Raceland coilovers:good, bad, or ugly?
 

I've recently inherited a '99 that has sat for around 6 years. I've already had a lot of work needed done just to get it Road worthy. It's got Tokiko shocks and lowered springs. It pretty much hits the bump stops constantly and sounds like it's scraping. And the car gets the shakes at around 35-40 and again at around 65-70. I need to 'fix' the suspension but don't have a lot of funds right now. New baby and wife is quitting her job to stay home with said baby. I need to get new stuff and leaning towards the raceland.com coilovers. I've tried to research and even sent some members messages with no returns. I'm sure I'll get some bashing but if the end result is my car rides better than so be it! Thanks in advance!

IMO, I would just try to find some bilsteins and do the DIY coilover sleeve job. Definitely way better than racelands, and you can probably do it for about the same cost.

OK, I have seen that thread on how to do the conversion. What springs would I get?

Do not get racelands. Buy normal safe suspension from any part out thread and focus on your wife and baby.

Sounds like you need to figure out what's wrong specifically instead of just blindly replacing with crappy coils.

Agreed. Buy Bilsteins from a Mazdaspeed and leave everything else for now. You will be amazed at the difference. Later you can add stronger springs and the shocks will handle it.

"the shakes" ?? Sounds like you need to balance your wheels. Whats your goal with the suspension? Maybe just find some stock springs to swap in?

What Tokico shocks? They might be fine with some real springs on them.

I'll be dealing with the wheels and tires as well. Just don't want to spend money on new tires and ruin them because the camber and toe is so bad. The Tokiko's have the dial on them. Not sure the model. I tried emailing Tokiko to see if I could send them to them to have them rebuilt. No response.

I guess I could contact a local shop to have them rebuilt. Just figured might as well put my money toward some new stuff.

It sounds like he's got the "65mph shimmy"... this is well known Miata issue. It's an interaction between a tire imbalance and the resonant frequency of the chassis which most often shows up exactly as described... shimmy at 33 and 65mph, varying slightly between individual cars.

Tons of threads on it over at M.net...

Given the car sat for 6 years, the tires probably need to be replaced.

I had replied to the earlier post and never made it past the administrators. I plan on addressing the wheels and tires but want to fix the suspension first so I don't ruin new tires. I guess I need to at least go get them balanced first. Hopefully if there was any flatspotting of the tires from sitting it's worked itself out from me driving it a bit.

You need to search on miata.net, there is a specific type of balancing machine you want to use, and then to certain specs. Get new tires on and balanced, then worry about suspension. You won't destroy the tires in the time frame that you should be sorting this all out in.

The first thing you should do is check your driveshaft. Just get under there and wiggle it.
A bad U-joint was the cause of my shimmy.

The car sat for six years. If the tires haven't been changed yet, that's the obvious first place to look. My Comp2s developed permanent flat spots - you can see the runout just from spinning the wheels with car in the air - after sitting for just a few months at recommended pressure, resulting in vibration. Then there's the fact that 6+ year-old rubber won't be good anymore anyway. Change and balance the tires, if you haven't already, and see if the shimmy is still there.

Also if the clutch was ever changed, be sure to jack the ppf and trans a bit so it's horizontal before snugging down the bolts. Slight misalignment might exacerbate drive shaft imbalances if it's in rough shape.

if I had a basket, I'd put those deplorable shocks in it.

Just buy something like this to get the car up and moving.

Mazda Miata (NB) - Front and Rear Shocks