Howdy,
On Wed, 13 Oct 1999, Jamie Sculerati wrote:
> Is this really true, or just an enduring autocross myth? Mark Chiles' use
> of custom shocks on his Neon generated lots of discussion at one time, but
> I haven't met or heard of many others who followed his lead. And based on
> an article Mark wrote for Grassroots Motorsports, the advantage gained
> from those fancy shocks has largely been negated by advances in
> aftermarket offerings for the Neon -- he was just ahead of the market.
The "Daddio Setup" stuff is $1200 for all four. Its just koni x
adjustables (earlier ones were singles, later are doubles) with no gas
pressure and revalved rebound/compression. The no gas pressure in the
fronts lets the car settle on its (relatively weak) springs to about 1/8"
above the bump stops. The valving is revalved to treat those bump stops
as springs. You'll hear about how the super stiff rebound packs the
shocks down to the bumpstop. That's (in my expierience) inaccurate. The
car will settle off a jack to within 1/8" of the bumpstop, no rebound
damping involved. The rebound damping change is to keep the stiff spring
effect of the bumpstop from tossing the suspension up off the bumpstop on
rebound.
> I have met or heard of no one using reservior shocks in Stock -- in fact,
> I don't think the rules would support it, since I know of no production
> car with such equipment.
Given the rules that state you can't modify anything to mount or route
reservoir shocks, I think it'd be pretty hard to make it work. I did
talk to Mike the Shocktek dude about custom making some bilstiens with a
small resevoir mounted in against the strut body itself (inside the coil
spring) but we never went anywhere with it.
> So *who* is really using mega-buck shocks in Stock?
I think many/most of the top neon folks went to the Daddio setup. How
many went and changed back I dunno.
> You know better! Shocks change the transient response -- springs and
> swaybars change steady-state. If I wanted to change my swaybar, I'd
> certainly wish to change the shocks as well.
In the traditional sense you're correct, but when you add gas pressure you
do get an effect on spring rate. And, of course, you can use shock
valving to help force the suspension to a particular state. None of those
is how you should really do it, but stock classes don't exactly give you
lots of options... :-)
Mark
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