E36 Suspension advice

[Dr.AK]

Okay guys, I need some suspension advice.

My current setup is a set of AP coilovers, which is identical to KW V1 coils.

The shocks are worn and would need replacing anyways.


I want to go quite low with my new wheels (which will receive 225/35/17 rear on 9.5 and 215/35/17 front on 8.5) Now, the problem is the following:

1. The front:

With my previous setup, my wheel sat about even with the tire, maybe 'tucking' 2-3mm of thread. The new wheels will be about 25mm less in diameter because of the tire size. I only have about 20mm thread left. I'm afraid that even completely down it will not be low enough. Also, the lower I go, the worse it drives due to the helper spring loosing pressure.


2. The rear:

I still have some thread left and should have no problem getting to the desired height, even with my planned 225/35. But, as I have tried, when I lower the rear more, it starts to bounce around, even on flat surfaces. Apart from this driving like crap and being annoying, it looks like shit when you see a bouncing car coming down the road.



Possible Solutions?

1. The easy but expensive way: Call up H&R and have them make me a set of monotube coils to my specs which will allow me to go as low as I want while still supplying me with acceptable or nice driving characteristics. The downside: Expensive with an estimated price of around 1600€.

2. The diy way: Keep the AP, replace the shocks with different ones - shortened / rebound ones of course, most likely Konis. The question is: will that fix my bouncing in the rear? And the front remains another problem. I have thought about having the front main springs pressed / blocked (if you're not familiar with this process, the spring gets heated and then put under pressure and is left to cool off, basically, wich makes it a few cm shorter). However I'm not sure how pressed springs drive at all. Money wise, this will put me around ~600€, I estimate, maybe cheaper depending on how much the shocks will run me. The downside is that I am by no means a suspension expert and there is no guarantee that this diy experiment will provide me with what I'm looking for.


Note: Before anyone suggests them: Stanceworks ZCC coils are not an option. Apart from not being available any more, to my knowledge, there is NO way I can get these TÜV approved without spending a bloody fortune.


What do you guys think on this topic? Any advice for how I should proceed?

[Zic]

waaaaaaaaaaait, helper spring losing pressure?
that makes no sence to me at all. if my understandment of coilovers are correct, witch i think they are. the helper spring is there only for when you jack up your car, so the main spring does not "fall" of the place were its supose to be seated "up against the plates, under the shockmount", and then putting the car back on the ground, the helper spring will guide the main spring back to place. the coilovers i had on my old e36, KWv1, i could compress the helper spring by hand, it does nothing with the driveability of your car.
when removing the helper spring, the feature you are taking away, is the spring will sitt lose on your shock, when you jack up the car. when putting the car down, its not 100% sure that the spring will seat up against the shockplatetingy, it will tho if you guide it in place.

about the bouncing in the back, sounds like bad shocks to me, i ran my setup, on the lowest setting in the rear, before i got the spacers and i had no bouncing at all.

then about the sw;zcc im maybe willing to sell my set, tho you will have problems with the law , tho cant you just pass them of as AP coilovers??, but on the other hand you could just buy the h&r setup, and be done with it.

anyhow, i would save up for the custom set, since it solves all of your problems. i would not venture into the wild and try to make some kind of shocks work.

[Zic]

side note, do you have some rear camber arms? or know were to get them, im looking for some that can be bought in Europe, for a decent price.

[Dr.AK]

waaaaaaaaaaait, helper spring losing pressure?
that makes no sence to me at all. if my understandment of coilovers are correct, witch i think they are. the helper spring is there only for when you jack up your car, so the main spring does not "fall" of the place were its supose to be seated "up against the plates, under the shockmount", and then putting the car back on the ground, the helper spring will guide the main spring back to place. the coilovers i had on my old e36, KWv1, i could compress the helper spring by hand, it does nothing with the driveability of your car.
when removing the helper spring, the feature you are taking away, is the spring will sitt lose on your shock, when you jack up the car. when putting the car down, its not 100% sure that the spring will seat up against the shockplatetingy, it will tho if you guide it in place.

Really? I always thought it was there to keep the main spring compressed due to driveability reasons.

Then again, now that you mention it, the helpers are not part of what is entered into your car's papers when you get the parts TÜV approved here.

about the bouncing in the back, sounds like bad shocks to me, i ran my setup, on the lowest setting in the rear, before i got the spacers and i had no bouncing at all.

Okay, that might be a reason. I tried lowering the rear like that when the shocks already had around 45.000 kms on them, I replaced the rear shocks last September or so, so now they have roughly 10.000kms on them... maybe I could get away with that.

then about the sw;zcc im maybe willing to sell my set, tho you will have problems with the law , tho cant you just pass them of as AP coilovers??, but on the other hand you could just buy the h&r setup, and be done with it.

Technically, I could if I rwere to just sticker up the number of my AP springs onto the ZCC springs. But there's also the risk that the TÜV approval is photographically documented since last year or so - so if they compare with the old photos they'll see a noteable difference and then I'm in trouble.

anyhow, i would save up for the custom set, since it solves all of your problems. i would not venture into the wild and try to make some kind of shocks work.

Yeah, that's what I'm figuring as well, but as it's still some months off before I'll tacke the suspension, I'm keeping all my options open and researching what is possible.

side note, do you have some rear camber arms? or know were to get them, im looking for some that can be bought in Europe, for a decent price.

I don't have any, but I know I've seen some on ebay UK for around 160€.

[Bimmerteck]

All you should need for a e36.

http://www.stanceworks.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=16326

[Dr.AK]

Reading. Not your strong point.

Note: Before anyone suggests them: Stanceworks ZCC coils are not an option. Apart from not being available any more, to my knowledge, there is NO way I can get these TÜV approved without spending a bloody fortune.

[Bimmerteck]

I'm usually pretty good with the whole reading comprehension thing but, I'll be dammed if I didn't completely miss that last paragraph while I was on Tapatalk during my last meeting, I was wondering why no one had suggested that set yet. TUV is the suck, and good luck in your endeavor sir.

[Dr.AK]

Haha, no matter. Thanks for the suggestion anyways.

Yeah, TÜV really is more than annoying... *sigh* I mean, I get the whole point of having a body that inspects if your car is secure for road use but they're taking it too far imo.

[Zic]

im gonna build my own set of camber arms, gonna go check out the price for all of the parts. then ill decide if im gonna make them or not. I will let you in on how it goes. and make a part list.

[Zic]

the pivot bearings are pricey as fuck, so better off just buying the arms online.