Sunday, 2 September 2012

Rims and Suspension

SSR Type C + Apexi Sport Spring
The spring is sold by one of my friends and it is rather cheap. I was aiming for Eibach spring but to my understanding, for that kind of price it doesn't give much different than the stock spring except it was lowered. Which is why I took the Apexi Sport Spring. Although I don't think its the real deal but it does serve the purpose. Its feels the same like the stock spring rate (but I think it was a bit stiffer and it is still comfort) and give a good lowering. The height is two and a half finger for rear and a finger for front. This is after the rim is changed.

As for the Sport Rims, personally, I'm really a bit of choosy. You see, I would definitely like to follow the offset of the stock rim to avoid improper situation where the rims will touch the fender on a bouncy road. The stock offset is +40 however I only manage to get +38 which is quite good. Another thing is it would be nice if it is wider, so this one is 7.0jj. It is a 15 inch rim and paired with Falken 195/55/R15 tyre (within my budget). I changed it at Rawang where they give high trade in price and they open on Sunday. But I would advice to bring your own camber nuts, tyre valve and lock nuts since this is where they mark up the price. The total including the tyre, nuts and valve excepts the centercone is below RM1k which is within my budget.

Anyway, regarding on performance, the springs do well on corners and highways where on 180KM/H, it  feels stable maybe due to lowered center of gravity. On fully loaded (4 person riding my car) there is no concern for the wheel to hit the fender.
The new wheels also doesn't effect much on the acceleration. Just simply follow the simple Inertia calculation and get the amount of rim's weight that satisfies the stock inertia.