When I first started hanging around here on S2kI the posts made me extremely paranoid. Even though I'm typically very skeptical, and even though I generally consider forums to be one of the most unreliable sources of information ever conceived, I still let all the posts about problems shake me up.

XViper doesn't even remember it, but he did more than anyone else to restore my confidance in the car, and since then I've done a number of things just to prove that the stuff we read here gives us an unbalanced view of our cars. I'd have upgraded my clutch when we installed the SC/AC, but I wanted to see if I'd have the kind of failures we hear about so often. I ran my stock diff long enough and hard enough after the SC/AC install to at least convince myself that it wasn't as weak as some would have us believe, and I think I may well be set on running the ProKit over the stock shocks until the shocks fail, just to see how long it will take.

The idea that you won't know until it's too late doesn't make any sense to me, becaue that's just not the way I think. I honestly believe that these cars are a heck of a lot tougher than some would have us believe, so I fully intend to push things until they break. At that point I'll fix 'em, upgrade 'em, or whatever, becaue when it breaks, it needed fixing anyway.

So what if my shocks to fail a little (or a lot) sooner? We go over the car with a fine toothed comb on a regular basis, and when they need to be replaced, we'll notice and replace them. In the meantime I have my car looking and handling in a manner that suits me, and I'm getting all the goodie out of my OEM shocks. Seems to me as if that's better than just throwing away a perfectly good set of KYB shocks or KYB clones. The stock shocks are amazingly well made and do a great job with the stock springs or the ProKit, so I fully intend to continue using them until they go soft or fail.

It's not like the shocks are going to fail suddenly, mid corner somewhere, and send you flying out of control. Even if the seals fail and they leak, you're going to notice a loss of damping or the leak(s) long before the handling goes totally to pot.

Eibach claims that their springs are compatible with the stock shocks, and if that's not the case, this is the forum where we can prove it. We just need more people reporting on their success to offset all the people reporting problems.

 

When I had an STi...the main "problem" on all the forums was that the car wasn't very compatible with blow-off valves. It got to the point that at meets, people were yelling at me cause I had one. "Dude, you're gonna run rich between shifts, it drives better without it, blah blah blah." So, after 4 months I took it off because I was preparing to sell it, and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. Did it drive any different? Not at all. Did it make a cooler noise with a bypass valve? As one would expect, NO! That was my reasoning to have the valve in the first place...the sound. I didn't race the car, and it caused absolutely no harm to it, so why do all of these amateurs have to say that within the first month of using it, your car will definitely start to change.

I have more respect for people who don't listen to the forums at times...I mean I think xviper knows a lot from what I can see, and I'd listen to his advice, or a moderator's advice on a problem I'm having. But am I going to take out my springs and not have the 1" drop...or pay $600 for shocks that I might not need because of a rumor? Nope.

 

I've had my H&R springs with my stock shocks for over 8k miles now and haven't seen any leaks and have not noticed any ill handling. I do not track my car and swapped the OEM springs solely for cosmetic purposes. I just think it looks tons better without the gap between the tires and fenders and the car handles better than I would ever need or want it to.

I disagree with all of this crap about OEM shocks with aftermarket springs being ghetto. It all boils down to what you want to achieve.

Just my opinion.

 

Well I must be ghetto too then. I have the SWIFT springs and have noticed the car handles more to my liking, a little more choppy over rough roads but not much diff from stock. I will be putting it to the test this weekend at Button Willow so I'll let all of you know how it goes. This is going to be a good comparison, I was just at the same track with the OEM set up and now I get to compare the difference just 4 weeks later.

I wanted the same handling characteristic just a little less body roll so I can corner faster...these SWIFT springs came highly recommended so I took the plunge. I have autoX'ed them the day after I got them and my car did very well and I was the only S2k with stock tires to be able to break the 1min mark. CLosest guy was 2 sec. off. so I say they work....Now just we will see how long it takes for the shocks to go..I plan on running it till it dies.

 

I purchased my car in "Ghetto form". I quickly changed the Skunk 2.5" drop springs out and replaced them w/ Swift springs. I wanted OEM but for some reason I couldn't find any

So far I've only got about 8K miles on the springs and I've tracked the car recently and will be tracking it again in a few days.

I'll keep you posted, but FWIW I really like the OEM shocks I'm a bit nervous about going with a CO as I know that it will take quite some time to dial in the settings.

 

[QUOTE=mgp 2675,Sep 29 2006, 06:09 AM]When I had an STi...the main "problem" on all the forums was that the car wasn't very compatible with blow-off valves.

 

[QUOTE=Mik3,Sep 29 2006, 05:29 PM]I purchased my car in "Ghetto form".

 

Yeah, BOV's sound awesome, and IMO that's really their only use. Yeah they help you out a little in certain cars, but not a noticeable difference. I'd love to hear a BOV on an s2k though!

 

[QUOTE=mgp 2675,Sep 29 2006, 07:51 PM]Yeah, BOV's sound awesome, and IMO that's really their only use.

 

SC S2000 BOV video. (Please right-click and save-as...)