Has anyone lowered their MP3?
- Thread starter suki
- Start date
bruce95fmla
Member
paulmp3 said:i got the spool springs, rides like stock. i wish the back was a tad lower.
Are you sure about that, It looks even to me .. Most people tend to wish the front was lower..
Bruce
bigbillsfan
Member
i lowered my mp3 with the spool springs as well. i agree i was hoping the back was going to settle some what, but i've had them on for about six weeks and they don't look like they have at all.
it is noticibly lower in the front. i can get 1 finger in the front well and 2 in the back.Here is my MP3 lowered with the Tein S-Tech's. The alignment on is fine where it's at, but I will be buying the Ground Control Camber plates to help dial things in a bit more. I've had them on for about a month now with no noticable tire wear and I have put these springs through the motions to guage the difference in handling. I'll just be rotating my tires more often until I buy the camber plates.
suki said:
i paid 229 shipped, i think they migh be cheaper now. I did the install myself, it was pretty simple just took a good bit of time because it was my first spring install.
Apexistud your drop looks very even, what is the drop on those. Looks verysimilar to the spools.
Tanginamo425
AAAAHHHH!!!!!
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- Mazda MP3, Laser Blue Mica
APEXistud said:
I was planning to get those springs. How do they feel handling wise? The TEIN S-Tech springs, I can get them for $180... Cuz i mean, with the stock springs, taking the corners still feels very stiff...
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The S-Tech's to me, feel a bit softer than the stock MP3 springs. I dug up some specs on the Racing Beat Springs that came on the MP3 and compared them to the Tein S-Tech's. Here's the original post.
Tanginamo425
AAAAHHHH!!!!!
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- Mazda MP3, Laser Blue Mica
Hey thanks for the post APEXistud. I'm starting to have second thoughts now.... hahah Hey for all u mp3 guys, has neone gotten the skunk2 race coilovers? I found them for sale so just curious to see what people think.
Tanginamo425 said:
Sorry if I made the Tein's sound like they suck, by all means they made an excellent product. It's just that they're not my cup of tea. I was thinking that they'd be more performance oriented as far as the springs rates are concerned. Looking at what MazdaProbeGT said in your other post. He seems completely satisfied with the S-Techs. 2KMazdaspeed had the Skunks2 coilovers on his MSP and he thought the Skunks were to stiff for his taste. So I think the question you may need to ask yourself is, what type of ride are you looking for? Soft, Stiff, or Race and do you plan on auto crossing or track racing? Or are you going for appearance more than functionality. I am very picky about the parts I put on my car and after riding in a Protege with JIC's, I'm kinda biased towards those. So the Tein's will keep me satisfied for the interim.
Tanginamo425
AAAAHHHH!!!!!
- :
- Mazda MP3, Laser Blue Mica
For me I'm lookin for somethin alittle stiffer than the Racing Beat springs. I'm plannin to do some autocross in the near future. I don't plan on buying any parts till after winter. Still, I'm trying to stick with JDM parts.
I lowered mine with ground controls. I love it, I can adjust it when ever I want to without messing up the alignment too much, as long as I don't go to far up or down. I checked this out, I had a friend align it PERFECTLY, then I moved it up an inch and had him recheck it and it wasn't really that far off. He told me it would take a while before it would mess up my tires. So as long as I stay under an inch of movement, I can move it up and down safley. I put it back down, so now it's about 3" in the front and 2" in the back.
Tanginamo425 said:
the S-Tech's probably won't be for you then. they're a little softer then Racing Beat version. figure in what class and the regulations regarding that class of auto-x first before you start the buying. if you're planning to get Tein then go with the full coil-over suspension if possible. the spring rate is considerably stiffer and you can buy harder or softer springs if you like. the strut is also adjustable, hard or soft.
like apexistud i'm biased to a particular brand but this is to tein (full coilover setup mind you) mainly because i have them and i still do not trust JIC's product line, despite claims of fixing certain things that were known to fail in their products in the past.
starflare21 said:
I've heard of the rumors product issues with the JIC's. But, no one's ever been able to say what type of problems that they've experienced. If there were any serious issues with the JIC coilovers. I definately would have found out about the them through Rishie. That is unless he didn't want to tell me. The only complaint that I've heard is about the instructions.
APEXistud said:
well, what i can tell you so far from several cases is that
1. their struts were notorious to blow out fairly easily.
2. customer service sucks when needing to replace or rebuild parts. are the JIC's even rebuildable and/or revalveable like several other suspension manufacturers?
3. the overall coilover looks great but there are certain flaws that get overlooked at first glance just because it looks good right out of the box. you don't realize these things until they actually happen. take for instance the camber plate. the center bolt is pressed in on the Tein and Cusco brands where as the JIC's are threaded screw type. this screw type method leads to the possiblity of either breaking or stripping a bolt/thread and leads to movement, possibly even untwisting of the bolt as it moves around. a perfect example is if you ever needed to install/remove the suspension or say a strut bar. frequent on and off will eventually take toll on it if not careful. the pressed in method is easier to replace if it ever breaks and just makes more sense if you're paying top dollar. compare a cusco/tein brand camber plate to the JIC and there shouldn't be any doubt which one is crafted better. true, Tein doesn't make camber plates for the protege but i'm currently researching several things that i'm hoping may broaden the selection of camber plates for the protege on the market.
4. the adjustment of the strut dampening on the JIC unit vs. the Tein unit would be significant. the Tein unit you could set at the lowest setting and work your way steadily till you dial in the suspension with each one click, to fine tune it down to a good small increment. each one click wasn't too drastic of hardness/softness thus the ability to fine tune easier. the JIC's for each one click increment made too much of a drastic change in hardness/softness from one setting to the next click and is a little bit more challenging to fine tune.
I guess if you didn't intend to use any of these full coilover setups for racing and just for show it might be fine but if so then what's the point???
don't get me wrong, i'm not trying to flame JIC to hell on their products i would merely just say do the homework on these kinda things to make people's purchases of these expensive pieces worthwhile. it's too bad Cusco didn't make a lot of products for the protege. Cusco pieces are made to fit like a glove.
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