Coilovers: Low or Compliancy?

[MeisterR 34]

We have been working with some owners in the USA market and this questions seems to come up a lot.

So we want to talk to the UK community to see what are the general opinion on this.

 

Because of the GT86 suspension design, it is a rather "knife edge" in terms of having the damper short so you can go low, or having longer damper with more travel to provide better compliancy.

Generally we strike somewhere in the middle so both can be achieve, but will be limited in the lowering range.

However, many USA owners seems to go all out and use extremely short unit in order to go very low.

I want to know if there are any owners who are interested in this type of "Super Low" kit or all around performance are the prefer suspension design.

Jerrick

[rob275 1817]

Doubt there will be much interest in it from the UK. I feel you can go low enough as it is, you can go low enough to cause issues on the road, why make hassle.

But Americans are weird so I understand why they've asked for this.

[Church 209]

Yes, there are many @US going for super low drop/hella-flush/bottom scraping/uber wide and staggered tire setup on oversized wheels. Unfortunately many - also means that many of such vote with wallet. I personally would hate to rob handling from car, where it's main distinguishing feature, rob comfort and rob daily driveability on far from perfect roads with deep potholes, speed-bumps, steep driveways and here - sometimes also deep unplowed snow. But then again i'm not representing statistically average customer of aftermarket tuning parts. On contrary i sometimes think of going other way, to gravel rallying

[Paul 442]

Roads in the US are generally better and smoother than those in the UK. Trying to go that low over here is a recipe for scuffed bodywork.

[Church 209]

Depends. They themselves often also say (and show example pics) that many of their roads suck/have lot of roadholes and such too, and usually it's Japan roads that are mentioned as exemplary. And traditionally they often are more comfort loving (illustrated by eg. often USDM suspension products being softer sprung then their counterparts (or car models in general) for EUDM or JDM). That's for normal people though. Aftermarket is often dominated more by bling/exageration/lack of normal sense. And by market principles supply has to take into account demand, even if it's something stupid as ghetto tuning of hellaflush, tuner stickers, very powerful audiosystems. Sensible daily driveability or handling won't matter to anyone that is hard set on lowest possible lowering no matter the costs. Yes, there are ones that care about handling or are serious about track racing and hence don't buy stupid products that sometimes makes things worse then stock. But imho for any quality high class coilover of ohlins/top KW offerings/penske/billsteins and so on, there are much more cheap taiwanese sub $1K coilovers sold looking just how low they can go and in what color they are painted. Heck, for brakes their painted caliper look and oversized crossdrilled rotors looks to many matters more then eg. consumables cost/reliability/intact brake bias. Big carbonfiber applicated antiwing is must have even if it hurts speed more then actually helps something. As some porsches/lambos/ferraris have wide and staggered wheel-tyre combos, then so must they have such in their underpowered toyobarus too.

[Varelco 211]

If your coilovers are harsh for UK roads they won't sell.

Alot of US owners are primarily interested in aesthetics rather than outright performance and compliance. The modifying scene for this car in particular seems to be quite a lot different in comparison.

[Keethos 842]

I think currently, a mega low suspension kit wouldn't sell that well as majority of the owners of the 86/BRZ's are car handling enthusiasts so slamming the car wouldn't be an option. However, there are still plenty of people in the UK who love to slam their cars but this is usually done to cheaper cars and done by....how to politely say it....a certain class of people(?), where super slammed and stupid camber is cool. So I reckon as the price of the 86/BRZ drops far enough that more of these kind of people buy into the 86/BRZ, then we might start to see a need for these super low kits....but personally you'd be doing us all a favor if you didn't bring the product to the UK

[Lauren 2259]

I think all the current setups on the market seem to offer the ability to get as low as anyone would want. Roads in the US are far worse than the UK in my experience. 

For the tiny percentage that want to cringe everytime they go over a cats eye, it's not really going to be worth it, they can just import from the US if they can't find what they are looking for here. 

Edited October 25, 2015 by Lauren

[MeisterR 34]

That is good to hear.

I am just looking at the engineering drawing for the GT86 and pretty much to make a suspension go any lower can our current offering, I am going to need to throw performance out the window.

We can do it, but it isn't something I personally would like because I know it isn't going to perform.

 

So the fact that most of you feel that there aren't a need to go "stupid" low is good feedback for us, because it mean we don't have to make a kit that I personally wouldn't like to be driving on.

 

Jerrick

[Nicebiscuit 655]

It's an interesting question - I can't really see the demand as the GT86 is all about handling - so it'd be an awful lot of money to spend on a new car to then immediately ruin it.

But then again, people do odd things. Give it a few years and people will be slapping dodgy Ferrari replica kits on these I reckon!

You're probably asking the wrong forum though - people here seem to want to make their cars better...

[MeisterR 34]

That is good because that is the "answer" I was hoping for really.

The GT86 is a great handling car, and because of the suspension design there is a limited adjustment range if you want to keep everything functional.

So our current coilovers allows the suspension to work as intended, but producing a suspension that will let the car go any lower will literally throw performance out the window.

Therefore, if people want to have a suspension that go really low, it is something we can do.

While we can still produce a functional and safe suspension that will go low, it will not perform as well as our current setup… and that will be a step backward that pains me.

Good that no one on this forum is interested.  

Jerrick