Suspension refresh and BC racing coilover review

Hi everyone, I have recently done a refresh on my suspension and wanted to give a quick rundown on my experience. The car is a 2003 C2 Manual coupe which I recently purchased. The car is generally in good condition but the suspension was still the original suspension with 112000 miles so a full refresh was in order. After reviewing various options I decided to go with the Spyder Performance kit with the polybushing for the arms and BC racing coilovers. The BC racing coilovers come in 2 types either with pillow ball adjustable camber front top mounts or with aluminium with rubber insert non adjustable front top mounts. I have read some reports or knocking noises coming from the adjustable top mounts. The spring rates can also be customized. I ended up going for the non adjustable top mounts and the slightly softer spring rates of 3.5kgmm front and 6.5kgmm rear. after installing I took the car for a wheel alignment to my requested spec below. Front Camber -2 deg neg. Front Toe 0 Rear Camber -1.5 deg neg Rear Toe 1mm toe in per side. I still have the standard anti roll bars. So how does it drive? Well I decided a Europe trip was in order to test it out. First stop was Nurbergring but not before a high speed run on the Autobahn. The car drives straight but I found at high speed it became a little unstable. The front wondering around a little. At 250kph it became unstable enough that I did not go any faster. I think this may be due to running so little toe in. With that noted it was time for the next test which was a few laps of the Nurbergring. I had set my front damper settings to 6 clicks off max soft and rear to 9 clicks off max soft. This was just what I felt was ok on the road. On the first lap of the ring the front felt quite good but the rear felt under damper over the undulations. It felt like I couldn't trust it. I came back in and increased the rear shocks another 2 clicks harder and went out again. This made quite a big difference that was definetly noticeable and was an improvement although I still didn't have confidence in the rear of the car. So I came back in adjusted the rear another 2 clicks harder and also decided to adjust the front 2 clicks harder as well. I went back out for the 3rd and final lap and I now felt much better. The car rode over the bumps well. It is not harsh and it feels controlled. It gave me much more confidence. Afterwards we continued our trip to Swiss Alps via Baden Baden and the B500 though the Black forest and I can say I'm very happy with how this turned out both for road and light track use. Other work I completed at the same time was cleaning behind all of the wheel arch covers and under trays. Installing 993 RS engine mounts, New discs and EBC blue stuff pads, Short shifter install, New Radiators, New AC Condensors and receiver drier, New front cross braces. Happy to answer any questions on any of the items. Unfortunately our trip was cut short when my power steering line failed on the Susten Pass and not wanting to either ruin the power steering pump or leave oil on the road I had to have the car recovered and am now in the process of having it sent back to UK . The work continues...

interesting trip, the real test of the suspension will be on UK roads

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Yes I will need to wait a bit for that. Before the trip I did drive it from Tavistock to Exeter on the A38 and from Plymouth to Dover although this was on the softer shock settings.

Thanks for the write up. Shame the trip ended as it did. Curious how does the recovery work? Through the insurance company? Do they recover it all the way home? How did you get back !?

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I had European breakdown cover though my insurance provider but the breakdown cover is actually provided by AA. I just rang up my insurance told them I was broken down and they organized a recovery vehicle to pick me up and take it to the nearest workshop to be repaired however because they could not repair it within the time allocated on the policy the insurance is paying to have the car relocated to UK. So that's where I'm at now but they have told me it will take 21 working days after the plans are finalized which can also take up to 14 working days... The insurance company provided a rental car which we could use for 3 days and we flew home from Basel. So money on the insurance was well spent in this case.

Interesting read, had Ohlins on mine. Considered BC but they use the same dampers across hundreds of cars, they are not valved specific. Also not approved for road use so didn't want to risk it. Saying that the Ohlins used to snap so.... Tricky one.

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I will ask BC racing about both these points and see what they say. They have been quite easy to deal with. The original spring rates they recommend for example were 4kgmm and 7kgmm and I asked them if they can make me some 3.2kg and 6.5kg. they said they have 3.5kg and 6.5kg available and that the option would be on the website the next day for me to order which it was. I didn't really consider ohlins or kw because they were more than I wanted to spend but I still researched them and thought their spring rates were too high. As were the Gecko coilovers that Spyder Performance sells. 3.5kg and 6.5kg is very close to the spring rates on the 996.1 gt3 which influenced my decision. When pushing the car it still has a bit of corner exit under steer so perhaps 3.5kg front and 7kg rear would be better for performance. Others I looked at were FEAL coilovers as they are only a about £400 more but BC also has a distributor in UK which was also a factor. I may add some adjustable anti rolls bars later to tune the balance a bit more.

avoid the Gecko coilovers, shocks not made for our purpose and just upgraded to meet a spec, added that it's certainly not made where it can be regarded as a location of sufficient quality for our intended purpose

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Be interesting to see what BC say, do update if you get a chance please. Ohlins were amazing on the turbo. Hoovered up back road bumps and dips so well that it gave you a ton of confidence on where the car was on the road. When i got to the track a few clicks and we were away. Would have them again in a heartbeat on a turbo. I understand the budget is always a consideration. However you are getting suspension which was developed for a specific car and tested on it as a result. Surely there is no way have BC tested them on a 996 and developed them specifically for £1000? Still a good middle ground no doubt and as long as they work as intended and you are happy then result!

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Hmmm, interesting. More camber up front than rear and no toe in on the front and virtually none on the rear. I think I would swap the front and rear camber, and then have 0.5mm toe in on the front and try and get around 1.8mm toe in on the rear. It will make it feel far more planted and not lose steering feel. IMHO.

I run bc racing coil overs on my caddy van (don’t laugh). I’d say they are the higher end of a budget setup quality and adjustability wise. They’ve done almost 40k miles on there and have been ok. I think if I was putting coilovers on a Porsche and didn’t want the price tag of ohlins or bilstein, kw then I’d look at GAZ

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I've had GAZ in another car and I wouldn't buy them again personally.

Hi @sirrecalcitrant just wondering if you have any further opinions about these shocks on (rough) UK roads?

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I don't unfortunately as I'm still waiting to get my car back from Switzerland. It's on its way though apparently so I'm hopeful to get the powersteering fixed soon and get some driving in before the weather gets too bad. I did drive it up the A38 from Tavistock to Exeter and from Plymouth to Dover to catch the ferry across and I was happy with it. A bit firmer than standard but not uncomfortable.

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I ended up fitting PSS10 to my turbo, I bought them from Centre Gravity with their specified spring rates (I had their CGGT set up on my 993 which worked really well on the road) When they arrived the garage that was fitting them were concerned that the CG spring rates weren’t right (the owner has had 6 tuned turbos himself and is a pretty competent racer, so I trust his opinion), and we left the stock Bilstein PSS10 springs on, standard turbo rates are f33 r60, the Bilstein rates were f 45 r 90, and the CG springs were f 49 rear r 59. It didn’t seem to make sense that the CG springs were stiffer than stock in the front and softer than stock at the rear, where as with stock and Billy the rears were twice the rate of the fronts. I can see me dropping spring rates by another 10% (which is max recommended without a change to damper rates) as it’s still a little harsh over poor surfaces at lower speeds, it does improve quite a lot when you start to push on a bit. Do the Ohlins improve as the oil warms up? I’m not sure if it’s just me acclimatising but the roads around the house seem to be smoother when I get home from a drive than when I leave the house!