captain_pants

Many shock builders refer to the # of flats from stuff for rebound measurement. i.e. the number of sixths of a turn from stiff. That could be 4/6ths of a turn.

Is anyone else as picky as me when assembling the S2000 adapters on the top of the Penske shocks? I set them so they're all within a fraction of a turn from 2 turns from full stiff. Doing that lets me reliably set rebound from the full-soft position. Then, the last time I had them apart I drilled out & turned down some nuts to act as spacers so that it was much quicker/repeatable to install those top adapters. The adjuster passes through the middle of the nut, while it acts like a spacer to accurately set the S2000 adapter at the same height.

I think Penske now machines the top S2000 adapter so this manual setup/spacer isn't needed any more.

oinojo

^this


I had Guy build me a set that exposed the adjuster nut up top. Makes for perfect equal adjustments!

Random1

The pins on top of my shocks will not go on far enough (threads bottom) to allow adjusting a stopping point for full soft. there is always more than three (1080 deg) of adjustment available. I don't understand why you would want to limit full soft to -2 turns rather then -3? You are removing 33% of the adjustment range. The full soft setting is usually limited by the rebound bleed rather than the valving in the piston for the spring rates we typically run. Therefore full soft is the same for all of us with Penskes. The piston valving dictates the other end (full firm) of the adjustment range.

My rebound adjusters are down inside the pin that goes on top of the shock shaft. Adjustment is made with an Allen wrench. It is very easy to reference from full firm (adjuster tight clock wise all the way). Where the allen wrench is pointing is the reference. Settings are then referenced from there in terms if negagative turns (360 deg), so -1 is one turn (360 deg), -2 two turns (720 deg), -3 turns (1080 deg) is full soft.

The right curve on the rebound dyno plot looks like full soft based on the data, so is likely -4 turns (360 deg x 4 = 1440 deg) rather then 4 flats or 240.

captain_pants

I'm just going off what Joe Stimola and Guy Ankeny told me - both basically said to not bother going past 2 turns as the shocks were already as soft as they'd get. Perhaps your valving is different from mine? Or perhaps I mis-heard? Either way, even for a long highway drive I'm within 2 turns from fully hard with Guy's shock valving.

FYI: My original shock graphs from Stimola quoted -6 for the rebound. That was flats from full stiff, or one turn. Not everyone uses the same standard for quoting adjustments, be careful assuming that they do.

Good to hear that Penske revised the design of the top mount/adapter in the past 4 years or so since I got mine.

Random1

I just got confirmation via email from Guy and he agrees that there is three turns (1080 deg) of rebound adjustment range.

captain_pants

Interesting, thanks for the update! My mistake then...

sillyboybmxer

this thread has been dead for some time now. Bumping, because suspension!!!

tcjensen

I'll add that if I had your KW Clubsports, I'd run OEM top hats, 750/650 rates, whiteline front sway, and and ap2 stock rear sway. No lower than 13.25 ride height. (For travel's sake in the rear). Think I'd be real happy.

sillyboybmxer

I actually traded them off to ViperASR for his AST 4150s
Gonna pick up the Karcepts top hats and probably have them revalved by Maxcyspeed(AST's authorized rebuilder in the states)....if not converted to the 5200s

tcjensen

Cool. "Maxcy" runs locally with us.

I keep watching good drivers beat each other back and forth - KWV3's takes win, then AST 4150's, then Ohlins, and round and round it goes. Had thought about the AST's and all their monotube glory, but the KW's kept giving them a run for their money, without the frequent rebuilds. Will be interesting to see your thoughts after running them for a while. Best comparison would be on equal spring rate, but seldom do people change shocks without changing rate a bit, so a direct comparison might be hard. The biggest selling point to me on the KW's was the fact that compression change was LOW SPEED, where it matters most in affecting handling. Even many expensive shocks (including MCS double adjustables) were still changing high speed compression instead of low speed. But if you daily drive your car, or if you race on smooth and then bumpy lots, I suppose even changing high speed compression could have advantages for you. But if you don't daily it, or don't encounter very bumpy lots ... Conversion to double adjustable, if it's only high speed compression, might not be worth it. I don't know. Just something the think about. You have to spend huge money to adjust low speed compression on most high end monotubes, which I can do with $1300 used KW's. Low speed compression is very important in autocross. Doesn't have to be adjustable per se' if you can get the car to do what you want with rebound adjustments, but you want to be present in high doses, lol. That said, there seems to be camps that run also low compression ... But it seems more national winners are in the more low-speed compression, more better camp