There have been many posts concerning replacing springs and/or shocks. Most of them are specifically looking for the drop, with the assumption that a lower center of gravity equates to better handling. Has anyone seen/done any skip pad tests to see if the results are measurably different? I did a search but the closest I got was a comparison of the G35 handling to a suspension modded Max. Only the G35 numbers were reported. I realize that most people do not have the facilities for making these measurements. I'm hoping someone can point me to some vendor measurements. Thanks.

 

Skid pad testing has alot to do with grip. Springs, shocks & sway bars will help keep the tires in contact with the ground helping #s but, you can get the same result with race tires.

My point is skid pad is cool but the better factor is slalom speed, this shows the cars ability to negotiate corners with grip AND control.

 

EXCELLENT POINT. I completly agree with that.

 

You are totally correct. A lot of people on this forum associate good handling with high skidpad numbers. Thats not the case! Skidpad is a measure of how well the tires grip the pavement. A set of grippy tires on pretty much any modern car will result in "good" skidpad numbers. Slalom indicates how a car's suspension performs in transition.

 

A great example of this is a few weeks ago I was on vacation in San Diego. There is an exit going off to Sea World/Pacific Beach. It is a 360 degree loop. I manually shifted to 2nd and floored it all the way around the loop and the tires did not lose grip at ALL. I was so impressed! My dad was in the car and commented on how he was just waiting for the tires to break loose but they never did.

On the other hand I don't think I would fair as well in several tight turns in succession. This is where the suspension comes into play.

Those Potenza RE950s have my total confidence!

Tony

 

I completely agree that skip pad is not the whole answer. My motivation for asking is that I'd like to improve the handling of my car. The Maxima is a big, debatably heavy, car and I'm not kidding myself that it could handle like a 911.

Personally I try to keep my "changes" to the bang for the buck. I've done the RSB/FSTB because they are cheap and easy. Especially easy to remove should some warranty situation arise. I considered the RSTB but that seemed like a very small gain for the hassle.

The next alternative is to replace my tires or do more suspension work. They both cost around $1k-1.5k to do. Tires are easier to hide (but I'm not suggesting getting racing tires) so I will probably go that route.

It would seem that replacing springs/shocks route would be the last resort. The question then is do I go with the high end (with dial-able shocks) or keep it simple.

Slalom results would be great but I've never seen any statistics for these. The closest I've seen is the Car & Driver TV show commenting on the slalom test but not report anything quantifiable.

Anyways thanks for the input.

 

those there should be no question, lowering springs do improve real-world performance/handling
Also note where they say H&Rs are harsher than Eibachs.....

 

that sounds like a typo

Also note where they say H&Rs are harsher than Eibachs..... [/B][/QUOTE]

 

url atached

http://www.tirerack.com/suspension/t...bach_hr_rd.htm

 

I was just going to recommend tirerack's reviews.

I did note that H&R=harsher in the past, but I wrote it off b/c they weren't testing Maximas. I think there's a pretty good consensus of H&Rs being near stock and Mathew just reported that they soaked up bumps better than stock - which makes me wanna cry...

 

be settled will be when one of us (not moi!) takes both the H&R springs and the Eibach springs to a shop who has the capability of measuring actual effective spring rate...

Both Eibach and H&R will tell you that since their springs are progressive there's no such thing as a spring rate which is horsepucky....any shop properly equipped will be able to measure total deflection (compression) when subjected to -say- a 500 lb load....less deflection = stiffer spring.

 

let them get on a bumpy road and see which rides more ruff

 

same..tires/tire pressures, rims, shocks, etc.

 

Springs/shocks in my opinion is the first thing to do along with a rear bar which you have.

 

Why not the tires? I find that the tires break loose on me all too easily. And they don't hold well through the corners. There still seems to be a great deal of debate on which is the best spring/shock combination.

 

Yes, wheels/tires are very important. You problably are experiencing understeer which the rear bar helps with. Body-roll will also not let your stock tires work to there full potential which springs/shocks/bars help with.

A Maxima with quality 235/45/17 tires with a good spring/shock/bar setup will outperform most peoples driving abilities.

 

Are you on the stock Potenza RE92's? They are not too great..

 

didnt some magazine test the stillen maximas? i bet there is some slalom info in those tests if anybody can find them

 

YEP!