[itsbrokeagain]

Pits, if you were looking for comfort while driving you should have left the oem suspension in.

It is a trade-off. You lose ride comfort for more stiffness. Does a track car ride like a buick? I think not.

The only car that will not jar itself over a pothole is one you dont try to hit. I avoid those like the plague but you dont need to mindlessly drive over them..that is bad for any setup.

I think if you did swaybars too that would make a big difference in feel. Coilovers only do part of the work.

Bumpstops only need to be cut once. When the ride height goes up, you leave them be. If it comes down you have less shaft travel and need to accomodate for it by trimming the bumpstop.

[kdiggz]

Originally Posted by Matt@Camber-Toe

Pits, if you were looking for comfort while driving you should have left the oem suspension in.

It is a trade-off. You lose ride comfort for more stiffness. Does a track car ride like a buick? I think not.

The only car that will not jar itself over a pothole is one you dont try to hit. I avoid those like the plague but you dont need to mindlessly drive over them..that is bad for any setup.

I think if you did swaybars too that would make a big difference in feel. Coilovers only do part of the work.

Bumpstops only need to be cut once. When the ride height goes up, you leave them be. If it comes down you have less shaft travel and need to accomodate for it by trimming the bumpstop.

jeez, finally someone that gets it! i thought i was taking crazy pills reading all these threads with people recommending coilovers to people that don't need/want them. these are supposed to be comfy touring cars, not an uncomfortable go kart. that's what my other car is for. it sounds like tightening things a bit with bushings and sways will go a long way towards making the suspension more "sporty." that's where i'm going to start rather than mess struts/springs/coilovers. it's definitely a compromise and all about finding the right balance for your needs

[pits200]

I understand the trade-off between comfort and handling. But I expect a 1:1 ratio, if the comfort level goes down by one, Im expecting the handling to go up by one and that is partly why you spend more money on a quality setup.

Perhaps my expectations were too high, but on the other hand the more I drive the car the better the coils feel. I'd love to ad sways or bushings but I don't think I can handle having the car any stiffer at the moment.

[pits200]

Originally Posted by Matt@Camber-Toe

Bumpstops only need to be cut once. When the ride height goes up, you leave them be. If it comes down you have less shaft travel and need to accomodate for it by trimming the bumpstop.

My logic to this was, why the hell didn't ast just provide shorter bumpstops, lol.

[UltraRacer13]

Originally Posted by pits200

My logic to this was, why the hell didn't ast just provide shorter bumpstops, lol.

Again- the really didn't do any R&D for the XI. One guy, Presidio, ordered them by mistake- he shouldn't have- so they made them fit for him. They should have told him no, but they decided to redesign the shock to make it fit. The XI shock was born. Then we come along and order them. Again, they could have said no, but they felt they had the right design. This is why Brian Hanchey was so eager to help me with my setup, he wanted to be sure they were setup correctly. What we learned, he immediately passed on to Harold.

Now whether or not the "i" guys need to cut their bumpstops...IDK. My guess is that they don't, because we are lowering the car more up front than they are due to the larger gap. So, like it or not, we are the R&D here, such is the case being early adopters. You mentioned you wanted to be the first guy to have the AST's on an XI, and you were pretty close. You have to expect a few issues if you basically are the beta guys.

All that said- I love my coils! My ride is great. Any ride issues I have are due to the camber plates (to be expected when the shock is directly bolted to the tower!). But the ride is nice (my wife thinks no dofferent) but my handling is immensly better. Track day in 1.5 wks. Counting the hours!!

Joe

[pits200]

Originally Posted by TXSailor

Again- the really didn't do any R&D for the XI. One guy, Presidio, ordered them by mistake- he shouldn't have- so they made them fit for him. They should have told him no, but they decided to redesign the shock to make it fit. The XI shock was born. Then we come along and order them. Again, they could have said no, but they felt they had the right design. This is why Brian Hanchey was so eager to help me with my setup, he wanted to be sure they were setup correctly. What we learned, he immediately passed on to Harold.

Now whether or not the "i" guys need to cut their bumpstops...IDK. My guess is that they don't, because we are lowering the car more up front than they are due to the larger gap. So, like it or not, we are the R&D here, such is the case being early adopters. You mentioned you wanted to be the first guy to have the AST's on an XI, and you were pretty close. You have to expect a few issues if you basically are the beta guys.

All that said- I love my coils! My ride is great. Any ride issues I have are due to the camber plates (to be expected when the shock is directly bolted to the tower!). But the ride is nice (my wife thinks no dofferent) but my handling is immensly better. Track day in 1.5 wks. Counting the hours!!

Joe

I kind of know where you're coming from Joe but this isn't like being the first person cracking open the engine and boring out the cylinders. Coils are coils, the internal structure is the same for AST but they just failed to do the nitty gritty when it came to the details. So having to be the guinea pig for coils isn't something that should ever have to be done, especially when you spend around 2k for them

Oh well, I'm over it.

Have fun at the track, let us know how it goes.

[itsbrokeagain]

Originally Posted by pits200

I understand the trade-off between comfort and handling. But I expect a 1:1 ratio, if the comfort level goes down by one, Im expecting the handling to go up by one and that is partly why you spend more money on a quality setup.

Perhaps my expectations were too high, but on the other hand the more I drive the car the better the coils feel. I'd love to ad sways or bushings but I don't think I can handle having the car any stiffer at the moment.

Doing suspension is never a 1:1 ratio. I can do bushings and arms in the car and make it come alive without sacrificing too much comfort. When it comes to springs and shocks, that is a whole new ballgame, and the results are usually a lot more tradeoff for desired handling.

[pits200]

Seems my 4100s have hit a snag. I've been complaining about the adjustment knobs and now finally as adjusting the front knob it would just spin freely.

I unscrew the brass nut and here is what I find. That is the part where the adjustment knob screws onto.

Hopefully AST or Harold can take care of this issue asap because now my car is out of order.

[Doyle]

It seems like this is not that uncommon. The shop I use highly discouraged me from buying AST 4XXX's...and they are an AST distributor.

[pits200]

Originally Posted by Doyle

It seems like this is not that uncommon. The shop I use highly discouraged me from buying AST 4XXX's...and they are an AST distributor.

This is a small issue though. As I've been running the car, I've started appreciating my asts more and more. I can tell overall they are off a solid construct with a small oversight with the adjustment knob quality.

Lets just hope they stand behind their warranty here and can get me the parts asap.