Handling Worse after lowering
 

Hi guys, I have recently lowered my 2004 blobeye wagon using some Eibach pro kit lowering springs. Still on standard shocks. I love the look and dont drive her like a crazy man so didnt need to get coilovers. Anyway, I have noticed she seems to under steer a bit easier than when she was on standard springs. They have been fitted correctly. She is fine on a smooth bit of road but on a road with some potholes, she can make a knocking/clunking sound. I dont know if these problems are related. Cant see any oil leaking from rear shocks. Considered getting the eibach anti roll bar kit or the roll centre kit. Any ideas?

have you had the wheel alignment done?

knocking/clunking could be ARB bushes or top mounts, if they are on the way out then the lowering will only amplify this.

Also 4 wheel alignment is crucial to getting the most out of it, my car was all over the place when I first got it but after a proper geo setup it's been transformed!

You need 4 wheel alignment, or you may as well if not bothered

Sounds like a wheel alignment is gonna have to be done. I stupidly haven't done this since lowering it. Doh! Thanks for responses guys. I drove her again this afternoon and maybe I'm exaggerating the clunk noise. She wasn't making any noises on normal roads or speed bumps. Just when there was a road with bad potholes under both sides of the car. Will check bushes too. Thanks again.

Having the alignment done transformed my bug STI. Would be the first thing I'd recommend to any owner.

You need to re-align your car as all the settings will have changed

Eibach Pro-kit springs lower the Impreza a little too much :(

This will mean great looks, but unfortunately your dampers have lost almost all of their travel and are almost or are on their bump stops - that is the nasty crashing noise over sharp bumps etc

You could trim your bump stops to get a tad more travel

As for the under steer, this again is down to the over-lowering. Your front wheels are not maintaining their camber under cornering load and the tyre is loosing its contact patch and grip (as well as other factors like rolling too much)

Have a look at your bottom arms and see if they are horizontal or sloping downwards or upwards (probably about level or maybe up)

Sorry to pee on your parade, but there are ways to improve things - you can for instance fit a roll centre correction kit etc to reduce understeer

Roll centre kit and alignment made a big difference on my wagon; Bonesetter knows what he is talking about

Eibachs I found to be too soft a spring in a newage.

Pair of these on the front, dome side up:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/FEBI-27848...item43d0985a8e

And, as bonesetter suggested - a roll centre kit.

Are you using the 120mm or 90mm rear bump stops?

I second Bone's comments.

Your car is a McPherson Strut system. Lowering lowers roll centre way below the standard, and far more than CoG lowers. Roll correction kits replace the front arm balljoints with longer ones to lower the outer pivot down to restore geometry and reduce roll. It doesn't fix the back though!

The roll axix will change and the car will want to really push down the back corners under load, lifting weight off the front inner tyre and causing that understeer.

The crashing is the car sitting on it's bump stops. Subaru use these to compensate for soft springing to give a nicer ride. On hard cornering a standard car will lean on these anyway, but you should have had 1'' of travel before pushing on these elastomer spring s and now you don't, os the damping is not set to work with the additional spring rate.

Your car must feel pretty nasty to drive.....

Cheap fix? put your old springs back on.....

If you have to have the car lower, then alignment and a fugoff big rear ARB plus cut one blob off the bump stops.

All crude though. Subaru put all this effort into designing and testing the chassis and you mess with it.

to be fair most subarus came out of the factory understeering -

top gear pointed that out about the WR1

Most cars come out of the factory understeering, except the RWD ones and even some of those do it because it's safer and easier to control, also cheaper to produce FWD cars than having a prop shaft and rear diff, you also get the benefit of avoidance braking if you have the presence of mind to do it.:thumb: