P.Po

I am having trouble understanding what makes a good shock, and what to look for when purchasing a shock absorber.

I used to have a set of LEDA rally shocks for a VW Golf rally car. These things where HEAVY and nearly indestructable. So, I guess on the track you are looking for stifness and weight savings in a shock. I also understand that adjustability range and type is important. I understand that remote resevoir (or double walled) shocks are an advantage to prevent dampening media cavatation and/or bubbling/boiling.

But what I would like to know, is that when I am comparing shocks which all have the same features (i.e. adjustable, remote resevoirs etc.) what else am I looking at? What's the REAL difference in a MOTON, LEDA, PENSKE, OHLIN, or MORRIS damper if they are all have similar features and wieght? I guess what I am getting at is, if I have a set of street Konis re-valved and adjusted to my setup compared with a set of MOTONs or LEDAs with similar settings, and we keep the setting static, am I really going to go that much faster spending more money? Will I notice the difference, and most of all will the stopwatch notice the difference? or is the difference the lighter wallet and some cool racing bling-bling?

I know this is a tough question to answer.... any help would be greatly apprecaited?

-Patrick

SundayDriver

WOW. Pick a hard question.

Rather than dump all I can think of I am going to give you part of my answer and see where you want to go with this. Now my perspective is Sports Racers and shocks are THE MOST IMPORTANT part of my setup. And the car is highly sensitive to shock tuning. The guys in more similar cars should be able to add some more insight, but I think my perspective is a little more far reaching than what you probably need.

Brands - you will find lots of people who will tell you which is the very best brand. Few will agree with each other and many different brands and technologies win races at the club level.

HERE IS THE BIGGIE - Support and knowledge. Who will support you? What are other people with the same car doing? If you have a knowledge base, you are not on your own to set up the shocks. Most Club Racers and DE folks are best served running a well known setup.

Tuning. You say that you don't change the settings now. I suggest that you are wasting your money with sophisticated shocks unless you are willing to go down the path of deep learning if you are not tuning them between tracks and sessions.

What is your ability to feel and tune the shocks? If you are going to tune them, then you need to train yourself to feel them. If you come in and say the car understeers, do you automatically know whether that was entry, mid-corner or exit? Did you automatically consider the corner (camber, surface, etc)? Did you automatically think about what you were doing (missed entry, trail braking, etc). If you don't do these things now, then you need to train yourself to do them if you really want to tune shocks.

What is it worth? A Lot! You will never get that last second or two if the shocks are wrong.

So the question to you - What car, what are you doing (DE, racing, etc) and how much effort are you willing to put in for a couple of years to learn how to tune shocks?

Professor Helmüt Tester

AAAAAAY-MEN.

Shocks are the single most misunderstood and most ignored part of the car. None of us have the time or money to learn everything there is to know about shocks and shock set-up. You really need to have an 'expert' that you can go to. What shock guys do you regularly see at the at the race track ? For me, it's Penske or Koni. Makes the choice simple. They may not be technically better than Ohlins or anybody else, but I know the name of my Penske shock guy, I know where he parks his trailer and I know what kind of beer he drinks. I know the phone number of my Koni rebuild shop, and know that I'll get what I want.

Geo

Only in amateur circles. In professional circles, dampers are one of the most active areas of R&D. Millions are spent on damper development every year and for good reason. The point is, for those inclined to learn, dampers is a great area to gain an "Unfair Advantage."

Professor Helmüt Tester

In spite of all the yammering and jabbering, there is no one posting on this board who even remotely qualifies as a 'professional'. Eager amateurs, yes. Repair shop owner/enthusiast racer, maybe. No sign of professional. And if there were, they wouldn't be talking to us.

GUMBALL

P.Po:
Tough question to answer in less that 10,000 words, and a good answer by Sunday Driver.
Geo also makes a very good point - ALL the pro teams have their own shock engineer.....and sensor data on their computers...

Let me start by asking the most important question: what are you doing with the car? What are your future plans for you and your car - street only, street & some track, track & slalom, track only. Before anything else, you need to decide that.

Let me add a few points:
-all the shocks you listed have several adjustments -
>high speed & low speed bump
>high speed & low speed rebound
>some have a foot valve bleed
-unless you are at the top pro level - ie. Nextel Cup, IRP, CART, etc, the differences between Ohlins, JRZ, Moton, Penske, Leda, Koni, etc, are very small.
-all these shocks are rebuildable (you can change the valving) but unless you have had the training and have the tools, that is not possible, or feasible.

-the MAIN point (and SundayDriver explained this as well) is that, as a driver, UNTIL you are at the level where you can dictinctly read EVERYTHING that the car is doing, at EACH segment of EVERY corner, AND THEN come in and know EXACTLY what to adjust and how much........you do not need shocks with multi-adjustments.
If you have a set of Konis, I would suggest that you talk to one of the techs at Koni, tell him what you are doing with your car, the specs of your car (springs, bars, tires, etc) let him make adjustment suggestions, and start there. The same would apply to the Ledas...

A friend, who is a CART engineer told once told me that
" a modern racecar has enough adjustments that one can adjust and adjust, until you have a car that God himself couldn't drive..."

The term K.I.S.S comes to mind.....

Have fun.....

Geo

Herr Professor, maybe I wasn't clear, but I wasn't disagreeing with you. More to the point I was trying to point out one of the differences between amateur and pro operations and the value to actually learning about damper adjustment. I'm sure as heck not an expert. I'm just another monkey with a wrench scratching my head (or is that my butt, I get confused. ).

RedlineMan

Hey Pat;

The process is much as Sunday describes, and his note is a great baseline to wrap your head around first. You need to know what you are doing to do it right in terms of deduction and subsequent adjustment. Of course, you also need to have the ability to adjust to learn how to.

Most people start with adjustable sway bars, and that is a nice way to learn balancing the chassis. You can play with your Koni sport shocks and see some noticeable changes, but they are not easily or widely adjustable unless you buy the top shelf stuff. When you get to truly adjustable damping, a whole new world of sophistication opens up. Sort of like getting your first computer. Once you learn your way around, the extra power you have to create usually ends up with you doing MORE work than ever before. Suspensions can have you fiddling in the extreme for sure, like back in the day when you had a graphic equalizer.

From my perspective, the Ledas I bought - and now sell - represent an excellent overall choice and value. I like the ruggedness you mention. The price is good. They have been stone reliable, and the ability to tune the suspension has made it easier to be quick and enjoy my track time. I find that I spend far less time trying to drive around chassis deficiencies. I never touch my sways any more, and usually only a few clicks here or there will dial the car in for the task at hand.

I am not convinced that all the gas charging, remote resevoir stuff represents any value for the weekend enthusiast at all. Gimmickery! Most of us will never drive hard enough or long enough at a time to overheat our shocks, so that stuff is essentially frippery. I have customers out there on oil only Leda coilovers who are exceedingly happy, and saved a lot of money too!

I am also don't believe that discrete compression and rebound, and then high/low speed on top of that, is something the average DE-er need get into. The proper use and tuning of such setups is just way beyond the need and capacity of most people. Single adjust damping is right at most people's limit of K.I.S.S.

Larry Herman

Bilstein offers a re-valving service as well. When I had my old Carrera, I had my new sport shocks set back with the type and weight of car, torsion bar sizes, sway bar sizes, bushing type and expected use (racing only) and they came back setup for my car. WOW! First it rode harder than any car I have ever been in. All the floatiness at 120 mph was gone. It turned in better, had more grip, and was still stable over rough pavement. It was lightyears better than with the regular sport shock valving. And they lasted for 6 years and are still in service with the new owner.

GUMBALL

Larry Herman:
You are right, I had forgotten about Bilsteins. A good shock, and right up there in the KISS category...

924RACR

I too run the Bilsteins, had them custom valved for my setup given spring/t-bar rates and corner weights. Car's been excellent out of the box (after installing them), and I've not yet found any adjustment needed that could not be achieved by other means. But the ones I have are not adjustable, only user-revalvable, and I'm sure with another year on them I may find that to be a bit of a PITA. However, for cost (especially as they're IT-legal monotubes) they couldn't be beat. That said, my next car will not be built to IT limitations, and I do not plan on using the same setup... leaning towards the Ledas now, to add some adjustability...

P.Po

Wow! That is a lot of quality feedback! Thanks to everybody who replied!

I think I understand basically what you guys are saying.

-Until you have enough knowledge to adjust your shocks, keep it simple and learn how to drive. Getting a shock that matches the spring rate and weight of your car is the first step in a good setup.

-Adjusting shocks takes a LOT of knowledge, research and time. First you need to know what you are feeling and second you need to know what to do about it.

-The shock quality is somewhat a function of the support and knowledge base behind the product. Very similar to purchasing software if the features are equal.

When I balance all of your feedback with the choice my wallet(wife) makes, I think that I should stick with my current setup and spend the money on SEAT TIME! My current setup (Koni Sports, 968 M030 Sway bars, upgraded srping rate on a 951 on street tires!) feels very balanced and capable. When I start setting up the yet to be purchased race car, I will contact the closest knowledgable source that supplies products to many local racers. That person happens to be John Hajny.... poor guy!

.... and of course I will be asking you guys for input as well!

Thanks and see you all at the track!

-Patrick

P.Po

Just re-reading and want to add:

Great adjustable shocks combined with knowledge and driver skill will give you better lap times.

Great adjustable shocks with poor driving and lack of knowledge makes your wallet lighter and may slow you down.

Funny how this is very similar to what I have learned about the car overall. I learned more about driving in the slower 944 then the well modified 951. This is the reason I am buying a 944 NA or 924S! Now I know to get a solid shock setup and just drive drive drive..... ;-)

-Patrick

GUMBALL

That makes sense...
As you get more seat time, don't be afraid to contact Koni directly for adjustment help - they have a good support system.

Have fun...