Subaru Impreza WRX STI JDM bogeye suspension

[S555DFH]

Hi All,

After 20 years away I am now back in a Subaru WRX.

I ve bought a 2004 Subaru WRX STI JDM.

I want to tune the car to be set up for B roads with a complaint rather than stiff and bone shaking suspension. I don t have any desire to track the car.

My car has standard JDM shocks (which I suspect have seen their best) with recent Tein lowering springs.

I have been researching new suspension but I have not found a solution. Many suppliers talk about fast road use but then people say they are too stiff for UK roads.

What is the recommended solution for a fast b road car?

I was looking at Öhlins but I understand these are discontinued.

Any advice / recommendations welcome.

Cheers

Dominic

Oops. Meant to type Blobeye😂

[Caddyshack]

It’s a big problem, so many aftermarket setups have a stiffer and lower setup across most cars.

The likes of exectc and dark art can make bespoke stuff but you still wonder how without testing etc.

[DCerebrate]

Have you looked at Bilstein B14? Non adjustable but Bilstein tend to do their research well and I was very impressed with the set-up for B roads with a TVR Cerb. Planning to fit these to my Sub soon as it the current coilovers ?Tein are so firm that it’s being literally thrown in the air round here! Springs are too firm so can’t do much short of changing coilovers.

[sam.rog]

The best setup was the one fitted to the rb320 impreza. Unfortunately parts are NLA.

Get yourself onto type-ra.com and ask for advice there. A lot of very knowledgeable people there who can guide you.

[DCerebrate]

Have you looked at Bilstein B14? Non adjustable but Bilstein tend to do their research well and I was very impressed with the set-up for B roads with a TVR Cerb. Planning to fit these to my Sub soon as it the current coilovers ?Tein are so firm that it’s being literally thrown in the air round here! Springs are too firm so can’t do much short of changing coilovers.

[S555DFH]

Hi All,

Thanks for your replies.

I have reviewed the comments on the rca website but there is no definitive answer!

I want the car set up for b road use. For this to be complaint and not to be too firm.

I have nitrons on my Caterham which are much superior than the standard bilsteins.

Despite extensive research I am surprised that there isn’t a go to solution.

Asking everyone what do you recommend that is still available.

Failing this i will go with the Nitrown R1’s from Roger Clark Motorsport.

[Nozzasti]

I've got a Blobeye Sti Widetrack model, I struggled with trying to obtain standard suspension, so have ended up with Meister R coilovers, in all fairness I don't use the car much but can safefully say the ride handling is perfect for me, I've adjusted the damper settings to what the garage recommended me to do and find its fine for what I use the car for. I understand you don't really want coilovers but just wanted to give my opinion just in case.

[vxr2010]

The Mrs has BC coilovers on her forester sti , set to a soft setting , so around three clicks up from the softest , the soft setting is less firm than the standard oe sti jdm hatchback suspension , both handle very well , the hatchback standard sti suspension is fairly firm but I would not say overly harsh , suspension lots of compromises depending on what you want , and what maybe good for one then not for another

[TEKNOPUG]

Every aftermarket spring will lower the car 20-35mm. This will automatically increase the spring rate. No one makes a spring standard height but uprated by say, 10%. Everything is geared to fast road/track or being lowered for aesthetics. No one caters for performance improvements but maintaining comfort. Sure you can get coilovers with 20 ranges of damper stiffness but the spring rates will only work properly with a small range of damper settings. Setting the dampers to soft (comfort) will just lead to the springs being under-damped, effecting performance and ride.

Short of getting a company to make you custom spring rate and damper coilovers (and what would those spring rates be?), your best bet would be to refresh with stock components. That's the best level of comfort you are going to get. You can still improve performance via offset top mounts and alignment settings etc. Or play about with bigger bars front and rear. Increasing the ARB diameter by 1mm typically increases spring rate (stiffness) by ~20%.

I'm in a similar predicament with my WRX. Over the last 10 years I've tried: Prodrive Blue springs with KYB shocks, Meister R coilovers, Prodrive Blues with adjustable Koni inserts and just recently Whiteline springs with KYB shocks. The best were Prodrive Blue springs with KYB shocks, although the shocks are working outside their designed range, so only last a couple of years. They're all too stiff for daily driving on anything less than perfect roads TBH. I'm going to refit the Prodrives with KYBs and if I'm still not happy, then back to stock springs.