Wow! Absolutely amazing what you put together! We've got the finalized instructions up finally here. Your diagrams will be really helpful to others installing this kit.
PS Just got your message, I'll get back to you this evening!
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Vendor Model 3 Öhlins DFV Coilovers - Engineered by Redwood Motorsports ™
- Thread starter RedwoodMotors
- Start date
Wow! Absolutely amazing what you put together! We've got the finalized instructions up finally here. Your diagrams will be really helpful to others installing this kit.
PS Just got your message, I'll get back to you this evening!
Received my coilovers today, so should be able to report findings in a couple of weeks once fitted and set up.
Quality looks superb.
Can't wait to try them out!
Quality looks superb.
Can't wait to try them out!
Just want to chime in as another happy customer. I dropped my car off at Redwood couple of weeks ago to install my sports coilovers and floating top hats. They really are right next to the mothership. I decided to do a mild 15mm drop since this is my daily shared by my wife and baby. As others have said, the quality of each component is outstanding and the handling is much improved. Body roll, dive and squat are significantly reduced, transitions are quicker and more confident. At my current setting 20F 22R the ride is closed to if not better than stock. There might be a slight increase in NVH, not sure if it's from the top hats or coilovers themselves but I have gotten used to the car and find it acceptable. The only regret is that I didn't get the front remote adjusters, which is a pain to adjust without. The back is easy if you lay on the floor at the right angle.
I was getting a lot of road noise from too much toe on the alignment. Fixed it myself with a DIY laser toe measurement tool and the road noise is so much less. Since they altered your suspension, you might want to have the alignment double checked.
Yes from full stiff. I should mentioned that at least for my set, I don't think the valve is fully open at 20 as referenced in earlier posts. When I went full soft or 32 clicks from full, the suspension is way under damped resulting in a bouncier ride.
I had my car aligned by Tesla and then a specialist shop that just does alignments for all makes, and it was still wrong after both of them did their alignments. I am done trusting the "pros" to do anything right.
I fixed it myself. Much less road noise!
Hmm ok did you have experience doing alignment or did you just figured it out yourself? Also what DIY tool did you use?
P3D-R
Closed
Did you provide them the settings you want? If not then I'd be happy to give you what I do. It's for this same reason I had to get involved in doing alignments at our shop. I just couldn't get the settings or quality I expected. In addition the numbers would look good on paper but the driving of the vehicle wouldn't represent that. So I've taken the car to get double checked at alternate locations only to find out the original alignment shop did some trickery with the printout. This was a couple decades back but I don't think anything has changed with these types of alignment shops.
So mine is now fitted. On the way back from the alignment I had them all set to full soft and I was pleasantly surprised. Ride quality was better than stock, but I didn't find it particularly bouncy. I've now set them all to -15 from full stiff and will take it for a longer drive tomorrow.
P3D-R
Closed
In theory setting toe isn't that bad but to do it correctly you'll need some sort of a slip surface. There's lot of DIY's on youtube. Many of my track buddies will just do string alignments in their garage with this setup.
Additionally you can just take 2 measurements from specific reference points. Measure the distance between the front tires at the leading part and the trailing part of the tire. This will allow you to make a measurement. In theory if toe isn't at zero it will result in a trapezoidal shape or some form of a quadrilateral. You just want both measurements to match for zero toe. Then do the same for the rear. Now this will not calculate cross toe which is also important to make sure there's no thrust angle due to subframe misalignment. On a laser alignment machine it should also be taking cross measurements from front right to rear left and vice versa. Those #'s should also match up to ensure you are "square".
Yes, I tell them what I want. I don’t think you’ll find a lazier group as a whole in the automotive industry than alignment people. They definitely know how to play games with the machine to fake the work. And they also don’t spend the money on maintaining their equipment to keep it in calibration.
I use Trackace. It’s an amazing laser tool for toe. And a very accurate digital camber/caster tool. Both around $100.
I use pairs of plastic for sale signs sandwiched with heavy grease in the middle for slip. I can literally slide the car side to side with one hand and the steering wheel turns like the wheels are off the ground.
No more $100-200 crappy “pro” alignments. And when you have 5 European cars and a Tesla, it’s great to stay out of alignment shops now.
Do you have a trench in your garage? how are you reaching tie-rods otherwise?
I'm all for DIY, and did a temporary one recently (by lowering the car off the lift onto ramps with some pieces of cardboard. But getting anything that slippery requires something secondary to actually hold the car in place. My DIY approach resulted in about 1/32 per wheel difference in toe as measured during the process and after, which is good enough as until I do more suspension mods and get it aligned better.
P.S. the front track is about 1/8" wider than the rear on my P3D+.
You measure the toe (I use Trackace)
Lift the car up and loosen the tie rod locking nuts
Mark the tie rod and the tie rod ends so you know how much you are turning them
Take a guess as to how much you need to turn both sides
Lower the car onto the slip pads and bounce the car and slide it side-to-side to settle it
Measure the toe again
If you need to adjust it more, reach under the car while it's still on the ground with your wrench and turn the tie rods more
Slide the car side to side, measure the toe again, and repeat adjustments until you get it right
When you have the toe dialed in, lift the car and tighten the locking nuts, put it down, and test drive
Yes a trench or rack would be easier, but pretty quickly you get a feel for how much the toe changes by turning the tie rods and it only takes 2-3 adjustments to get it right.
P3D-R
Closed
I'm definitely gonna look into this since I sold off my Hunter Elite rack a couple years ago. I'm about to redo my garage slab and want to provision it as flat as possible. I'll probably get some tables fabricated for my scales with slip plates built into it. That way I can just lift the car up and get to work. Who knows, maybe I'll put a 4 post in there but it will be a tight fit.
P3D-R
Closed
Yes they can be. Ohlins has many companies that are capable of doing this as well as themselves in their USA office.
Here's the camber/caster tool that I mentioned:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00PKI0VT2/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Here's a decent price on Trackace:
Trackace Laser Wheel Alignment Gauge
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