Can I has input?
11-12-2008, 10:38 AM
#21
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ZEALS are widely used in Japan in Super Taikyu, and Super GT. Two racing series that not many Americans know exist. The Endless 350Z won the Super Taikyu Chamapionship this year on ZEAL dmapers.
If you want Bilstiens go for the PSS10 and have the valving matched. The dampers themselves with springs cost approx $1600. But you won't have nay independant height adjustment. Adjsuting spring preload adjusts the height.
If you want Bilstiens go for the PSS10 and have the valving matched. The dampers themselves with springs cost approx $1600. But you won't have nay independant height adjustment. Adjsuting spring preload adjusts the height.
you got your 4 zeals.. you "tune it" and that's it. even if you get the ohlins dfv of what the hell are they is a different ball game from what they offer for competition. a set of "competition" ohlins cost as much as 4 grand per shock and you still need to buy springs, brackets and so on.
and we are talking about "regular" stuff...
competition koni shocks are 2K+ per shock.... easy. a little bit more than your zeals, my hks and so on.
11-12-2008, 10:46 AM
#22
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Jet.. when it comes to competition is a different ball game from what you get for the tuning market. completely different.
you got your 4 zeals.. you "tune it" and that's it. even if you get the ohlins dfv of what the hell are they is a different ball game from what they offer for competition. a set of "competition" ohlins cost as much as 4 grand per shock and you still need to buy springs, brackets and so on.
and we are talking about "regular" stuff...
competition koni shocks are 2K+ per shock.... easy. a little bit more than your zeals, my hks and so on.
you got your 4 zeals.. you "tune it" and that's it. even if you get the ohlins dfv of what the hell are they is a different ball game from what they offer for competition. a set of "competition" ohlins cost as much as 4 grand per shock and you still need to buy springs, brackets and so on.
and we are talking about "regular" stuff...
competition koni shocks are 2K+ per shock.... easy. a little bit more than your zeals, my hks and so on.
i dont need 12 grand worth of quad-adjustable shocks for a few pro-solo's and nat tours lol
11-12-2008, 11:03 AM
#23
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Couple things...
Observation: that website with the shock comparos, while excellent information, I'm almost positive was compiled at least 5 years ago (it's been a while since I've read it, so I'm not sure about that, but I know it's not the most recent information.)
2nd: to the OP (and for my own personal curiosity) ... why would your rear tires be coming off the ground in a car like the 350z? That's usually a function of poorly set up sway bars is it not? (And it's usually the fronts lifting right?)
Observation: that website with the shock comparos, while excellent information, I'm almost positive was compiled at least 5 years ago (it's been a while since I've read it, so I'm not sure about that, but I know it's not the most recent information.)
2nd: to the OP (and for my own personal curiosity) ... why would your rear tires be coming off the ground in a car like the 350z? That's usually a function of poorly set up sway bars is it not? (And it's usually the fronts lifting right?)
11-12-2008, 12:14 PM
#25
Jet.. when it comes to competition is a different ball game from what you get for the tuning market. completely different.
you got your 4 zeals.. you "tune it" and that's it. even if you get the ohlins dfv of what the hell are they is a different ball game from what they offer for competition. a set of "competition" ohlins cost as much as 4 grand per shock and you still need to buy springs, brackets and so on.
and we are talking about "regular" stuff...
competition koni shocks are 2K+ per shock.... easy. a little bit more than your zeals, my hks and so on.
you got your 4 zeals.. you "tune it" and that's it. even if you get the ohlins dfv of what the hell are they is a different ball game from what they offer for competition. a set of "competition" ohlins cost as much as 4 grand per shock and you still need to buy springs, brackets and so on.
and we are talking about "regular" stuff...
competition koni shocks are 2K+ per shock.... easy. a little bit more than your zeals, my hks and so on.
11-12-2008, 02:03 PM
#26
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same with engines... "minor teams" buy 5 or 10 car.. they dyno all of 'em and than they choose the one making consistently more power.
and, the most important stuff... than I guess nobody here has access to.. full telemetry to setup all the value as needed.
besides that... you don't really need all this crap to run in HPDE or have some fun in autox... that's how I live that. If I would like to race to win.. I'll be frustrated not having hundreds of thousands to spend to make it
11-12-2008, 02:13 PM
#27
I definelty agree with you. There is a certainly a price point of diminishing returns, and value for your money and everyone has to decide where that point is. The question is really is how fast can you afford to go. To go a little bit faster takes ALOT more money.
The thing to remeber is that you can take a whole lot of money and throw it at a not so capable driver and not get much faster. For me the point of diminishing returns was the ZEAL dampers. At this point my car is more capable than I am and I have to catch up.
The thing to remeber is that you can take a whole lot of money and throw it at a not so capable driver and not get much faster. For me the point of diminishing returns was the ZEAL dampers. At this point my car is more capable than I am and I have to catch up.
11-12-2008, 02:50 PM
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I like to think i'm a pretty good driver, but I doubt i could use any 3000 dollar dampers effectively really. Double-adjustables would be stretching my ability to effectively tune the car through trial and error, triple-adjustables would be out of my ball park at this point with my feel as a driver. like giving a 12 gauge to a 10 year old.
it really gets silly how much $$$ people spend on autox. for much more than an ASP vette you could buy a GTA class stock car and run in the V8 Stock Car road race series for a season lol.
Last edited by ke0ki2k; 11-12-2008 at 03:15 PM.
11-12-2008, 04:33 PM
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Actually, Dennis is Canadian. And of Scottish heritage, I guess, because at many events he drove in a Canadian hockey jersey and a kilt and played bagpipe music at full volume... strange bird!
11-12-2008, 06:12 PM
#30
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I definelty agree with you. There is a certainly a price point of diminishing returns, and value for your money and everyone has to decide where that point is. The question is really is how fast can you afford to go. To go a little bit faster takes ALOT more money.
The thing to remeber is that you can take a whole lot of money and throw it at a not so capable driver and not get much faster. For me the point of diminishing returns was the ZEAL dampers. At this point my car is more capable than I am and I have to catch up.
The thing to remeber is that you can take a whole lot of money and throw it at a not so capable driver and not get much faster. For me the point of diminishing returns was the ZEAL dampers. At this point my car is more capable than I am and I have to catch up.
my next pick (probably in 2 years, on a 370 nismo) will be ohlins (3 grand, more or less)... 10% of the value of the car in coilovers it's "enough" for my standards... if I can afford 30 grands in tuning I'll buy an used GT3 and than be sure I'll never pick up the capability of the car itself... not even get close.
you know which is the "funny" part? the racing monoblock kit from endless for the 350z.. cost.. just... 14K us$.... half the car (or like a good used)
and I never had a problem running hpde with the stock brembo
(with good pads (ferodo ds2500 for street tires, ds3000 for r comp), ate blue fluid and braided lines)
11-12-2008, 07:53 PM
#31
Really Zeal is about out of my price range anyhow. Zeal coils arent really widely used so thats probably why they werent mentioned. swinging koni 8142's would be hard enough at 2 grand, a discount price, without springs.
He seems to be in love with Bilsteins...what shocks would you run from them for an autox app? and who would you have custom re-valve them?
He seems to be in love with Bilsteins...what shocks would you run from them for an autox app? and who would you have custom re-valve them?
Shaikh J. Ahmad (pronounced "Shake")
FatcatMotorSports
http://www.fatcatmotorsports.com/contact.htm
I cannot stress strongly enough to what the link say's and avoid email and call him directly.
Here's a link to follow to look at Shaikh past post's on Miata.net
http://forum.miata.net/vb/search.php?searchid=2587747
Their is something else that can be said about the Penske and Ohlins product, they do have a lot more option's for any person trying to set the valving for you, piston options vs how your setting bleed or shimming. I considered having these guys make me a Ohins based setup http://anze.biz/applications.cfm, as they have already done a Penske setup and theirfore have the upper and lower mounts figured out. Too much $$. I can afford the setup, don't think I can afford the dial in process. I'll just stick with revalving the Pss9's.
You mention Koni 8142, what are those? I cannot find them on Koni's site or in the Truechoice Racing Services PDF catalog. Do you mean the 2812LB?
IMO work really hard to get raw Roehrig CVP or PVP shock dyno files sent to you of actual dyno runs. That way you are in total control concerning what data you see vs being feed ONLY what the manufactuer wants you to see. Can make the differance between a ton of Hystersis and not knowing it's their. To view the files you download the demo version of Roehrigs shock 6.2 software. I have my own dyno files for Koni Yellows andvTruechoice phase IV shocks. Having those files was extreamly helpfull, let me know I was right about what I didn't like about the Yellows and wrong about the Truechoice shocks (I thought they had a lot Hystersis). I also have TcKline DA shock dyno files, which didn't look very good to me or the guys around the shop (Shaikh happened to have the files on his laptop, I don't own the shocks ).
Last edited by Gsedan35; 11-13-2008 at 05:01 PM. Reason: fixed typo, ment to say 2812lb and not 8212lb
11-12-2008, 08:45 PM
#32
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Bilstein can give do the revalve, however it will be generic and NOT what you need. I do know of someone that find's out what you want in detail and gathers a whole lot of technical data points as well for the revalve process. He will be revalving my Pss9 dampers if I can ever get around to sending them out. And just to mention it, he might be able to convert off the shelf Bilstein HD shocks into double adjustable, he's doing it for the Miata, not sure if it can carry over for the Z.
Shaikh J. Ahmad (pronounced "Shake")
FatcatMotorSports
http://www.fatcatmotorsports.com/contact.htm
I cannot stress strongly enough to what the link say's and avoid email and call him directly.
Here's a link to follow to look at Shaikh past post's on Miata.net
http://forum.miata.net/vb/search.php?searchid=2587747
Their is something else that can be said about the Penske and Ohlins product, they do have a lot more option's person trying to set the valving for you, piston options vs how your setting bleed or shimming. I considered having these guys make me a Ohins based setup http://anze.biz/applications.cfm, as they have already done a Penske setup and theirfore have the upper and lower mounts figured out. Too much $$. I can afford the setup, don't think I can afford the dial in process. I'll just stick with revalving the Pss9's.
You mention Koni 8142, what are those? I cannot find them on Koni's site or in the Truechoice Racing Services PDF catalog. Do you mean the 8212LB?
IMO work really hard to get raw Roehrig CVP or PVP shock dyno files sent to you of actual dyno runs. That way you are in total control concerning what data you see vs being feed ONLY what the manufactuer wants you to see. Can make the differance between a ton of Hystersis and not knowing it's their. To view the files you download the demo version of Roehrigs shock 6.2 software. I have my own dyno files for Koni Yellows andvTruechoice phase IV shocks. Having those files was extreamly helpfull, let me know I was right about what I didn't like about the Yellows and wrong about the Truechoice shocks (I thought they had Hystersis). I also have TcKline DA shock dyno files, which didn't look very good to me or the guys around the shop (Shaikh happened to have the files on his laptop, I don't own the shocks ).
Shaikh J. Ahmad (pronounced "Shake")
FatcatMotorSports
http://www.fatcatmotorsports.com/contact.htm
I cannot stress strongly enough to what the link say's and avoid email and call him directly.
Here's a link to follow to look at Shaikh past post's on Miata.net
http://forum.miata.net/vb/search.php?searchid=2587747
Their is something else that can be said about the Penske and Ohlins product, they do have a lot more option's person trying to set the valving for you, piston options vs how your setting bleed or shimming. I considered having these guys make me a Ohins based setup http://anze.biz/applications.cfm, as they have already done a Penske setup and theirfore have the upper and lower mounts figured out. Too much $$. I can afford the setup, don't think I can afford the dial in process. I'll just stick with revalving the Pss9's.
You mention Koni 8142, what are those? I cannot find them on Koni's site or in the Truechoice Racing Services PDF catalog. Do you mean the 8212LB?
IMO work really hard to get raw Roehrig CVP or PVP shock dyno files sent to you of actual dyno runs. That way you are in total control concerning what data you see vs being feed ONLY what the manufactuer wants you to see. Can make the differance between a ton of Hystersis and not knowing it's their. To view the files you download the demo version of Roehrigs shock 6.2 software. I have my own dyno files for Koni Yellows andvTruechoice phase IV shocks. Having those files was extreamly helpfull, let me know I was right about what I didn't like about the Yellows and wrong about the Truechoice shocks (I thought they had Hystersis). I also have TcKline DA shock dyno files, which didn't look very good to me or the guys around the shop (Shaikh happened to have the files on his laptop, I don't own the shocks ).
It says they arent a coilover design, but the fronts are ride height adjustable so do the 8242's from TC Kline have threaded bodies up front?
so could you buy a threaded rear perch and make it ride height adjustable from and rear?
11-12-2008, 10:16 PM
#33
8242 matches what TcKline show's on their web site, those are a factory built DA version of OTS 8241 Koni yellows. Why don't I foreward the dyno runs from the shocks to http://www.resuspension.com/Services-sp-3.html and they can give you a independent look at how they are valved. IMO, I would not touch them based on what I see. IMO, you are far better off getting the Koni 2812 or professional revalved Bilsteins.
Last edited by Gsedan35; 11-13-2008 at 05:00 PM. Reason: f
11-12-2008, 10:30 PM
#34
http://farnorthracing.com/autocross_secrets6.html
Dennis Grant is a pretty nice guy, he posts on Sccaforms, I'm sure you can pm their for his imput.
Here's a link to his username
http://sccaforums.com/user/Profile.aspx?UserID=352
Dennis Grant is a pretty nice guy, he posts on Sccaforms, I'm sure you can pm their for his imput.
Here's a link to his username
http://sccaforums.com/user/Profile.aspx?UserID=352
Last edited by Gsedan35; 11-13-2008 at 05:42 PM.
11-13-2008, 09:02 PM
#35
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Gsedan35, thanks for the mention. Let me know when you're sending those shocks over and what rates you want them valved for. We just did an RX-8 last week, our first NC Miata, about about our 70th NA and NB 
Keeping busy!
BTW, did I tell you about our customer from NW region, Jerry Jenkins? He's been a National-level autocrosser for years but was getting frustrated with his DA Koni setups. We started working together before the Packwood NT in Aug and dialed in his car very quickly so he could win that event, plus the ProSolo (over Paul Brown's MR2, usually favored at Pros).
Then in September, I drove out with Jerry and his wife Kyra to Nationals (loooong trip!). He ended up WINNING E Stock on our FCM Bilsteins, leading by a whopping 0.8s going into the second day! He admitted to feeling a lot of pressure and slowed down Day 2 but held on to the win! People definitely started paying us even more attention after that. 
ke0ki2k, we ought to talk about possible Bilstein-based setups. We can start with a PSS9, revalve it for the springs you plan to use and you'll have a custom setup without spending Penske/Ohlins money. The double or triple-adjustable setups are overkill when you can get the valving right with a single-adjustable or even fixed damping setup.
Re: Dennis G's page, I've spoken with him and definitely respect the amount of time he spent thinking about, designing instrumentation for and tuning his car. The results were there. That said, I don't agree with a good percentage of what he says, based on my own experimentation and testing. In particular, I believe Tein makes good products although usually overdamped in rebound. The general fascination for adjustable body length is annoying in that it that steals droop travel which can be a detriment in some conditions (mountain driving for instance, lifting an inside tire under accel). When you find right body length, small adjustments can be made with spacers/packers and bump stop choice.
Shaikh
Keeping busy! BTW, did I tell you about our customer from NW region, Jerry Jenkins? He's been a National-level autocrosser for years but was getting frustrated with his DA Koni setups. We started working together before the Packwood NT in Aug and dialed in his car very quickly so he could win that event, plus the ProSolo (over Paul Brown's MR2, usually favored at Pros).
Then in September, I drove out with Jerry and his wife Kyra to Nationals (loooong trip!). He ended up WINNING E Stock on our FCM Bilsteins, leading by a whopping 0.8s going into the second day! He admitted to feeling a lot of pressure and slowed down Day 2 but held on to the win! People definitely started paying us even more attention after that. ke0ki2k, we ought to talk about possible Bilstein-based setups. We can start with a PSS9, revalve it for the springs you plan to use and you'll have a custom setup without spending Penske/Ohlins money. The double or triple-adjustable setups are overkill when you can get the valving right with a single-adjustable or even fixed damping setup.
Re: Dennis G's page, I've spoken with him and definitely respect the amount of time he spent thinking about, designing instrumentation for and tuning his car. The results were there. That said, I don't agree with a good percentage of what he says, based on my own experimentation and testing. In particular, I believe Tein makes good products although usually overdamped in rebound. The general fascination for adjustable body length is annoying in that it that steals droop travel which can be a detriment in some conditions (mountain driving for instance, lifting an inside tire under accel). When you find right body length, small adjustments can be made with spacers/packers and bump stop choice.
Shaikh
Last edited by Fat_Cat; 11-13-2008 at 09:04 PM.
11-14-2008, 03:13 AM
#36
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Aside from driving, Most of your speed increase will be from a good tire and wheel combo dont knock yourself out for not having the best shocks possible, they do make a difference, but not nearly as much as tire/driving.
Have you considered 285/30 or 295's all around ? (these two tires are essentially the same width, just different diameters 24.9 vs 25.3) how fast are your local autocrosses in speed, do you need to do 2-3 shifts often, you cant change gearing in BSP, but you can play around with tire diamater.
I really dont see how much a staggered set up is going to help a BSP Z too much, it is going to hook like crazy with R compounds. It would be nice to have the option of rotating front to rear to make the Hoosiers last a little longer.
11-14-2008, 08:04 AM
#37
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These arent legal for SP anyways, and this type of product normally helps a MacStrut car, I dont see how it can help the 350Z too much.
Aside from driving, Most of your speed increase will be from a good tire and wheel combo dont knock yourself out for not having the best shocks possible, they do make a difference, but not nearly as much as tire/driving.
Have you considered 285/30 or 295's all around ? (these two tires are essentially the same width, just different diameters 24.9 vs 25.3) how fast are your local autocrosses in speed, do you need to do 2-3 shifts often, you cant change gearing in BSP, but you can play around with tire diamater.
I really dont see how much a staggered set up is going to help a BSP Z too much, it is going to hook like crazy with R compounds. It would be nice to have the option of rotating front to rear to make the Hoosiers last a little longer.
Aside from driving, Most of your speed increase will be from a good tire and wheel combo dont knock yourself out for not having the best shocks possible, they do make a difference, but not nearly as much as tire/driving.
Have you considered 285/30 or 295's all around ? (these two tires are essentially the same width, just different diameters 24.9 vs 25.3) how fast are your local autocrosses in speed, do you need to do 2-3 shifts often, you cant change gearing in BSP, but you can play around with tire diamater.
I really dont see how much a staggered set up is going to help a BSP Z too much, it is going to hook like crazy with R compounds. It would be nice to have the option of rotating front to rear to make the Hoosiers last a little longer.
I wouldnt buy them anyhow unless someone well reputed said they made a gigantic difference...I forget that stuff like that isnt SP legal, i'm in that frame of mind that if it runs OEM mounting points...its legal. need to break that mentality...I'm running 285/30-18 Kumho V710's right now. I'm considering doing the 295's all around but i looked at Brian Flanagans tires (the BSP Z that did well at Nats) and his rears/fronts seemed to be wearing about the same really. as far as shifting depends on which site locally really, Pelli is all 2nd gear, wont get out of it with my 3.5 gears back in. Bristol i get well into third several times. right now i have to row between 2nd & 3rd fairly often with the 4.08 gears.
