins (I think the GCs for Konis and Bilsteins are a little more expensive as well).

If you want to daily drive the car and still have some ride comfort then your spring rates won't be high enough to require revalving the shocks.

Ground Control will probably recommend getting softer rear springs than front springs because for daily driven cars they don't want to recommend a setup that will get the car oversteering 'cause oversteer is considered more dangerous on the street than understeer (understeer is more intuitive to correct for).

For a daily driver/occasional autocross I'd prolly go with 400-450 front and 350-400 rear. The softer you can go the better (as long as you control body roll with the anti-roll bars), 'cause softer springs hold better on bumpy roads than stiff springs (if you've ever seen an 18-wheeler trying to brake hard the back will start bouncing up and down 'cause the springs are made stiff to support a full load, but they are too stiff to keep the tires in contact with the road).
Plus, like someone already said, if you really get into autoX and want to stiffen things up you can always get another set of ERS springs ($65 per spring) for course and track.

Just my 2 cents.


[Modified by Bampf, 11:25 AM 4/12/2002]

 

I see some people recommend a higher rate in the front and lower in the back. While others recommend just the opposite. What's the reason behind the discrepancy? Usually when I see spring rates advertised, the rears are stiffer than the fronts. Can anybody explain this to me? Thanks!

 

In general, on front wheel drive cars stiffer springs in the rear (or a fat rear anti roll bar or both) reduce understeer.

Factory springs and packaged sets like Eibach Prokits usually have a front rate bias to keep the car understeering at the limit as it's safer/easier to recover from.

 

that is not totally true ..

would benefit more with stiffer sway bars and a rear adjustable sway bar + a good spring setup in the 1.1 F/R ration range than with a stiffer rear spring..

+ he said that it is a street daily car ..
so no need for reversed ratio spring rates wich onl benefit in particular car setups for a specific reason .. ( though i tend to more and more not see the point but neway .. )

1- keep a close spring ratio, but don't over do it..
2- keep it under 500lb/inch or your shocks won't do ****
( i wouldn't go at more than 400lbs/" on any stock blisteins ..even konis have hard time keeping up with 500lbs + )
3- keep the rates as low as possible annd get sway bars if not already done..


the point is not to get as stiff as possible..but rather to stay as smooth as possible without letting the gemoetry drives your tires on the edges
( limit and help camber changes by other means that are more confortable ..like a small drop + sway bars )

 

I'm running a 2000 Honda Civic Si coupe (prolly same weight as your sedan) with Koni Yellows and GC 350f/400r and it's a bit rough for daily driving. I'm getting back pains

I would suggest 300f/350r or 325f/375r.

 

I'm running 400f/400r on my '95 del Sol VTEC, with GC's, Koni yellows and an ITR rear bar. Its a dual-purpose car, currently seeing some backroads use, and hopefully seeing some autocross and driver's school action soon. Its comfortable enough on public roads, both ride and handling-wise, but its about as extreme as I want to go right now. Our car weights are probably near the same. Wheelbase, of course, is not.

 

since you said this is primarily a street car and will see some auto-x duty, you don't need spring rates as high as many people are recommending. autocross requires quick transitional handling, so the extremely stiff rates desirable on a road racing coarse will not allow the car to rotate enough through an autocross course. additionally, i have been talking to truechoice about a setup for my own car and according to them, stock konis are valved to go up to about 400 pounds. above that, they recommend re-valving. i can't imagine a daily driven car would need rates stiffer than a stock koni sport can handle. for comparison, the stock type-r had a progressive rear spring with the upper rate around 240. so given how well a stock type-r handles, i can't see needing a rear spring rate much over 250 for a car primarily driven on the street.

as for front/rear balance, the recommendation for stiffer rear springs is to reduce understeer or even induce oversteer. i see that you are from ohio, so i assume you have to drive in the winter. having stiffer rates in the rear than the front will be more problematic in the snow and other slippery conditions. another reason FF cars come with higher front rates is the front weight balance. there is much less weight in the rear, so having a very stiff rear spring rate with not a lot of weight on it can cause the car to skip over road irregularities, causing an uncomfortable ride. rate increases in the rear have a much greater impact on comfort than increases in the front rate.

i'd recommend something along the lines of 350f and 250r. talk to ground control about getting equal length springs (sometimes they run 1" smaller on one end). you'll have plenty of adjustment range to compensate, and this will allow more flexability down the road. i have been able to find the ERS springs for $50 from a few places. if you find the initial setup too soft, you can move the 350 springs to the rear, and order a set of stiffer springs for the front and you'd only be out $100. adding a stiffer rear sway bar is also a good way (better than stiffer springs) to reduce understeer.

good luck,
phil

 

I agree. I drove in a 500F/425R GSR and in a 400f/400R Civic (all Koni Yellows)and they were not very comfortable at all on the back roads. They would be ok for me because I only use the GSR on the weekend and to mainly race but for daily use I would not recommend those rates. The ride will only get worse over time as everything keeps settling and wear & tear takes its toll. The only time the ride was ok was when we were on a perfectly smooth road with no irregularities. Any other road surface, and the car and our bodies took a lot pounding. I just can't see people driving like that every day.
I recommed 350F/300R GCs at the most for daily drivers and occasional auto-xers. This is also a very good auto-x setup and a little stiffer than the regular GC street kit. This has a much better ratio than the stock spring rates (which are 212f/117R) and will give you a very neutral feel. Like Philbert and others said, you need to get yourself a bigger sway bar to control body roll. Even with higher spring rates, without a bigger rear sway bar, you 'll still have plenty of body roll. Plus the Bilsteins you already ordered will not nto work properly with 400lbs or higher spring rates.

 

This is a good thread that I want to continue. I am also considering my suspension setup. Mostly daily driven occationaly autocrossed '00 GSR. Ill be going with Ground Controls and Koni Yellows. Would 500F/400R be too extreme for daily driving? Ive driven in a car with Sportlines and could tolerate much stiffer.

I just dont want to be stuck with a setup thats too soft or too hard. I wanted to go with a setup that was as stiff as I could tolerate (within reason). Ive also read that some people said that since GC uses ERS springs and they are the same front and rear, that they could be swapped. If I went with 500F/400R and it turned out to be stiffer than I want, could I move the 400s to the front and get 300 or 350 springs for the rear?

 

Well, ride quality and what's daily drivable is definitely subjective. It's really a waste of time argueing about this. Just pick a rate and try it out. They are relatively cheap things to buy. I have a pair of 425 lb/in coming tomorrow. I have really no idea how they will feel, but trial and error is the best solution. If they don't work out, you can always sell them.

CB

 

NO! You can't swap the rear GC springs for the front or visa versa. They 're different size!
I just got back from the shop. We installed GCs 475 Front & 400R. I really wanted 450F at the most but they were back ordered till the end of the month.
The Konis will not last long with anything over 450. They start deteriorating especially if you auto-x or road race. Matt Watkins' GSR (forgot his HT name) had 525F/400R for only 3-4 mos and his Konis are blown. He 's sending them out for rebuilt & revalve (to match his rates). I expect mine to go soon too because I do 20 auto-x events a year like Matt..

Now about the ride. My Konis are over 2yrs old and have about 45-50 racing events on them so keep that in mind. The guys at the shop jacked up the GCs at their highest level and told me to drive home like that because they should settle a little bit, and then lower them. So I drove home 65mi. on rough NYC roads (and some smooth highways) and the darn things didn't settle 1mm!! The height is at the max (4 finger gap all around, ouch!) and factory stock. I set the Konis for a little over 3/4 turn in the front and 1 full turn in the back. The ride was very tolerable except when I hit bumps and small pot holes, it got a little noisy and bouncy, BUT it is better than before when I had the H&R Sports because the car was not lowered at all during the 65mi. drive home, PLUS we cut the bumpstops in HALF which I think helps tremendously. I now realize that I was riding on my bumpstops a lot before. I now had much more shock travel so the bumps and pot holes were much more tolerable and the car just went up and down a little more and the ride was smoother than before when I had the 276F/220R H&R Sports.

I 'm pretty sure that as soon as I lower the car the ride will get worse, plus everything is nice and tight now and we also replaced the front LCA bushings. The handling was not better than before because I had 0 drop & I haven't riden in a stock height Integra in so long, I thought I was driving an SUV! I also realized how beneficial a lower center of gravity is. I went up to 100mi. an hour on the highway curves and it held just as well as before with the H&Rs but lane changes were a little slower than before. As soon as I 'm done with this post, I 'm going out to my driveway to lower the car at least 1" and then take it for a test drive in the country roads behind my house. Too bad you have to take the tires off to get to that little screw and turn the threaded sleeve. People said you can adjust all four in a few min. Yeah but it takes me 20-30min. to take the tires off and put them back on Oh well, can't have everything.

I 'm definitely getting the shocks rebuilt and revalved in the Winter time. I can tell they 're not like they used to be and I 'm sure the front 475lb springs will finish them off quickly. They Konis also have 3 seasons of racing on them so I 'm not disappointed.

 

D.Lansing: From your sig you have a GSR, and others are correct, you will have to revalve your shocks for high spring rates. Unless Bilstein has new stuff, the GSR shocks are HDs, which are pretty soft and not the same as the ITR sport shocks. You can revalve them at hotshox 814/774-880. they used to have a website but it doesn't seem to be working.