Haha, I didnt think you had any idea of what I was doing Sam. :P (Assuming that your shipping name is your name...haha)


01Maxine, I really need to get a better system to do this. I used a hack saw and a saw zaw to cut it in half, but both had their faults. Hack saw was slow, saw zaw was difficult and often crooked. Then my bench grinder died, so I had to file the 'notches'. Then I hand drilled the holes, where I really need to use a drill press to make it as straight as possible... But once I get a better system, I would be glad to make a few for some people that are interested.

Anyhow, to make it most effective it should be done on both struts. I only did it on one just to test it out, and it doesnt move at all. My steering wheel did move about 1* off center when I made a u-turn very agressively, however I believe that if I had another one on the other side, it wouldnt do this.

 

whats the benefit of hacking it??? btw one of your top collars is different than mine I just noticed, more/smaller teeth on it.

 

Well, what it does is it clamps down on the strut housing. Instead of relying on tension/friction of being pushed against the lower strut housing, it uses both the tension/friction and the strength of clamping itself onto the strut housing.

As in, you could move this up and down the threaded housing, tighten it on anywhere, and it wont spin.

 

ohhhh I see what your saying, you basically ground off some of both sides so it would tighten on the housing. I like the idea of being able to remove the collar rather than threading it all the way off to remove it but I guess I should have read your whole post to see what you did there.
Mine dont move personally but I have using those stupid *** tools.

 

yeh, i go by sam.
man you did that all by hand and a saw? sheesh, go buy you a dremel

wonder how much ksport charges for those. but i still have 1 more extra

 

Dremel is broken...hahaha.

It would actually probably be better to use the collar that I referred to that I wasnt using. Its smaller in thickness and should work the same way.

 

useful.. Just got my k sports.... cant wait to install them..

 

Very nice man, be prepared for a stiff ride(but you will love the handling)...its not to harsh, just stiff. I hope you enjoy them.

 

I'm still waiting on mine. Apparently they were out of stock at the warehouse and had to build them. It was suppose to take a week and a half, so hopefully I'll get them soon. I got them from the Jensu group deal (terrible about keeping me updated BTW). I landed up contacting Ksport directly to even figure out what was taking so long.

 

Finally got my K-sports installed, considering how low I have them set, it actually rides pretty smooth....... after the alignment. Only bad thing is you can feel every bump but again thats because I have them set low. Overall, very good product.
Pics:

 

I'm finally shipped from ksport today...errrr yesterday I suppose (since its 1AM). They should get to me by the 1st of July. It only took a month to ship .

 

timmay- unless you are so low that you are bottoming out on everything, which it doesnt appear you are, the ride quality will not really change. Thats the point of the threaded body, your dampeners "throw or stroke" ,for lack of a better word, is the same no matter where your collars are placed/your ride height.

Not related to your quote, but just a general statement- I feel like the rear end of my car is so light that the rear shocks are almost too stiff. I get some bouncy bull**** going on whenever I'm driving around and it almost seems like whne I've got a trunkload of stuff the car rides better. Anyone experience this? I'll probably have to soften the dampening settings up if I havent already. I gotta admit, there are times when I just get tired of the ride. I have a very sensitive throttle and if the car jerks the tiniest bit, my foot presses on or off the pedal and I can get some extremely irritating bucking bull **** going on.

 

yeah when I first installed them it would bottom out on everything! but I raised it up some, so I dont bottom out on anything unless I go fast over a bump/pothole. Do you have the coilovers set for stiff or soft? From what you are saying chillin014, maybe you should set the coilovers for soft.

 

Look what came in today!


So, before the big install, what do I need to buy? Is lithium grease a must?

 

congrats. now for the fun, painful install, and bountiful of future issues heheh.
just buy some good tools if you don't have any. impact wrench would be helpful

 

I think 4DRSpeed might help me with the install. Hopefully between the two of us, we can figure everything out.

 

yeah Hexon, as long as you have a basic knowledge of tools, install isnt really that bad. good luck and congrats on the new coilovers.

 

uhh, define basic knowledge. Righty tighty, lefty loosey?

 

Pretty much. I Bought a Ratchet set (120 or 160 peice. can't remember) from lowes for $70, some WD-40. Have a 2' pipe there to get to stuck bolts and your good to go. Dont forget jackstands either. Air tools make it 10000 times easier though.

 

I just saw this massive thread lol. Ryan everything will be A-Okay

I don't have air tools but plenty of PB Blaster lol. If everything goes smoothly I don't expect this to take too long at all, it should be a lot faster than spring/strut setup which is a royal PITA at times.

 

What kind of grease do you all use on your pillow ball joints? Mine was making some really creaky sounds until we sprayed it with WD-40. Is there anything better that might last longer? Or is it best just to keep some grease in the glove box?

 

White Lithium Grease in the tube(not aerosol).

 

Okay, I sprayed the top of the ball joint down with WD-40 and then covered it with lithium grease, but the driver's side front is still creaking. I'm going to jack it up to make sure everything is tight tomorrow, but what else can I do to stop the creaking?

 

I am getting these really annoying popping sounds from the front driver's side coilover when I turn my steering wheel to the right. Normally I can only notice it when my car is going around a slow right turn, turning into a parking space, taking sharp turns, or when i sit in idle and turn my wheel to the right slowly. The more I keep turning the wheel, the more it keeps repetitively popping. All the collars are tightened with a hammer. The top and bottom spring isolators are covered with white lithium grease and I've sprayed wd-40 in the pillow ball joint. I've also put the lithium grease at the top of the pillow ball but I don't think it seeps down. I'm pretty sure it's coming from the pillow ball. I was just hoping someone might know how to fix what is causing this annoyingly loud popping sound. The right front was doing it as well, but the alignment shop sprayed some wd-40 into the pillow ball joint and it hasn't done it since. A day later the left front starts to do the same thing, but I can't seem to fix it. HELP PLEASE.

 

Well the only way to really tell if its the pillow ball is to open the hood and listen to it as someone turns the wheel. If youre sure its the pillow ball then what I would suggest doing is this:

Remove the top upper nut
remove the bearing sleave
Grease in the bearing channel/ball
Put it back on

Thats all you can do without removing the strut assembly all together.

 

I've already had the hood open with my dad turning the wheel. It will only make the popping sound when the wheel is on the ground and not jacked up. The top of the strut is where the sound is coming from. We've noticed that if you take out the **** that controls the soft/harness of the strut, or if you put it in the middle setting, the sound gets worse.

How do I remove the top upper nut? When I twist it the entire thing rotates (but I've only tried tightening it. What is the bearing sleeve? Sorry but I'm a bit of a noob at this. Is there any way that you could post up a picture or describe what these parts are in detail?

EDIT: I found some really good pictures of the pillow ball assembly (http://www.tamparacing.com/forums/ch...hanks-d-c.html), but I still don't know the names of the pieces or how to disassemble and grease this down. I'm also going to try to find a better spray lubricant than WD-40. I've read where some noises go away after the first couple of weeks. It's just really embarrassing when I go to turn and these things creak and pop like they are. If all else fails I will take off the assembly and clean it thoroughly and then apply grease before reinstalling, but I'm afraid of messing up my alignment if I do this.

 

Ok, I've been searching the internet for solutions on how to fix the ksport popping noise. I've found were simply spraying teflon lubricants on the pillowball, springs, or the metal/rubber washers has solved the problem for some. Other times, people disassembled everything and greased anything that moved.

A guy on a suburu forum had terrible creaking/groaning sounds while making slow, sharp turns or by idling and turning the wheel. He solved his problem by tightening the nut on the top of the strut piston as tight as humanly possible. This is what may be my problem. I have tried tightening this, but since the piston spins with the bolt my attempts failed. I'll try tightening with a wrench with someone holding the top with an allen wrench.

But I also found a diagram of some megan coilovers (they look almost identical to the ksports) with everything labeled and also highlights what needs to be greased (even going as far to recommend a grease). I thought I would share this for future reference for people as noobish as me.

 

hmm nice

 

For everyone else with ksports, what happens to the spring when you turn your wheel? Does it stay stationary in the spring seat or does it spin as you turn the wheel? Mine will spin, then stop, spin, then stop.

 

Well there is your issue....I think. Do you have any pre load on the springs? I have probably about 10% on mine. Meaning that the spring is compressed to 90% of its original length or so.

 

No, I lifted my car and only tightened the springs enough so that they wouldn't move up and down in the spring seat.

 

my K-sports have clunk sounds from time to time, but its bearable, how ever whats not bearable is the fact that i rip through axle boothes so easily my drop isnt even that serious

 

Well I fixed most of the popping by heavily greasing the washers that are supposed to quiet the springs. It still pops some, but not as loudly. Will more preload keep it from popping as much? I also have another problem, now for some reason my steering wheel is out of alignment. Car drives straight, but the wheel is crooked from some reason. All I did was raise the car and lube the springs. Is there a way to fix this?

 

Every time the springs pop, your steering will adjust slightly. Nothing you can do. Its possible that preload will help, but its only a theory.

 

WTF. So does that mean the springs shouldn't be rotating at all? If so I should definately try to add a bit of preload to hold the springs more securely.

 

Upon closer inspection I noticed that my drivers side wheel has some toe out (|--\?). This makes since I guess because I've noticed that the car is pulling to the right as well. Can I play with the camber plates to fix this? I don't want to take it to get aligned again.

 

as you adjust one, it will adjust another. You could adjust the camber but you wont know for sure the effects it will have on the toe/caster. No way to know unless you have an alignment machine at home.

Sadly another alignment maybe in order, unless your alignment was performed recently then you might be able to tell them that its still not aligned properly and get them to do it again free

 

I had it aligned last week, but I hate to be a bother to them. I had to go back because I thought they messed something up and it turned out to be my pillow ball joints making noise. Plus they pushed my rotor shield into the rotor, so they fixed that. Then they had to replace one of my lugs, which i cross threaded. Do i need to wait a while before I get another alignment? Apparently it got itself unaligned, and I don't want to go back only to have that happen again. I need to fix the problem of it changing its alignment first.

 

Well, I got my car realigned by Firestone this time. The camber plates on the driver's side slipped causing the alignment to be off and giving my driver's side wheel some nasty negative camber. Has anyone else had problems with the camber plates slipping? How do you all keep your allen screws tight? Firestone tightened them, but they said that they were fearful to tighten them too tight for fear of stripping them, since they don't know what the torque specs should be. I haven't see and specs for those bolts, just the upper and lower mount bolts. I think I'm going to break out some paint and mark where everything is, so that I can readjust if this ever happens again.

Unfortunately Firestone couldn't warrant their work either, since they didn't trust the after market camber plates.

On, a side note though, the popping is almost completely gone. When it does pop, it is bearable and nowhere near as loud.

 

i'm sure the torque specs is not a lot for the camber screw. try calling ksport up and ask them. mine never has slipped so far. infact, i don't see how they would slip cause i thought they have holes to actually screw into...