Has Anyone Read The Adjustable Shock Article in the April CHP?

[Gearhead Dude]

The April issue of Chevy High Performance has an interesting article (p. 40) discussing Alston's Single and Double-adjustable shocks. On an A-Body built for spirited street driving, are they worth the extra budget expense? I've got a set of Edelbrock IAS shocks on now but it's not yet on the road, so I don't know how well they work. I've got Hotchkis springs and swaybar package with aftermarket rear control arms.

[ss dave]

I'll let you know in about a month.
I removed my IAS and replacing them with the DA Varishocks all around.

[Gearhead Dude]

Cool, I'll be very interested to hear your thoughts! While the DAs will be a dramatic improvement over the IAS, did you have any problems with them?

[ss dave]

No, but Iam changing my front and rear suspension.
Got a 69 Camaro vert, removing GW front stuff for ATS spindles, Hotchkiss sprngs, SPC UCA and SC&C LCA, G link rear with DA's all around. Read the article today btw.

[silver69camaro]

I am a firm believe that you should buy the best damper your money can buy; they are hands-down better than off-the-shelf units. They DO make a difference.

[Tom Vogel]

Bump... Well? Whats the verdict?

[rlovell383]

I just installed a set of single adjustables in my 67, replacing KYBS.... It literally transformed the car. No exaggeration. The suspension actually tracks the road now, rather than skipping over the bumps and just being stiff. Highly recommended.

Randy

[buddyholly]

I have run the Varishocks on the front and back for a year now. Had KYB's on before. Neat to be able to adjust them to my needs but not nearly as dramatic a change as I was expecting. I have a problem with the rear Varishocks so I had to switch back to the KYBs and after a few miles I hardly notice a difference. Still running the fronts and I think the front makes the bigger difference.

[Freddiecougar]

I think that Mary Pozzi made a very good case for the effectiveness of good adjustable shocks over the weekend in Costa Mesa. She had good bolt-on parts, then supplimented them with our DA VariShocks. She was running right with (or in front of) cars with much more elaborate and expensive systems. Maybe we could get her to chime in? Mary????
Tim

[Twentyover]

How much is due to the shock, and how much to Mary's madd skillz as a crosser

[JRouche]

Good topic. I am in the process of putting in some shockwaves. They are the same as the varishocks from what I can tell. I have double adjustable. My question is where do you start??

So you have adjustments for both rebound and compression. Do you start off with a midrange setting then move from there. Just one at a time, otherwise you dont know what change made a difference. And I dont see them making that much of a difference really, from click to click. Not that I will notice. Im not a racer or anything, just a street car. But I see them as being made for a street car, they arent really track type shocks. Which makes them perfect for me.

Now spring rates, or even more so, sway bar rates make a dramatic "feel" in the change. But the adjustable shocks, I dont know. Maybe snake oil?? I cant say till I drive it, almost there :) JR

[Norm Peterson]

Here is a shock tuning guide for Koni double-adjustables that should generally work except for the detailed descriptions concerning how to actually make the adjustments. For street use, you may find that dialing back to slightly less damping than optimum for road-race is preferable.


KONI ADJUSTMENT TUNING GUIDE
Suggested Adjustment Procedures For Road Racing Use

Adjusting The COMPRESSION (Bump) Damping Control
(Very Important to do this FIRST!)
Bump damping controls the unsprung weight of the vehicle (wheels, axles, etc.). It controls the upward movement of the suspension as when hitting a bump in the track. It should not be used to control the downward movement of the vehicle when it encounters dips. Also, it should not be used to control roll or bottoming.
Depending on the vehicle, the ideal bump setting can occur at any point within the adjustment range. This setting will be reached when "side-hop" or "walking" in a bumpy turn is minimal and the ride is not uncomfortably harsh. At any point other than this ideal setting, the "side-hopping" condition will be more pronounced and the ride may be too harsh.
STEP 1: Set all four dampers on minimum bump and minimum rebound settings.
STEP 2: Drive one or two laps to get the feel of the car. Note: When driving the car during the bump adjustment phase, disregard body lean or roll and concentrate solely on how the car feels over bumps. Also, try to notice if the car "walks" or "side-hops" on a rough turn.
STEP 3: Increase bump adjustment clockwise 3 clicks on all four dampers. Drive the car one or two laps. Repeat Step 3 until a point is reached where the car starts to feel hard over bumpy surfaces.
STEP 4: Back off the bump adjustment two clicks. The bump control is now set. Note: The back off point will probably be reached sooner on one end of the vehicle than the other. If this occurs, keep increasing the bump on the soft end until it, too, feels hard. Then back it off 2 clicks. The bump control is now set.

Adjusting the REBOUND Damping Control
Once you have found what you feel to be the best bump setting on all four wheels, you are now ready to proceed with adjusting the rebound. The rebound damping controls the transitional roll (lean) as when entering a turn. It does *not* limit the total amount of roll; it *does* limit how *fast* this total roll angle is achieved. How much the vehicle actually leans is determined by other things such as spring rate, sway bars, roll center, ride heights, etc.
It should be noted that too much rebound on either end of the vehicle will cause an initial loss of lateral acceleration (cornering grip) a that end which will cause the vehicle to oversteer or understeer excessively when entering a turn. Too much rebound control in relation to spring rate will cause a condition known as "jacking down." This is a condition where, after hitting a bump and compressing the spring, the damper does not allow the spring to return to a neutral position before the next bump is encountered. This repeats with each subsequent bump until the car is actually lowered onto the bump stops. Contact with the bump stops causes a drastic increase in roll stiffness. If this condition occurs on the front, the car will understeer; if it occurs on the rear, the car will oversteer.
STEP 1: With rebound set on full soft and the bump control set from your earlier testing, drive the car one of two laps, paying particular attention to how the car rolls when entering a turn.
STEP 2: Increase rebound damping three sweeps (or 3/4 turn) on all four dampers and drive the car one or two laps. Repeat Step 2 until the car enters the turns smoothly (no drastic attitude changes) and without leaning excessively. An increase in the rebound stiffness beyond this point is unnecessary and may result in a loss of cornering power. Note: As with the bump settings, this point will probably be reached at one end of the car before the other.
However, individual drivers may find it desirable to have a car that assumes an oversteering or understeering attitude when entering a turn. This can be easily "dialed-in" using slightly excessive rebound settings at either end.


Norm

[Freddiecougar]

How much is due to the shock, and how much to Mary's madd skillz as a crosser

I'm certainly not trying to steal any credit away from her ability, she is a terrific driver! However, there was a noticable difference in the handling characteristics of her car from when she started Saturday Morning to the time when she made her best laps on Sunday. The front end needed to be tightened up, it was lifting like a drag car when she would get on the throttle leaving a corner, so that was addressed. She needed the back end to step out a little to turn quicker, so we tightened the bump to make it a little tail happy. All in all, it was the whole package that worked, and I believe that the adjustable shocks were an important part of that. If you talk to Mary, ask her opinion, i'm certain that she would have some more to add.
Tim

[claytonisbob]

Thanks for the Koni Adjustment Guide Norm. Thats useful to know regardless of brand of DA's.

[bochnak]

I have the single adj Varishocks up front, stock rear for now. I love the adjustability as 1 click makes a difference.

I'll probably run the re-valved bilstiens for the rear due to funds $$$$.

[JEFFTATE]

The adjustment guide is helpful .
Thanks !

My car has a bit of "side-hop" or "walking" in curves.
Maybe I have the front shocks adjusted too tight ???
Hmmm......

[GetMore]

Adjustable shocks are probably the less expensive way to make sure you have the proper damping for your car.
Actually putting your car on a chassis suspension dyno and getting custom valved shocks tends to cost more.

The ability to adjust for the planned use helps as well, since you can change between street and track settings.

[ProdigyCustoms]

We have run double adjustables on many of our cars for years. Both drab and Pro Touring. Awesome. Simply awesome.

[Twentyover]

I'm certainly not trying to steal any credit away from her ability, she is a terrific driver! However, there was a noticable difference in the handling characteristics of her car from when she started Saturday Morning to the time when she made her best laps on Sunday. The front end needed to be tightened up, it was lifting like a drag car when she would get on the throttle leaving a corner, so that was addressed. She needed the back end to step out a little to turn quicker, so we tightened the bump to make it a little tail happy. All in all, it was the whole package that worked, and I believe that the adjustable shocks were an important part of that. If you talk to Mary, ask her opinion, i'm certain that she would have some more to add.
Tim

Tim-

My comment was not directed to the portion of the comment regarding adjustable shocks, but more toward the comment that she beat more sophisticated setups with a more primative suspension design. A better comparison would be for Mary to have tested the more sophisticated setups with double adjustables in addition to the tuned shock setup she ran. This would factor out differences in skill between the more primative vs more spohisticated designs.

An even better test would have been to run a readily available high performance shock, single adjustables, and double adjustables on two or more course configurations. This would tell guys like me that maybe a single adjustable is say 1 sec faster than high performance shelf dampening, and the double adjustable 1.2 seconds faster then the shelf dampening for a given setup. The use of multiple course configurations would address the variable of course design inadvertently favoring the shelf dampening.

With this data, I could make a more informed decision on whether to spend the incremental money for the single or double adjustables over the shelf shock.

Or I could read the article........


Thinking (dangerous) further, you could set up an orthagnonal array and run a Toguchi mthods DOE to determine what impact each variable had on performance

[David Pozzi]

Mary loved the Varishocks, she started out with a street setting, very soft. Then added more as she went. The DA's give you twice the adjustment but twice the confusion if you don't keep track of how many turns which way on which knob!!! When we got home we found one knob that was quite a bit off... There's something about laying on your back all turned-around to get at those knobs that can make it easy to go wrong.

I like the ability to change settings and reduce body roll or front rise. Some shock mfr's will tell you shocks can't reduce body roll, but if you are starting out with too-soft a shock, the roll can be reduced by stiffer valving, especially under autocross conditions where you do severe left-right turns, and you have plenty of torque multiplication running in 1st gear.
David

[redhead]

excuse me while I vent for a second.
I read the article and afterwards I wondered why I did since I knew
the outcome. as far as useful information the article was null
and void. ok, maybe we got a couple graphs but not much that
a tuner could use. what really bugs me is there was only one
product brand discussed and one source of data -Alston himself
so to me it was nothing but a multi-page advertisement.
what we need is true standardized product comparisons and some
sort of testing of several products on a common chassis.

JR is spot on.. how do you setup a car with adjustables?
where do you start?

this type of hodrod journalism is typical and regretable.

[mpozzi]

+1 and a million to what Dave just said ... I had installed the DA VariShocks about a month before Costa Mesa Good Guys and set the knobs at 3 clicks (both bump and rebound) as I do drive the car on the street. Tim McCain kept telling me to go up ... and then up a bit more until I either felt something good or not so good (push/snap oversteer). It's good to have some adjustability and suspension tuneability in your arsenal. Especially for the tight courses Good Guys has as a couple of tenths on a 30-second course isn't much cushion. I'm very happy with these shocks ...

My first runs produced some understeer on mid-corner and corner exit but this could also have been from the brand-new virgin Kumhos; as the morning progressed, the car behaved very neutral. After going up three clicks on all four shocks (both bump and rebound), the front end stopped going up and the times started coming down. A couple of clicks more for front rebound saw a few tenths more leave the board. And on from there ... this was the primary adjustment I did and pretty much left the tire pressures around 32 psi (hot) for the two days.

I ended up with 10 total clicks for the front (both bump and rebound) with the rears at 6 clicks for bump and 5 for rebound. It's an experimentation process and each car is different. I logged the settings in the run book and will use them for Del Mar. For the street, I'll soften the shocks back to around 5 for front and 3 for rear ... maybe.

What was also neat is that after each shock adjustment change, my own personal "butt-dyno" could feel the difference. I made changes in two or three-click intervals, not one, and it really helped as this course had no real straights, lots of transitions (a good shock helps here), and a turnaround at each end.

Cheers,
Mary Pozzi

[mpozzi]

excuse me while I vent for a second.
I read the article and afterwards I wondered why I did since I knew
the outcome. as far as useful information the article was null
and void. ok, maybe we got a couple graphs but not much that
a tuner could use. what really bugs me is there was only one
product brand discussed and one source of data -Alston himself
so to me it was nothing but a multi-page advertisement.
what we need is true standardized product comparisons and some
sort of testing of several products on a common chassis.

JR is spot on.. how do you setup a car with adjustables?
where do you start?

this type of hodrod journalism is typical and regretable.

Talk to some of the editors of the car mags as this could be an excellent article. Take a few cars, test several brands and types of shocks, use an autocross course, slalom, and road as categories ...

Mary P.

[Jeremy]

I've got DA's on the front and once click can make a big difference.

I adjusted the compression as the guide suggested and there comes a point where one click was too much.

I think they are at their best when you deviate from a suspension kit.

Pricey, but I could not dial in my combo without them. I will probably never get autocross or track it, but they have let me achieve a better ride and better handling than stock.

[Marcus SC&C]

It`s hard to convey how important proper shock dampening is in a performance handling application. You have to experience it to appreciate it. Good adj. shocks aren`t in everyones budget but if you can swing em, do it! These cars are all hot rods, no two are exactly alike so no out of the box fixed rate shocks will ever be perfectly spot on.
If you`re concerned about how to set them and where to start with your application simply buy them from a dealer who knows your car, knows the shocks and can give you meaningful input on starting settings and tuning from there based on your feedback. We do, every day. :) Mark SC&C

[ss dave]

Since I saw the flames on this thread I went back to it and realized I posted, so update.
Got the G link installed after some part changes. Looks great but going to have to be creative on the exhaust.
Had trouble getting the AFX spindles, but they arrived last week, and the SKF hubs arrived Fri.
Front gets put together this week.
Should have it on the road in two weeks with the new suspension and new Bowler tranny.
I'll post my experience but the news from Ms. Pozzi and others sounds great.

[zman1969]

well I've been trying to learn up here, but I'm a regular guy that finds it hard to swallow 180$ a shock for QA1's - could you guys in the know give us some ranges of something Ok or Good vs Great? I was figuring on $70-$90 range but $720 for a set of shocks for a street driven car that may see a auto-X once a year, Im ready to buy some now for the rear of my bird but its gonna have to be a custom as stock upper mounts are gone- the maker of the mount kit recommended: 11in retracted & 18in extended with a ½ in variance
We recommend the QA1 shocks part number 122-sts1578P. However any shock you choose this length will work as long as it’s the stated length. - both upper and lower mounts are like 1/2" stud mounts. Im not sure what to use up front - with Hotchkis springs all around and a rack and pinion install from BRP- with a ls6 I dont know how high it will be sitting so I was going to see and maybe buy new LCA and coilover front setup so the height is adjustable - sorry to be longwinded but thats where I am - looking for the Guru advice!

[zman1969]

well I finally found out Chris alston caries the Vari-shocks and the single adj are up there with the QA1's how about bilsteins? KYBs? - any opinions guys?

[neki67]

Koni's?

Hey, I'm Dutch (as is Koni) you can't blame me . . .

[Bryce]

I went with AFCO's T2 double adjustable coilovers. I just finished building my front suspension last sunday. I set camber/caster and went around the block to let things settle in. First test drive was decent. More tuning to come. Lowered the car a liitle more last night and checked the settings. It was sprinkling in San Diego yesterday so i didnt drive it. Tonight i will get some miles on it.

I will keep posting updates on tuning the shocks.

[Skip Fix]

"Mary loved the Varishocks, she started out with a street setting, very soft. Then added more as she went. The DA's give you twice the adjustment but twice the confusion if you don't keep track of how many turns which way on which knob!!! When we got home we found one knob that was quite a bit off... There's something about laying on your back all turned-around to get at those knobs that can make it easy to go wrong." I'm sure!

Kind of like starting to mess with air bleeds and emulsion bleed holes on a carb-easy to screw it up!

[Marcus SC&C]

I`ll throw a little general advice out for the guys who asked for it. This is all based on my own opinions and of working with all sorts of shocks on both street and race cars in our shop for 25+ years. As always YMMV. :)
Non adj. stock type shocks: best bang for the buck IMO Bilsteins. Especially at the prices you can get them at right now. If we could get them cheap enough to make any money on them we`d sell them like candy. Konis? Just as good but more $$$. I wouldn`t give you a dollar for a whole set of KYBs.
Adj. aluminum shocks: QA1 and Varishock look as if they`re very similar but they only look that way. We also do hot rod service work and deal with a LOT more QA1 issues than any other adj. shocks. Even Alden Eagle "streetrod grade" shocks seem to hold up better. The Varishocks are reliable and hold up well. Adjustments are nice and repeatable and the adj. range is huge. For the price you can`t beat em. The next step up in Bilstein or Koni adj. aluminum race shocks is more than twice as expensive and would require fabbing all new brackets etc. to install. What`s more on a PT car you`d probably never be able to feel any difference. Mark SC&C

[Lowend]

Adjustable shocks are probably the most useful real-time tuning tool out there. BUT you have to tune them. Having shocks say adjustable on the box actually buys you more problems when they first come out of the box.

In my experience QA-1s are not well built, lots of issues. I have seen some pretty out of wack shock dynos (other's data) with them.
Varishocks came along because Alston was sick of having issues with QA1 after being their biggest dealer in the country

[Steve1968LS2]

That's funny.. there's a shock article in the new Camaro Performers as well. lol -- mine goes more into explaining the difference between twin tube and mono-tube.

The only problem with adjustable shocks is that most people have them adjusted wrong. I miss the adjustability, but I feel far less pressure at an event since I don't have to wonder "should I click the knob?".. I just drive. :)

The Track Rat will have some new wiz-bang Varishock that they are cooking up. Can't wait to check them out!

[Lowend]

I should add. For a street car, there isn't much need for an adjustable shock. Once your valving is correct (a-la custom Bilstiens) there is no reason to go back in. Kinda like coilovers.

For a race car or even a dual purpose car; they become an outstanding tool allowing you to compromise on the street for a more aggressive ride at the track. This is why I just dropped $2K on a set of Ohlins' for my STi project.

It's also very easy to get carried away with remote reservoirs, pushrods ect. I know more than a couple of Auto-xers who have $10K into just shock absorbers.
The best
http://www.penskeshocks.com/
http://www.ohlinsusa.com/us/
http://www.jrzusa.com/
http://www.kw-suspension.com

[amx2334]

How does one decide between single and double adjustable? besides $$$. Does anyone have first hand experience with changing from single to double and was it an improvement worth the money?
If you are running double adj. what are the settings both for comp. and rebound? are they usually the same or close to it?
I am trying to decide which ones to go with. I have both but need to sell one set off before the car is on the road.

[Norm Peterson]

If your wheels, tires, rotors, and the rest of your unsprung mass now is significantly higher than OE, you'll probably be better off with the DA's.

Keep in mind that compression damping is primarily aimed at controlling the unsprung mass, and that the general formula for critical damping has %critical damping being a square root function of mass. So if your new unsprung mass happens to be 20% heavier than the OE, you may want to start with about 10% more compression damping than OE. Obviously, that's if OE compression damping was satisfactory with the OE unsprung mass.


Norm

[Rick Dorion]

Great info. I just got a front set of DA Varishocks. The directions help but for a starting setting, should I have a difference between compression and rebound settings?

[Norm Peterson]

Full soft on both. Adjust compression to suit, then adjust rebound.

I'm guessing that this approach keeps rebound damping from confusing your interpretation of the car's behavior as you are setting the compression damping. More rebound damping momentarily unloads inside wheels to a greater extent - and that additional "removed" load has to change the wheel loading elsewhere, like the corners that you're trying to set the compression damping on.


Norm