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Shortened housings are a must- you will be pretty short on travel without going this route.
I'm a big proponent for GC stuff. The camber plates are super nice, and easy to adjust. Strut housings are nicely done. Koni's aren't they best but they are miles better than the BC/Megan/etc dampers and perform very nicely on the street and GC customer/knowledge/support has always been great
Thanks for the input. Yes was referring to that link. I definitely want to go with shortened then. They don’t sell them anymore so If I go this route I’ll probably get the sectioning instructions and do it myself .
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Brilliantrot 1991 325-1995 BMW S50 Engine S50 intake-headers Borla Pro XS- 318is Radiator Spal 16” pusher fan Cone filter Tuned by RK- Bilstein Sport dampers with IE springs -Z3 steering rack- 16” style 5 from E32 Wilwood 4 piston Dynapro calipers -EBC pads Volkswagen Corrado rotors stainless steel lines-E32 M5 master cylinder, 325iX brake booster, 2002ti remote reservoir-1996 325i driveshaft Z3 3.15 Torsen LSD Z3 1.8 shifter IS lip and spoiler Antenna deleted Euro Grilles
What is a higher end suspension? Everything I have read has pointed me to GC being best available for E30’s
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GC is best value, but at some point, Koni shocks are midrange at best.
Most of the E30 suspensions are crap, however, so I guess that makes GC look like top end. (To be clear, I have a lot of GC and Koni suspension components.)
At the high end, you’ve got MCS shocks available. My point, mostly, is that for double the shock cost, you’re getting maybe 1% performance. It’s still a koni. (And to be clear, I own a bunch of double adjustable konis.)
I recommend a GC/Koni setup, for anyone wanting to do any type of performance driving, with their E30. Once you get more serious and have learned the limitations of this setup, then you can move on to something a little more advanced; I would say that, for most folks, especially those that want to have some fun with their daily driver, the GC/Koni setup is the best bang for the buck. IMHO, of course.
I recommend a GC/Koni setup, for anyone wanting to do any type of performance driving, with their E30. Once you get more serious and have learned the limitations of this setup, then you can move on to something a little more advanced; I would say that, for most folks, especially those that want to have some fun with their daily driver, the GC/Koni setup is the best bang for the buck. IMHO, of course.
I agree with you. I’m just saying that adding nearly a thousand bucks in cost for a double adjustable shock is decent bit of money for nearly no reward.
I agree with you. I’m just saying that adding nearly a thousand bucks in cost for a double adjustable shock is decent bit of money for nearly no reward.
Oh, totally, I agree with you. No real value to adding the DA dampers.
OP is definitely on the right track; at least he isn't asking our opinion of BCRacing coilovers....
Thx all. I am a total newb with the E30. The car I bought has IE springs and bilsteins. I bought the car to cruise and take to the track for HPDE and autocross.
If DoubleAdjustable is overkill what do you recommend the standard $1750ish kit
Thx all. I am a total newb with the E30. The car I bought has IE springs and bilsteins. I bought the car to cruise and take to the track for HPDE and autocross.
If DoubleAdjustable is overkill what do you recommend the standard $1750ish kit
What else is recommended I THINK it has stock sway bars I’ll have to ask the seller.
Looking for the best handling without being break your back stiff.
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The kit you posted, is definitely what I would suggest. I would certainly have them assemble everything, that way, you only have to bolt the parts on and set your ride height/dampening. A 450/650 spring setup should be a nice balance between aggressive and soft.
Unless you plan on spending a lot of time on track and making adjustments, DA coil overs are a waste of your money. Most SA dampers adjust compression and rebound together and are much easier to set up.
Personally I always piece together suspension. Spend the majority of money on the dampers, those are what make the difference. Go with quality name brand, no Chinese knockoff crap.
Get some threaded sleeves and some used springs off eBay in a few different rates to play around with. Eibach springs are widely available used and usually cost $30-40 each. The rate bias front/rear is determined by what’s already on the market (H&R, GC, Turner) and is a good starting point. Also look at the typical lengths, nothing too short like 4” or long like 8+”
Top mounts should preferably have some isolation and not have spherical bearings unless you track the car or don’t mind knocking and banging once the spherical bearings start to wear.
If all of that sounds like way too much work just buy a kit I guess. Unfortunately you don’t learn anything that way and will forever be stuck buying kits. One cool thing you can do piecing together a kit is add dual rate springs, which are the best option for a car driving on street and track
Make sure you let GC know how low you want your car to be. When I got my coilovers in 2015 with the shortened housings and 6" springs, I found that even with them set max height the car was still too low. I resolved this issue by adding 1" spring spacers, but it could also be achieved by requesting either a longer shock body (I believe mine were shortened by 2", so get 1" instead) or by getting a 7" long spring (probably the better solution).
I also concur on the spring rates of 440/650 making sense. It feels a bit soft to me on the street, but I'm going to tune the rest of the car with sway bar since the ride frequency is already pretty high and I want to have maximum grip.
Overall I'm quite happy with the GCs. The Koni shocks ride well, the spring rates are reasonable for a track/autox car, and they've held up well for the 3 years I've had them.
The other thing you need to consider with lowering an E30 is that your suspension geometry is going to get worse.
In order to fix the front you really need to run roll-center correction ball joints up front (basically unubtanium) or move the inside pivot of the A-arm up into the subframe (lots of fab). You don't have to do this, but it will help with preventing excessive roll from the increased distance from roll center to CG. I'm in the process of figuring out these modifications on my car right now.
In order to rectify the rear, you'll need adjustable RTA mounts. I highly suggest the PosiLock style ones, as the cam bolts on mine have moved a couple times. Once my car is set for good, I'm going to just spot weld them in place. The other option in the rear is to raise the rear sub frame (best in conjunction with the adjustable RTA mounts).
If you want to read more, one of the best resources I've found is http://e30sport.net/index.html although take everything with a grain of salt. Not all of his calculations were correct and I've since take some measurements on my car to recalculate the front motion ratios correctly (the published numbers of 0.94F, 0.67R are right, but his math for calculating them was incorrect)
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