Sell the AGX, get Billies. Even on NB top hats and stock valving I expect them to be heaps better. Just don't get too low, else you will be spending a LOT of time on bumpstops=uncomfortable, as already pointed out by Six. And keep it on stock sways.

 

Thanks man, this is the tentative plan. Already have the ISC 1" front 1.5" rear tophats I'll be using. I'll keep my Ground controls and put 'em on the billies and see what happens from there.

Thanks again!

 

Try 450/350, extended top hats, good bump stops, and stock sway bars. If you go too low on the rear rate you end up contacting the bump stops too easily on bigger bumps. The softer stock bars will give you more independent wheel travel over bumps and stop that side to side shaking of your head on the street.

 

My friend has spec miata take offs with 450/350, runs about stock ride height with NA top hats and cut down mini bump stops and no sway bars. (The rear was takennoff before, front got bent in a crash and never replaced). It rides super nice.

 

So I finally got almost all my ****. I got the ground control kit to start with because I got it very cheap used.

I have some bumpstops left from my Mk4 Jetta that are the yellow ones and seem to be OK durometer. The only problem is that the center hole is 1/4in bigger or so.
I imagine that this must make it softer since it can not only expand out but expand in when compressed (imagine a donut getting fatter I guess), but does it really matter that it's bigger?
If not, you can get these for $6 from Amazon with Prime delivery.

They def sit on the shock and not tied to the tophat, but I don't see any issues with that since the shock is German and the bump stop is german, they probably understand each other well
Size difference (that's the tophat washer btw, so the shock shaft is actually a bit bigger).

 

I used them anyway and in the rear there is some travel before the bump stop.
In the front however, I'm using the stock front NB bump stops cut down to 45mm, I understand that the first two bumps are hollow and the last one is solid, but with a hub-fender distance of 13'', I'm already touching the bump stop as in the picture below.

Do I need extended tophats in the front to run 12.75 fender to hub? Seems odd that I'd have more clearance in the back than the front no?

 

I normally end up trimming the bump stops to ~25mm or down to the last "lump". Trim, extend top hats or raise the car.

 

In the front there's really only about 20mm more shock travel available for NB bilsteins with extended tophats before your tyre will be hitting things (at least on the NB I measured on).

So a smaller top hat extension (1" or less) and keep cutting down the bump stop and testing till you're not far from making wheel contact to get as much travel as possible.

 

But I took the picture with a 13'' distance to the center of the hub, I understand that many run at 12.5'' in the front, so not even close to having my tire hit anything from what I understand.
I'm looking at the Maruha, thinking of ordering them directly unless someone here bought a couple to resell or something.

 

No that's where you would be wrong, lots of people run at 12.5" and fully into the bump stop, these are the people that complain about their shocks being crap. There can be a full 1" of travel difference between a 205 and 245 tire, alignment matters build tolerances matter, so the only way to do this right is pull the spring and trim your bump stop for your setup

 

Back from the dead...

My free 97R Billies are bad, one leaking, one partially blown (if that's a thing, the top 1-2" has no resistance). So you get what you pay for.

Since I am in a pinch to get something together (car now needs to be floggable October 20) I managed to land some higher mileage NB Billies off an NB1 with the LS suspension. Should arrive today/tomorrow and I can piece them together with the rest of the parts. Also landed some Raceland springs with helpers as another spring option.. should be 400 & 350. I should be able to pull together something with all the stuff I have, as long as the shock are not leaking or blown as advertised. Ditched the cheapo ES bumpstops and bought 5X 36mm blue units, and their NB top hat conversion parts (which I won't need for this setup since it's now going to be NB on NB).

Oh, and the backup plan of using the Allstar sleeves on the KYB AGX - no joy. The AGX needs some adapter spacer thing to catch the lip of the collars, they just slide past. FCM used to sell a kit to do it but not any longer. Anyone know if such a kit exists any longer somewhere else? Would be nice to be able to build these out as cheap coilovers to toss on a flip car.

Who is the current recommended choice if I wanted to have the bad 97R shocks rebuilt/revalved? Or is that a moron move?

 

About ready to pull the trigger and could use some mild spoon feeding. I've settled on 7" QA1 550 front and 7" QA1 350 rear on my OEM MSM billies. Car would mainly be a street car but will see some track duty from time to time. Will also be purchasing Marhua top hats for the front and rear. One final question, i've seen mentioning of running 6" springs in the front with a 550 spring rate. Any reason why I would do that over the 7" spring? Also, i skipped out on the torrington bearings but i'm going back and forth on that and their true need. Anything else I'm missing in the below list? "build" list below:

 

Might not be able to achieve not-monster-truck height with 7" springs. The better question would be: What perceived advantage do you feel you would gain with 7" springs?

 

Thanks for the feedback. That was one of my concerns. The primary advantage was avoiding coil bind, but i just skimmed over the thread again and am probably misguided in thinking a 7" spring is needed to avoid coil bind with the spring rates I'm going with. I'm assuming with a 6" spring and the same rates, i should be OK.

 

You wouldn't hit coil bind with a 5" spring.

 

Thanks. Appreciate the feedback. The goal is around 4.5" pinch weld height. I did skim a few other threads and some people have gotten there on 7" springs, but on shorter Koni shocks. I'm guessing it would make sense to go with the 6" springs to compensate for the longer OEM MSM billies to get to around that ride height?

Apologies for the spoon feeding. but appreciative of the help.

 

OEM MSM billies are same length as normal NB billies. I can tell you with authority that 6" springs are appropriate on MSM shocks for that ride height. (Exactly what my budget setup is.)

 

Awesome. Any particular reason why most other 550f/350r setups run 7" springs at similar heights as I'm looking to run? I'm assuming those setups are probably maxed out with the spring sitting at the very bottom of the collar.

Trying to see if there's maybe something else I'm missing here in terms of advantage with a 7" spring, but if coil bind isn't an issue and my ride height seems to be about median from all the other builds i looked at, i don't know what other reason i'd go with a 7" vs a 6".

 

 

Longer springs will do nothing to combat unseating.