KSport Coilovers: All About 'Em

[RandallNeighbour]

Insite, I'm gonna need some help from you to get my Ksport Kontrol's installed right. My mechanic's never installed them before and it's gonna cost me a bunch of extra cash for him to learn how to do the basic adjustment as the clock ticks away at $100 an hour.

I just inspected them again this morning (in the box, at the office) and the rears have a 2 inch thin, light spring below the main spring that must be for the height adjustment.

However, the fronts do not have it on the shock, and it came loose in the box for me to add. Where does it go? Why would it not be on the shock the same way the rears have it on there?

The instructions sent are total crap. They're for another setup completely and only have about half the information I need.

The dials that go in the tops of each strut to do fine adjustments on the camber are not mentioned at all!

I'm thinking the company you bought them from may be more helpful than the eBay seller I bought mine from. I've put an email into tech support at Ksport headquarters in Phoenix but they're not open for business yet.

When you get yours in, do comment on what you got and how they're supposed to go on the car and the basic info I will need to do the install. For example, I'd love to know how many MM or inches I should set them up for at first.

Should I get mine installed first, I will try to explain what I finally figured out.

Hopefully, my email into Ksport headquarters will yield some better information.

[insite]

randall -

FYI, i was an ASE certified mechanic back in the day. i'm intimately familiar with this type of suspension package. how do you want the car set up? street, track, both? what kind of ride height do you want to run? i'll assume primarily street w/ my advice here.

let's start with the helper springs. on each strut from top to bottom, the order of parts should be: top mount, spring cup, big spring, spacer, little spring, spring perch, and locking collar. you will adjust ride height from the spring perch at the bottom.

prior to installation, do all of this:

for starting ride height, tighten the perches just until they hold the springs in place. then, give them three more full turns and lock the collars.

you will NOT be able to adjust the camber plates once the struts are in the car; the holes on top of our strut towers are too small. since you will probably run your car a little lower than stock, we will need to take OUT some camber up front. loosen the allen bolts on the camber plates and position the center pillow ball so it is one quarter of the way between outboard and inboard. to picture this, if it were installed, the pillow ball should be closer to the outside of the car than the inside.

in back, we will also want to remove camber. remove the allen bolts on each top mount and move the pillow ball to the outermost of the three positions.

set all four shocks to full soft. MAKE SURE you leave the adjusters in the rear struts when you install them; you will not be able to fit them in after the fact.

once they're installed, go for a short drive to let the ride height settle. figure out how much you want to raise the car. put her back on the lift and adjust each spring perch up by that amount. these are linear springs, so ride height has a 1:1 ratio to perch height. raising the perch 1" will raise ride height 1".

now, align the car. since the suspension will not travel as much, you will need a tad bit more static camber than stock. set the front to -1.2 and rear to -1.8 (if you can get it) or -2.0. set front toe to zero and rear toe to a HAIR of toe in.

now, we can play with damping. since we're on full soft, the car should be porpoising badly. drive around and pay attention to the rear. increase rear damping by 1/4 turn at a time, taking a drive between each adjustment. once the rear settles down, do the same up front. at this point, you should have a good street setup.

you can probably run slightly lower tire pressures now; this will make things a bit more comfy. with those spring rates, i recommend 33 front and 28 rear.

once i receive my parts, i can be of more help. if you want to wait, i can give a more detailed write-up once i install mine. it will probably be another two weeks before they're here & i can install them.

[insite]

on another note, randall, if you want an atlanta vacation, you can flee the hurricane and i can put them in for you on the cheap.

also, if you haven't replaced your rear wheel bearings, this is the time.

[RandallNeighbour]

Here's a crappy cell phone pic of the fronts:



And the entire set:



So why are the thinner lowering springs not already attached to the fronts? I can see no way to put them on to look like the backs so there must be a different configuration.

I'm already having my mechanic do the front wheel bearings. He says the backs sound fine and don't need replacing right now.

BTW, I bought Che's adjustable toe links for the front and back. I'm getting rebuilt lower control arms all the way around, rebuilt rear trailing arms, and new drop links. The rear end suspension will be completely rebuilt and most of the front will be new as well.

[insite]

Originally Posted by RandallNeighbour

So why are the thinner lowering springs not already attached to the fronts?

not sure. some people choose not to run the helpers. i will be running them.

Originally Posted by RandallNeighbour

I'm already having my mechanic do the front wheel bearings. He says the backs sound fine and don't need replacing right now.

you have over 100k on your odometer. do the rears. if you don't and one goes bad, you will essentially have to redo all of the work required to install the coilovers. since the knuckles will already be off the car, it's easy to disconnect the ebrake cables & replace the bearings. they're $30 each.

Originally Posted by RandallNeighbour

BTW, I bought Che's adjustable toe links for the front and back. I'm getting rebuilt lower control arms all the way around, rebuilt rear trailing arms, and new drop links. The rear end suspension will be completely rebuilt and most of the front will be new as well.

nice. there are no toe links up front (tie rods instead). do you mean the diagonals?

[insite]

randall -

one more thing: it's my understanding that the bolt threads on the Ksports are a different thread pitch than the OEM. you will need to buy the right nuts ahead of time.

[insite]

randall - are they threaded on both sides of this collar?