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KW V3 coilovers for Tesla Model Y

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#64
Hi,
I wanted to share some experience of KW V3 coilovers. Recently I bought and installed the KW V3 Leveling kit to my 2021 LR MY (Shanghai) with 20" Induction wheels. Here in Finland our roads are crap and full of holes, patches, grooves etc. so my goal was to get rid of unwanted hardness without compromising ride height. My goal was to set the ride height to original height. The kit comes with basic install manual. I recommend to watch a youtube video or two about the install before tackling the job if you haven't done suspension work before. The install job is easy, it took me only couple hours and just to mention this was my first time working with this car. The Model 3 and Y have simple suspension structures.

Ride height adjustment
Model Y stock ride height should be 17" or 432 mm fender to hub. The V3 leveling kit can be adjusted to +5 ... -20 mm (+0,2" ... -0,75") compared to stock height. At my first install and adjustment attempt, I tried to adjust the rear height to -5 mm from the given values in the manual ("A" = 53...54 mm, max is 59 mm). This resulted the rear of the car sitting more than 10 mm lower than stock. For front, I installed the coils to given "A" = 180 mm measure, where A = 185 mm is the given max height that should result in +5 mm ride height. This ended up the front ride height to settle at -10 mm and -5 mm left and right.

After some thought I decided to raise both front and rear to full height the manual states ("A" = 59 mm and 185 mm in front), which after around 500 km resulted the car to sit exactly at stock height. So for all you there looking for stock height with this KW V3 Leveling kit, I recommend installing it to max value "A" shown in the manual and letting it adjust for some time. Right after the second adjustment the car stood over 10 mm higher than stock. In my case the suspension settled and lowered at least 10 mm in every corner after the first install so give it some time! After the mentioned 500 km drive we're finally more or less back at stock ride height front and rear.

Bump and rebound adjustment
My goal was to get rid of the annoying bumpy and harsh ride but not to make the car too floating or soft. I know the suspension can be somewhat sporty without compromising too much comfort. IMO the preset given in KW manual represent KW's view of stock suspension stiffness. This was a good starting point because it viewed how much better and quieter the suspension can be with good components compared to Tesla's stock although it was way too stiff for me. I kept on adjusting it two to three times to find my sweet spot.
Going full soft resulted the car being extremely comfortable at low speeds. Both front and back absorbed almost every bump in the road but you can't really feel that much and car felt floaty. Driving on a cobblestone street in Helsinki the car just glided through, when the stock made me fear for losing my teeth. This is way too soft for speeds over 100km/h / 60 mph and the car doesn't feel like it could handle windy roads and MY power output.
I went back to a bit stiffer and adjusted it back to these settings:
Front:
Rebound full hard -> 11 clicks open (from 16)
Bump full hard -> 9 clicks open (from 12)

Rear:
Rebound full hard -> 11 clicks open
Bump full hard -> 8 clicks open

Results
With these settings the car sits at stock height and feels much much more civilized and steady. I no longer have to stress for patches or minor bumps in the road, city driving in bumpy streets is comfortable and driving on highway speeds is as steady as stock without loud noises. Driving with 4 people in the car it didn't feel too soft either.
I can't say for sure if the car has less road noise or not but at least I feel that way. There's definitely fewer punchy sounds coming from front. Now I think the car drives like it should (at least with this price), a bit smoother than stock Model 3 LR. And there's still plenty of options to go softer or stiffer.

Some tips
  • The job can be carried out on the floor with 2 jacks. I do recommend using a car lift. I installed this in a lift but did the adjustments in my garage using two jacks. When using a lift, you need another jack for the rear control arm bolt.
  • You do not need to detach the front upper suspension mount as seen in couple Youtube videos. Just carefully remove the ABS sensor wire with trim removal tool and there's plenty of space to thread the coilover into place.
  • The rear height adjustment is a PITA. Height adjustments can't be done when the coil is in place and lower control arm is attached.
    • To adjust the height of rear suspension you always need to remove lower plastic trim underneath the control arm, remove shock and detach the control arm from knuckle.
    • It's easiest to just accept this and take the upper coil adjustment seat off the car and then adjust it with care using a caliper.
  • The front ends is very easy to adjust, just jack up the corner, remove the wheel and start adjusting with the tool. Use both hands, hold the tool in place with one hand while turning with another. Don't overtighten the lock screw (just 1-2 Nm!)
  • AND remember to tighten the upper shock bolt in front shocks to given torque in the installation manual.
  • Shock adjustments are easy but require wheel removal or at least jacking up every corner.
 
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#69
koskisolli said:
Hi,
I wanted to share some experience of KW V3 coilovers. Recently I bought and installed the KW V3 Leveling kit to my 2021 LR MY (Shanghai) with 20" Induction wheels. Here in Finland our roads are crap and full of holes, patches, grooves etc. so my goal was to get rid of unwanted hardness without compromising ride height. My goal was to set the ride height to original height. The kit comes with basic install manual. I recommend to watch a youtube video or two about the install before tackling the job if you haven't done suspension work before. The install job is easy, it took me only couple hours and just to mention this was my first time working with this car. The Model 3 and Y have simple suspension structures.

Ride height adjustment
Model Y stock ride height should be 17" or 432 mm fender to hub. The V3 leveling kit can be adjusted to +5 ... -20 mm (+0,2" ... -0,75") compared to stock height. At my first install and adjustment attempt, I tried to adjust the rear height to -5 mm from the given values in the manual ("A" = 53...54 mm, max is 59 mm). This resulted the rear of the car sitting more than 10 mm lower than stock. For front, I installed the coils to given "A" = 180 mm measure, where A = 185 mm is the given max height that should result in +5 mm ride height. This ended up the front ride height to settle at -10 mm and -5 mm left and right.

After some thought I decided to raise both front and rear to full height the manual states ("A" = 59 mm and 185 mm in front), which after around 500 km resulted the car to sit exactly at stock height. So for all you there looking for stock height with this KW V3 Leveling kit, I recommend installing it to max value "A" shown in the manual and letting it adjust for some time. Right after the second adjustment the car stood over 10 mm higher than stock. In my case the suspension settled and lowered at least 10 mm in every corner after the first install so give it some time! After the mentioned 500 km drive we're finally more or less back at stock ride height front and rear.

Bump and rebound adjustment
My goal was to get rid of the annoying bumpy and harsh ride but not to make the car too floating or soft. I know the suspension can be somewhat sporty without compromising too much comfort. IMO the preset given in KW manual represent KW's view of stock suspension stiffness. This was a good starting point because it viewed how much better and quieter the suspension can be with good components compared to Tesla's stock although it was way too stiff for me. I kept on adjusting it two to three times to find my sweet spot.
Going full soft resulted the car being extremely comfortable at low speeds. Both front and back absorbed almost every bump in the road but you can't really feel that much and car felt floaty. Driving on a cobblestone street in Helsinki the car just glided through, when the stock made me fear for losing my teeth. This is way too soft for speeds over 100km/h / 60 mph and the car doesn't feel like it could handle windy roads and MY power output.
I went back to a bit stiffer and adjusted it back to these settings:
Front:
Rebound full hard -> 11 clicks open (from 16)
Bump full hard -> 9 clicks open (from 12)

Rear:
Rebound full hard -> 11 clicks open
Bump full hard -> 8 clicks open

Results
With these settings the car sits at stock height and feels much much more civilized and steady. I no longer have to stress for patches or minor bumps in the road, city driving in bumpy streets is comfortable and driving on highway speeds is as steady as stock without loud noises. Driving with 4 people in the car it didn't feel too soft either.
I can't say for sure if the car has less road noise or not but at least I feel that way. There's definitely fewer punchy sounds coming from front. Now I think the car drives like it should (at least with this price), a bit smoother than stock Model 3 LR. And there's still plenty of options to go softer or stiffer.

Some tips
  • The job can be carried out on the floor with 2 jacks. I do recommend using a car lift. I installed this in a lift but did the adjustments in my garage using two jacks. When using a lift, you need another jack for the rear control arm bolt.
  • You do not need to detach the front upper suspension mount as seen in couple Youtube videos. Just carefully remove the ABS sensor wire with trim removal tool and there's plenty of space to thread the coilover into place.
  • The rear height adjustment is a PITA. Height adjustments can't be done when the coil is in place and lower control arm is attached.
    • To adjust the height of rear suspension you always need to remove lower plastic trim underneath the control arm, remove shock and detach the control arm from knuckle.
    • It's easiest to just accept this and take the upper coil adjustment seat off the car and then adjust it with care using a caliper.
  • The front ends is very easy to adjust, just jack up the corner, remove the wheel and start adjusting with the tool. Use both hands, hold the tool in place with one hand while turning with another. Don't overtighten the lock screw (just 1-2 Nm!)
  • AND remember to tighten the upper shock bolt in front shocks to given torque in the installation manual.
  • Shock adjustments are easy but require wheel removal or at least jacking up every corner.
Click to expand...
Hi, I just upgraded to V3 Leveling but cant seem to find the right adjustment.
Was there any reason you chose rear bump value lower than front? (Will try you adjustment next)

Im currently on
front
Rebound 11
Bump 9

Back
Rebound 11
Bump 11

Very bouncy on uneven roads.
 
#70
koskisolli said:
Hi,
I wanted to share some experience of KW V3 coilovers. Recently I bought and installed the KW V3 Leveling kit to my 2021 LR MY (Shanghai) with 20" Induction wheels. Here in Finland our roads are crap and full of holes, patches, grooves etc. so my goal was to get rid of unwanted hardness without compromising ride height. My goal was to set the ride height to original height. The kit comes with basic install manual. I recommend to watch a youtube video or two about the install before tackling the job if you haven't done suspension work before. The install job is easy, it took me only couple hours and just to mention this was my first time working with this car. The Model 3 and Y have simple suspension structures.

Ride height adjustment
Model Y stock ride height should be 17" or 432 mm fender to hub. The V3 leveling kit can be adjusted to +5 ... -20 mm (+0,2" ... -0,75") compared to stock height. At my first install and adjustment attempt, I tried to adjust the rear height to -5 mm from the given values in the manual ("A" = 53...54 mm, max is 59 mm). This resulted the rear of the car sitting more than 10 mm lower than stock. For front, I installed the coils to given "A" = 180 mm measure, where A = 185 mm is the given max height that should result in +5 mm ride height. This ended up the front ride height to settle at -10 mm and -5 mm left and right.

After some thought I decided to raise both front and rear to full height the manual states ("A" = 59 mm and 185 mm in front), which after around 500 km resulted the car to sit exactly at stock height. So for all you there looking for stock height with this KW V3 Leveling kit, I recommend installing it to max value "A" shown in the manual and letting it adjust for some time. Right after the second adjustment the car stood over 10 mm higher than stock. In my case the suspension settled and lowered at least 10 mm in every corner after the first install so give it some time! After the mentioned 500 km drive we're finally more or less back at stock ride height front and rear.

Bump and rebound adjustment
My goal was to get rid of the annoying bumpy and harsh ride but not to make the car too floating or soft. I know the suspension can be somewhat sporty without compromising too much comfort. IMO the preset given in KW manual represent KW's view of stock suspension stiffness. This was a good starting point because it viewed how much better and quieter the suspension can be with good components compared to Tesla's stock although it was way too stiff for me. I kept on adjusting it two to three times to find my sweet spot.
Going full soft resulted the car being extremely comfortable at low speeds. Both front and back absorbed almost every bump in the road but you can't really feel that much and car felt floaty. Driving on a cobblestone street in Helsinki the car just glided through, when the stock made me fear for losing my teeth. This is way too soft for speeds over 100km/h / 60 mph and the car doesn't feel like it could handle windy roads and MY power output.
I went back to a bit stiffer and adjusted it back to these settings:
Front:
Rebound full hard -> 11 clicks open (from 16)
Bump full hard -> 9 clicks open (from 12)

Rear:
Rebound full hard -> 11 clicks open
Bump full hard -> 8 clicks open

Results
With these settings the car sits at stock height and feels much much more civilized and steady. I no longer have to stress for patches or minor bumps in the road, city driving in bumpy streets is comfortable and driving on highway speeds is as steady as stock without loud noises. Driving with 4 people in the car it didn't feel too soft either.
I can't say for sure if the car has less road noise or not but at least I feel that way. There's definitely fewer punchy sounds coming from front. Now I think the car drives like it should (at least with this price), a bit smoother than stock Model 3 LR. And there's still plenty of options to go softer or stiffer.

Some tips
  • The job can be carried out on the floor with 2 jacks. I do recommend using a car lift. I installed this in a lift but did the adjustments in my garage using two jacks. When using a lift, you need another jack for the rear control arm bolt.
  • You do not need to detach the front upper suspension mount as seen in couple Youtube videos. Just carefully remove the ABS sensor wire with trim removal tool and there's plenty of space to thread the coilover into place.
  • The rear height adjustment is a PITA. Height adjustments can't be done when the coil is in place and lower control arm is attached.
    • To adjust the height of rear suspension you always need to remove lower plastic trim underneath the control arm, remove shock and detach the control arm from knuckle.
    • It's easiest to just accept this and take the upper coil adjustment seat off the car and then adjust it with care using a caliper.
  • The front ends is very easy to adjust, just jack up the corner, remove the wheel and start adjusting with the tool. Use both hands, hold the tool in place with one hand while turning with another. Don't overtighten the lock screw (just 1-2 Nm!)
  • AND remember to tighten the upper shock bolt in front shocks to given torque in the installation manual.
  • Shock adjustments are easy but require wheel removal or at least jacking up every corner.
Click to expand...
Hey, I got a set of these recently too, but find the ride quality worse than my standard MYP even at full soft setting. I don’t understand how you can feel yours are smoother than the stock MYLR when mine are harder than my standard MYP. Would you mind sharing the part number so I can compare? My front shocks are 874 1005 L.

Also, to get the preload of 185mm I find the spring perch incredibly difficult to turn even when using an additional lever on the spanner. Have you found your front perches take much effort to turn?

If you find the information useful, I compared the standard shocks to the KW’s at full soft when out of the car. The KW’s were slower in compression and rebound when at full soft setting.
 
#71
HonchoNI said:
Hey, I got a set of these recently too, but find the ride quality worse than my standard MYP even at full soft setting. I don’t understand how you can feel yours are smoother than the stock MYLR when mine are harder than my standard MYP. Would you mind sharing the part number so I can compare? My front shocks are 874 1005 L.

Also, to get the preload of 185mm I find the spring perch incredibly difficult to turn even when using an additional lever on the spanner. Have you found your front perches take much effort to turn?

If you find the information useful, I compared the standard shocks to the KW’s at full soft when out of the car. The KW’s were slower in compression and rebound when at full soft setting.
Click to expand...
Sorry, I hadn't followed this thread and didn't notice your message months ago.

MYP has different springs and dampers than LR. And depending on where and when your car was manufactured, there are some revisions done to performance suspension. If you car is late 2022 to 2023, you have the revised suspension set which is supposed to be better than the crap many LR drivers have to deal with. I believe that with 19" tires and newer, 2023 "comfort suspension" I wouldn't have gone through the trouble and installing the KWs. But the long range models built in Shanghai between 2021 to early 2023 were hard, harsh and bouncy so there was just no other option than to change them. I don't have any data from stock and KW suspensions compared other than me driving it for 17k kms and handful of people who have driven my car before and after, but we all agree the ride is definitely smoother and less bouncy. To me the difference they made was significant.

I just want to double check that you have adjusted the kit to full soft rather than full hard? Sorry for silly question but just want to be sure because for me the ride with both adjustments in full soft is like driving a Chrysler Voyager and the stock perf suspension just isn't that soft.

My part numbers are front 874 1005 L and rear 874 1103. Yes, the front was difficult to turn without any lubrication when getting close to correct level. I sprayed some WD-40 equivalent that helped a lot.

How did you measure the speed of your suspension setup?
 
#72
ingbkky said:
Hi, I just upgraded to V3 Leveling but cant seem to find the right adjustment.
Was there any reason you chose rear bump value lower than front? (Will try you adjustment next)

Im currently on
front
Rebound 11
Bump 9

Back
Rebound 11
Bump 11

Very bouncy on uneven roads.
Click to expand...
Hi,
Which wheel setup you have? Hard to guess why yours is bouncy. Could you try to compare it to the stock suspension?
I found the rear setup to work well with the settings I posted. I guess you could spend hours and hours finding the best one, but I felt good enough at those levels I posted. Sorry for late answer.
 
#73
koskisolli said:
Sorry, I hadn't followed this thread and didn't notice your message months ago.

MYP has different springs and dampers than LR. And depending on where and when your car was manufactured, there are some revisions done to performance suspension. If you car is late 2022 to 2023, you have the revised suspension set which is supposed to be better than the crap many LR drivers have to deal with. I believe that with 19" tires and newer, 2023 "comfort suspension" I wouldn't have gone through the trouble and installing the KWs. But the long range models built in Shanghai between 2021 to early 2023 were hard, harsh and bouncy so there was just no other option than to change them. I don't have any data from stock and KW suspensions compared other than me driving it for 17k kms and handful of people who have driven my car before and after, but we all agree the ride is definitely smoother and less bouncy. To me the difference they made was significant.

I just want to double check that you have adjusted the kit to full soft rather than full hard? Sorry for silly question but just want to be sure because for me the ride with both adjustments in full soft is like driving a Chrysler Voyager and the stock perf suspension just isn't that soft.

My part numbers are front 874 1005 L and rear 874 1103. Yes, the front was difficult to turn without any lubrication when getting close to correct level. I sprayed some WD-40 equivalent that helped a lot.

How did you measure the speed of your suspension setup?
Click to expand...
I've got the latest 2023 suspension. Definitely adjusting the correct way and at full soft are noticeably harder than standard. I pushed down on the shocks when they were out of the car to measure speed.
 
#74
HonchoNI said:
I've got the latest 2023 suspension. Definitely adjusting the correct way and at full soft are noticeably harder than standard. I pushed down on the shocks when they were out of the car to measure speed.
Click to expand...
Okay. I haven't test driven the newer suspension MYs so can't say for certain how much better it is compared to earlier models, especially when you have the MYP. Still it sounds odd that the KW would be worse. :(
 
#75
i'm using kw v3 leveling. my car is a 2022 model 3 performance, with 20 inch wheels. i've changed my tire size to 245 35 20 instead of 235 35 20. i'm about 10mm lower than stock. i've found this setting to work well:

bump: front 7, rear 5
rebound: front 10, rear 10
psi: 37-38

I find the front bump should be 2 clicks softer than the rear, as per KW recommendation. However, KW recommends the rebound to be 1 click softer than the front, and I find this not to work well. I believe bump settings should not be too soft, as this will cause the ride to be very crashy and unstable. i'm guessing that a bump setting of 9 7 or 10 8 should likely be the softest you can run. in terms of rebound, i think 11 is the softest i can accept. i think the main weakness of the kw is the settings change too much with just 1 click. this means it is very difficult to find an exact setting that works well. for example, for bump, i think they should divide the settings into 18 instead of just 12.
 
#76
benchan78 said:
i'm using kw v3 leveling. my car is a 2022 model 3 performance, with 20 inch wheels. i've changed my tire size to 245 35 20 instead of 235 35 20. i'm about 10mm lower than stock. i've found this setting to work well:

bump: front 7, rear 5
rebound: front 10, rear 10
psi: 37-38

I find the front bump should be 2 clicks softer than the rear, as per KW recommendation. However, KW recommends the rebound to be 1 click softer than the front, and I find this not to work well. I believe bump settings should not be too soft, as this will cause the ride to be very crashy and unstable. i'm guessing that a bump setting of 9 7 or 10 8 should likely be the softest you can run. in terms of rebound, i think 11 is the softest i can accept. i think the main weakness of the kw is the settings change too much with just 1 click. this means it is very difficult to find an exact setting that works well. for example, for bump, i think they should divide the settings into 18 instead of just 12.
Click to expand...
Whats your ride height set to? (measurement from the centre of the wheel to the edge of the wheel arch trim)
 
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