Adjustable shocks?

[jlumba81]

Anyone know of quality adjustable shocks for the 7 that are rebuildable in the US/North Amercia? Most of the adj shocks I've seen are from UK or German. I might end up getting a set of 1 way adjustable nitrons, but was looking for more options.

[escondidoron]

I am using QA-1s on my '62 S2. They are light weight, rebuilbable and very reasonably priced. They are adjustable for both jounce and rebound. However the adjustment is not external. The adjustment is by way of changing the internal valves. But once the proper setting is established, no further adjustment is needed. The pic below compares the Lotus OEM Monroe coil overs and the aluminum QA-1s.

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4109/5607556261_846c13503c_b.jpg

[jlumba81]

Thanks for the quick reply. I forgot about QA-1s, I'm familiar w/ them from the Extreme4x4 tv show. The Proma Star single adjustable shocks look interesting. What length of shock did you end up getting? How is it w/ the spherical bearing vs a poly bushing? Any excessive wear from dirt and dust getting in the bearing?

[blubarisax]

I got the Nitron 3-ways and like them very much.

[escondidoron]

Thanks for the quick reply. I forgot about QA-1s, I'm familiar w/ them from the Extreme4x4 tv show. The Proma Star single adjustable shocks look interesting.

1) What length of shock did you end up getting?

2) How is it w/ the spherical bearing vs a poly bushing?

3) Any excessive wear from dirt and dust getting in the bearing?

 

I have the 82 Series small body circle track shocks. I didn't consider any of the other QA1 series for a couple of reasons; 1, Large body outside diameter, and 2, Cost. I also was not interested in any adjustable shock that combined adjustment on jounce and rebound. I feel it is imperative to have individual control to get an effective setup in the end.

 

Answers to your questions:

1) 4" travel in front and 6" travel in the rear. Since my Seven has pin mounting at the top of the shock an adapter was also purchased to convert from an upper eye mount (the standard QA1 configuration is eyes at both ends of the shocks).

 

2 & 3) I don't have sufficient miles on them at this point to make an accurate assessment of the wear of the rod ends vs a rubber bushing due to contamination. However I'm pretty serious about keeping the car clean. I have rod ends on the upper arms of the rear suspension for some time and those have held up well. So I don't anticipate any issues...so far at least. Also, the rod ends on the coil-overs don't contribute to any additional harshness in the suspension. I have them valved for relatively soft jounce and firm rebound. So they really absorb bumps nicely while still maintaining good wheel control.

[danilo]

Certainly look nice.

How will the Ali Adjuster threads wear after a few miles of pounding on them? Also what are the pricings ?'

More or Less than Gaz adjustables ($600 Set with springs)

[WestTexasS2K]

I like the Advanced Racing Suspension shocks. They are made in the USA and are great quality shocks. They can make just about anything you want. They are more expensive than QA1 or Jaz units. I haven't used the Jaz before but I have used the QA1s and prefer the ARS much more. Well worth the price difference to me.

[escondidoron]

Certainly look nice.

How will the Ali Adjuster threads wear after a few miles of pounding on them? Also what are the pricings ?'

More or Less than Gaz adjustables ($600 Set with springs)

 

The threads should not be an issue. They hold up fine on dirt track cars. And the street and track use on the Seven are much more benign than that.

 

All in pricing was about $700 delivered.

 

For comparison, remember that the QA1s are 3-way adjustable, with separate adjustments for jounce, rebound and height/spring pre-load.

[Birkin42]

I wanted to go with a fairly high end shock for my build so I ended up going with Ohlins TTX36 shocks. They are custom built to order for length, stroke, mounting and dampening. There are a number of distributors in the US that can build, tune and service the shocks. They can be built to nearly any length/stroke combination but the base stroke length is fairly long to start with. I believe they come with 1/2" spherical ends as standard. They also use standard 2 1/4" coilover springs.

 

There are a few really cool things about these shocks. They come standard as 3-way adjustable with spring preload, low speed compression and low speed rebound adjustments. You can upgrade them (at any time) to 4 or 5-way adjustment by adding high speed adjustments to the compression and/or rebound.

 

All of the valving is in a pair of cartridges that are accessable from the outside of the shock. The piston is solid and has no flow through it. The body is a twin tube so the flow from the bottom side of the piston runs through the annular cavity to the cartridges. Damping is done based on the full flow and not just on the area of the piston rod, which is typical for most nitrogen charged adjustable shocks. The nitrogen charge is relatively low compared to other shocks since it does not have to protect against the damping cartridges from cavitating.

 

I won't even mention the price as they aren't inexpensive, but I believe you get what you pay for, and for me, shocks are a key ingredient for improving the handling of a vehicle.

 

At this point, I don't have my car together yet (don't go there) so I can't speak about how they work on my car, but from my experience with motorcycles and mountainbikes, Ohlins knows what they are doing with shocks. The quality of manufacture is top notch.

[danilo]

All in pricing was about $700 delivered.

For comparison, remember that the QA1s are 3-way adjustable, with separate adjustments for jounce, rebound and height/spring pre-load.

 

Thank you..for the info.

GAZ also '3 way' adjustable but there is 'at least' $100 shipping from the UK.

So no obvious advantage/disadvantage either way as far as I can tell.

 

Rebuilding of Shocks, has in my experiences pretty well equaled the cost of new replacements.. but they never mention 'that' in the Sales Brochure :-)

[escondidoron]

I think that you may find the GAZ shocks at this price point to be quite a bit heavier. When I was shopping, the only units that I could find were steel bodies and about 2X as heavy. You may want to keep that in mind as keeping unsprung weight down has a significant impact

on suspension control.

 

Also, the QA1s are user rebuildable. It costs about $100 to get set up to do it yourself. Or they can be serviced by several authorized shops.