hi all,

i have some new Bilstein PSS9 coilovers on my Evo 7, and need help on setting them up.

i have tried a few settings, but the car's composure and handling at speed has actually deteriorated versus the stock springs and shocks (although comfort at low speed has improved significantly).

anyone here have experience with this suspension? i've done a search on the forum, and though there are a few threads mentioning the PSS9's, no one has actually said anything more about them, much less what setup works best on an Evo.

currently the best setting so far i've found has been roughly mid damping up front (setting "4", with 1 being hardest and 9 being softest), and about medium soft at the rear (setting "6"). I've also several other combinations, but none are as sure-footed as the stock shock/springs over rough surfaces at speed. the car won't be tracked much, more for fast road use.

HELP!

 

First you might want to try www.lancerregister.com it is a European forum and they have access to those Bilstein shocks and as far as I know, we don't yet.

Now to help trouble-shoot your problem. Do you know the spring rate of the Blisteins compaired with stock? The reason I ask is that if they are much stiffer than stock the ride will never be as good as stock (no matter how much fiddling you do). You need to describe exactly what you feel the car doing and are the shocks single or double adjustable? Are the shocks new (or did you buy them used). Are they designed for fast road use or are they a "track day" set-up? The Bilstein stuff is usually really good and well matched (shocks/springs) I think we are trying to figure out wheather your set-up is good for the roads YOU drive on....

 

thanks for the quick reply.

yes, i've posted on the MLR. just waiting for claude and maxi and blade and the rest of the evo nutters on there to enlighten me. though claude will probably scold me for not going for ohlins or proflex

you're right, i should get the exact specs (the bilstein dealer is a friend of mine anyway). i purchased the shocks new about a month ago. they are single adjustable-- bound/rebound are controlled, but in tandem by one knob which can be set from 1-9. from what they've said on the MLR, the shocks are for fast road and occasional track use, but by no means full-bore competition units.

at slower speeds, especially in traffic or just puttering about, the improvement over the stock set-up is astounding. it is when you're going for it at higher speeds that the handling suffers-- the car just seems much more easily upset than before.

unfortunately, only one other set of these shocks has ever been installed here (i live in the Philippines) for an evo, so there's not much data to go on.

anyway, i'll need a bit more time to do more experiments and try to figure out what the car is doing and where the susp is "misbehaving".

thanks!!!

 

Hesperus, This will sound a little silly (obvious) but what are the tires and pressures you are running? If the kit is a lot stiffer than stock you will need a stiffer tire to complement the new suspension. If your tire sidewalls are too soft (and/or too low a pressure) then you will literally bounce across bumps (tires are undamped springs!) with the new stiffened suspension Also what are your alignement specs AFTER installing the Bilstein kit?

 

chrono,

not that silly and certainly not that obvious (at least to me!). shows how little i know!

i have new Yokohama Advan Neova AD-07's on the car. Based on tests i've seen, they are worth a second around a short track like Tsukuba over the original Advan A046's.

I'm not sure which of the two tires has stiffer sidewalls. I think the original tires may be stiffer, though the Neovas are stickier. Am running stock tire pressures right now (32F, 29R). So you think i should increase the pressures, or try putting back the original tires? Sounds like an interesting experiment...

And yes-- the symptom is exactly as you mentiond-- the car literally bounces across bumps!!!

Had the car aligned immediately upon fitting the suspension, and everything is perfectly according to spec-- camber, caster, toe-in.

Thanks for your input! Will let you know how i get on.

 

chrono, you may indeed have been right!

after trying some other suspension settings without much success, i put back the OEM yokohama A046's, which seem to have much stiffer sidewalls than the new Neovas... and much of the bounciness over the bumps seems to have disappeared!

i need to do more testing over the weekend, but if this turns out to be the culprit, do you think further tweaking the suspension, IN CONJUNCTION with playing around with the tire pressures on the new tires will work?

shame if i can't use the tires with the suspension-- the tires weren't cheap! and they seem to have way more mechanical grip than the A046's, while being more comfortable (likely from the softer sidewalls)

thanks!