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Official 5th Generation Suspension Thread


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strut tower brace is useless. what are you swapping, and what have you done so far?

 

A spring/shock upgrade will get most of the roll away, and i would actually do a front bar first before the rear since theses cars have the weight up front and need most of the roll control there first. If you have done all this, then a rear bar may be prudent, but most people misinterpret front roll as rear roll. if you get the front to corner flatter, the rear wont roll as much.

 

he's bagged.

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You're on bags, right? Any way to adjust pressure on those without affecting ride height? You'd probably want a higher "spring rate" to do things right, but if you have the stock RSB in there, the 20mm WRX bar may be a good band-aid. Less roll on smooth pavement, anyway.

 

I know even less about air suspension than I do about regular spring suspension, so take that for what it's worth.

 

Edit: hooray, crappy cell signal...

Edited by cww516
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You're on bags, right? Any way to adjust pressure on those without affecting ride height? You'd probably want a higher "spring rate" to do things right, but if you have the stock RSB in there, the 20mm WRX bar may be a good band-aid. Less roll on smooth pavement, anyway.

 

I know even less about air suspension than I do about regular spring suspension, so take that for what it's worth.

 

wow! someone is not following the conversation :lol: . DC_Titus is on bags, not ripstik.

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he's bagged.

 

You're on bags, right? Any way to adjust pressure on those without affecting ride height? You'd probably want a higher "spring rate" to do things right, but if you have the stock RSB in there, the 20mm WRX bar may be a good band-aid. Less roll on smooth pavement, anyway.

 

I know even less about air suspension than I do about regular spring suspension, so take that for what it's worth.

 

i know little about bagged suspension as well, but what i highlighted sounds right. Maybe you could also lower the lower bag perch so you would need more PSI(spring force) to attain the current ride height, giving you more stiffnes and roll resistance.

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Correct. Although you may "feel" a little difference with one installed, you will be hard pressed to quantify any real "performance" gains without having a fully modified suspension set up with track spec coilovers, really wide sticky tires, and hard bushing all the way around.

 

the thing you would feel is the added weight slowing the car down.:lol:

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wow! someone is not following the conversation :lol: . DC_Titus is on bags, not ripstik.

 

I thought I was. Decided to live dangerously and reply to DC_Titus' comment without quoting it, since he had just posted, but I neglected to remember that my cell signal is suck. Kinda surprised that post made it through, I would have thought Chrome would have given up after 13 minutes.

 

I guess a more accurate word might be "trailing" rather than "following"...

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Yes, I am bagged. I thought about moving the perches down but the pressure I drive at is actually pretty stiff as it is.

 

So far I have a front strut tower brace, rear LCAs, toe arms, and endlinks. I'm putting in new sub frame bushings, diff bushings, new swaybar bushings, new bushings on pretty much every control arm, and replacing every nut and bolt.

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ok, so if you don't want to lower the perch and run more pressure, than all you have left is bars. However, if you are concerned with ride quality after adding more pressure, you may want to look at shocks. what shocks are running with the bags?
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:lol: No you wont. The bar doesn't keep you off the stops. Your spring does. The amount of force a sway bar makes is only enough to change the car balance. Its no where close enough to support the weight of the car(keep the car off the stops).

 

so a sway bar doesn't help both sides of the suspension travel more similar distances? And when you compress one side of your suspension and extend the other one this puts absolutely no force on the sway bar?

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so a sway bar doesn't help both sides of the suspension travel more similar distances? And when you compress one side of your suspension and extend the other one this puts absolutely no force on the sway bar?

 

thats not what i said. what i said was that the bar is not what keeps the car off the bump stops. what you said here is correct but has nothing to do with the car being on the stops or not. the spring is what holds the car up and the added force from a sway bar present during cornering is not what is keeping thcar off the stops. And if you arent cornering or driving on uneven surfaces, the bar is not doing any work at all.

 

the amount of force the bar generates under full cornering is only supplemental compared to the springs. This is why a modest spring rate increase, properly damped, will do more to control body roll than a bar. That way your suspension stays more independent, more comfortable, and the car has less front to rear pitch too.

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Yes, I am bagged. I thought about moving the perches down but the pressure I drive at is actually pretty stiff as it is.

 

So far I have a front strut tower brace, rear LCAs, toe arms, and endlinks. I'm putting in new sub frame bushings, diff bushings, new swaybar bushings, new bushings on pretty much every control arm, and replacing every nut and bolt.

 

Having looked at your build thread, i can say now that its your shocks that are the problem. not sure what damper tech those units are using but f they cant be that good. Some good valving will go along way towards making it more comfy and allowing you to run more PSI and lower the perch to get the ride height you want.

 

do they offer shock rebuilds or upgrades?

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I'm gonna go ahead and find a different, slower-moving thread to post in for now, pretty sure molasses in winter is faster than my internets are right now. Edited by cww516
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Something I would like to add to this conversation is that in lower traction scenarios, less lateral grip can be achieved, far less suspension loading occurs when cornering, and when combined with uneven surfaces, softer suspension is required to keeps the wheels on the ground at all. So, from a "spirited crappy-street driving" perspective, a stiffer rear sway bar helps neutralize the car, even if it is at the expense of rear grip. Rear grip isn't worth much if you understeer right through a turn.

 

Here is an example to illustrate what I mean: I have never pushed my car to the limit on dry asphalt. I simply do not know what/where that limit is: I speak not about that. However, on a snowy/icy road in the winter, I drive near the limit all the time and regularly tempt/push that limit to find out where it is. In fact, I make a point of it as part of safe winter driving to know what the limit is, so I can adjust my driving accordingly. In my city they simply don't plow the roads half the time, and in some places, never, and I mean that seriously. As a result, understeer can be very scarey.. just snow-plowing tangentially through a corner (literally and figuratively) straight towards a curb, pole, or worse is terrifying (My Rav4 is brutal for that). A stiffer rear bar has corrected that by helping the back to come around in a mild and controlled way, which gets me through the corner, and much much faster than if I had to slow down enough to avoid the understeer. And we may be talking about speeds of 20 - 40 MPH.

 

Now, with that said, I fully recognize that the better way to address that would be to swap my rear diff for a 1.5 LSD unit, then RSB be damned it would come around on demand no matter what using my right foot.

 

And when we are talking about winter-land, I have what one would call "excellent performance tires", and I buy nothing short of the best. So in this case, I am showcasing how tire capability is already maxed out, and changes to bars helps neutralize things.

 

My point is, there are always trade-offs. The key is knowing what those are and adjusting your setup to meet your handling desires (and budget) as best you can for the surface conditions you face. I have no problem sacrificing limit grip in ideal conditions in favour of drastic improvements in poor conditions, but that's because 50% of the year the roads would qualify as "poor conditions". I also have no problem dropping whatever it costs for the absolute best winter tires, because ultimately, tires are what holds you to the ground.

 

Whitetiger has provided a lot of great information here that I find very helpful in evaluating those trade-offs, and frankly has reinforced some of the decisions I have come to on my own setup.

 

 

My $0.02 :)

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^you are doing the right way. winter driving is a great way to test the limit since the speeds are much slower.

 

the thing about understeer though, is that you can deal with it in one of 2 ways.

1.increase front grip

2.decrease rear grip.

 

It is always better to increase front grip, but its easier to decrease rear grip in a pinch with a bar. Increasing front grip though will make you faster, and be safer in the winter, and on dry warm tarmac.

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Agreed. But is there any way to increase front grip in winter beyond high quality dampers, a bit of negative camber (-1 to -1.4) in the front, great tires, optimized tire pressures, and the odd Scandinavian flick?

 

Because frick do I hate winter understeer :)

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It depends on the diff. A torsen/helical diff will bias tq to the gripping wheel and pull the front through a turn. now of course this wont help you under braking or if you are going in too fast, but once you make the apex, and apply power, a front diff is a beautiful thing.

 

 

you can only compensate for driver skill to a point with parts.

Edited by whitetiger
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Narrowed suspension upgrades to three: RCE Tarmac Zeros, Bilsteins/ Blacks, BC Coils. I am leaning more towards the Bilsteins for more of a set it and forget setup. The car is purely on the road and will never be tracked, but I am looking for a little firmer feel. I am just trying to prevent any buyer's remorse not spending a little more for coils
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