NC coilovers/dampers with minimal drop?

Technical Area Steering & Suspension
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  1. My model of MX-5 is: NC1 2.0 soft top
  2. I’m based near: Hampshire
  3. I’m looking for technical help or recommendations on: Coilovers and dampers

Hello… I realise there’s quite a bit of information on the webs about coilovers, but a lot of it is written with different objectives to mine.

Essentially I suspect my dampers are worn (the ride can be harsh on larger hits at low speed, and there’s a loss of grip when encountering rough tarmac at higher speed) but I find that the handling is otherwise fine.

(Background on the car, for context: I’ve had it for three months, it’s an 06 model, is completely stock, and has had only one owner before me who put just 28k on the clock. So it’s quite possible that the dampers are still in decent condition and I’m being over-sensitive.)

I have a European road trip coming up in 2-3 weeks’ time so if I’m to replace anything I need to do it next week, which limits me to parts that are readily available now.

The other challenge is that I don’t want to lower the car if I can avoid it. I don’t need track-oriented handling, I just want better grip and an improved ride. I’m fine with a slightly softer and longer-travel setup than a lot of people seem to favour. If the setup is adjustable so that I can later change my mind about that, then that’s a bonus, but not essential. My priorities are damping quality and reliability over features and price.

From what I can see, I have two options which will definitely maintain the stock ride height:

  • Bilstein B6 dampers (I’ve found few user reports for these as people seem to talk more about the B8 which lowers the car)
  • MeisterR SportZ coilovers (which I can’t presently find in stock anywhere)

There are two options which may or may not have a significant effect on ride height:

  • MeisterR ZetaSport (for which I can’t find any ride height information at all, and again I can’t find them in stock)
  • MeisterR Sportives (which say “The out of the box ride height setting is about 330mm/13.0″ Front and Rear”, which I think is a small drop…? Not sure how much, and I’m away from home at the moment so don’t have the car to hand to measure it.)

Then there are a bunch of other coilovers (Tein, YSR, Bilstein, etc) which do lower the car to varying degrees.

If I realistically have to lower the car a bit then I’ll be pragmatic and do that, but I’d like to minimise the drop.

So… any advice please? :slightly_smiling_face: I suspect it realistically looks like Bilstein B6s or MeisterR Sportives purely on the basis of availability.

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I’m in the process of fitting Sportives at the moment, but have the opposite problem in that I can’t get the ride height low enough at the rear. Currently 350mm on the lowest setting, where as the fronts are sitting at a perfect 330mm with lots of adjustment availale to raise or lower.

Can’t comment on the ride\handling.

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I can’t get the ride height low enough at the rear. Currently 350mm on the lowest setting, where as the fronts are sitting at a perfect 330mm

Interesting. Do you have the soft top or the PRHT? I seem to recall reading that they have different rear shock lengths.

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PRHT. I don’t have rear bumper or exhaust silencer on at the moment, but that would make minimal difference. Need to check for twisted bushings as per MeisterR’s suggestion.

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I found good adjustability with the Tein Flex-Z setup on my NC2, along with a really good level of ride quality and compliance. You could also run them at stock height, if you wanted to.

I settled on 340mm front and back in the end - worked well :+1:t2:

16s for autumn/winter:

Coilovers
Coilovers1920×1296 404 KB

17s the rest of the time:

RHS-Bridgewater
RHS-Bridgewater1920×1501 553 KB

ArchWork
ArchWork1920×2560 296 KB

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Hi Jeff,

Great to have an exciting European road trip to look forward to in a couple of weeks time - have a brill holiday, and to share pics here of your time away.

I’d actually question whether it is wise to implement a major change like fitting coilovers so close to going away on a big trip, particularly as they can take a couple of weeks to “settle in” before finalising the alignment.

If it were me, and the car was new to me, I’d probably look to check the state of the tyres. I certainly found when I bought my MX-5 that putting a brand new set of decent tyres on it livened up the handling, and improved the ride comfort.

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TEIN FLEX Z set at 345 all round

tein flex z
tein flex z512×362 78.1 KB

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If they’re anything like the NA/B ones you’ll be winding those struts back up within the first 20 real-road miles.

But hopefully they’ve actually put some springs in the NC ones that can take their own weight.

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Perfect ride height above on the Tein coilovers :heart: It’s what I was hoping for with MeisterR :face_with_diagonal_mouth:

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Yup, that was at the back of my mind. It’s quite a significant variable to change at the last minute.

I’m assuming that replacing just the dampers for B6s is less of a change. Either way I can almost certainly get the alignment done after a few hundred miles of bedding in before I go, but at the end of the day even if I have to use the existing dampers then so be it.

It’s got Hankook Ventus V12 Evos on it, and they look pretty new. I did suspect those, but comments online suggested they were on the soft side rather than the hard side, so I’d dismissed them. Maybe worth another look.

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I’ve just ordered a set of Tien advance coilovers which should be fitted next week. I can let you know how they perform if it helps. Though the ride height will be lowered by 30mm.

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Have you checked how much the suspension bounces/ overshoots?

Meisterr Sportive on my 2006 NC are “harsh” as in quite go-kart like suspension, so you might not find them a “cure”. I lowered them as well, but I think they could be wound up to give normal wheel arch clearance.

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Do check the suspension bushes. My 160,000 mile 2011 NC2 bushes are almost certainly f***d.

Going to invest in a full superpro bush kit hopefully soon!

I have the same symptoms - ride is generally OK, but when I power out of corners or do a hard launch, I get crazy wheel hop on the inside wheel (or both if launching). Bumps sometimes seem to shock the entire subframe at the rear especially, and sometimes bumps I can hardly see jolt the steering wheel when I drive over them at speed - slightly scary!

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I was in a similar situation recently, two broken rear springs and took the opportunity to upgrade. With MeisterRs out of stock everywhere I went with BC Coilovers with the stock spring rate. I personally took the opportunity to take just a centimetre or two out of the ride height, aiming for 100mm of clearance front and rear (enough to clear the most aggressive of speed bumps).

These are adjustable for both ride height (could go heigher than stock if you wanted!) and damping, but unlike the cheap coilovers I’ve experienced on friends’ cars in years past, these ride more like high-quality aftermarket suspension I’ve fitted to touring motorcycles. They’re never harsh, even when stiffened up considerably for fast driving, taking the edges off even the nastiest of hard-edged suspension inputs.

I’m very impressed, and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend them. My goal was to build a fast, comfortable road car for day drives and big road trips, and they’ve worked perfectly.

IMG_0041
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Edit: Found the link to the specific ones I purchased:

Nick

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The Zeta sport fills the same place that the Zeta Crd did,

I had these fitted to my NC2 with new power flex bushes. adjustable height and stiffness found them very good for road use and occasional track use on road tyres. I run it full soft on road and about 10mm lower than stock bearing in mind the NC2 is about 15mm lower stock than your NC1

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Like @stevegilkes I also find the Sportive ‘harsh’. An alternative could be the basic Koni damper set (STR.t) and keep the original springs. 2 Koni STR.T Shock Absorber Dampers 2-8250-1035 rear for Mazda MX-5 | eBay UK

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For what you say you’re after, just swap out the rear struts like-for-like. No matter what aftermarket you go for, it’ll never be OEM ride quality.

Maybe a set of thicker roll bars will be the handling tweak you’re after. Improved turn-in, flatter cornering, but still keeping all your suspension travel.

If you enjoy being able to just drive down roads without having to second guess every other bump and pothole, then don’t lower it.

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I’ve got B6s on my PRHT, standard ride height.

They are firmer than the standard damping, slightly choppy at low speed around town, but give decent ride quality above 50mph even on our bumpy dales roads. Handling is tighly controlled and superb - it is a proper ‘B’ road blaster.

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‘For what you say you’re after, just swap out the rear struts like-for-like. No matter what aftermarket you go for, it’ll never be OEM ride quality.’
You’re right, except it will probably be better. It’s common to fit new suspension with little regard to how the original performed. Sadly, anything that old can’t be used as a yardstick.
Despite using Meister( because they were a Trump-type deal) I do think using alternative damping with more compliant springing is underused.
Not surprising as you have to rebuild the original setup rather than the quick fix of a straight swap the all-in-one package provides.

I’ve rebuilt and also done the straight swap. The former was fitting lowering springs and the latter fitting the Meisters.

Fitting all in one coilovers is so easy but no matter what you hear, the way their springs are made there will be a harsher ride than springs that include more than one diameter over the whole spring.

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A four wheel alignment massively helps with how your car feels if you are confident the tyres are fine and the is no misting or seeping from your current shocks
I would start with the alignment it is probably the cheapest thing to get done and probably the most ignored