Konan

I’ve recent purchased a 120K bug eye wagon with some suspension work done on it. As I understand it, it has Blue Prodrive springs, whiteline front and rear ARB and droplinks. For all I know, the struts could be original 120K items.

I’ve not had a lot of time to acquaint myself with the car, but I’ have noticed that the car appears to be quite ‘soft’ on a good old bump test. Just pushing on the A pillar, I can easily rock the car from side to side. By comparison, my Standard blobeye with 50K (fairly new rear struts as the inverted type packed up at 30K) is rock solid, as is our Yaris SR. My folks have a GX wagon and, although I’ve not had them side by side, I’d say it’s the closest thing in terms of being ‘easy to rock’

The car settles straight away with no knocking, so I don’t believe the struts have ‘had it’ – I need to take it out again and see what the nose does under heavy breaking.

The car definitely sits lower than standard and feels fine to drive, although I’ve not been able to take it anywhere to really stretch it yet. Parking in a rough grass carpark I did find it jolted me over ruts (bump stops need cutting down to suit the drop?).

I’m not a believer in ‘lower and stiffer is better’ and accept that a more supple suspension may suit the car, but I do intend to take the car on track so I want to be confident that the suspension is as it should be! I did wonder if the lowering was achieved through lower rate springs.

I'm not sure how the whiteline ARBs figure in this either, I'd assumed they where thicker items and would make the car more resistant to being rocked from the side? Again, it's much easier to bounce than my standard car!

Any advice appreciated, especially if somebody has a similar setup for comparison. I can identify knackered suspension but I'm less able to determine if it's tiered. I'm also finding it hard to find any conclusive answers on how it should be.

If It helps, I could video how the car moves compared to standard.

Konan

Well, it behaves on track OK. Although the rear struts are now definitely a knockin.