Koni Yellow's+ Springs or Coilovers?

[BeQuietAndDrive]

Well, the time will come soon when I will purchase some suspension goodies.

Koni Yellow's (sports) have just been released for the xA. I have heard many good things about these. I could buy these, and then pair them up with some good springs.

There is also the option of coilovers, which would be a good bit more expensive. I don't think I really "need" the adjustable ride height feature.

Or, I could go with Ground Control coilovers, and match them with Koni Yellow's. I have heard good and bad about Ground Control.

Any suggestions?

EDIT- I just found a really great deal, it seems. 4 Koni Yellow's and 4 Eibach Sportline's for 649.99. Anyone have experience with these brands?

[Leonard]

Koni makes great shocks. I've got their 3012 aluminum body double adjustable shocks in the FFR and they're amazing.

Eibach springs are fine.


As far as coilovers go, you gain ride height adjustability. That's why ricers love them and think it's great for performance. I consider it (to a large degree) to be a red herring. The down side to that is that by changing the ride height, the car operates in a different part of it's wheel travel and you can easily get into areas where you have unfavorable camber changes and things like that. Cars are designed to have good suspension behavior at the oem ride height.

The UPSIDE, if you're willing to spend the money on the alignment is that you can have the car corner weighted. Small (VERY small) changes in ride height can shift the weight around signifigantly between the wheels. The idea is that you shift the weight around so that the cross weights (LF+RR) and (RF+LR) are the same. Typically it's done with ballast in the driver seat that is roughly equivilent to the driver. I'll spare you the math involved, but the end result is a car that is very well balanced.


Something to consider before making any changes is how it will affect what class you run in. Right now, I know you only run with sunriders. Their class system is very simple. If you start running with other groups, you need to be aware that springs or coilovers could bump you to signifigantly more competative classes.

[BeQuietAndDrive]

Yeah, thankfully Sunrider's only classes on experience, which can be good or bad.

In all honesty, however, since the xA is my first car I have autocross experience in, I'm not sure how "competitive" it is in it's class. Most likely this will be the car I use to get experience in, not to be competitive in. So me being bumped into a different class is not a big issue to me.

[Loren]

The benefit to a coilover setup on most cars is that the aftermarket spring kits usually lower TOO far. Looks cool, but you run out of suspension travel and sometimes unpredictable handling at the limit.

[99TL]

I just got the ground controls with konis... so far I love them.. .It is a little rough for everyday driving but the car felt great autocrossing and during regular spirited driving. My car has been corner-balanced.

[kickslop]

- Decent coilover setups can be had for $1400-$1500 nowadays, which includes pillowball tops that would be an extra cost in a Koni + springs purchase.

- Those pillowball tops very often offer adjustability for a more aggressive alignment than a stock setup usually allows.

- Pillowball tops may irritate the hell out of you. They clunk. If not today, or in the first 6 months, they will eventually. You are also increasing noise and vibration transmitted into the cabin through the chassis. Just something to consider if this is a daily driver.

- Most coilover spring rates are high. You can sometimes get them with lower spring rates, but there is often a wait, and you'd ideally want the coilovers revalved for the lowered spring rate. Some coilover manufacturers offer "US spec" products that are geared toward aggressive use with streetability in mind (revalved + non-race spring rates). Just another thing to consider if this is your daily driver.

- And yes, if you SLAM your ride and totally botch your suspension geometry's original design, your car will handle like ass. For any reasonable person, like yourself, this is not a concern.

[BeQuietAndDrive]

I would like ground control's, but was told that often they don't work well for daily driven setup's. quite a few scion owners who have them have told of the rear springs popping out after raising the car too much, and I'd be quite worried of them popping out going over a speed bump or something of that nature.

[Loren]

There are ways around that if you're willing to spend a few more bucks. They're called "tender springs". They fully compress and do nothing under normal circumstances, but when you get enough droop to slacken the main spring, they "tend" to it and keep everything in place.

I'm wondering what the heck folks are doing on the street to get that much droop!

[BeQuietAndDrive]

Who knows. One owner with an Echo stated that he was driving on the freeway going 75 when one of the rear springs came loose and popped out. He must have hit one hell of a bump.

[Loren]

That sounds like BS to me. The only thing I can see happening (and it almost happened to me once) is if the circlip that is used to support the lower spring perch on the Koni shock is not properly installed, it can shift and possibly allow the spring to push the perch down.

I caught one of mine during a pre-track inspection a few months ago. I hadn't fully seated the circlip in it's retaining groove and it was half way out of the groove in the shock. The spring perch (GC threaded barrel in this case) had cocked down on that side. Everything was still together, but the top of the threaded barrel was rubbing against the inside of the spring. A few good hard bumps could have dislodged that circlip, or possibly vibration could have caused it to break... that corner of my car would have taken a nose-dive at that point.

But, other than that issue, I don't see how the springs themselves are going to "pop out" of the upper or lower spring perches unless you get the car completely airborne. Generally speaking, if you do that with a street car, you'll have other things to worry about besides your springs being seated.

[BeQuietAndDrive]

Well, here's the thread. http://www.scionlife.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11484&highlight=ground+control

let me know what you think.

[PseudoRealityX]

Loren, it's fairly common when using shorter length springs. Most cars at full droop with aftermarket coilovers don't have much, if any spring compression going on. The spring doesn't fall off, it just unseats itself from the top perch usually, and will recenter itself when that wheel compresses again.

[Loren]

Loren, it's fairly common when using shorter length springs. Most cars at full droop with aftermarket coilovers don't have much, if any spring compression going on. The spring doesn't fall off, it just unseats itself from the top perch usually, and will recenter itself when that wheel compresses again.

This differs from the "came loose and popped out" at 75 mph on the freeway story quoted above. I realize that the springs can and will shift around in their perches when the suspension is in droop. I guess my point was that it is not usually a problem. I think you and I are on the same page.

Now, after seeing the pictures in the linked thread, I gotta say, that's a weird setup! I've never seen a suspension that used a spring in a bent configuration such as that. Seems like a poor design to me.

[BeQuietAndDrive]

The Echo/xA/xB rear suspension uses a semi-independant torsion bar set up. It's slightly odd because the spring is not mounted over the shock. Here's a picture to illustrate the rear, although the spring in this picture does ot appear so "bent"

http://www.taka.nu/vitz/myvitz/img/200403_e01.jpg

I'm still slightly unsure about the GC coilovers for my car. That person in the thread I posted however said that he seemed to have gotten a very early design of it, which could explain why that happened to him.

EDIT- here's a better image of the rear suspension in an xA

http://www61.tok2.com/home/istist/west.html#we10

[Leonard]

The springs in mustangs have been similar with regard to the spring not being around the shock and I've not once heard of a spring falling out driving down the highway. I'd think honda would have engineered it as well as ford with respect to keeping the spring in place through the full range of travel. I lean towards this being some jackass who did something stupid.

[PseudoRealityX]

The springs in mustangs have been similar with regard to the spring not being around the shock and I've not once heard of a spring falling out driving down the highway. I'd think honda would have engineered it as well as ford with respect to keeping the spring in place through the full range of travel. I lean towards this being some jackass who did something stupid.

Scion != Honda ;)

[Leonard]

Scion, Honda, Toyota.... they're all small import rice burners... :-P


You know what I meant!

[MrSideways]

Something to keep in mind. Off the shelf shocks (koni, tokico, kyb etc..) don't work well once you up the springrate beyond XXX (not sure off hand, jesse would know). You may really want to consider send the shocks off and having them valved for your specific spring rate.