Lol, it's not that hard to cut the coils, actually, you don't even have to take them fully off the strut, I didn't. As long as you compress the springs until they're fully independant of the upper and lower perch, cut away. If you wanted to flop the compressor kit upside down there might even be a way to compress the springs with the strut still attached to the car? I'm not sure if there's enough room up there honestly, but it doesn't take 15 minutes to get each strut off after you jack the car up, after the first time it's a breese because you realise it's only 4 bolts! And the clip for the brake line ofc!
Timmay, you need to keep in mind what your doing here tho, your attempting to shorten the distance from the top mount (body) to the axel/hub. Your lower control arm is a fixed length, therefore the stock ride height with the stock springs is what determines your camber, if you extend it, like it is now with taller springs, your camber is in the positive,
meaning your tires are slanting inward "\ /".
Now if you cut the spring to stock ride height, they will be sitting flat on the pavement "¡ ¡"
Then if you cut more to "lower" your car, they tires will go into negative camber "/ \"
Negative camber is bad for more than one reason, oversteer and poor handling being the biggest I can think of, but also it's going to put more wear on your tires and bearings/lca because they'll be taking more abuse trying to keep the tires pulled in with the weight of the car always bearing down on it.
Camber bolts can correct this, to an extent. The ones I was looking at only correct 1.5 degrees, I'm not an expert, I'm just throwing it out there that you need to be careful, I'm not exactly sure how far into the negative (or positive) is so bad that it will be a practical danger.
This is just "book" information, and I believe it's true, but may not be, you should look into it to verify for yourself. IMO, "book" information isn't always practical, I mean we all know these struts fit even tho no manufacturer or shop would recommend it, we all know you can start a car with a motorcycle battery, and it's common knowledge that festivas & aspires are the best cars in the world, even if edmunds rates them as the 89th? worst vehicle ever produced.
My aspire right now, with 1 coil off, still has positive camber, you can clearly see the tires slanting inward "\ /" slightly. I've put roughly 5k on it, and haven't noticed any extra wear on the tires whatsoever, and the handling is unbeatable imo, i've heard a little positive camber is good, at the same time I haven't had it aligned yet either to see what 'they' say about it, even after completely removing the sway bar my steering wheel sits where it used to. Who knows what 20k miles is going to do to the tires tho, that's why this is still a trial and error swap.
Timmay, you need to keep in mind what your doing here tho, your attempting to shorten the distance from the top mount (body) to the axel/hub. Your lower control arm is a fixed length, therefore the stock ride height with the stock springs is what determines your camber, if you extend it, like it is now with taller springs, your camber is in the positive,
meaning your tires are slanting inward "\ /".
Now if you cut the spring to stock ride height, they will be sitting flat on the pavement "¡ ¡"
Then if you cut more to "lower" your car, they tires will go into negative camber "/ \"
Negative camber is bad for more than one reason, oversteer and poor handling being the biggest I can think of, but also it's going to put more wear on your tires and bearings/lca because they'll be taking more abuse trying to keep the tires pulled in with the weight of the car always bearing down on it.
Camber bolts can correct this, to an extent. The ones I was looking at only correct 1.5 degrees, I'm not an expert, I'm just throwing it out there that you need to be careful, I'm not exactly sure how far into the negative (or positive) is so bad that it will be a practical danger.
This is just "book" information, and I believe it's true, but may not be, you should look into it to verify for yourself. IMO, "book" information isn't always practical, I mean we all know these struts fit even tho no manufacturer or shop would recommend it, we all know you can start a car with a motorcycle battery, and it's common knowledge that festivas & aspires are the best cars in the world, even if edmunds rates them as the 89th? worst vehicle ever produced.
My aspire right now, with 1 coil off, still has positive camber, you can clearly see the tires slanting inward "\ /" slightly. I've put roughly 5k on it, and haven't noticed any extra wear on the tires whatsoever, and the handling is unbeatable imo, i've heard a little positive camber is good, at the same time I haven't had it aligned yet either to see what 'they' say about it, even after completely removing the sway bar my steering wheel sits where it used to. Who knows what 20k miles is going to do to the tires tho, that's why this is still a trial and error swap.
Comment