Okay so I finally have something worth posting !!!!!! I took this car off the road about 4 months ago. The insurance had ran up and I decided to drive my other car, a 1980 Corolla wagon. Far cheaper on gas and insurance and I can throw stuff in the back without worrying about wrecking the leather.
I wanted to check wheel fitment, start on the fender work and see if I would have any clearance issues with our new adjustable front upper control arm. The first things to do take off the little fender trim. This is one aspect of Toyotas I've hated since first being exposed to it with my first corolla. I feel it cheapens the look of the car and although it doesn't appear to be as bad with the newer cars, with the old corollas it just trapped dirt and water prematurely rusting out your fender or quarter. With these gone I took out the inner fenders and struts. This allowed me to fully raise the suspension and see how various wheels would fit with the sock arms and geometry.
I tested four different rims on my car
[CENTER]Work Meister M1R 18x10 +0 [/CENTER]
[CENTER]Racing Sparco - NS06 Cheetahs 18x10.5 +18 [/CENTER]
[CENTER]SSR Professor SP1 19X9 +24[/CENTER]
To remove the rear strut i had to remove the rear seats, this was a bit harder then I had imagined but nothing to write home about. It did however let me remove the antenna off the parcel shelf for the non working JDM car phone. That was last piece of non working electronics to go ( JDM Phone, Wangan Toll Card, 6 Disc Changer, Antenna )
[CENTER]Work Gnosis GS2 19x11 +9[/CENTER]
All of the 18s are way too small, the down pipe sits lower then the bottom of the tire in theses photos. I'm going to go 19" on all four corners. Thinking something in the 19x10- 20 and 19x11-30 range should do just fine
[CENTER]Coilover Time !!!!!!!!! [/CENTER]
Gerard ( User: SERIALN9NE ) had Stances on his 147 Aristo with 18/14k ,They were the standard off the shelf Super Sports which had swapped springs on, and they were definitely under valved for that spring rate. They also came with rubber upper mounts when I wanted upper and lower pillow-balls. Despite being a loyal Stance user, having them on both of my last two MX73 Cressidas ( one of which was the world’s first )and previously on my AE86 ( also the first on a AE86 in the world ) It was time to open my mind to various options. We had received various emails from XYZ and had only spoke to them about their big brake kits, As both Gerard’s Cressida and my own were both happily on Stance Coilovers. Initially we did some research and XYZ came up as a company out of Taiwan and some Vette guys seemed to really like the brakes stating large improvement in brake feel and fade over the OEM brakes. We weren't looking for coilovers back then so we never looked into their dampers any further.
Jump a year forward from then to now and G and I were both stuck for choices so digging deeper into XYZ, turns out they are quite popular for drifting in Eastern Europe as well as Russia and New Zealand. Partly due to their massively diverse product line which covers Holdens, Renaults, Alfa Romero and Smart among others. After some debate, both G ( SERIALN9NE ) and I ordered the RACING SPEC dampers with 25/20k springs for my UCF20 and his JZS161
[CENTER]The Boxes[/CENTER]
[CENTER]Coilover extended all they way in and out to show the adjustment range[/CENTER]
[LEFT]Rears on the Left[/LEFT]
[RIGHT] Fronts on the Right [/RIGHT]
Now that I finally had them in my hands it was less than 2 hours before I had them in the car so I could get a feel for how they rode. My initial impressions were that they felt pretty accurate with the provided spec sheet. Six clicks counter clockwise from full hard is basically the softest you would want to go with this spring rate, anything below that and the damping is too sloppy and loose. They're definitely the stiffest off the shelf coilover for Lexus that I've seen and ridden on. We ended up at around 27 clicks out of 30 and they felt well matched at that point. Firm yet controlled, stiff enough for what I’m doing, which is essentially belly scraping with occasional drifting. These feel traditionally stiff, most people might even say too stiff. Unlike Stances which are very compliant yet controlled. Some people mistake the Stance for being “soft”, but for any given application I’ve dealt with they are extremely well damped. As I stated in the beginning I don’t have insurance on my car right now so I only drove around for like 4 hours, I’ll need more time to make a complete assessment. XYZ also offers a "SUPER SPORT" kit which is both cheaper and softer for most people, maybe we’ll get one of these into a customer’s car to review as well.
This is with the front collars 1 inch from the lowest and the rear collars around 3 inches.
This is with 18x10.5 +18 with a 225/35R18 Achilles ATR and
18x11+9 with a 235/35R18 BFG KDW2
So as you can see, to have your car as low as I would like, they need to go around 2 to 4 inches lower. I’m going to order 4 inch shorter brackets so that I have a more desirable height range.
So that’s pretty much it for now. Next up will be to do my fender work so I can lower the car the rest of the way these mounts will allow without destroying my fenders. After that will be all suspension arms, and wheels......
View original BBCode
Okay so I finally have something worth posting !!!!!! I took this car off the road about 4 months ago. The insurance had ran up and I decided to drive my other car, a 1980 Corolla wagon. Far cheaper on gas and insurance and I can throw stuff in the back without worrying about wrecking the leather.
I wanted to check wheel fitment, start on the fender work and see if I would have any clearance issues with our new adjustable front upper control arm. The first things to do take off the little fender trim. This is one aspect of Toyotas I've hated since first being exposed to it with my first corolla. I feel it cheapens the look of the car and although it doesn't appear to be as bad with the newer cars, with the old corollas it just trapped dirt and water prematurely rusting out your fender or quarter. With these gone I took out the inner fenders and struts. This allowed me to fully raise the suspension and see how various wheels would fit with the sock arms and geometry.
I tested four different rims on my car
[SIZE=3][CENTER]Work Meister M1R 18x10 +0 [/CENTER]
[/SIZE]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_3_zps3ef2e03c.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_3_zps3ef2e03c.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_4_zps875d14c3.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_4_zps875d14c3.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_5_zpsa0e72c40.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_5_zpsa0e72c40.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_6_zpsa6e1850f.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_6_zpsa6e1850f.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[SIZE=3][CENTER]Racing Sparco - NS06 Cheetahs 18x10.5 +18 [/CENTER]
[/SIZE]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_2f_zps5800bd18.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_2f_zps5800bd18.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_3h_zps9d55d2ae.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_3h_zps9d55d2ae.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_4u_zps1d72082a.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_4u_zps1d72082a.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_5i_zpsbb0bb879.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/imagejpeg_5i_zpsbb0bb879.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[SIZE=3][CENTER]SSR Professor SP1 19X9 +24[/CENTER]
[/SIZE]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20130921_153800_zps39541502.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20130921_153800_zps39541502.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20130921_153734_zps4e6d5995.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20130921_153734_zps4e6d5995.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
To remove the rear strut i had to remove the rear seats, this was a bit harder then I had imagined but nothing to write home about. It did however let me remove the antenna off the parcel shelf for the non working JDM car phone. That was last piece of non working electronics to go ( JDM Phone, Wangan Toll Card, 6 Disc Changer, Antenna )
[SIZE=3][CENTER]Work Gnosis GS2 19x11 +9[/CENTER]
[/SIZE]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131005_161051_zps55b4a793.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131005_161051_zps55b4a793.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131005_161020_zpsc4386148.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131005_161020_zpsc4386148.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131005_161100_zps857aedad.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131005_161100_zps857aedad.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131005_161034_zpsccf74f57.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131005_161034_zpsccf74f57.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
All of the 18s are way too small, the down pipe sits lower then the bottom of the tire in theses photos. I'm going to go 19" on all four corners.[SIZE=3] Thinking something in the 19x10- 20 and 19x11-30 range should do just fine[/SIZE]
[SIZE=5][CENTER]Coilover Time !!!!!!!!! [/CENTER]
[/SIZE]
Gerard ( User: SERIALN9NE ) had Stances on his 147 Aristo with 18/14k ,They were the standard off the shelf Super Sports which had swapped springs on, and they were definitely under valved for that spring rate. They also came with rubber upper mounts when I wanted upper and lower pillow-balls. Despite being a loyal Stance user, having them on both of my last two MX73 Cressidas ( one of which was the world’s first )and previously on my AE86 ( also the first on a AE86 in the world ) It was time to open my mind to various options. We had received various emails from XYZ and had only spoke to them about their big brake kits, As both Gerard’s Cressida and my own were both happily on Stance Coilovers. Initially we did some research and XYZ came up as a company out of Taiwan and some Vette guys seemed to really like the brakes stating large improvement in brake feel and fade over the OEM brakes. We weren't looking for coilovers back then so we never looked into their dampers any further.
Jump a year forward from then to now and G and I were both stuck for choices so digging deeper into XYZ, turns out they are quite popular for drifting in Eastern Europe as well as Russia and New Zealand. Partly due to their massively diverse product line which covers Holdens, Renaults, Alfa Romero and Smart among others. After some debate, both G ( SERIALN9NE ) and I ordered the RACING SPEC dampers with 25/20k springs for my UCF20 and his JZS161
[CENTER]The Boxes[/CENTER]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/image-3836017870_zps9ece9054.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/image-3836017870_zps9ece9054.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[CENTER]Coilover extended all they way in and out to show the adjustment range[/CENTER]
[LEFT][SIZE=3]Rears on the Left[/SIZE][/LEFT]
[SIZE=3][RIGHT] Fronts on the Right [/RIGHT]
[/SIZE][URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/photo1_zps9ddb6abc.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/photo1_zps9ddb6abc.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
Now that I finally had them in my hands it was less than 2 hours before I had them in the car so I could get a feel for how they rode. My initial impressions were that they felt pretty accurate with the provided spec sheet. Six clicks counter clockwise from full hard is basically the softest you would want to go with this spring rate, anything below that and the damping is too sloppy and loose. They're definitely the stiffest off the shelf coilover for Lexus that I've seen and ridden on. We ended up at around 27 clicks out of 30 and they felt well matched at that point. Firm yet controlled, stiff enough for what I’m doing, which is essentially belly scraping with occasional drifting. These feel traditionally stiff, most people might even say too stiff. Unlike Stances which are very compliant yet controlled. Some people mistake the Stance for being “soft”, but for any given application I’ve dealt with they are extremely well damped. As I stated in the beginning I don’t have insurance on my car right now so I only drove around for like 4 hours, I’ll need more time to make a complete assessment. XYZ also offers a "SUPER SPORT" kit which is both cheaper and softer for most people, maybe we’ll get one of these into a customer’s car to review as well.
This is with the front collars 1 inch from the lowest and the rear collars around 3 inches.
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131029_103105_zps6870555c.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131029_103105_zps6870555c.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131029_103210_zps40d7c9be.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131029_103210_zps40d7c9be.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131029_1032261_zps342ce011.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131029_1032261_zps342ce011.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
[URL="http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131029_103121_zps4b9b3809.jpg"][IMG]http://i584.photobucket.com/albums/ss282/SERIALNINE/20131029_103121_zps4b9b3809.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
This is with 18x10.5 +18 with a 225/35R18 Achilles ATR and
18x11+9 with a 235/35R18 BFG KDW2
So as you can see, to have your car as low as I would like, they need to go around 2 to 4 inches lower. I’m going to order 4 inch shorter brackets so that I have a more desirable height range.
So that’s pretty much it for now. Next up will be to do my fender work so I can lower the car the rest of the way these mounts will allow without destroying my fenders. After that will be all suspension arms, and wheels......
