Coilovers - changing springs to effect ride height.

[GreyZ]

So looking for some opinions/experience with my current suspension situation.

I currently have a 4 door on procomp/4wp coilovers that I have been quite happy with. My only concern is that I would like to reduce the rear ride height a bit. I am currently at the limit of losing preload on the rear springs, so I cannot go down any more in ride height with these current springs. The current springs are 18"long with a 250 lb/in rate.

My first thought was to go to a tender spring setup paired with a 16" x 250lb/in spring that would allow me to reduce the ride height abit while avoiding the potential to lose spring preload at max droop. There is concern with this option becuase at the very limit of travel the spring rate of the vehicle would change.

The other option is to go to a softer rear spring, but with my front springs being 650 lb/in, I am hesitant to go softer in the rear as it would reduce the front articulation. Balancing roll stiffness with IFS and SA is obviously a challenge. A third option is to reduce spring rate and add a rear anti-roll bar to gain back some of the roll stiffness.

I figure @87-Z28 may have some good thoughts on this.

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[87-Z28]

I have a 4dr non SAS. I also have the procomp coilovers. I was surprised to see they have a 600 lbs/in spring rate in the front. I bought an oem rear sway bar to go with this setup. Was also going to drop the front sway bar diameter. Haven’t installed anything yet to see how it is sitting. I want to keep the cg as low as possible. I am still running 35s till they wear out.

How is yours sitting? How high is the rear. I have pretty low weight high clearance aftermarket bumpers. No winch and no heavy skids. So not much additional weight over stock.

 

[GreyZ]

Right at 40" rear fender height, with oem 33s.

I was 38-3/4 prior to these.

 

[Brian_B]

The redneck way would be to throw 310 lbs of gear/rocks/sandbags in the back. Your back at your previous ride height. Or throw bigger tires at it.

(I do realize neither of those are what you are looking for)

I don't have a serious answer for you other than I'm also running ProComps and was surprised by the amount of lift they provide - they ride tall.

I think I was sitting at 40.5" at the rear on 35s - also with the rears at minimum height recommended for pretension. Now with 38s, a 1/4" top hat spacer, and a 3/4" body lift, I'm at 42.5". So the math seems somewhat funny.

 

[JL8jeff]

Not sure if this helps any but I also have the 4WP/Procomps on my base 2 dr Sas V6 mod bumper with C rated 37" BFG AT2's and my fronts are around 41-3/8" and the left rear is 41-1/2" and right rear is 42-1/4" sitting in the garage. I have the rears at the minimum setting. I've measured the right rear a little under 42" in some parking lots so the upslope and lip to get into the garage might make it lift a bit (totally stock the right rear was always 1/2 to 3/4" higher measured in the garage).

Being at 40" with stock 33's seems pretty high but are the non Sas flares higher off the ground vs Sas?

 

[GreyZ]

The redneck way would be to throw 310 lbs of gear/rocks/sandbags in the back. Your back at your previous ride height. Or throw bigger tires at it.

(I do realize neither of those are what you are looking for)

I don't have a serious answer for you other than I'm also running ProComps and was surprised by the amount of lift they provide - they ride tall.

I think I was sitting at 40.5" at the rear on 35s - also with the rears at minimum height recommended for pretension. Now with 38s, a 1/4" top hat spacer, and a 3/4" body lift, I'm at 42.5". So the math seems somewhat funny.

Not sure if this helps any but I also have the 4WP/Procomps on my base 2 dr Sas V6 mod bumper with C rated 37" BFG AT2's and my fronts are around 41-3/8" and the left rear is 41-1/2" and right rear is 42-1/4" sitting in the garage. I have the rears at the minimum setting. I've measured the right rear a little under 42" in some parking lots so the upslope and lip to get into the garage might make it lift a bit (totally stock the right rear was always 1/2 to 3/4" higher measured in the garage).

Being at 40" with stock 33's seems pretty high but are the non Sas flares higher off the ground vs Sas?

I typically run with the seats flipped and completely empty with a winch on the front. All of these will raise the rear marginally.

I think the heavier rear spare tire of ya’ll’s setups like contribute also.

When setting my shocks up, I loosened the adjusters until the spring was barely loose, and then gave the collars one revolution. There is room to lower them further, but then I would loose spring preload in a fully drooped situation.

There may be marginally different fender edge heights between the narrow flares and sas flares. The sheet metal is identical.

 

[JL8jeff]

My C rated 37 spare is probably less than 10 lbs heavier than the stock 35 so that may not make too much of a difference, but I forgot I added a steel rear bumper to my base (I also have a hitch but that doesn't weigh too much). My rear was definitely sitting higher without the rear seats when I got the tires swapped so it shows how sensitive the weight in the back is.

 

[Snacktime]

Happy hunting as they are not a normal spring. They are taper down to 3" on both ends. Normal 4" springs like the fox ones pictured are a 1/2" wider inner diameter and don't fit. I was thinking about having adapters made but gave up as I would need to lose weight for belly clearance while wrenching.

 

[Snacktime]

I was looking at something like this.

https://eibach.com/product/SPACER300

 

[87-Z28]

It is interesting that the 4WP coilovers have some of the lowest fully compressed lengths both front and back. a lot of the typical coilovers for running 37s (king/fox/acutune) have significantly greater compressed lengths (>1”). I think they are conservatively trying to keep the tires out of the fenders in jounce.

I think 4WP uses heavier springs to accomplish this. 600/250 front/back compared to 550/206 for kings.

@Snacktime are you over sprung with the 4WP on 37s? You getting nearly full travel? Any issues with fender clearance in jounce? You looking for stiffer or softer springs? Do you have a rear sway bar? And front?

 

[Snacktime]

@87-Z28 was just looking to be able to lower my suspension down for out of state adventures. I was able to get some Fox springs for free and figured I would experiment.

 

[87-Z28]

@87-Z28 was just looking to be able to lower my suspension down for out of state adventures. I was able to get some Fox springs for free and figured I would experiment.

according to accutune the fox springs are 365/185 front/rear. I would like to experiment with some slightly softer springs also. I am going to be on 35s for a couple of years. I would like to do linear springs something like 500/200.

do you still have your oem springs? When I swapped mine to the 6100 bilsteins I seem to recall they had slightly tapered ends. Not sure if they are the same length either?

 

[climb2descend]

On my 2 door with a steel rear bumper and seat delete I just swapped in Eibach 16" 225 lb spring into my 4wp/pro comp and it barely dropped it down, maybe 1/4" drop, with minimal preload still. With 33's im sitting at 39 3/4" rear now. I'm debating swapping to the 18" 200 lb spring or getting the accutune progressive springs for the king shocks they make. If I stick with the 16" 225lb I'm probably going to put in the eibach helper spring to give more preload so I have more traction at droop. I bought some 550 lb eibach also for the front but haven't had a chance to swap those in yet.

 

[87-Z28]

On my 2 door with a steel rear bumper and seat delete I just swapped in Eibach 16" 225 lb spring into my 4wp/pro comp and it barely dropped it down, maybe 1/4" drop, with minimal preload still. With 33's im sitting at 39 3/4" rear now. I'm debating swapping to the 18" 200 lb spring or getting the accutune progressive springs for the king shocks they make. If I stick with the 16" 200lb I'm probably going to put in the tender spring to give more preload so I have more traction at droop. I bought some 550 lb eibach also for the front but haven't had a chance to swap those in yet.

so the eibach springs fit nicely? No issues I guess?

since you swapped springs, did you measure free length on th 4WP springs?

 

[climb2descend]

so the eibach springs fit nicely? No issues I guess?

since you swapped springs, did you measure free length on th 4WP springs?

The 4wp/pro comp rear spring is 18" free length. Yes the eibach fit fine, no issues, it's definitely a smaller o.d and wire diameter then the 4wp spring, but no rubbing issues that I've seen so far and they fit nice on the collar and perch. I took a bunch of measurements and the 16" spring block height is fine if you don't preload it too much. Wish they had 25lb increment on the 18" spring though.

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