I have played with a lot of various set ups and used to be a suspension tech for a racing team, so I wanted to share some of what I learned to help you get started on setting up your coilovers. I am going to bias this for street guys as I think 99% of us probably use our beloved Minis on the street and occasionally hit the track/ auto-x.

How to prevent rubbing:

While this may not benefit guys that want to slam and tuck tire, this will help you a little, but this is geared more towards the guy (like me) that like to maintain a "proper" ride height and keep about a 1-2 finger gap between the wheel/ arch.

Preparation:

1) Start with the back by raising both tires off the ground. Give the tires about 6" of clearance.

2) Remove both rear wheels.

3) Disconnect rear sway bar.

4) Remove both coilovers, and remove the spring. I would remove the top not, remove the top plate, and remove the spring. Alternatively, you can disconnect the lower mount, remove the lower mount, remove the collars, drop the spring from below. This method keeps the coilover in place, but makes for a little more work in reality. Just pull the coilover. At this time, its off, clean em up, get the grit out, and grease the collars and threaded body. I like to use assembly lube on my threads. Anti seize works well too. Go ahead and adjust the lower mount so the assembly is as short as possible. You want it to theoretically be SLAMMED.

5) With the springs removed, put it all back together. Keep the sway bar disconnected and go ahead and put your tires back on.

6) Now, take a look at the position of the shaft and the bump stop. You can get a feel for how much travel you have. This is going to alter, so don't pay much mind here.

7) Take a floor jack and start raising the tire to mimic bump travel. You will either make the bump stop contact the top plate (limit of travel) or the tire will wedge way up in the wheel well and hit the arch, or more hit something metal inside the wheel well. Lets assume you are making contact with the tire...obviously this isn't ideal, so we need to raise the suspension. Drop your floor jack and starting adjusting the suspension to add ride height. Do this by rotating the shock assembly in a COUNTER-CLOCKWISE rotation. You already were at max drop so lets add 1" at a time. Do your 1" adjustment and raise the assembly with your floor jack. Check for hitting/ clearance. Keep doing this over and over until you are hitting the bump stop and no longer hitting the tire. It'll definitely take some trial and error. You'll know when you have hit the bump stop when the car lifts off the jack stand and you can spin the tire without rubbing. When you achieve this, you need to add 1 more inch because you need to factor in for tire deflection at full compression and tire flex.

8) When you have set the height on the one side, measure how much thread is visible on the shock body and adjust the other side for the same. This makes adjusting quick for the other side. Adjust the height the same and use the floor jack to confirm you aren't rubbing. Remember to add leave 1" for the tire deflection.

9) Drop everything and put the spring back on. *In another thread I talked about adding thrust washers on top and on bottom of each spring, this will be most beneficial when you get to step 11. This is the time to add them!! While its off, set it up for zero spring preload (you can't move the spring up and down more than 1/8", but the spring will rotate as it has no resistance). While its off, measure your spring. Lets just use a rough number of 8" top to bottom. Go ahead and put the assembly back in place, put the wheels on and set the car on the ground. You should be sitting pretty damn low right now. Don't fret. If you are ok with this height, you can stop here. You're not going to rub anymore. Lets assume you want to raise it up a little. Keep reading...

10a) With the car on the ground, climb under the car and measure your spring. Lets assume with the weight of the car its 6.5 inches top to bottom. You've settled 1.5" so you need to put that back. Why? Suspension travel. This is where you get a good bit of your ride quality.

10b) If you are REALLY ****, sit in the car and have a friend measure the left and right springs. Lets assume your drivers side is at 6.25, and passenger is 6.5" top to bottom.

11) Raise the car AGAIN and take the tires off. You need to put that 1.5" back (or 1.75" on the left, 1.5" on the right if you did 10b). Rotate the collar directly under the spring 1.5" UP (counter-clockwise). Once you get past the 1" mark, you'll need to use your muscles. just make sure ONLY the collar is turning and NOT the ENTIRE ASSEMBLY. Stepping back a second, you're going to want to create that 1.5" gap between the lower ring and the collar under the spring. Once you have that gap, go ahead and lock that lower ring against the collar under the spring. Do both sides.

12) Put the wheels back one and drop it. Drive the car back and forth 10ft or so to settle the suspension. At this point you have equal bump (compression) and droop (full downward travel). Every suspension is a little different, so I can't say you'll be X height. If you like the ride height, reattach the sway bar and move on. You're done here.

13) Hypothetically, lets say you don't like the height and you want to drop another inch. Easy, drop the assembly 1/2" and the spring collar 1/2". You want to adjust both equally. Want to go 1" higher, just do the opposite.

Now the front...

This is easy, basically, everything you JUST did on the back, do to the front. WITH ONE EXCEPTION...when you have it all back together, you ideally want the front lower control arm to be level with the ground. This is "proper" for best handling, but that might throw off the ride height/ rake/ etc. I have found that most cars benefit with a 1/2" rake front to rear. If you follow the pinch weld (or the jack pads on the Mini) if the front is 4" from the ground, adjust ride height to the rear so the rear is at 4.5" from the ground. Just remember to set the ride height using both the lower mount and spring to each allow for half the adjustment.

I'd love to add more info as I think of things, so I will add to this post as I come up with more...

What else would you like to know?

 

^Excellent

can you cover how to setup dampaning in a FWD car (R53) would be good to know lol.

also what kind of spring rates to use. some times with a couple of companys you can ask for diffrent rate springs on the coilovers. ( but i guess it all depends on what you want to do).

do i need to change my coilover settings with a larger rear swaybar (ie, dampaning, any amount of preload).

would tire size/ weight change the settings you would need again?

what kind camber, caster, rake should i use in different situataions. (ie. street, driveing very agressive on back country roads, autoX, track.)

Thank you!

PS. take your time i know im asking a lot.

 

This part isn't really universal. The china branded kits (Megan, BC, etc) typically use the same A1 shock valving (dyno is available on Megan's site). For fwd, I tend to bias the firmness to the back. A universal rule of thumb is you can make it front end bias (under steer) by making the front stiffer or rear end bias by making the rear stiffer. Driving styles differ, so just play with it. On a 30 way shock, try 20 clicks (stiff) in rear, 10 up front and see how it feels.

Most china companies throw an 8k spring up front and 6k rear in the rear. It's literally their universal set up. I haven't prototyped anything, so it's hard to say. I'll come back to this.

This is a tough one BECAUSE larger sways act as a stiffer spring. I'm a fan of running stock bars and using appropriate springs. Theoretically, if done right you could run without bars and get more independence out of the suspension, but that more applies to rally with different degrees of surface on either side.

For daily driving you reeeeeally don't need to focus on absolute precision. Adjustments, cross weights, etc favor the guy that needs to shave 0.10 at a track. Generally on the street, find a happy medium of handling/ comfort and run with it.

Another tough one, I haven't had any seat time to data log or do some trial and error. My setup is still on paper with lots of eraser marks. I'm trying to push the limits of my stock suspension using street tires, but I'm not sure how much more track time I will have.

As for take though, a 1/2" variance front to rear should be a good start. With the right rear spring, weight transfer should keep you fairly level under acceleration.

You're quite welcome, and no...that's the point here; information. I hope I answered some of your questions thoroughly enough.

 

Just so y'all know, I'm going to use something like an AST shock (or have an empty housing valved to be similar) with a 4-6 way adjustment, Road Magnet spring with length/ rate to be detirmined, front camber plates and pillowballs on all 4 corners. Aluminum lower mounts and top plates. I should be able to keep it under 10lbs per corner.

Finally, it'll be a black shock cartridge, dark silver mounts and red springs. Gotta match my car.

I'm considering making more when I'm satisfied with what I finally end up with. Not a "plug" just crossed my mind...I have the means and desire, why not. I've made other things for people in the past under my label TRACKST⭐R.

 

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

Great job man!! 5 out of 5 here! I'll use this in the future for sure.

 

On damper adjustment settings....remember they do not affect the balance of the car in a steady state corner, only how the car reacts on entry and exit.

For spring rates, it's important to select your springs to match your tire choice. This is very important and often overlooked. 8kg/mm springs with 195 width all season tires will be rubbish. Similarly, hoosiers with 200 lbs/in springs will feel sloppy.

Pick tires first. Then pick spring rates.

Sticky tires work better with firmer springs. That said, I see people going too stiff far too often.

 

Excellent point, too often people think a super high rate will automatically make the car ride on rails.

 

The best street/track spring rate we have found is 450F 550R. Spring lengths are going to be around 5" front and 6" rear. Dont put the heavier spring on the front, it'll cause understeer. With this setup set the shock in the middle of the adjustment. Swaybars use stock bar in the front and a 24mm in the back. Use rear bar adjustment to help with over/understeer. Also use shock adjustment to adjust over/understeer for conditions and course. Ride height should be set so that front lower control arms are parallel to the ground. 1/2 inch of rack F to R
If you're running high speed tramac rally events, move the suspension up 1/2" for big bumps. If road is pretty smooth use same spring rate, if road is rough or has big holes go up 100lbs F & R also change to smaller rear bar.
This setup is for good street tires, for Hoosiers move up 100 F&R with aero add another 100lbs to springs.

 

+1. Great writeup!

 

Great information, thanks.

I recently added tsw springs with 19mm rsb at hardest and it seems to have messed up the balance at the limit. IE: went into a 2nd gear turn and tried to induce lift off throttle oversteer and the car went immediately into a drift which I over corrected and spun out the other way. Is this from the rear being entirely to stiff? Or is it that after lowering the rear camber increased more then the front, and/or the toe changing?

Lastly, when setting up for aggressive street/autox do you run the camber even from the front to the rear, or have a little less camber in the rear?

I may just ditch this setup and put the stock rsb back in and get some custom springed BC coilovers (I don't have the budget for Ohlins :-(.)

Cheers

Josh

 

Sounds like the RSB caught you off gaurd. I'd suggest going less stiff if its adjustable. IME the best way to recover from a slide (albeot not the fastest) in a FWD car is to mash the gas and keep the tires pointed in your intended direction of travel.

 

What kind of tires and what size are you running? What's your alignment?

- Andrew

 

I have Dunlop star specs 205/50/16. My alignment before the springs was -.7 front with 0 toe and 0 degrees rear with 1/16 toe in. After the springs my the front camber went negative a little, maybe around -.8 degrees but the rears probably are around -1.2 degrees. Not sure on the toe yet, haven't had time to check it out.

 

You would like more front camber than the rear for track days. But it is not possible since you don't have front camber plates. A good starting point for those Dunlop z1 star specs would be -2.2 f and -1.6 r. Then you can experiment with rsb settings and tire pressures. Get as much front Camber as you can get. Toe is sort of good between total 0 and in 1/16.

I also run 450/550 linear springs.

 

I would run a lot more front and a little more rear camber. In the meantime, set the rear swaybar to soft.

I run IE fixed camber plates up front with -1.6 ish front camber with around -1.4 in the rear with a tiny bit of rear toe in and 0 toe up front. I run a 19mm rear bar on stiff, though mine only has 2 positions. I also have Konis and Tein h-tech springs (sort of similar to TSW springs) I actually have some steady-state understeer because it rides on the bumpstops (I want to cut them) but it does oversteer with lift-off. That's just gonna happen. It's pretty darn controllable at the limit though and a lot of fun with my set-up. The Konis help.

The other thing is...try to avoid lift throttle oversteer. Yeah it's fun but it's not exactly the fast way around a corner. More front negative camber will add some front grip which could add some oversteer, but it will also keep you from relying on lifting off to get the car to turn. Adding rear camber and a little toe-in will help keep it controllable and catchable.

- Andrew

 

slinger was right on. Pay attention to tire pressures and you do want more camber up front. The IE fixed plates are a good "best of both worlds" in that it's still a rubber mount and not harsh at all (actually better than stock). You don't get as much as you would with a metal adjustable mount but it's still a great part.

I only run -1.4 rear camber but you'll want a little more. My tires are crappy so they don't need it but your starspecs will like -1.6 or so.

- Andrew

 

I would love to get some camber plates but I'm not sure if I want to drop the money on them for my setup now then only to change to a coilover and have to buy another set if I wanted more out of my suspension. I was hoping that this setup would hold me over but after reading how to setup the coilovers, it's making me reconsider. I was also advised by WMW to skip the IE plates and save for Eibachs or Vorshlag plates, no explanation was really given though.

I'm going to try to put my control arms on tomorrow and I'll dial the rear camber back a couple tenths from the front and set the sway bar to softest. I'll also try to measure my toe to see if it's out of whack.

Do you guys see the BC racing coilovers to be an upgrade to what the Mini's come with stock? Being able to order custom spring rates plus built in camber plates seems like a deal. But I know all to well that you get what you pay for.

Thanks guys for the input.

 

Welcome to the trials of suspension tuning.

I have the Vorshlag camber plates on AST 5100. Previously I had the Eibach multi pro coils. I also ran adjustable IE plates with stock suspension with rsb and control arms for a while.

First you have to decide if you want a street car for occasional track use (perhaps 5 days a year) or a track car that is streetable (barely) but can do 20-25 track says a year and not be a pushover or a full track monster. I started with the street car and gradually went to a track car but not a full track car.

I would say save up whatever you can and get something pretty good. Never skimp and get street stuff to use on the track. Most of the stuff you talk about will likely be junked as soon as you start being more serious about the track (that means over 15 days a year). What you want is adjustability, rebuildability and track durability.

 

I am not a big fan of BC coilovers or any of the low priced taiwanese stuff. But...the stock dampers are really bad so for the MINI they are slightly more appealing.

At that price range your options for R53 are BCs or Konis + Swift sport springs. The Konis are a superior shock for sure, but like stock lack bump travel.

I run Konis with Tein H-tech springs and IE fixed camber plates. I like it...the springs would be a little soft for auto-x but the Swifts will be a little lower and firmer (without slamming the car). The bumpstops should be cut with either spring. I don't care much for TSW springs....too soft.

The BCs will likely have more travel at a lower ride height and obviously have the advantage of adjustable ride height. The damping, even though it's adjustable like the Konis, just isn't that great. The firmer springs will be nice for auto-x.

BCs with custom swift or hyperco main springs in 6k/6k (or a little firmer with sticky tires) spring rates would be interesting for auto-x and I would be tempted. Ride quality should be okay, maybe even better than stock (which sucks). I doubt it would ride better than my Koni + Tein H-tech set-up but might be similar to Koni + swift. Not sure.

- Andrew

 

Great How To. I have a question though. Is step 11 the way you setup the preload?

 

Yep, that's the basics

 

Well, found a machinist and someone who is willing to do my shocks for me as I just don't have time. I am playing 'general contractor' and subcontracting people to do my work for me.

Hold off on those suspensions folks, might have something for ya! (Finally!!)

 

Hi again, i am going to change my rear springs very soon so i am going to use this guide for the setup but i have another question. Since on step 11 and 12 you setup the suspension to have equal bump (compression) and droop (full downward travel) why on step 13 in order to change tbe ride height you have to alter the spring preload also? Shouldn't you only raise or drop the full assembly. What the advantage to go half for the assembly and half for the spring?

 

If you want to drop an inch, do 1/2" at the lower mount, 1/2" on the spring seat. In some cases you want more droop or preload bias. That set up just gets you neutralized. If you take away preload, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND getting micro cellular urethane bumpstops from somewhere like fatcat motorsports- honestly I do em no matter what as transition to the bumpstops is very progressive.

http://www.fatcatmotorsports.com/

Talk to Shaikh Ahmad there, tell him your set up, and you MIGHT need to tell him the diameter of the shock piston, but he hast vast amounts of knowledge so he won't steer you wrong.

 

I just finished the final touches on the suspension that I made for myself. Now if I could just find the time to put them on I will take them to the track and run them through their paces. They are almost too pretty to install haha.