Putting together a street/strip car, 70% street, 30% strip. I have been looking on the boards and talking to various experts (UMI, Strano, local shops, etc.). No one says anything bad about them, but I have heard a few say for a street/strip car, I am spending too much money. Every time I get ready to spend the cash, someone says don't bother. The money can always go other places, so here the question.

Any one have a street/strip car with Koni yellows? For now, lets disregard the rest of the suspension, I know it all needs to work together. Just for this question, do they work on a mild (say 400-500hp MAX) car to get decent strip performance, assuming the rest of the suspension is working as it should? Thanks for all replies.

 

Buy them and don't look back. I could get into a bunch of reasons, but the general consensus is these are the best you can buy. They are rebuildable and adjustable. Perfect for the all around driver.

 

I highly recommend any decent adjustable shock for street/strip duty. They do work at the strip when set right and when set back into street mode, you can handle with the best of them. Or set them light and go cruise...much softer ride.

I have adjustable tokico illuminas on my car that sees mostly strip now but can handle with its stiff eibach springs and wide tires. It has been 1.4's 60 foots so the suspension works.

 

If you have the cash for them, and they are what you planned to get then just go for it. As the above poster said they are generally viewed as the best you can get without getting into buying a set of racing shocks / struts. Even then you can get Koni Yellows revalved since they can be rebuilt if needed in the future.

If you want to spend less money I'm not going to be one of the people that harp on saying konis is the only choice. You can get by on something a bit cheaper if you are mostly doing street (like you said you were). Only reason I bought Koni Yellows for mine instead of Tokico Whites is because the Koni Yellows went on sale and were only ~100 dollars more than the Tokico's instead of their normal ~280 dollars more. (They are still on sale as far as I know, 20% off at some places. Got mine from tirerack.com)

I finally found someone with a set of Tokico whites a couple weeks ago and he was running a set of springs with a similar spring rate to mine, at an autocross event. I can't really tell a difference in the ride on the street. My konis do feel a little stiffer on the track than the tokico's though. I imagine however if by strip you mean drag strip where you aren't turning, the difference is going to be negligible.

 

Thanks for the replies. Yes, the Tokico's would be the other choice for this application. And yes, Koni's are on sale...I think until May? I will check Tirerack. My issue is shipping across the border. Talked to Sam at Strano and he said he won't ship it to Canada...too many issues in the past. I don't mind spending the cash to do this right. It IS a lot of money, but, I think in this instance, you get what you pay for. Only reason I am reconsidering is I have had 2 performance shops steer me away from the Koni's when I said the application was street/strip. They equate Koni to autocross-only applications. I wouldn't be against autocrossing the car once or twice, but I don't have the wallet to make it hang with a new Z06 'vette, and I think I would get very frustrated trying to do that as well. I can probably be done, but that's not a realistic goal for this car, and that's fine.

 

By strip do you mean Drag Strip? Because if you do, there is no sense in spending money on konis at all.
If you aren't serious about handling, you don't need konis.

 

Thanks for responding Pablo. Was reading your post on springs the other day, nice stuff.

I am serious about having a car that is fun to drive on the street, take hard around the on/off ramps, and can hook at the track once I put a decent motor in it.

What would you suggest for that application? It will see lots of street miles. Also, I have two drag strips within an hour of me.

 

What is your priority? Drag racing or handling? If you are just having fun on on-ramps, I think one of the cheaper brands will suit you fine. Something like the Kyb agx for example.

I do not have experience with those but I do have koni yellows on my handling car and lakewood 90/10s on my drag car. I would only suggest either of those if handling on the autox course/track (konis) or launch (lakewoods) were a top priority. If you are just out having some fun without any sort of lap times to aim for, I think you'd be wasting money on the koni yellows. You could stretch that cash a lot farther with cheaper shocks and maybe some other mods that would increase your fun factor.

 

I agree with Pablo. If you were building a car for either end of the extremes the decision would be a little easier. I'm not sure how soon you are looking to pull the trigger on a set of struts/shocks but if you can wait a week or two, I can take you for a ride in my car so you can at least get a sense of how the konis work.

Also, have a look at getting stuff shipped to Port Huron, across the river from Sarnia. either SCC Parcel Pickup or the UPS store there. Any bigger items I have sent there and go and pick them up. Usually saves a fair bit on shipping/duty this way than sent direct to Canada.

 

Pablo, Kevin, thanks for the input. I don't need to pull the trigger soon, just like to make a decision so if I do decide to spring for the Koni's, I don't miss the current sale. Otherwise, no hurry. I do have a place in Buffalo I can ship to, but its just the PITA factor I am trying to avoid. I guess I will take Kevin up on his offer and take the Koni's for a spin. Thanks for the offer Kevin. I actually have a junker 89 GTA with KYB GR2/AGX front/rear on it. Drove it for a few years. It rides pretty firm, but I only have my old pickup to compare to, so anything rides firm comparatively. Really hard to compare handling and ride quality when you don't know what "good" feels like, though I definitely know what "bad" feels like.

 

Keep in mind that dampers are only part of the equation. If the rest of your car is correct, dampers are a fine tuning tool at the strip (i.e. a few hundredths, maybe a tenth on 60ft times). Great shocks can sometimes crutch a bad suspension, bad shocks can ruin a great suspension. If I had a Koni equipped street car I'd leave the settings as-is and try it. If the front didn't come up to my liking, I'd go full soft on the rebound on the fronts and try it again.

 

That is essentially what I had in mind, using the shocks to tune the suspension.

 

go with the koni's. Run a regular sport up front. You can run this on the min setting at the track. with the correct spring rates, the front end will settle much faster after launch. On the rear, i would go with a 4th gen rear sport. If you can afford to buy them, get the double adjustables(compression adjustment will be for street use). Crank the rebound to full max at the strip and you will be very happy!

 

If your going to buy the Koni's call Autoanything and tell them that tirerack has a lower price then them. The will not only match tireracks price but beat it. Thats where i got mine from.

 

For the time being I'll be running the factory installed WS4 springs. Those should allow the front to lift. Now I thought about the rear double adjustables but Sam Strano said not to bother unless I was running a significantly heavier rear axle. That might happen eventually, but its not in the current plans unless I smoke the 9 bolt. accordlxrj, can you give me some more info as to why you'd run those vs the 4th single adjustables? Thanks.

Thanks for the info murphbird, I'll look into that. Anything has got to be better than Canadian prices, which sucks because I would like to buy from my local shops...we are talking hundreds of dollars difference.

 

The 4th gen uses a 82 series twin tube and external adjustable. It has a wide range of adjustment. The 3rd gen is a 30 series monotube and not external adjustable.

 

Right, those are the regular 4th gen, and yes, the 3rd gens are only adjustable off the car. What I meant was is there a measurable benefit of the normal 4th gens over the double adjustable 4th gens for a stock axle application?

I would be interesting in the fronts if you are thinking of selling.

 

I have

 

For your power levels, and standard thirdgen suspension, I doubt you will need to go with double adjustables.

If it was a high power radial tire car that needed alot of adjustment, then yes they'd be worth it. But with basic shocks, good supporting suspension pieces and a sticky tire, you can 60 foot very very quickly if you have the power. Suspension as is with regular shocks/springs can take a good launch. I've been 1.41 60 foot with adjustable tokico's, just single adjustable and with the rest of the supporting bolt on parts like LCA's, torque arm, sfc's, etc. Thats on eibach pro kit springs which are stiffer than most drag setups.

 

Assuming we are talking about the rear shocks, the thirdgen monotube design is considered superior. The lack of on car adjustability is the only drawback to them.

 

accordlxrj - sent you a PM

Orr89 - Thanks for your comments. That's sort of why I was questioning the need for the double adjustables. Any reason you went with the Tokico's rather than other brands?

 

I'm not up on my shock technology. Why is the monotube better? I don't relish the thought of having to unbolt the shocks every time I track the car, but if its better, then its better.

 

The monotube is not better in the case for the camaro. Everyone that is racing their third gen switches to the 82 series or 8212 for drag or road race.

 

From frrax's suspension and chassis info sticky thread:

From KYB America's website http://www.kyb.com/service/monotube.php

A thread here on TGO:

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/susp...ni-yellow.html

And a thread on FRRAX if you're registered there http://www.frrax.com/rrforum/index.php?showtopic=11681

It may not be that big of a deal, and I woudlnt be surprised if the differences in performance are completely unnoticable between the Koni 4th gen twin tube rear shocks and the Koni 3rd gen monotube rear shocks, but on paper the monotube design is superior for all out performance. Whether that translates into the real world, I dont know. I suppose accordlxrj doesn't think it does. But I did want to reiterate that if you're switching from a 3rd gen Koni to a 4th gen Koni to get a better adjustment procedure, you're not really getting the same shock. There are very fundamental differences between the two.

 

I work in the R&D dept at Koni. I probably don't don't know much.

 

Yea, that's great, but then you give relatively worthless answers like:

They're better because they are... or because everyone is switching to them... Um sure. WHY?

Some people may be happy with "do this and you'll be happy," but a lot of us want to make our cars do specific things and might have a different approach to what they're doing, so some actual information would be helpful.

 

No big reason other than they were on sale. At the time, the car was stock with catback only and I was going to replace my suspension since my shocks were dead. I wanted an adjustable for tuning my ride quality and wanted something of quality. The KYB shocks seemed to be cheap and read some reviews that seemed to say go with something else. Then I found the Tokico's on ebay for a really good price. It was a sale that was goin on and at that time on my budget, I couldnt afford koni's. That was almost 10 years ago now Still have the tokicos on it and they still seem to be working well. Although I think I broke the adjuster on the front struts.... it just spins around and doesnt stop at the highest setting. May need to replace them.


Now my auto car launches well. My friends 6 spd car runs mid 10's all motor and low 9's on spray. Its been 1.3's 60 foot now that he has a double adjustable shock on the rear and front I believe. Car with its short torque arm and aggressive clutch just hits the tires super hard and wears out sidewalls. Car in slow motion vid looked like the rear was unloading so he went double adjustable to tune that rear suspension. It worked. Car immediately started hooking better and staying planted. Went from low 1.5's to back into the 1.4's like it should be. Then down to high 1.3's on spray with some adjustments to the spray timing. Certain applications need it but some dont. I've been 1.41 60ft on a mid 10 second pass on spray while he's done the same 60 fts but with 6 spd on mid 9 second passes Just different requirements for both setups.

 

I'm not getting into a bitch slapping fight. He ask what was the best set up for his application. I told him my opinion. I was not or did I feel a need to get into damper designs. I just told him what would work best.

 

wow, technical person working for a company that makes shocks, posting to a technical forum about suspensions to a question about shocks and refusing to explain what we're asking about.

Good job buddy. I'm betting that you've already done enough damage to your company's reputation that some people won't want to deal with you. Of course, I guess you guys are lucky that you're the only real game in town that have a product that really fits that spot in the market...

 

Do you really expect these kinds of poor posts to carry any weight? Even if you're correct, which you very well could be, but no one has any idea one way or another to make up their own minds. Even if you are right, people who are reading through and trying to make up their own minds for their own rides have learned absolutely nothing from your post. If you're not going to contribute anything of value, why bother at all? All it does is make you and your company look arrogant and unhelpful.

 

First, thanks Orr89 and InfernalVortex for your responses. I appreciate it takes time to respond in detail. Second, I agree that accord's response was short, but he did address the question. On one hand, I agree that more information as to the reasoning behind the advice is useful, however, on the other hand, sometimes you don't feel like getting into a huge detailed description on the boards. I know sometimes I don't. I figure at that point, its up to the poster (me) to ask for some clarification, either on the thread or in a PM, rather than get all bent out of shape. Essentially, we are all passionate about the same cars and trying to learn from each other, I just wish sometimes we could critique each other with a little more tact. I'm going for a spin in Kevin's car when he gets his little brake issue fixed, and then I can make a more intelligent decision, which I will post on here. Thanks all.

 

http://www.ajusa.com/KONI-Sport-Shoc...v6f6q8214.html
AJUSA will also knock another $10 off of $596.92 if you tell them
that AutoAnything will only beat the price by $10
and tell them you found out thru 3rdgen that always helps too