Mux213 Levin GTS

[Mux213]

It was alot of fun ibrahim,

Next time its your cars turn!

[Apolan]

man i envy you having such a lovely ae community up there..

[Mux213]

OKay guys,

Heres a photo impression of the work we've done. We took many more pictures that will be online later but this gives a nice idea.

A few need to knows. Because we couldn't get the coilover sleeves loose from my old struts we first build and installed the struts without them, directly placing the spring on the clamp. Not ideal but it would have worked I think.

When Robokill showed up he was able to get the coilover sleeves off and save the day. At first we decided to finish off and go home but then found out we made a very stupid mistake. We put the left strut right, and the right strut left. This results in the brake calipers being mounted at the rear instead of the front and that aint good. So we had to pull the struts off again (very easy now with the shortened struts) and we decided to finish the work properly.

So the photo's aren't exactly in the order we did it, but more in the most logical order I think you should tackle this:
1) strip the strut (I removed the rotors and everything so I could replace them)
2) modify the strut
3) put on the coilover sleeve
4) put the shock inside
5) install the springs
6) put the whole thing on the car
7) now install the rotors, the brackets and brake parts (this is much easier to do once everything is on the car especially if the car is elevated).
put the wheels back on

Voila done. I'll do a real writeup later

[Mux213]

Okay, this is what it looks like with the wheels on.

Note that the first two pictures are with the car still lifted off of the ground. To me it looks like stock ride height

The last picture is with the car on the ground. The coilovers are now screwed into a position where the spring is fully unloaded but not loose while the car is in the air, so basically this is the lowest setting that MOT allows. I think it suits it very nicely. Leads me to believe cutting the strut 4cm and using a 2cm spacers was the right idea (2cm spacer + length of shock fully extended is now maximum length of the whole struts and dictates the maximum lowering you can do without the spring coming loose while the car is off the ground).

I would even go as far as saying that cutting the strut 5cm and using a 1cm spacer might even be more ideal with these springs (note that the equation changes for different types/lengths of spring). In that case I would have had to put a slight load on the spring in the situation where the car is off the ground.

[kungfumaster]

Great little write-up and pics!!
I wanted to do a shortstroke too in the future...after seeing this...I want it NOW!

Great teamwork !
And of course Have fun with it

[Mux213]

Hehe, thanks, remember though, the reason we could do this in one go is that we had a second set of struts already prepared. We just needed to put it together. The most time and work you spend in cutting and welding the struts.

Owh and taking struts appart that have been on your hachi for 20 odd years, that really is a lot of work...

Seriously though, the next set we do (probably Djexors), I want to have a video camera

One small downside, I think one of the bolts on the right side wasn't tighten up correctly, something rattles sometimes when I drive over bumps.. need to figure that one out

[banpei]

Cool.
It looks a lot lower right now.
And go finish that how-to write up. >

[Apolan]

great stuff! Report on how it handles!

[DJexor]

I'll arrange a camera next time.

You said this is probably the lowest setting and it could be more ideal if you cut the strut 5 cms, but don't forget that probably the front will lower a little if you turn your dampers a little softer... am i right?

[The Doctor]

Mux213 Wrote:One small downside, I think one of the bolts on the right side wasn't tighten up correctly, something rattles sometimes when I drive over bumps.. need to figure that one out

I've got the same thing. I've narrowed it down to the pads in the calliper.
I'm missing some of the clips, so that's what's causing my problem. If you've got something else, let me know, maybe i've missed something.