Post REVIEWS of your new suspension here.

[ultrasonic]

My Sport Sedan needs new suspension. At least I want it to have new suspension. I bought the Legacy, drove around for a few days getting used to it. Then, I got back in my Impreza-- it just feels so much tighter and deliberate. Much more fun to drive, except for not having the turbo that the Legacy has. The Legacy is a MY91 with 83k miles, so I’m sure the struts are shot. The struts on my Impreza were pretty much gone when I changed them at about 60k miles.

I have read the Suspension Sticky at the top of this forum. I think I understand everything, but I’d like to have some further information upon which to base my decisions. I would like to hear a review by anyone who has replaced springs and/or struts on a BC or BF. I want first hand comments on this matter. It would certainly be helpful to me, and I bet others would find it very useful, too.

I propose a thread with the following information:

-Year: (the year of your car, i.e. MY91, etc.)
-Model: (the model, i.e. Legacy BC, BF)
-Trim: (the version, i.e. Sport Sedan, FWD, AWD, etc.)
-Original Suspension: (what you replaced, i.e. stock, stock air suspension, blown out Monroe's, etc.)
-Miles: (how many miles on the clock when you made the upgrade?)
-Elapsed Miles: (how many miles have you put on the new suspension?)

-Driving Style: (meek commuter, hardcore autocrosser, track day junkie, aggressive canyon carver, rally crosser, club rally, etc.)

-New Struts: (what parts did you put on? i.e. AGX, GR2, OEM stock, etc.)
-New Springs: (what parts did you put on? i.e. Eibach, OEM stock, Whiteline, etc.)
-Extras: (new tops? convert tapered spring to 92 style?, etc.)
-Alignment Specs: (what was your alignment results after the mods? did you add camber bolts? etc.)

-Other Mods: (do you have any other mods that may effect your suspension review? i.e. swaybars, end links, etc.)

-Driving impressions of your new suspension: (THIS IS AN ESSAY QUESTION: how do you like it? does it bounce? oversteer/understeer? over damped/over sprung? fun? kidney bruising? etc.)

-Did you achieve your goals in doing this modification? (ANOTHER ESSAY QUESTION)

-Would you do anything different? Do you intend to do anything to further modify your suspension?

Well, I think that does it... or over does it, maybe. Let me know if you think a thread like this is a good idea. If it already exists, sorry! If everyone thinks it’s the best idea since forced induction, then maybe it’ll be a sticky.

Thanks for reading this far.

[JasonGrahn]

I propose a thread with the following information

I propose searching by individiual makes of suspensions will yeild great results.

For instance, search by "KYB" then "KYB AGX" and maybe later "DMS" or "JIC" or *gasp* check out the library: http://legacycentral.org/library.htm

[ciper]

90 wagon LS
Air suspension
Swap to OEM spring/strut (cone shaped rear)
Agressive driving
Better than the air suspension, still not good enough

90 wagon LS
Swap to GR-2, kept larger rear sway (turbo size). 205 55 16 re-92
Aggressive
Better sway control, comfortable firm ride. Lower profile tires help ALOT.

90 wagon LS
Gr-2
Swap to whiteline control springs with STI tops. 205 50 16 kuhmos
aggressive
Lowering effect and stiffer springs are nice. Car is really awake now

90 wagon LS
"pin in box"style sway bar mounts
Swap to MRT adjustable control arms and 18-22 whiteline rear sway bar 20mm front sway bar with stiffened bushings and new style drop link. Performance alignment. 0 Toe front, slight Toe out rear. .5 camber rear .75 front. Increasing the rear trac helps as well for stability
Aggressive
New bushings with sway bars and controls arms must make a big difference. Siff bars along with stiffened lower springs keeps this car on rails.

90 wagon LS
Addition of Cusco Oval rear strut tower bar and whiteline front facing (clears intercooler) strut tower braces.
The rear strut tower brace made a big difference. Didnt notice anything bad about the car, after adding the bars I felt how "predictable" the car was

90 wagon LS
Gr-2 with whiteline springs and STI tops
Swap to Impreza AGX struts and viscous LSD
The struts adjustable allow me to dial in a smooth ride or agressive. A stiff rear with LSD lets me EASILY rotate the car with the gas pedal. I intentionally tested the car before install and the difference was huge.

90 wagon LS
Factory front control arm mounts
Whiteline ALK, hardest version
agressive
The ALK is a great cheap upgrade, DO NOT GET THE STIFFEST VERSION. I dont like how much shock is transfered through the car with this. This kit should be called anti dive. When the AGX where set on the softer side my WRX front brakes could make the car slightly dip. Now there is none.

90 sedan LS
Factory original
Gr-2 and 195 70 r14 Dunlop sport a2
city driving
The addition of some sticky tires and the gr-2 really brought this car back to life. It seems happier to drive. Good upgrade for the money

91 sedan LSI
Factory replacement, 70k old
Gr-2 and 16 inch wheels with re-92
Agressive
The suspension wasnt shot but still weak. The addition of GR-2 and shorter profile tires make this car easier to drive at the edge yet still be a good daily driver. Had to use a sledge hammer on the next install of 205 55 16 continental contiextremecontact because rear spring perch to tire interfearance

90 wagon L
Factory replacement suspension, shot at 192k miles
Gr-2
Agressive/city
Its surprising that even with this many miles the chassis is still stiff. Fun car to thrash on.

91 wagon L
factory original, SHOT suspension
Gr-2
City driving
Again the GR-2 is a great choice

93 wagon LS
Original
Gr-2 with 205 55 16
City driving
The gr-2 with short sidewall larger diameter tires help with the low 1st gear.

I think there might be two more, but you get the idea.

[mTk]

-1992
-Legacy BC
-Originally: FWD L 4eat Now: AWD Sport Sedan 5mt
-functioning stock monroe replacements
-170000 mi
-30-40k mi

-aggressive street driver

-GAB Revolution II coilovers (strut/spring setup)
-came with pillowball tops
-alignment is close to stock for now

-Whiteline: 20-24mm adj rear swaybar, front and rear endlinks, and rear mounts.
Whiteline ALK (hard version)
MRT adjustable control arms
Generic front and rear strut tower bars
yokohama paradas (205/45/17)

-It is very very very stiff. I LOVE it, it is not bouncy by anymeans, just harsh. when i was FWD i found that i could induce understeer or oversteer pretty easily. The car was maybe a tiny bit tail happy. It was also easy enough to get all 4 sliding through a turn. I've converted to AWD now, so i am sure it is going to change pretty drastically, but i haven't yet been able to drive

-Have I achieved my goals? I don't know for sure. I enjoy driving much much more now, so i have gotten at least partly there.

-Future mods may include changing the front and rear swaybars to correct for any over/under steering issues that may arise.

MK

[ciper]

Guess I forgot the goal part. For most of the cars they are intended to be cheap daily drivers or occasional fun. Gr-2 and 16 inch wheels are the ultimate upgrade for they money.

For my speedwagon I have not acheived my goals as of yet. Suspension tuning is still needed:

I want to weld a small spacer on top of the rear springs
Find the best firmness setting to match the alignment and new sway bar
Find the right alignment settings
Find the right tire, Falkens are nice but wear too quickly

I need to get brakes to match the setup. Right now I can outhandle most WRX but my brakes start to overheat and I have to back off. They get me on the straight aways too becuase my engine hasnt been completed yet. I might get a front LSD so that would most likely need slight changes to suspension to counteract the pull.

[LegacyT]

Stock Sport Sedan suspension destroys the Impreza L's anyday. But if you want to replace it get some GC8 STi struts with tein springs or even 2.5 RS springs.

Mark,

[ultrasonic]

Stock Sport Sedan suspension destroys the Impreza L's anyday. But if you want to replace it get some GC8 STi struts with tein springs or even 2.5 RS springs.

Mark,

Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that my Impreza is rolling stock suspension. It's current set up (RS struts/springs, 20mm rear sway bar, solid rear end links, Falken Ziex 512 in 205/55/16 on stock WRX wheels, performance alignment) certainly whips the worn out stock Sport Sedan's suspension.

Which Tein do you recommend? Have you run th STi struts/Tein springs set up on a Sport Sedan? I'm wondering how the GC front/rear spring ratio works with the Sport Sedan, as the stock Sport Sedan appears to have equal rate front and rear.

I also wonder about lowering. If a GC spring set says -1.5", can we assume that it will lower a Legacy the same amount?

Thanks for all the informative replies, guys. This is exactly what I was hoping for.

[LegacyT]

A local guy swapped in STi struts and gc8 springs into his 93 Leagcy sedan, He loved it. I'm prolly gonna do the same thing with my car. As for tein springs, I've heard good things about them , I think boostjunkie has em on his car.

Mark,

[THAWA]

are sti struts kyb made or are they actually sti?

[ultrasonic]

-GAB Revolution II coilovers (strut/spring setup)

What are your spring rates? How low are your coilovers set?

[mTk]

What are your spring rates? How low are your coilovers set?

From what i was able to translate, they are 336/280 lbs-inch front/rear.

Never did an exact measurement on the drop, but here is a good pic, it's as low as i could go and not rub.

After Before


MK

[ultrasonic]

I just mounted my new wheels/tires. RS six spoke 16x7 with somewhat used high performance 205/50 tires.

Of course this has transformed my SS. The tires that were on the original 15x6 were really crap. Grand Spirit Aqua Flow or some such. Not to mention that the car had been driven only about 1500 miles in the last two years before I bought it. The tires were starting to get dry rotted and had flat spots from sitting. Really terrible, and probably unsafe.

At this point, I have to say that my suspension is not in as bad condition as I thought it was. I'll move suspension upgrades down the priority list and live with it for a while. It's good enough for right now.

That being said, I'm still researching, reading, and asking around.

My suspension goals: A firmer, more deliberate, well sorted handling package that is still reasonably comfortable for daily driving. Only slight lowering, as I wish to maintain clearance for TSD rally and fun on forest roads and unimproved roads. I'll likely have 3 season tires on the 16x7, and something for winter on the 15x6. I don't particularly plan to autocross or rally cross, but might do an event or two for fun. Eventually, I'll lay on some extra boost. Oh yeah, I'd like it to be reasonably priced, dead nuts reliable, and not finicky or tweaky. That's not too much to ask, is it?

One problem I have, is that there are many reviews of GC suspentions on GC cars, but not much about GC suspentions on BC cars. Could we determine some ratio of lowering between the two chassis? Something like --if a spring lowers an RS 1", then the same spring will lower an SS 1.5" I'm making those numbers up just to illustrate the kind of information I'd like to have access to in making my decisions.

Anyway.... thanks again for everyone's input. You guys are great.