Hey guys,

Needing some help. Was trying to drop the ride height on my RX8 today, and turned out to be a lot more complex than i had thought. I thought that adjusting the ride height on coilovers was merely a matter of jacking the car up, taking off the wheel, and tightening/loosening the nuts (obviously get camber/alignment sorted after doing so).

But when i took the wheel off the rex, it was obvious this was not to be the case. The nuts were right in the space between the opening on the axle/strut, so i could not get the pliers used to adjust the ride height in there. Now i don't see how i could change the ride height without taking the whole shock out, adjusting it, and then putting it back in.

Can anybody enlighten me? (i've tried searching, in fact i did so when I was actually trying to adjust the ride height). I need to drop the front 10-15mm in order to get it sitting right, need to maximise the sexiness of the feed bodykit!

Im running Tein Superstreet coilovers.

Thanks guys

 

aren't you adjusting the perch collar for ride height? at least that's how most coilovers are. when i had to adjust mine, i simply jacked up the car, reached in and loosened the collar to adjust it.

do you have a pic? it may help.

 

Yeah, perch collar... couldn't remember the name of it. The problem I'm having is that the coilover goes through the axle, and where the perch collar currently is, is right in that space, so i cant get in there to adjust it. It seems like I'd need to undo the strut bolts and drop the assembly or take the whole shock out. If the car was sitting higher than it is (i.e perch collar was 10mm or so higher) then this wouldn't be a problem, but the way its currently sitting i cant get into the perch collar to adjust it

 

put the car on jackstands and then jack the lower control arm up to see if you can gain enough clearance, the collar should still be able to turn even with the full weight of the car on the suspension (such as when coner-weighing) it just takes more force to turn it

otherwise it sounds like it could use a shorter main spring with a helper spring, but that depnds on whether they shortened the travel as compared to the OE shock

 

i see. in that case, you'll have to find a way to maneuver into it. there has to be some way. if you already have an alignment done, than its a loss to have to take it out again.

is the coilover substancially shorter than the stock shock assembly? maybe undo the bolt at the bottom of the coilover so you and move the rotor assembly up and down a little.

 

also, with the car weight off the suspension you should be able to turn the perch by hand rather than the tool, the tool is typically used when the suspension is loaded

 

We had the car jacked up and managed to get the tool into each of the two perches and we should have technically been able to rotate them a bit before we were totally blocked by the axle, but they wouldn't budge. So I'm not sure if we'd be able to rotate them by hand. I thought about undoing the bolt at the bottom and seeing if that helped but i was losing my patience by this point lol.

I may take it to the shop that fitted it for me and did the alignment, since I'm going to have to pay for the alignment anyway. (providing they don't charge me an arm and a leg). I'll give it another shot tomorrow though before i give up.

 

the perches typically have a set screw that is locked down to prevent the perch from moving unintentionally from vibration, etc.

Did you loosen it first?