Coilovers & suspension travel

[Scott Williams <sfwilliams@home.com>]

UrGTI@aol.com wrote:

> But if you have a shorter piston that when at rest sits higher up in the body
> I believe you could still have the same affective compression at least . You
> may not get as much extension but how often does a road car see full droop
> while being driven?
>
> does any of this make sense cause I may have just confused myself .

Yes, that makes perfect sense! You are correct that even with a shortened shaft,
the suspension travel is compromised. I don't think that folks are considering
the extension at all. Not all of the travel is involved in the compression; there
has to be some travel "left" when everything is at rest.

And no, the suspension on a street car will not commonly go to full droop but
we're talking engineering absolutes here. Now, my rallycar on the other hand?
That thing goes to full droop about every five minutes when I'm competing!

> What I personnaly did was raise the mounting tabs on my housings so they sit
> lower on the knuckles and in the rear made mounts lower on the trailing arms

I hope that your welds are good. :^)

Both of your measures will maintain the suspension travel while lowering the car.
I forgot about these methods, actually. The deal here is that the location
relationships between the spring and dampener innards remain the same.
Compression and extension are untouched; the only difference is that the chassis
ends up lower to the ground.

How much were you able to lower the front, though. -couldn't have been much,
right? For that matter, how much did you do it in the rear? Huh huh huh... I said
"do it in the rear". Huh huh... ;^)
--
Scott F. Williams
NJ Scirocco nut
SCCA ProRally driver
Hotrod Rabbit GTi


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