Seriously? Is this fact?

 

Yes.

Like I said I used to have Teins and they leaked.
Ksport and the likes are sure gonna leak sooner. My buddy's friend needed only a couple of track days before he blew his KSports lol.

I've done lots of reading about coilovers in different forums before buying a new set. I've read plenty of reports about leaking shocks. Koni's, HKS, Cusco's etc. It is completely unavoidable, unless they're made by god.

Even the KW competition versions get blown. Seems like KW doesn't provide any warranty for their competition line up. (I got a friend who worked for a race team and he told me about this)

But let me rephrase my previous sentence though.
It could happen to any coilover

 

well......ok the damper is gone, but why does the car still settle that much? i´m 100% sure everything is in the correct place and i didn´t overtight anything!?!? i read the manual provided by KW and as soons as i read that the dampers are already set from them to medium stiffness i didn´t thought about changing/touching the dampers........so why is the car lowering itself??? anything else i can look for?

 

It's hard to determine what may be causing the lowering of the car. Are you measuring it as soon as you set the car down from jack stands and then comparing that to post-driving? That's going to happen every time.

@350ZDj - I'm not discounting what you say, but that just sounds crazy. I have several friends running several different brands of coilovers and the only ones that have had a leak are the Megan Racing.

 

its not very accurate to measure tire to fender drops.... those things can change often due to alignment, tire wear, new tire sizes/brands, and weight added/removed. My the rear of my car changes about 5mm with a full tank of gas compared to when its empty.

I would have the damper serviced and call it good.

 

Allstar brings up a good point (1st paragraph).

Also, I think 350ZDj is just saying that it will eventually happen to all of them, no exceptions. How soon depends on the quality, usage, and some luck.


BTW, I'm also on KW V2s, albeit for only 1.5 years, but no problems so far.

 

A quality damper shouldn't blow a seal and leak. It's always possible, but it isn't always going to happen.

 

I had a moton blow....must not be a quality damper. Had double koni's, leaked both times after rebuild.

My car is trailered to events, run hard, then put back on the trailer. No street driving (less than 15mi this year).

Even the best shocks can and do leak/blow. It happens, deal with it and get them rebuilt.

 

i meausered with the same condition of the car, right after i adjusted it and went out for a quick drive around the block......and now it´s different from before. i know it´s not an accurate measuring method, but it should be always the same (if the car is in the same condition)......and it was always the same.


what i really like to know, and nobody answered it here right the way is does the damper effect this settlement of the car.....i mean yes you could possibly run the car in the rear without the damper, but at what hight????
with full rubbing the tire?

 

The damper controls the frequency and oscilation. If you ride without the rear damper the ride will be very bouncy and you may risk blowing the opposite corners front shock.

If you adjusted your height and jack the car down, it will settle after you go for a ride around the block. If you were to jack up one corner of the car without doing anything else and let the jack down. Your finger gap will be different and a stroll around the block will settle the suspension/tire.

 

OP - The shock seals could potentially fail on any shock. While it does seem a bit unusual if you haven't driven the car that much, I would not completely rule it out.
+1

I doubt that the springs are sagging from just sitting around. From what I've seen, KW makes some pretty solid products. We even run them on our shop E92 M3, with no issues (this car gets driven fairly frequently).

 

so you think it´s more the springs than the shocks?? which would make more sence for this lowering issue,.......but do the sag so much with that low milage on them??

 

No, I do not think the spring is sagging. I do think it may be have to do with the springs or the locking collars, but I don't think a spring with that little use would actually sag.

 

still clueless about what causes all of this....maybe i´ll inspect it for another time
still a sad situation wanted to drive this year a bit more, but with not knowing what´s wrong with the suspension i´m a bit affraid to do

 

Due to missing oil in the coilover the spring might be compressed completely (this could be the reason for your damaged powder coating). With the spring at the limit the forces aren´t absorbed anymore and so they have to be going anywhere. I think the adjsting nut on your coilovers is moving and this is the cause for your car to lower. Mark the nut head for a test drive and check the position afterwards.
A rebuild shock absorber would be my choice in this case.

 

When I took out my rear shocks for servicing, I was running only springs. The car never got any lower.

But good advise on marking the height adjusters for any movement.

 

that's just what i thought or let's say i was thinking of, but wasn't sure if this could really be the factor! but since i measured the rest of the thread on the adjusting nut (and wrote down the value) i can easily check wheather the nut moved somewhere or not. hopefully the nut moved and this caused the second settle of the car!! would be easier to change just the damper instead of the spring

 

just to bring this thread up to life!!!!! i ordered a week ago some new springs since they are only 90 bucks per side! so i ordered 2 new once for the rears and installed them yesterday on the car.....while i had the old one out and laying next to the brand new one i measured out if there´s any difference in height.......and here it is the old one where 10mm shorter than the brand new one!!!! on both sides. so how would you guys explain that?!?!?! i´ll try to contact KW on monday and ask them wtf this is all about. the car has only 25k km on the clock and only about 20k km on the KWs.

right now the car sits ooook not the way i wanted it but i can´t go any higher becuase i´m at the end of the thread....which is still pretty strange. so with the springs changed and still not at the same old ride height what else could it be!?!?!
i checked everything to be in place and it is (as far as i can tell).

 

Since the springs are new might need some time to settle down.

 

down??? i want that thing to get up :P i really start thinking about the dampers and that they might also support ride height somehow......cause what explanation is there left??