Miles,

I'm also curious about the valving as well. One thing, these coilovers are compatible with Eibach ERS springs, so it is possible to change the spring rates if you so desire.

Unless I can get custom springs made for my konis at the rates and ride height I desire, this will be the route I'll go. I'll probably run the coilovers as delivered for a few events before changing springs, etc.

Let me see if I can dig up the paperwork that came with them. Not sure if I still have it, may have been lost in my move.

Whats the spring rate on these? and what is the equivalent shock that bilstein sells for our cars?

bump?

The spring rates are listed earlier in the thread. Bilstein sells a Bilstein HD standalone damper for the RX-8, but it's damping curve is different from the PSS9 curves as that damper is valved for standard RX-8 springs.

The other day, I talked with of John @ Bilstein tech support about revalving the PSS9s for autocross duty (STX). One of the first things I brought up was the spring rates as reported in this thread, and he told me the rates reported here are incorrect. This is what I learned about the RX-8 PSS9s:

Front spring rate: 340 lbs/in, 80 lbs/in tender
Rear spring rate: 240 lbs/in, didn't ask about the tender

Seem like reasonable rates to me.

FWIW.

thanks for the info

The rears don't have tenders. They are progressive as seen in the pics.

Quite interesting. With the lack of a tender, any idea what that does to rear droop travel? As you know, droop travel is what I'm having the most issue with.

They need to work on getting their employees the correct information. I called 3 times and was given the rates that I had posted earlier in the thread each time. The numbers you were told seem more in line with all the other brands of coilovers for the RX-8 in regards to front/rear spring rate ratio.

Just out of curiosity, did you happen to talk to the East Coast or West Coast headquarters?

It was west coast. Again, I spent 15 minutes on the phone, talking about custom revalves, etc. He even looked up the damping values for me, but I didn't write them down so I'm not going to post them here (I recall the range being fairly tight, as in you will not experience a huge difference from full soft to full stiff). And, as I said, when I first told John about the rates, his response was "That doesn't sound right - let me look it up."

I agree, it is frustrating to get different data.

As for the rears, since they are progressive springs, there shouldn't be a need for tenders, as was stated above.

Ya, I had talked to the east coast, maybe they just make up rates cause they are too lazy to look it up, lol. Regardless I am extremely happy with my PSS9's. They are exactly what I was looking for. Comfortable for every day use, but more than capable for DE track events. I have no interest in Auto-x so I wasn't looking for higher spring rates. I have noticed results from the adjustments I have made on track, even if the damping range is small.

Good to hear. If you are tracking it and are not having oversteer problems, I am inclined to believe the rates I reported above as opposed to the rates you heard from the east coast office.

And, I'm sure you will feel a difference between clicks, just not HUGE differences. There seems to be two schools of thought on damper adjustment - big steps with very obvious differences between clicks, vs. more subtle changes for each click. I prefer thre later, as it allows you to more precisely tune the car.

Of course, the advantage of having a wide damping range is that it makes it easier to fit stiffer springs. This is probably the only drawback to the PSS9s. But as you say, the rates are probably ideal for the typical dual-use car as-is. Even for STX autocross, conventional wisdom (right now) is that you wouldn't want to run much higher.

I haven't had any issues with excess oversteer. I'm sure the rates you were given are the correct ones. Right now the car is very neutral. I have my front sway in the middle setting and my rear in the soft setting. I had started out with the stiffest settings on my shocks but found the car to be much more stable under braking and a little less on edge in high speed turns when I softened up the rear. My original settings were 1 in front and 2 in the rear(1 being stiffest, 9 softest), my settings now are 3 front and 6 rear. My next track weekend May 2, will be my first on my NT-01's. I'm sure I'll be messing around with the settings a bit more with the extra traction and braking of the R comps.

Excellent to hear that, as your report is consistent with how they wanted to set me up with the custom valving. Basically, once you tell them your spring rates, they set the valving so that the middle of the range corresponds (more or less) to critical damping and then you tweak from there to get the balance you want. Sounds like the stock valving is set up the same.

Hmm...

If I had known those were the rates beforehand I'd probably have gotten the PSS9s instead of trying to build my own. Nonetheless, I have no regrets as the process I've been through has been incredibly educational.

Peppy, about how long are the rear springs? If possible, can you take pictures of the rear at full droop?

Lionzoo - I'll measure the springs and take a picture of the rear at full droop for you tomorrow.

Hi, was just wondering if you recall whether your PSS9's were shorter in extended length than the stock shocks, or were they the same.
thanks.

Time to bump this old thread...

I'm in the market for a set of coilovers in the coming months and the Bilstein PSS9's are near the top of my list.

From the spring rates George was quoted, it seems like Bilstein used similar rates as the MX-5 PSS9's:

http://www.good-win-racing.com/Mazda...-1070pss9.html

Front: Linear 343 lbs/in + tender (80 lbs/in?)
Rear: Progressive 242-282 lbs/in

These seem very close to the figures George was quoted.

I'll definitely want to up these rates for autocross use, and Good-Win-Racing sells a nice adapter for the rear coilovers:

Attachment 273601

http://www.good-win-racing.com/Mazda...t/61-0196.html

After I get an accurate understanding of what spring rates the RX-8/MX-5 PSS9's can handle, I'll probably look into a revalve and getting some 2.5" Swift/Eibach springs.

I was told that the PSS9s have a fairly narrow damping adjustment range, and will require revalving for most spring rate increases. They reccomended that I run them for a while with the stock rate to get an idea of the rates I wanted, and then send them back to be revalved for the stiffer rates once I had a target established.

George,

That's my understanding as well, but Jung is willing to give me technical assistance with revalving and sorting out my set-up along the way. He's also given me the contact info for the person he uses for revalves at Bilstein in Poway, CA.

I'm pretty sure they'll do a revalve for me right away. I'm still gathering info on spring rates and I'll be interested to see what rates Isley used on his car @ Nats with his motons.

From the info I have currently, my front spring rate "revalve range" will be around 550-400 lbs/in, while the rears will be around 350-250 lbs/in. Eibach, Swift and Hypercoils will all work with these coilovers and I'll probably pick up several different sets/combos.

As Nats probably won't be in my cards next year, I want to spend my time sorting out my suspension and wheel/tire set-up.

-Chike

I wouldn't recommend those adapters. As detailed in my Bilstein thread, I can't figure out a way to make an adapter for a 65mm springs in the rear that won't result in rubbing and someone else later chimed in that the adapter as used on his friend's NC had rubbed all the finish off the damper. On the RX-8, the rubbing can only be worse.

Are their any other adapters out there?

I've been e-mailing back-n-forth with an engineer at Bilstein in CA, and iirc he mentioned that the fronts accept 70mm ID springs and the rears take 65mm ID springs (recommended Swift springs).

Same type of part on the Moton, works fine. :dunno:

Looks like I'll be able to get custom valved bilsteins from the Poway, CA office for $125 per shock (if requested they'll include a dyno graph of the performance change @ .52m/s). Once I've selected a vendor, they can do the revalve for me prior to shipment.
Where did you get your adapters for your rear motons? I'm wondering if the quality of some adapters are better than others... :eyetwitch

I just read through your Bilstein thread. If I'm not mistaken, aren't you using revalved Bilstein HD's? Btw, when re-reading my e-mails from the engineer at Bilstein, he actually said the rear PSS9's take 60mm ID springs (not 65mm as I previously stated).

Is there a possibility that the shock bodies on the HD's and PSS9's are of different diameters?

It comes with the Moton's. Looks very much like the Good win part, only it is white.

Not sure why you would want to screw around with something that is likely not as good as your BS shocks. :dunno: Maybe you like doing things twice. At the very least a set of singles from AST would put you light years ahead of screwing around with Bilstein revalves. :Eyecrazy: Nice thing about the AST stuff is they are modular. Buy the singles now, when you have more money - or the aptitude with deal with a double (trust me, twice as much stuff to screw up) - you just purchase the other parts. :icon_tup:

I'm considering the AST's, along with the Ohlins and a few other manufacturers. With a revalve and the proper spring rates, these Bilsteins can be made to work really well as Jung proved by his car finishing 1-2 in STU.

And with five years worth of shock development you to can match the performance of a commonly available race shock. :rollingla I bet Rick is on revalve number ten by now. And it does not hurt that he is friends with the guy who does his shocks.

Aside from the cost of the revalve, look at the down time while you wait and your labor to remove/install them multiple times.

Real Ohlins are great. The JDM version that a lot of these places are selling are crap.

How can I tell the "real" Ohlins apart from the JDM crap? These are the ones I'm looking at and will be at the top of my 3K budget:

http://www.good-win-racing.com/Mazda...5-RX8-DFV.html

JDM... The "cheap" price gives it away.

The fact that they could not be bothered to build a shock with the right length body, its adjustable :scared: , is an indication that this is just another application tossed together from parts they had on the shelf.

The issue I've found with the adapters is that as the damper moves through it's travel, its axis relative to the top of the mount changes. The Motons could possibly have a smaller body diameter which avoids the issue, or it could just be that the body hits the delrin piece and glides along the delrin. Regardless, I'm not the only person to report rubbing, there is the person in my Bilstein thread as well as Robin Yang with his Motons who states: "this part sits at an angle and can rub against the shock body if it isn't shortened."

http://www.hi-impact.org/ryang/modif...ock_moton.html

Maybe it's a production tolerance thing? Certainly the rubbing I saw wasn't horrible and was near the top of the travel, but I decided to be safer and reduce a part count by not even using that part.

I'm not sure why Bilstein states the rear PSS9 uses a 60mm or 65mm spring. From pictures earlier in the thread, it's very clear that the rear PSS9 spring is a tapered spring that isn't a standard off the shelf size. Certainly the top of the spring has a diameter closer to 90mm than 60mm!

Gotcha. Thanks Jason. I guess I'll look elsewhere...

Unless you use a hydraulic perch on each end of the shock you will never eliminate side loading on the spring. As any spring moves up and down it also moves side to side and twist.

Yes, the perch on my Motons rubbed on the shock body, the delrin is not going to hurt the body, and over time is clearances itself. There are way more import aspects when it comes to choosing shock then if a piece of plastic touches it.

Agreed.

My only concern with that is there isn't a whole lot of material on the lip to start with and the rubbing will only make it thinner. While having it rub away in one spot isn't so bad, if the perch shifts you might have it rubbed away in any parts and then the chances of the spring unseating might be greater. Of course this is a concern that is unfounded probably 99.9% of the time, but I'm a little paranoid. Also for autocross applications, treating the perch as a consumable item isn't too bad. Just that I'm allergic to interference...

Price-wise the revalved PSS9's and KW Variant 3's will be a wash. These are my two front-runners at this time, as I'll have to go up another 1.5-2K to get to a better product and it's not in my budget to spend that kind of money.

The KW V3's will be the safe choice -- double adjustable, decent spring rates right out-of-the-box, etc. The PSS9's will be a bit of a gamble as they'll need a revalve, however, as someone who's input I value once put it "a good set of monotubes are a very real upgrade". Bilsteins can obviously be revalved to work very well in autocross as the results in ES and STU have indicated this year.

I'll continue reading, researching and speaking with engineers and autocrossers about both of my options and hopefully come to a decision in the next 3-4 months. :)

So wait how much are these coilovers?

They typically sell for ~$1,400 from most vendors. Revalving costs $125 per shock, so I'll be looking at ~$2,000 when all is said and done. The KW Variants 3's go for around 2K as well.

Actually there is no real Öhlins as Öhlin Sweden (HQ) dosen't make them, I spoke with one of their engineers (that happends to own a Blue RX-8) and dose ones at sale in USA and Japan is rebranded Coilovers.

But that dosen't make the USA version bad, not at all! I run on KW V3 and last track event there was an RX-8 with those Good Win Racing version and they where hands down better then my KW, no doubt.

The Engineer at Öhlins HQ thould me it was possible to make coilovers (as she had some on here RX-8) fo the neat sum of $8746,36 I said that I needed to think about it first... ;-)

Well, I've decided to go with a set of these for my RX-8. My budget is a little tight for 2010, and from my research these seem to be my best option in the sub $1.5K price bracket. I'll be ordering a set from Stranoparts in the next 1-2 weeks and hopefully this winter weather will cooperate and I can get up to my friend's place and install them shortly thereafter.

I also ordered a set. Should be in 1/04/10.
Going to run them stock for 10 and maybe revalve for 11 if I feel they need it.

Cool. I'll be more than happy to discuss settings and set-up info as my local season progresses. Do you have adjustable swaybars F&R?

I'm running progress fr/rr adjustable sways right now. Medium in the front and hard in the rear. . I'll go down to soft on the sways to start with when the coilovers are on. Will have to see if that's too much bar or not.
Only other mods so far are konis and a muffler delete. And 17s and star specs. As is I'm about 1.5 sec off the only 2 nationally competative drivers in our region. Once in the wet and once in the dry.

Those progress bars are pretty stiff, but Peppy liked them on his track RX-8 with the PSS9's. I wanted smaller bars that would allow for more "finer" adjustments to be made. I kept my Hotchkis MX-5 27mm 3-way adjustable FSB from B-stock and added the Eibach MX-5 16mm 2-way adjustable RSB.

Not sure what my starting points will be, but I'll probably try to attend a few T&T events at the start of my season to get any idea of how different shock & swaybar settings affect the handling of my car.

I wanted to do Dixie this year, as it's the only NT close enough that I'm off of work for this year. But I'll only have 1 event on the new setup before then. Not that matters a whole lot. It will be my first NT and won't have much prep on the car. I'll just go to have fun and try for not DFL.

S0l08 - I tried all possible settings with the sway bars and found that the Front bar in the middle and rear on soft was my favorite with front and rear shocks set to full stiff. This was for the track, you may find different settings better for auto-x.

If you guys have any questions with the setup or install, let me know. I'm taking my PSS9's off in the next few weeks as I'm returning the 8 to stock. Gotta get the RX-7 I just picked up track ready for the 2010 season. Chike I sent you a PM ;)

^Got the pm. Thanks for the offer. :)

S0l08, if you do attend the Dixie NT, don't fret the big stuff -- just try to focus on getting adjusted to the grip level of the asphalt surface and driving to the best of your abilities for that weekend. I've done that NT the last 2 years but I won't be going this year. I'm trying to decide between the Peru and Finger Lakes NT's. Peru has some grippy concrete that's broken up and bumpy in spots, while Finger Lakes is 80% asphalt with a small concrete section in the middle.

Asphalt is all ive ever raced on. Every region within local driving distance is on asphalt. Some very good on down to almost gravel. At one event site we actually made ruts on the line. I had to change my set up from one site to the next on my old STI. There are a few local people that have done Dixie, I'll ask which local site it is like and try to set up for it. Again it would be nice to have more time to get used to the new mods.

Chike, you doing a FatCat revalve?

I'm running the coilovers box stock for 2010. When I am ready for a revalve, I'll be going through the Bilstein office in Poway, CA. Not sure what I'll be doing beyond 2010 though...might actually try and pick up a co-drive in a ES Miata R.