I frequent a smooth track and was told that I should consider upgrading my Tein Super Racing to. Ohlins DFV. Reading the reviews I can't help but shake the feel that the DFV is clearly more slanted to daily driving while I would probably be able to eke more out of Super Racing on the track. I'm focusing on track performance so I'd be keen to know which is faster at flat out.

I've searched on the forum for relevant comparisons but there was no direct comparisons between both as far as my searches have yielded. Any thoughts ?

 

i dont have any direct experience but the SRC seems to be clearly the smooth track damnper over the ohlins dfw.
The cost difference alone should show that it would be a downgrade.

 

Stick with SRC. If you can pony up get the JRZ RS Pro or Ohlins TTX line. These shocks when dialed in are day and night difference to what most people run on the boards. But a 5000+ price tag is often reason enough to scare people away (rightly so)

I wouldn't pay 3k or anything close to that or over for SRC. There is a set of JRZ triple selling for 4500 right now in R&C. Total steal.

 

DFVs do have quite a few track features that many high end dampers don't have.

• One of them being temperature sensitive low speed needle valve that adjust to the temperature of the damper fluid to reduce variations in damping when the shock is hot. This is huge for extended lap sessions. Im not sure of many, if any other shocks that have a similar feature which is a cleary a track focused feature
• Additionally these shocks are completely rebuildable & valving can be adjusted to fit your track needs
• There are 32 clicks of adjustment so you can stiffen them up quite a bit for smoother tracks

The reason why they are so compliant and work well on the street is that actually have a 3rd super high speed valving that acts as a two way blow off valve. This helps on bumpy roads or pot holes and provides stability on bumpy tracks.

As for Smooth tracks, we will be offering the DFVs with a Swift Spring upgrade option very soon. So we can increase Spring Rate for you quite a bit for smooth tracks and still maintain smoothness on bumpy streets or stability if you vista a bumpy track due to the 3rd high speed oil path.

Please take some time and visit our site. Read our own write up on the DFV features and listen to an Ohlins Engineer explain further.

http://urgedesigns.com/Suspension.html

I have to respectfully disagree ranking a shock on pure price. In 2013 they were $3000 and that certainly doesn't make them an upgrade over the Tein SC and now that they are $2425, it doesn't make them a downgrade. In our experience we had Moton Club Sports ($4200 with out Spring/hats) on our Shop Car before the DFVs and the DFVs were a clear upgrade. Despite multiple set-ups, adjustments and Spring rates we couldn't get the car stable over rough stuff with the Moton CS. DFV swap the car settled immediately and allowed us to focus on fine tuning. The DFV have clear design advantages over anything priced closed to it as well as shocks that cost 50% more. They were extensively drive tested by Ohlins and set up specifically for the S2000 chassis, something which most other shock manufactures don't do. They simply add mounts to their shock and offer another product. Not claiming Tien does this, but it is common that Shock manufactures do not test the shocks directly on the car they designed them for. There are countless DFV reviews that have proved their "confidence factor" and soon we have will some lap time comparisons.

The main knock agains the DFVs is they are Single Adjustable. However Adjustments change both Compression & Rebound with Ohlins designing them to compliment each other through the adjustment range.

 

The only way you're really going to take advantage of the SRCs is with R-compound tires and an aero package. The grip that R-compounds and an aero package make available to you requires higher spring rates to take advantage of it. With higher spring rates and aero load, the damper needs less symmetry in terms of damping force in compression or rebound. This is where independent rebound and compression adjustments become more handy, because you can better control the spring in the ways in which you're loading it. Most of the time, with spring rates that high you can kiss ride quality and quick bump response goodbye for several reasons.

For those who don't want/need the higher spring rates, the Ohlins look like they work really well with a good balance of low speed damping force and response to open up the high speed path as the piston speeds increase. It controls the spring better and looks like it responds quicker, which is worth it's weight in gold when tracks get bumpy. If you don't use stiff, sticky R-compounds that produce higher lateral forces the more you load them, the Ohlins produce more than enough force to control sticky street/UHP summer tires and be fast.

My point is that it depends on your tire choice and how you use them.

Sorry, I'm tired, so I may have skipped a few steps in the explanation. Hopefully that makes sense.

 

Well Said..

 

got mine for about 2.7K used haha so thats a deal to me,.

 

Thanks for the input. Am running RS3 and i do have basic aero like splitter and wing. At this point for a refernce, I can get about 1.3 lateral with spikes to 1.4 on the track but do take the exact numbers with a pinch of salt as the track is pretty smooth.

 

That sounds like you have a pretty good set up then! Do you find yourself adjusting the SRCs much?

 

I agree with you for the most part, but todays newest EHP tires (R-S3, Z2, Rival etc.) are damn near as fast and grippy as an entry level r-comp (NT01, R888, RA1, etc.) Fresh R-S3s specifically are pretty universally accepted as being roughly as fast as NT01s with the time attack crowd.

EHP street tires without any aero can still take full advantage of the spring rates on the SRCs.

Between the two- If I were running anything less aggressive than an EHP street tire I would certainly choose the DFVs and anything more I would take the SRCs

The problem is that most people are right in the middle using 255 EHP street tires.

I know the benefits of the DFV's third pathway, especially for rougher tracks or tracks where you are cutting a corner and hitting a berm at 90+mph (Buttonwillow comes to mind) but the spring rates are too low and the single adjustability kills me. The original $3k price tag made it a somewhat easy decision to get something double adjustable but they fell substantially in price for 2014 which gives people more to think about.

For a mostly street driven car with a few track days per year these are a no brainer over anything else, especially with the 2014 pricing. For the somewhat typical track s2000 (17x9+ with 255 EHP street tire, non stagger, wing, small splitter) that attends timed events, I just think there are more appropriate options for the money.