[flash]

http://www.944spec.org/944SPEC/technical...e-indexing

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[Inkedupfatboy]

We are looking at my car and the ride height in the rear just looks and feels a couple inches low. I am not sure I want to go through this...yikes...

Can I replace rear shocks that are original to 19 year old car that was sitting for 5 years to bring back up or do I need to rip out my entire rear end?

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[Lear35A]

Ride height is adjustable within a small range just by turning a bolt on the arms that connect the torsion bars to the rear hub carrier. You can probably pick the rear up to where you want it with this adjustment. Any alignment shop that knows 944's can do this.

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[tamathumper]

Your ride height isn't determined by your shocks, they just dampen up and down movement. Your springs and suspension settings are what determine your ride height, and the rear is adjustable on the 968, but it takes the right tools.



See http://www.evernote.com/shard/s20/sh/2eb...1de33131af



and



http://www.evernote.com/shard/s20/sh/bb7...9857e338d2

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[rl968]

new shocks could raise the car an inch, assuming yours are shot

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[flash]

the most i've ever seen shocks raise the rear is 1/2", and those were koni yellows, and due entirely to the 25# gas charge. hydraulic shocks won't raise it at all. any time shocks resulted in more raising than that, there were coil springs involved.

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[Inkedupfatboy]

Yea that is what I figured Flash, and being no springs, no help there.

The rear is solid. Seriously solid. It is hard to even compress the rear end...

I am wondering if the droopy rear end is what is making the steering all loosey goosey at high speeds....

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[rl968]

when I put konis on the rear, my car went up a full inch so it's possible.I think it went from 25.5 to 26.5. adjusting the eccentric brought me down 1/4-1/2", but I have since had my car lowered and I now sit at around 24.5-25. the car handles do much better at the lower height. flash, I think you and I had a conversation about how high my car went. I also have coils on the rear.

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[flash]

rl - that's more than i've ever seen. i wonder if you just hadn't settled the suspension yet. it takes a bit of jouncing with gas shocks. stock ride height is 26.5" or so. the eccentrics will drop things a max of 3/4". that means that the lowest a stock setup could be is 25.75. it seems you are lower than that, which tells me that the shocks didn't really raise anything.



fatboy - what shocks are in there now?



and yes, a dropped rear end will make the car track oddly and cause the front end to wander

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[Inkedupfatboy]

I am assuming the stock shocks. I have no records that they were ever changed.

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[rl968]

I just went back and searched for my initial thread. I went up 3/4" to over 27 when I put new shocks in. After turning the eccentric, I came down to 26.5 After lowering the car, I'm at around 24.



http://www.968forums.com/topic/9709-upgr...uspension/



Here's the thread I started when I lowered it w/pics.



http://www.968forums.com/topic/11228-feeling-a-bit-low/

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[Inkedupfatboy]

Thanks,

I don't want to lower the car. It is already too hard to get in and out of and I don't really want to mess around with all the settings..I just want it to be basically stock and to drive and track right..



I have already broken the ass end loose a couple of times while getting on it, so I need to have my guy check it out.

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[rl968]

maybe it needs to be aligned and corner balanced. my car rarely swapped ends and when it did, it was my fault. tires, including pressure and temp, matter too.

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[Inkedupfatboy]

Tire pressure is good. I will have it aligned, but wanted to wait until I got all my D1R braces installed. The car tracks great otherwise. I think I might wait and go for new rear shocks and do a torsion bar tweak and then have the alignment done. I didn't want to waste the cash and the two hours sitting in the car on the lift until I was ready.

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[bombfactory]

Unless your car has M030 struts up front, or a similar coil-over setup, you won't be able to corner balance the car, as the stock non-M030 front struts are not height adjustable. After switching to M030's in the front, I can report that a good corner balance and alignment (including leveling the car out) can make a huge improvement in handling (I had four alignments before I found a shop that did the job correctly). Tires are also critical - if you're still running on the tires the car was sitting on for the past five years, get new ones asap. Ride and handling will improve dramatically. Good luck!



PS - The D1R upper and lower braces will not affect the alignment if they're installed afterwards.

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[flash]

as a note: 24 inches is too low, unless you have repositioned the rack and tie rods. at 24" your roll center is below ground, and that is going to cost you in the corners. (i really need to find those drawings of the suspension geometry that got misplaced in the move here). it may "feel" like it's cornering better, and initial turn in will be better, but in reality it will lose grip at the limits, as it puts the car through too much camber change. 630mm is the absolute minimum. been there done that. messy results. i raised it up a bit and it corners much better at the limits.

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[Inkedupfatboy]

Hey Bomb,



Nope...tires were replaced as soon as the car was running. D1r Braces are installed...Castor and Strut tower with the firewall brace.

All shocks and struts are original as far as I know. Only 44 k on the car, so probably still good, but I may swap them out. I can get factory OEM's from sunset for around $900 for all four corners.

Not sure what corner balance is but I am not switching to a M030 setup. I just want to car to handle properly. It should be good on a straightaway at 130MPH, but I can't get to 95 without the car getting all mushy and wandering up front...It just feels squirrley and I don't trust it.



We got to looking at the car, and others here mentioned it when I posted the photos, that the rear end looked a bit low. I will try to go and measure the ride height tomorrow.



If I can get my ride height even with a slight torsion bar adjust and new rear shocks, I will probably be satisfied. Then I will have it aligned.



I don't have many miles on the car yet, less than 200 but I may switch out tires. I think either upgrading to the Michelin Super Sports or the Yoko's I was on the fence about. I think some of it might be the chevron tire tread.

Flash, I just want to car to handle stock like it is supposed to. I don't want to lower the car as that throws everything off and I don't want to deal...When I did my volvo, I lowered a bit, but only an inch for a bit of cosmetic looks.

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[flash]

i have both the michelin pilot super sports (on the sl-550) and the yokohama advan ad-08 (on the blue 968). i like them both. the michelins are a bit quieter and smoother (not a lot), and are much better in the wet. the yokes are better in the dry. if i ever had to drive the car in the rain, i would choose the michelin. if i knew for certain that the car would never get wet, i'd probably stick with the yoke.



as for the mushy/wandering thing, once you get that thing flat and level, take a really good look at the caster blocks. if there is any play in those (and a power steering leak will make them soft) then they need to be replaced. soft front struts can cause this too. the front end should resist manual compression. if you can get it moving, it should only bounce 1.5 times before coming to rest. (push down, it comes up past zero and settles back to zero)



then look at your settings. there is a thread here with alignment specs, varying based on desired traits. too much camber (very common) or toe out, will cause wandering in a hurry.

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[rl968]

[quote name='flash' timestamp='1377822834' post='148352']as a note: 24 inches is too low, unless you have repositioned the rack and tie rods. at 24" your roll center is below ground, and that is going to cost you in the corners. (i really need to find those drawings of the suspension geometry that got misplaced in the move here). it may "feel" like it's cornering better, and initial turn in will be better, but in reality it will lose grip at the limits, as it puts the car through too much camber change. 630mm is the absolute minimum. been there done that. messy results. i raised it up a bit and it corners much better at the limits.[/quote]



I have coils in the rear and had m030 bars, the car handled incredibly well, virtually no body roll. I didn't think 24 was too low. The only limiting factor for these cars is hp, but if you are a good driver and can maintain speed/momentum through the corners, you can keep up with virtually anything out there. These cars are so well balanced.



Inked: you asked what corner balance was. Basically, you put each tire on a scale and depending on the car, you adjust the suspension so that each corner of the car has the specified weight. For our cars, all corners are nearly the same weight and that is what you want to make sure of. I'm no expert, but if one of your corners is significantly different from the other, the balance of the car gets thrown off and it may not handle like it should.

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[Inkedupfatboy]

Thanks RL...my car is basically stock, but I don't think I am going to worry about corner balance.

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