I think the bc sounds pretty good from what I have been reading. I think for the 6k or less miles I drive a year they may be just fine.
Still researching....
Still researching....
-
Protip: Profile posts are public! Use Conversations to message other members privately. Everyone can see the content of a profile post.
Best Coilovers for under a grand?
- Thread starter NetViper
- Start date
I was quite close to trying out the BC coilovers. I ended up spending more on something else but now i'm in your same boat. I'm too low for street driving yet I love the handling and love the adjustability with my current setup and don't want to give it up...BUT I wish I had an air lift assist system to add more daily driver friendliness.
Ravi wants something crazy like $2-3k for a VRH kit. There's also the Roberuta Cup Kit which is where Ravi copied his from seems like and that's like $5k+. Then there's the Cargraphic kit they make for Porsches which shouldn't be difficult to adapt for the NSX.. that's also $5k.
So at the end of the day it's $2-4k for a good set of coilovers plus $3-5k on an air lift system... you're out almost $5-9k at the end of the day.
Then I found the K-Sport AirTech system. If I had known about this kit I'd have given it a shot. This is roughly $3k for the NSX specific kit and gives you variable right height via air. Who knows.. maybe i'll still give it a shot next year. Theoritically the ride height is infinitely adjustable within the max/min range but the more interesting part is the perch can be adjusted to achieve a desired ride height AT a certain air bag PSI. That's sort of like being able to adjust preload on a spring. I'm no expert and I don't know how air bags compare to traditional springs from a handling perspective... Just seems fun to play with.
Btw... from some of the folks I've had discussions with who actually track their cars K-sport dampers may not be the best out there but they got a bad rap they may not necessarily deserve.
EDIT TO ADD: I found a review. Isn't the OP here from prime? http://www.clublexus.com/forums/gs-second-generation/560459-ksport-airtech-review.html
Ravi wants something crazy like $2-3k for a VRH kit. There's also the Roberuta Cup Kit which is where Ravi copied his from seems like and that's like $5k+. Then there's the Cargraphic kit they make for Porsches which shouldn't be difficult to adapt for the NSX.. that's also $5k.
So at the end of the day it's $2-4k for a good set of coilovers plus $3-5k on an air lift system... you're out almost $5-9k at the end of the day.
Then I found the K-Sport AirTech system. If I had known about this kit I'd have given it a shot. This is roughly $3k for the NSX specific kit and gives you variable right height via air. Who knows.. maybe i'll still give it a shot next year. Theoritically the ride height is infinitely adjustable within the max/min range but the more interesting part is the perch can be adjusted to achieve a desired ride height AT a certain air bag PSI. That's sort of like being able to adjust preload on a spring. I'm no expert and I don't know how air bags compare to traditional springs from a handling perspective... Just seems fun to play with.
Btw... from some of the folks I've had discussions with who actually track their cars K-sport dampers may not be the best out there but they got a bad rap they may not necessarily deserve.
EDIT TO ADD: I found a review. Isn't the OP here from prime? http://www.clublexus.com/forums/gs-second-generation/560459-ksport-airtech-review.html
Last edited:
Cool. Keep us posted on how you like it. I might end up the same way.
Sounds like a decent kit. Texas Brent has something similar to this. I think.
Sent from my Thrive using Tapatalk
Sent from my Thrive using Tapatalk
Response:
From Post #8:
http://www.nsxprime.com/forum/showthread.php?t=149691
At the end of the day, a mildly lowered NSX on Konis (or Bilsteins) will handle and ride very well and should be more than enough for most peoples street and even track use. For me, the ride quality, ability to lower the car further and still have an excellent ride quality -let alone very high performing track ability, the KW V3 fits my bill which is why I have them on 2 of my cars.
0.02
I was quite close to trying out the BC coilovers. I ended up spending more on something else but now i'm in your same boat. I'm too low for street driving yet I love the handling and love the adjustability with my current setup and don't want to give it up...BUT I wish I had an air lift assist system to add more daily driver friendliness.
Ravi wants something crazy like $2-3k for a VRH kit. There's also the Roberuta Cup Kit which is where Ravi copied his from seems like and that's like $5k+. Then there's the Cargraphic kit they make for Porsches which shouldn't be difficult to adapt for the NSX.. that's also $5k.
So at the end of the day it's $2-4k for a good set of coilovers plus $3-5k on an air lift system... you're out almost $5-9k at the end of the day.
Then I found the K-Sport AirTech system. If I had known about this kit I'd have given it a shot. This is roughly $3k for the NSX specific kit and gives you variable right height via air. Who knows.. maybe i'll still give it a shot next year. Theoritically the ride height is infinitely adjustable within the max/min range but the more interesting part is the perch can be adjusted to achieve a desired ride height AT a certain air bag PSI. That's sort of like being able to adjust preload on a spring. I'm no expert and I don't know how air bags compare to traditional springs from a handling perspective... Just seems fun to play with.
Btw... from some of the folks I've had discussions with who actually track their cars K-sport dampers may not be the best out there but they got a bad rap they may not necessarily deserve.
EDIT TO ADD: I found a review. Isn't the OP here from prime? http://www.clublexus.com/forums/gs-second-generation/560459-ksport-airtech-review.html
Seems like they ride on half full and dump it when parked, which will obviously effect handling. Wonder how they'll handle not full, since this is how they compare to Ravi's kit. We ride with no air and only use it to raise car to clear scraping.
Pm Ravi. He might be able to give you a good deal. I bought the kw3 from him for a bit over 2k.
From my research the common cup kits out there only assist in the occasional lift of usually 1-1.5". They rely completely on the dynamics of the existing coilover when not pressurized. I don't think they're designed to be pressured for any long duration of time either. A true airbag suspension is designed to be pressurized at some psi all the time however the difference between 0psi and 150psi is huge from a "spring rate" perspective. Not even sure if a traditional (non-magnetic) damper can handle that kind of variance.
I'm not too sure on the compression/rebound dynamics of a air bag vs. a spring. Obviously the air bag rates are more infinitely adjustable and I could really see some folks screwing up their settings. I'll do more research but I'd assume air bags won't have the spring reverberation that springs inherently have.
Ridetech has pulled off really fast times with their Air Ride kits in the muscle car world.. albeit most those cars still run on 40yo suspension technology.
I might still try it out in a year or two assuming there's a failsafe in there because what if a valve or a bag fail while driving. Then you're SOL!!!
Last edited:
Racecars don't have to pull up onto my aunts driveway twice a month and don't have the burden of pulling off hellaflush :wink:
Thank You :biggrin:
Just the info I needed :wink:
BTW...how many sets of wheels to you have?
Seems to me that a bag dependent system wouldn't be anywhere near ideal for those who may be looking to track the car. Given that the effective "spring" rate increases the more air pressure is stored in the bags, and that the more air there is in the bags, the higher the car sits. Would that not mean that as your suspension stiffens, your center of gravity rises?
Sorry to OP if I've sort of derailed this post.
This is just conjecture on my part.. but when you think of this particular air bag suspension, since the lower collar perch is adjustable you can virtually inflate the bag at a particular PSI where the bag can't expand anymore and that PSI is enough to hold the car up. Let's say that max height is achieved at 55psi, where 54psi will lower the car and anything above 55psi will NOT raise the car since the bags are at their maximum height UNTIL addition load/weight is added to find that optimal PSI again. So theoretically you can go to 55+ psi and still keep the car at the same height effectively increasing the "spring rate". You then use the lower spring perch to adjust the ride height. If the appropriate "spring rate" can be found w/o fully extending the bags to max height then that's just an added bonus. In a nutshell.. I would tune the PSI to achieve a satisfactory "spring rate" not tune to achieve a ride height.. that's what the lower perch is for. I don't know... I could be totally off base with all this!
So if I had a setup like this i'd have my max ride height preprogrammed at a certain PSI and at a certain spring perch height and at a certain alignment. This would be my "track" setup and get-up-over-speedbumps setup. (My track setup is usually about .75" higher all around anyway so i can use slightly wider 235s in the front). I would deflate the bags a bit to achieve my street "stance" (lol.. i used the word stance...) albeit with slightly off alignment and non-optimal "spring rate". I'd want a softer street ride anyway. In addition, I've found that my current setup works best (for me) at zero preload. It seems one would loose that added adjustment dimension with this setup.
Again.. all just fun conjecture for me. Most would think it's all just too much trouble.
This is just conjecture on my part.. but when you think of this particular air bag suspension, since the lower collar perch is adjustable you can virtually inflate the bag at a particular PSI where the bag can't expand anymore and that PSI is enough to hold the car up. Let's say that max height is achieved at 55psi, where 54psi will lower the car and anything above 55psi will NOT raise the car since the bags are at their maximum height UNTIL addition load/weight is added to find that optimal PSI again. So theoretically you can go to 55+ psi and still keep the car at the same height effectively increasing the "spring rate". You then use the lower spring perch to adjust the ride height. If the appropriate "spring rate" can be found w/o fully extending the bags to max height then that's just an added bonus. In a nutshell.. I would tune the PSI to achieve a satisfactory "spring rate" not tune to achieve a ride height.. that's what the lower perch is for. I don't know... I could be totally off base with all this!
So if I had a setup like this i'd have my max ride height preprogrammed at a certain PSI and at a certain spring perch height and at a certain alignment. This would be my "track" setup and get-up-over-speedbumps setup. (My track setup is usually about .75" higher all around anyway so i can use slightly wider 235s in the front). I would deflate the bags a bit to achieve my street "stance" (lol.. i used the word stance...) albeit with slightly off alignment and non-optimal "spring rate". I'd want a softer street ride anyway. In addition, I've found that my current setup works best (for me) at zero preload. It seems one would loose that added adjustment dimension with this setup.
Again.. all just fun conjecture for me. Most would think it's all just too much trouble.
Last edited:
This is the best option if one is on a budget and still want some degree of performance in mind.
This..
Do you know how to use Google?
I wouldn't touch any of the Asian coil overs for the reason that they have terrible droop. And in the case of my teins, they make noise that makes the NSX sound cheap.
How does zero droop improve your handling or ride quality?
This.
And it's not just limited to our cars. The boys at the other car forums love them too.
BTW, I keep hearing from various unrelated people that the key people at KW, JRZ, Moton, etc. all had worked at Koni at one point in their careers.
For the crappy road conditions in CA the lack of droop makes my NSX feel like a jet ski in the sense that when I hit choppy road conditions at freeway speeds the NSX would launch up in the air just enough so that I have no contact patch in one or 2 of the tires......
Droop/preload recommendations vary depending on who you ask. One thing to note.. Your stock NSX and even NSX-R suspension have some preload and certainly 0 to negative droop.
Race car drivers and even your more educated grocery errand boys will have opinions to no end. Just try different settings and see what works best for you.
Race car drivers and even your more educated grocery errand boys will have opinions to no end. Just try different settings and see what works best for you.
I know you're just stating your opinion but oh man.. that's quite a blanket statement. You must have had the cheap Flex.. tho the Monoflex isn't all that much better. You can't believe all you read on the boards man...there are many good quality "Asian" coilovers. It's too bad the market has just been flooded with poorly made cheap imitations.
And btw.. droop is adjustable.
While ideal droop is debatable, droop is a different topic from preload.
A lack of droop travel results in an infinite rate under rebound (like bottoming out a shock or coil-binding a spring will result in an infinite spring rate under compression). Hitting this droop limit results in a very harsh ride for the street and upsets the chassis for performance driving as well - causing the car to lose traction/skip/not load the tires consistently especially over bumps.
Almost every car ever made has preload. This is because the use of a very long spring is needed with a low spring rate to achieve the desired ride height. But pretty much every production car has this calculated ride height to have a proper amount of droop (in most cases, A LOT) and compression travel.
0.02
Similar threads
- Locked
