This is what I've figured all along. For those of us who don't care or need to adjust our suspension, simply changing out the shocks would probably be a good enough upgrade to improve the ride quality. And I would have to think considerably cheaper than a full coilover kit, but probably a little more expensive than springs. My concern is that springs alone (comfort or otherwise) really isn't going to improve the ride quality. I'm very surprised there are no aftermarket options just for shocks at this point.
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MountainPass Performance Comfort Coilovers
- Thread starter noshadow
- Start date
This is what I've figured all along. For those of us who don't care or need to adjust our suspension, simply changing out the shocks would probably be a good enough upgrade to improve the ride quality. And I would have to think considerably cheaper than a full coilover kit, but probably a little more expensive than springs. My concern is that springs alone (comfort or otherwise) really isn't going to improve the ride quality. I'm very surprised there are no aftermarket options just for shocks at this point.
Exelion
Member
The shocks would help a lot, but how much $$$ are softer springs? That's also what comes included with the coilover kits. The way I see it, a non-adjustable spring set, that lowers 1", making the car the same height as a performance Y (or 3) coupled with a simpler adjustable shock set, maybe 5-8 settings, painted steel body rather than the stainless Inox, would be enough. Heck, if a non-adjustable shock set with settings in the 10-12 range was on the market, I'd be tempted to buy those too! Living in an area that doesn't see any snow, I don't really need a stainless Inox shock body, although I can see where many would. Point is, the choices just aren't there yet.
I'm hoping the aftermarket companies are seeing this. Right now, the options are a harsh ride, paying upwards of $3000 or more, but nothing in between.
Exelion
Member
Ok, just got finished installing the fronts.
-I think the fronts were easier to install than the rears, especially if rear camber arms are included in the installovided that the right steps are taken! (More on that in a bit)
-One of the reasons is that the shop has an available permanently fixed spring compressor which was so easy to use. Put the clamps on and spin the the top arms. Impact gun the top nut off. Done.
-installing the new springs onto the shocks is easy, because the perch is wrenchable. Difficult, but doable (vs. impossible). More on that below.
-do not try to remove the nuts circled in red, thinking you’ll save time. It turned into a nightmare because the upper control arm got in the way of removing the shock assembly. Bad, and dangerous idea. I actually nicked the plastic fender trying to get it out. Thankfully its plastic! Again. Do not try to remove the shock assembly by going for these three!!!! Go for the bolts circled in blue. So much easier!
-MPP’s front (and rear) springs are softer than Teslas. This part is obvious from the look and feel. I pushed down the springs and the MPP’s have a little bounce. The Tesla’s, however, are incredible rigid. There really isn’t much difference between these springs and a solid steel sleeve. You can see from the pic below:
Tesla also beefed up the sway bar end link connector. The lower connecting rod end is stamped steel vs MPP’s billet cut solid aluminum and like the rear shock, the Tesla rod is very thin, and moves slow in both directions.
-Unlike the rears, the front height is ajustable but make sure you sleeve a 19mm long hex nut on the end of the handle or else you’ll hurt your wrist!
-After installing riding a complete set of MPP coilovers (rather than last week’s just the rear) this is a completely different car as far as suspension goes. Small bumps are gone, and big bumps feel like small bumps. Dare I say it rides like a normal everyday car? What’s very strange is that it gets more comfortable faster the car goes. I didn’t expect that.
-The reason why people say it doesn’t ride like a cadillac, is because there’s a property that comes with that kind of ride-the car reverberates. After hitting a bump, the shock takes the hit, bounces back, but then it bounces back again, although a lot less. This reverberation is what we don’t want included with the plush ride. It will take some fine tuning to get a good aoft ride without the boing-woing-woing effect. I’m pretty sure that’s whats happening.
All in all, I really like driving my car now, much more than I did, just didn’t like having to pay so much for it.
-I think the fronts were easier to install than the rears, especially if rear camber arms are included in the installovided that the right steps are taken! (More on that in a bit)
-One of the reasons is that the shop has an available permanently fixed spring compressor which was so easy to use. Put the clamps on and spin the the top arms. Impact gun the top nut off. Done.
-installing the new springs onto the shocks is easy, because the perch is wrenchable. Difficult, but doable (vs. impossible). More on that below.
-do not try to remove the nuts circled in red, thinking you’ll save time. It turned into a nightmare because the upper control arm got in the way of removing the shock assembly. Bad, and dangerous idea. I actually nicked the plastic fender trying to get it out. Thankfully its plastic! Again. Do not try to remove the shock assembly by going for these three!!!! Go for the bolts circled in blue. So much easier!
-MPP’s front (and rear) springs are softer than Teslas. This part is obvious from the look and feel. I pushed down the springs and the MPP’s have a little bounce. The Tesla’s, however, are incredible rigid. There really isn’t much difference between these springs and a solid steel sleeve. You can see from the pic below:
Tesla also beefed up the sway bar end link connector. The lower connecting rod end is stamped steel vs MPP’s billet cut solid aluminum and like the rear shock, the Tesla rod is very thin, and moves slow in both directions.
-Unlike the rears, the front height is ajustable but make sure you sleeve a 19mm long hex nut on the end of the handle or else you’ll hurt your wrist!
-After installing riding a complete set of MPP coilovers (rather than last week’s just the rear) this is a completely different car as far as suspension goes. Small bumps are gone, and big bumps feel like small bumps. Dare I say it rides like a normal everyday car? What’s very strange is that it gets more comfortable faster the car goes. I didn’t expect that.
-The reason why people say it doesn’t ride like a cadillac, is because there’s a property that comes with that kind of ride-the car reverberates. After hitting a bump, the shock takes the hit, bounces back, but then it bounces back again, although a lot less. This reverberation is what we don’t want included with the plush ride. It will take some fine tuning to get a good aoft ride without the boing-woing-woing effect. I’m pretty sure that’s whats happening.
All in all, I really like driving my car now, much more than I did, just didn’t like having to pay so much for it.
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Exelion
Member
I’m at the recommended MPP settings Front compression/front rebound:ear compression/read rebound of
12/12:10/8
I briefly bumped it to 11/9 in the rear but that started the slight reverberating in the back. Plushier, but comes with the cost. Went back to 10/8 in the rear.
12/12:10/8
I briefly bumped it to 11/9 in the rear but that started the slight reverberating in the back. Plushier, but comes with the cost. Went back to 10/8 in the rear.
gundarx
Member
I think you’ll like 10/9 in the rear, with 9 being rebound- turns from full stiff. That rear rebound adjustment seems to make the biggest impact in comfort and firmness, roll stability for this car.
Hmm...well that's not how I'm perceiving it. It's fundamentally different, not just interior rattles. Most of the loud noises over bumps are simply gone or dramatically reduced. I don't know if this is what is really happening, but it seems like previously the bump would hit the wheel, go directly into the frame and cause a big noise. Now it doesn't, the shock absorbs the impact. Or maybe a part of the original shock system would bang into the frame or other parts, or upon itself, I don't know, but it's not doing it anymore.
I wanted to update my response here, after living with the MP coilovers for awhile. (Also, for some reason, it takes me a while to make sense of equipment changes and fine tuning, whether it's bikes, skis, or in this case, cars, so bear with me here).
First, pt19713 is ultimately completely correct. As I said, because the better shocks absorb some of the harsher bumps, it reduces the noise associated with those bumps But the basic noise parameters of the car haven’t changed.
Two points to make.
First, the suspension and handling are really good. I've been comparing it very carefully to the 2017 Mercedes C350e we recently bought (cool plug in hybrid btw) which is completely loaded and has dynamic suspension settings. The MY's ride is very comparable in terms of comfort now and it’s much more enjoyable to drive.
The noise problem is still the dominant issue. It took a while to realize that much of my perception of the suspension was really a reaction to the noise coming through and if I focus exclusively on how it feels And the level of harshness it’s very good. But it’s still annoyingly noisy On anything but a very smooth road service.
Exelion
Member
Yes, the mm hub to fender distance of a MYP is 406.5mm (16"), one inch lower than the the MYLR, which has a hub to fender distance of 432mm (17"). I know this because that's also my target height.
Sez YOU!!!
My installer didn't do what I asked. I wanted OEM height, they dropped it 1.25". It doesn't work for me, around the DFW region. Way too many concrete irregularities. The will make the necessary adjustments.
It DOES look cool, though!!
Exactly what i'm looking for. Can't wait to get my coilovers. I didn't think the ride was so harsh when i first got the car but now my wife likes to point out the harshness every time we go over a pothole. This is the only aftermarket accessory she's ever been on board with
thesmokingman
Active Member
You can't really get stock height w/o compromising the valve. These are single adjustable dampers, ie height is only one way adjustable. You raise height by raising or lowering the spring perch. Thus on a fixed perched coilover as you raise the perch to raise the car, you make a compromise with the droop. Another way to visualize this is if you could pick the car up like a hotwheels car and the wheels drop down right? Imagine that in your mind. Now as you raise the car, the coilovers have no more drop or travel. You've used up all it's travel to raise the height. Thus with a fixed perch system you do not want to go up too high or low, in other words you have to be copacetic with the "designed ride height" of the coilover. If you raise the height too much you'll lose traction as the wheel will lift in corners etc. The opposite is true if you lower the car too much and in this case you end up riding on the bumps stops. Either case is bad. If stock height is a paramount concern you wanna look at a double adjustable or dual height adjustable coilover like the ohlins.Sez YOU!!!
My installer didn't do what I asked. I wanted OEM height, they dropped it 1.25". It doesn't work for me, around the DFW region. Way too many concrete irregularities. The will make the necessary adjustments.
It DOES look cool, though!!
Exelion
Member
All coilover kits were designed with the stock height in mind, actually, that's probably where the coilover designers start their designs from. The model Y has two (not one!) stock heights. Stock height means the height at which the car was delivered from the factory. The LR's and the Performance models have different stock heights, the LR with 17" and the Performance with 16". This means that if you go from 17" to 16", you're still inside a Tesla's stock height. Not that particular model, of course, but as Tesla would say "Within specs". Now don't everyone go out to their cars with tape measures, you won't like what you find.....
All the coilover companies, Unplugged, Redwood, and MPP, of course, designed their systems to fall into a range a little above and a little below this range. You can see that when you start turning the perches. Go too far up, drop the car, it rides a little higher than stock, by maybe 1/4" or so. go too far down, (but still within the limits of the coilover mfgr) and you'll be a little under the 16", maybe 15" or so. Of course, you go too high or too low and you get into the exact problems stated in the previous post.
Now, as far as the dual adjustable coilovers (which have a spin-on lower tube), I'm not so sure they're superior, especially in the regards for street use. While they do give you the extra few mm for adjustment (again, there's a range, you cannot extend them too far), what you lose is the entire body of the shock for the hydraulic mechanism. Basically, if that shock is the same length as the Tesla shock, but extended by 10mm to achieve it, that's 10mm of empty dead space that could be used for the oil/hydraulic mechanism, which is a lot-because every cubic in. of oil volume counts.
I'm actually thinking the main reason many of those shock bodies are dual-adjustable isn't actually for the consumer, but for the builder to meet the designer's specs. Think about it. If MPP asked me to design a shock with X length, it'd be a lot easier for me to grab my *universal length shock* and then screw on a lower tube, and hand it to them, job's done, rather than hit the Solidworks and draw an entire new shock from scratch just to match their request right?
Don't believe me? Take a look at this excerpt from Redwood Motorsport's manual for their Ohlins DFV coilovers:
Redwood Motorsports recommends using only spring-preload to lower the car. Not the adjustable shock tube, the spring pre-load (which is the spring perch)
I'm not Saying the Ohlin's DFV aren't good, they're probably awesome. Just saying that dual-height adjustable might not be so great as people might think.
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thesmokingman
Active Member
That's wrong on both accounts. The KW coilovers are lowered and the designed ride height is not stock. As with most KW coils they might say 1in lowered height but in reality its more like 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 in lowered or more. You don't get that slammed look by accident. It's designed for that lowered height.
Now about Redwood's recommendation, you must have missed the text where they wrote that to prevent ppl from running their cars too low to PREVENT battery punctures and damage. That recommendation has no bearing on intended design of the height adjustability. In other words they're saying to on purpose lower the height just like one would with a fixed perch system to use up the compression travel so it limits how low the car can get and drum roll how much it can compress. When lowering like this the shock has reduced compression travel thereby reducing chances of the battery impacting the ground, speed bumps etc etc. With a dual height adjustable coilover and without knowledge of this one could put the chassis very close to the ground.
That said the opposite of that raising the height doesn't have this issue.
Exelion
Member
it all comes down to what you consider stock. A stock MYP sits at 406mm (16”). A MYLR sits at 432mm (17”). The design is meant to fall into a range, and making them adjustable inside the range is exactly what they are-variable to what the consumers want.
MPP’s adjustables instructions place the max height at 426, which is a half inch below the MYLR but 1/2” above the MYP. I found I could actually go more (higher) than this but realized that may have been put there to prevent overextending the rear spacers or compressing the front springs way too much. Truly, if MPP (or KW) didn’t want us to go to those levels, they could stop cutting the threads to those points. Would’ve saved them time (and money)
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thesmokingman
Active Member
It seems too me that you are just replying in defense mode. I've no damn clue why nor do I care. The point is I made to the other poster is too teach about losing droop travel which you clearly don't understand. You pick out parts of Redwood's data w/o understanding the ramifications of what they are saying, again not understanding the underlying points. FYI, no one is dissing your MPP coilovers. There are limits to raising and lowering of height with fixed perch coilovers. What's ridiculous is that a lot of ppl are running these and no one has told you about the limits and compromises. Instead of soaking this in you try to do the opposite?
Double adjustable height coilovers are better. They allow one to change the ride height w/o impacting droop and compression. That's the whole freaking point to them. That's why Redwood suggested that ppl don't go too low and if they do, to lower by the spring perch too ON PURPOSE put the car into a compromise on the side of safety so YALL don't blow your batteries up. However that doesn't mean you have to use them instead. If the height is in the desired range single adjustable are better suited BECAUSE they are at the intended use height which makes them cheaper and less complicated. But no, you take that as a chance too diss on a better design. In racing you actually want to put the chassis as close to the ground as possible. It's called reducing aerodynamic lift.
If you're interested in learning about the differences watch this.
Exelion
Member
And it seems to me (and just about everyone else that's reading this) that you're now making passive-aggressive comments. Can you not make passive-aggressive comments?
I never implied anyone was. MPP's KW suspension is great, but they do have their flaws. I have pointed that out in one of my posts above. And of course there are limits. There are limits to adjustable body coilovers too. The point is that consumers need to read the manuals and not exceed the limits the manufacturers state.
That's the part I disagree with. The reasons I have are the following:
-What is *better*? Better for what? track racing? Autocross? Not everyone purchasing coilovers is interested in these things. I'll even venture further and say I think those who buy Model Y's for those reasons are even in the lower minority. When there's choices in design, there's advantages and disadvantages. Saying something is clearly outright *better* in every possible way is not only misleading, but also false.
-If they're discretely *better*, then why doesn't every single coilover manufacturer employ this design? You find this design in the really high end, and strangely, in the extreme low end (chinese clone brands). From a manufacturing perspective, the addition of threads on the bottom, a welded cup, and a lock ring are not more difficult to make than say, a truly advanced valve system (which Ohlins DFV has BTW)
-Unplugged coilovers cost less than MPP's, and also feature an adjustable body, like the Redwood Motorsports design. While the shocks are also Ohlins, I have not seen evidence (and I would like to) that they are Ohlins DFV.
-Another drawback (add that to the one stated in an earlier post) of the adjustable body shock is that the settings adjusters only have one location ->at the top. From what I've seen (and again, I'd like to see evidence of the contrary) the single control ties both the compression and rebound together. Settings like 10/8 or 12/10 aren't possible, only settings like 10/10 or 9/9 or 8/8 are.
Even Ohlins as a manufacturer doesn't push their dual-height adjustability. Their website clearly wants to show a better valve design. *Sets us apart from our competitors* they say:
The Features Of DFV Technology | Öhlins
So what is DFV? It is Dual Flow Valve technology – and it sets us apart from our competitors. Only Öhlins has DFV technology on its road and track products. With DFV, the dual flow valve gives the same characteristics … Continued
www.ohlins.com
Which is what the $1,000 pays for, not the dual-height adjustability, something that the Unplugged products (a lower priced system) also has.
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Hi @thesmokingman,
To be honest, I didn't read all of your posts because they are just the typical "forum expert" stuff that is full of misinformation and over-confidence, but I did want to request that you don't post information as "fact" when you don't actually have the facts in front of you.
Our dampers actually have the same droop as stock, so raising them to OEM ride height makes no difference to the remaining droop travel. These aren't some JDM coilovers with only 2" of suspension travel. One of the things we designed on our kit was tons of droop, so that even at a high ride hight the user would never run out of droop travel.
Secondly, using body adjustable dampers are downright dangerous for one specific reason - users and shops who think they are smarter than they are. The Model 3 and Model Y both have suspension links that will crash solid into the chassis if the damper is allowed to travel too far. With large wheels and tires this contact will happen before the vehicle touches the ground. We spend a lot of energy ensuring that the body lengths and bump rubbers are tuned in a way that allows maximum compression travel without contact.
This is one point I am extremely serious about as being a safety-critical aspect, so the fact that you're arguing for the exact opposite is actually comical.
I will strongly say that adjustable body length dampers have zero advantages on this application among the entire range of uses we offer, UNLESS the user is cutting the chassis up for additional suspension travel. In that case, I could see how shortening the body length would be advantageous with a massive tire diameter. We have the same droop as OEM, and more compression travel.
If you'd like to start a separate thread to discuss these points and "keyboard race" about the minute internal differences between Ohlins and KW, go right ahead, but please let's keep this thread on the topic of customer impressions and reviews of our suspension kit, so that curious customers can get a feeling of what these ride like and whether they are the right choice for them.
With lots of love,
Sasha Anis
To be honest, I didn't read all of your posts because they are just the typical "forum expert" stuff that is full of misinformation and over-confidence, but I did want to request that you don't post information as "fact" when you don't actually have the facts in front of you.
Our dampers actually have the same droop as stock, so raising them to OEM ride height makes no difference to the remaining droop travel. These aren't some JDM coilovers with only 2" of suspension travel. One of the things we designed on our kit was tons of droop, so that even at a high ride hight the user would never run out of droop travel.
Secondly, using body adjustable dampers are downright dangerous for one specific reason - users and shops who think they are smarter than they are. The Model 3 and Model Y both have suspension links that will crash solid into the chassis if the damper is allowed to travel too far. With large wheels and tires this contact will happen before the vehicle touches the ground. We spend a lot of energy ensuring that the body lengths and bump rubbers are tuned in a way that allows maximum compression travel without contact.
This is one point I am extremely serious about as being a safety-critical aspect, so the fact that you're arguing for the exact opposite is actually comical.
I will strongly say that adjustable body length dampers have zero advantages on this application among the entire range of uses we offer, UNLESS the user is cutting the chassis up for additional suspension travel. In that case, I could see how shortening the body length would be advantageous with a massive tire diameter. We have the same droop as OEM, and more compression travel.
If you'd like to start a separate thread to discuss these points and "keyboard race" about the minute internal differences between Ohlins and KW, go right ahead, but please let's keep this thread on the topic of customer impressions and reviews of our suspension kit, so that curious customers can get a feeling of what these ride like and whether they are the right choice for them.
With lots of love,
Sasha Anis
Ruffles
Member
@MountainPass - How many miles do you think it takes for the suspension to fully settle? I noticed about 1/2" additional drop all around after my initial install at around 1500 miles so I re-adjusted the height. I'm at 2k miles now and the rear has settled another 1/4" (front about 1/8"). Should I wait a little longer before I adjust ride height again? The first time I reset my height, I checked the measurements of the spring perches and they hadn't changed so it wasn't a problem of loosing height due to loose set screws etc. Thoughts?
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