Koni 8611-race question (custom housings and fitment question). Help
Long story short, my right front 8611-race (1256 or 1257, not certain, but I think it's 1257) shock exploded in spectacular fashion last night spewing shock oil inside the entire wheel well. This was not discovered until this morning. However, I KNEW something was not quiet right last night as I had massive amounts of wheel "hop" and the right front shock began to make "clunking" noises over low speed bumps. Also, before I had a chance to get under there today, I initially figured the top strut retaining nut had come loose, but once I went to tighten it, the nut itself tightened down the shock, which also lengthened just how much of the shock protruded from the GC camber pate (basically, the amount of threads showing once it protrudes from the GC camber plate was not even from left to right). To me, this meant that the shock lost all compression damping from the fluid being in the shock. This was confirmed once I took the wheel off as:
- There was shock oil all within the wheel well
- There was shock oil seeping through the upper portion of the GC camber plate
- Loud "clunks" as the shock tried to absorb any road irregularities (read: bumps)
Now, to note, I have a proper theory as to HOW these ended up failing.
I currently have it setup with 650lb springs. Initially, both compression and rebound damping were set on the middle and driven on for several hundred miles (this vehicle is NOT my daily driver by any means, and is mostly a HPDE car with limited street duty when its nice out). However, in order to chase some ride quality and a somewhat uncontrollable bound/rebound issue, I set BOTH rebound and bound to the minimum setting as a baseline to see if that would aid my corner exit some and simply make for a "better" ride. It seems this low setting was not capable of controlling just how sharply the springs at this rate operate on the street, and during bound, there simply was not enough set into the damper with my settings to control such movement which inevitably led to a quick demise (only 200 miles of street driving before it failed dramatically last night).
Now, here are several questions I pose to you all. There seems to be several routes to take as far as getting this setup and are listed below. Which would you guys recommend and reasons as to why?? The car will mostly see HPDE and some street duty but is NOT my daily!
1) Buy a set of 8611-race and drop them right in and call it a day (not too expensive @ $330 PER damper)
2) Buy a set of cheaper 8610-race and drop them right in (a little cheaper @ ~$220 per damper)
3) Give Koni/TrueChoice/etc a ring and see how much it cost and have it rebuild to my car and spring specifications (could potentially be big $$$$, but I have no cue off hand how much a rebuild service is)
And I have another question. I may have the inside line on a set which are slightly longer (the 1259 version). How will this affect the the fitment of the damper as ofcourse, it is "physically" longer with a difference in stroke as well. How will this increased length affect my setup and how will I have to compensate for this, if it's even possible to do with drastic changes??
Now, in addition, I will also be going easy on the spring rate for the street for now (circa 350-450) in order to aid in the longevity of the damper if the car will see some street duty. The weather is getting nicer and it's very therapeutic to simply take it out on a nice Sunday morning and simply just drive! Not like a goon, as the driving on the race track takes care of this, but just to simply drive. Be it crappy city roads, wide open highway, or whatever it be. My cars are made to be both bomb proof reliable, versatile and FAST! No garage queens here!
Pictures of the carnage
@Keo, @wnwright, @coach, @Vadim, @BenFenner, @billc
Thanks!
- There was shock oil all within the wheel well
- There was shock oil seeping through the upper portion of the GC camber plate
- Loud "clunks" as the shock tried to absorb any road irregularities (read: bumps)
Now, to note, I have a proper theory as to HOW these ended up failing.
I currently have it setup with 650lb springs. Initially, both compression and rebound damping were set on the middle and driven on for several hundred miles (this vehicle is NOT my daily driver by any means, and is mostly a HPDE car with limited street duty when its nice out). However, in order to chase some ride quality and a somewhat uncontrollable bound/rebound issue, I set BOTH rebound and bound to the minimum setting as a baseline to see if that would aid my corner exit some and simply make for a "better" ride. It seems this low setting was not capable of controlling just how sharply the springs at this rate operate on the street, and during bound, there simply was not enough set into the damper with my settings to control such movement which inevitably led to a quick demise (only 200 miles of street driving before it failed dramatically last night).
Now, here are several questions I pose to you all. There seems to be several routes to take as far as getting this setup and are listed below. Which would you guys recommend and reasons as to why?? The car will mostly see HPDE and some street duty but is NOT my daily!
1) Buy a set of 8611-race and drop them right in and call it a day (not too expensive @ $330 PER damper)
2) Buy a set of cheaper 8610-race and drop them right in (a little cheaper @ ~$220 per damper)
3) Give Koni/TrueChoice/etc a ring and see how much it cost and have it rebuild to my car and spring specifications (could potentially be big $$$$, but I have no cue off hand how much a rebuild service is)
And I have another question. I may have the inside line on a set which are slightly longer (the 1259 version). How will this affect the the fitment of the damper as ofcourse, it is "physically" longer with a difference in stroke as well. How will this increased length affect my setup and how will I have to compensate for this, if it's even possible to do with drastic changes??
Now, in addition, I will also be going easy on the spring rate for the street for now (circa 350-450) in order to aid in the longevity of the damper if the car will see some street duty. The weather is getting nicer and it's very therapeutic to simply take it out on a nice Sunday morning and simply just drive! Not like a goon, as the driving on the race track takes care of this, but just to simply drive. Be it crappy city roads, wide open highway, or whatever it be. My cars are made to be both bomb proof reliable, versatile and FAST! No garage queens here!
Pictures of the carnage
@Keo, @wnwright, @coach, @Vadim, @BenFenner, @billc
Thanks!
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Originally Posted by Cliff 
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