I’m looking for technical help or recommendations on:coilovers
I realise this subject has probably been done to death but have a question about meister r coilovers.
I’ve had tein coilovers in the past (control master type flex) and was very impressed with them. I see that most people with mx5 run meister r crd but I know very little about them, they seem to be bc racing/godspeed/you name it coilovers as most of the Taiwanese setups are. I’ve also had pedders xtreme, vogtland and a couple other brands with varying levels of satisfaction.
I will need coilovers 100% for the wheel and tyre setup and ride height I intend to run, but want to retain a good level of comfort as I will be using the car quite regularly on normal roads and the car will be primarily road focused with maybe some track. I realise a shock and spring combo would be best bet for outright comfort but wouldn’t give me the range of height and damping adjustment I’d like to have.
Does anyone here run tein flex in a 7/5 setup? I was leaning towards them as I have used tein before and the fact that they use a twin tube design as per most oem shocks should lend themselves to having better road manners, but if ride quality can be maintained using the mono shocks that the meister r 6/5 setup use then I’m open to going with those - and I understand that these are what most owners are likely to be able to share their experience with.
Yes, I run Tein FlexZ with a 17x7.5J wheel and 215/45/17 tyre. I’ve had them fitted since March and have done a good few thousand miles with them now. I’m very happy with the setup. I’ve set ride height at 340/340mm and clicks set mid-way. I have a ‘fast road’ type alignment dialled in.
Personally, I don’t agree that a shock/spring combo would be more comfortable, as you have the option to adjust
Shame you’re a bit far from Cheshire, otherwise we could have done a meet-up
Thank you Wardy. Good to hear someone else has them and is happy.
I’m a bit of a tein fanboy as I rated them so highly with my s15, but I realise things have moved on a bit since then and tein sell a different product now so wanted to ask.
I’m also not sure about whether I’d feel the real world benefit of the monoshock setup (as per bc/meister etc) on a road going car as all the research I’ve done points to them being firmer and better suited to smooth track conditions and I’m concerned they would be detirmental to the ride on a road car. My mustang had monotube coilovers and though they were very good, they were either too firm on conservative damper settings or too bouncy on full soft.
Hello there,
I have the Tein FlexZ. Installed them myself 2 years ago, done around 25,000 miles since, I love the feel of them. Left damping as standard and just changed the height slightly lower.
The only issue I have is driving country roads/bumpy roads because of the height. I’ve had to replace the exhaust because it cracked on the floor. I wouldn’t recommend lowering much lower than the factory height. I’ve only driven on road though.
Thank you lance. Yes unfortunately it appears there’s quite a bit under these cars that protrudes so I guess it’s a hazard that has to be accepted. I’ve had low cars before and am quite used to the pitfalls, though I’d rather when they design cars they’d tuck everything up a little further - it wouldn’t hurt.
I have the BBR manifold, exhaust middle section and backbox and the middle section protrudes less than standard, but still managed to crack it despite being pretty careful. I just thought it looked horrible with a big gap in the wheel arch (16" wheels), so had to lower the height… Plus I’ve got performance upgrades to give the car around 190 bhp.
Arch gap is actually marginally higher with the 17" OEM setup compared to the 16s. If you’re comparing two cars with the same factory ride height of course!
This compares 205/50/16 with the 205/45/17. Calcs here:
When you say you ‘left the damping standard’ what do you mean exactly? Where have you set the Teins in terms of ‘clicks’ on the dampener adjuster?
With the exhaust issue you mention, was this due to the backbox contacting the road? I’d say you may need to stiffen up the dampener, as it sounds like they couldn’t sufficiently support the vehicle. Would also be useful to know what your hub to arch measurement is.
I’ll be on a 215/45 so marginally larger, I will probably be able to close the arch gap quite nicely without reducing actual ground clearance to a ridiculous extent. I’ve certainly had lower cars without too many issues. This was the last one, was pretty darn low.
Gives you slightly more sidewall which is nice for some more comfort and compliance and I’ve noticed no detriment to steering sharpness or extra roll. It’s a popular tyre size switch on the NC
The Coilover kit is listed as ncec but no specific years, I assume it was built for the chassis which from what I’ve found out so far remains fundamentally the same throughout?
But - Mazda claim a reduced roll centre on the NC2 and 3 as part of the chassis / handling improvement.
I wondered if that had been achieved by lowering the car slightly - or if they have moved suspension linkage points to do it.
EDIT - just found this
Chassis Upgrades NC2
The front suspension geometry was revised by altering the ball joints’ vertical pivot position, lowering the height of the front roll centre by 26 mm
Decreased fluctuations in vertical load on the outer wheel when cornering so that roll movement caused by steering input is now more linear
New suspension tuning for even more precise reaction to steering input
Yaw and roll feel more natural for a higher quality ride
So basically as soon as the car is lowered the roll centre will be off anyway won’t it. I have enquired before about anti bump steer rod ends for when I drop the car but there aren’t any about so presumably it isn’t a big issue on these
Assuming the alterations mazda made to the linkages etc were in concert with the reduced standard ride height I should theoretically be in better shape lowering on a later car than earlier as everything is not as far away from the original positions. Does that make sense to anyone but me .
I was just curious about ride height more than anything else.
My 2006 NC1 currently sits at 365 ish ( wheel ctr to arch both ends )
My mate has a 2010 NC2 that sits at 345 ish ( wheel ctr to arch both ends )
If you put the FlexZ kit on - is their quoted drop from my 365 or from the NC2 345
I’m not sure. Being a fully threaded shock aside from minimum location in the bottom mount and the correct preload on the spring seat you could potentially have it anywhere in between. For frefernecw mine is an nc3 and sits approximately 355-360mm centre to arch but doesn’t seem like it’s on stilts. The earlier models did which is strange if their values were around 365.
I think you’ll find quite a bit of variation. Also if people have measured it properly…
I’ve seen NC1s at 390+. My NC2 was at 365. I’ve just been out to re-measure based on this discussion! Now at 340F/335R. So it’s settled a little bit since March.
Photo from Sat morning that gives a reasonable view on ride height and that’s with me sat in it:
.