Sure thing. Does nobody have the front geometry numbers?
It's approx 0.95
Are you suggesting that say the Steeda dual-rate spring of ~220lb/in (38.5N/mm) in order to achieve the same 19mm droop as this Ohlins system, that the Steeda spring is under nearly 48.8mm (~2 inches) of preload? Yikes!
You're overthinking this. The Steeda dual rate spring has a totally different free height compared to the Ohlins coilover spring, and is designed to have most of the 220 lb/in portion compressed at ride height (think of it as a built-in helper spring). Additional spring compression goes into the 350 lb/in range. The traditional strut and coilover have the same mounting points at the knuckle and strut tower, thus the same motion ratio. The motion ratio has some change and migration through the suspension sweep, but that would also be the same for both traditional and coilover.
Yes. That's not a particularly high amount of preload for a strut, though. The factory springs have far more (I never measured but I'd guess closer to 3.5-4"). On a stock-style strut, the minimum free height to always have at least some preload under full droop is 10".
This is what was on my mind earlier. 19mm and 10mm looked a lot more like amounts of lowering than anything else.
Actually, Ford probably does consider their AdvanceTrak, EPAS, and ABS tuning to be proprietary information. Never mind the difficulty of quantifying it in terms that a consumer with average (or even above-average) intelligence might actually understand. Hell, I'd bet that half of all Ford sales people don't even understand sta-bar stiffness well enough to do any more than parrot what's in the sales literature.
Exactly. Which is a big part of why I don't care for most of these active driver assistances in the first place. Don't know what I'm getting, or how conservatively their tunings are, how much of the car's ultimate performance potential is being denied to me. Though ABS at least prevents the flatspotting of expensive tires.
Right. I was leaning towards the off-the-shelf due to price but at the same time I'm curious to know if there's any valuable experience of members here that have the kit and experience of it being stiff but remain tolerable at the city streets. I'm pretty sure Ohlins have done their research as to why they chose their spring rates.
agreed. Hotpart recommends high-200's or low 300's I believe. I have 225/350 dual-rate (Steeda) and wouldn't dream of running 500's on the front. The 350 is already an acquired taste. I have some 250 and 275lb/in springs that I may put on instead at some point.
Right usually the rear is some of the enthusiasts here have mentioned 350+ lb/in front has to be countered 1100+lb/in on the rear (that's almost x3+ compared to the front!).
