SPL Parts Coilovers - Review

[S14DB]

S14 is in stock thou?

[Nismo_Freak]

Originally Posted by S14DB

S14 is in stock thou?

Was... now on Charlies car

[No Motiv]

this need to go into the Faq archieves STAT!! verrryyyy good comparison.......I adore you :P

[DRFT180]

my set is already on the way! :P

[coldfire07]

I called and the guy said there's a 4-6week waiting list on the s14 coilovers. If an SPL Parts guy reads this, is there any chance of that getting moved up? My shocks are blown and I want some KTS, but having to wait 4-6 weeks sucks pretty fucking bad.

[gmckey]

4-6 isn't that bad, and riding on blown shocks, quit being a wimp, it's bad but not bad enough to need to complain about a month.

[KA24DESOneThree]

Once I get a job, can I put a reservation payment down for the S13 coilovers so I can get 'em as soon as they're back in stock? I need them by September 15.

[nightwalker]

Originally Posted by gmckey

4-6 isn't that bad, and riding on blown shocks, quit being a wimp, it's bad but not bad enough to need to complain about a month.

...and that's how sales are lost.

[tastyratz]

this whole post has been very thorough and i feel by looking at things that i am fairly convinced. the review was excellent and im pretty impressed, good job guys :-) i think you just made my to do list... the only thing though is the brake line bracket kinda urks me a bit, that would definitely be worth integrating into the design. i like the idea of all the little final touches suggested in the original post too, seems like it would round things off nicely. still fresh though so there is room for improvement in those few areas. other than that everything looks good :-)

[coldfire07]

Originally Posted by gmckey

4-6 isn't that bad, and riding on blown shocks, quit being a wimp, it's bad but not bad enough to need to complain about a month.

I have had blown shocks for 7 months. 4-6 weeks is a lot because I'll be missing 2 drift events and 3 auto-x events. That leaves about 1 of each left in the season until next March.

Some of us don't just street our cars, so quit talking out of your ass when you have NO idea what's going on.

[ZK]

Originally Posted by AKADriver

For a street car, I'd still consider the Flex, only because they took care of the rust issue, and the street spring rates should work well with the damping.

In the end, all coilover setups are flawed somehow, but you have to pick your battles.

I'd have to agree, the Tein Flex is an awesome product. I am running these on my S13 and it works great. The majority of driving my car sees is commuting and adjustable for the weekend open track events I go to. These have worked great with settings and retain stock ride quality at a lower ride height to harder settings for track.

No one needs RACE suspension for street use! You will not feel too good when you drive 2+ hours on the street on some RAs!

[S14DB]

Originally Posted by nightwalker

...and that's how sales are lost.

Agreed. I just went over some train tracks and lost another strut. I guess the choice for FLEX's is real easy if they are the only ones I can get.

[TurDz]

I am very impressed with your coilovers. The only coilovers I have ridden on were JIC FLT-A2's. If anyone can give a comparision of the SPL ones to the JIC's, I would appreciate it.

Also, I agree with the other member that brake line brakets should be integrated in, eventually. Otherwise, the product LOOKS awesome!

[justinhustle]

my best friends altezza has jic flt-a2's and they make the car so damn bouncy on the hardest setting, its nuts

handles well, but god my brain still shakes after i get out of the car

[sykikchimp]

They should actually be failry similar to the JIC's.. They are setup about the same.

[KA24DESOneThree]

Heh... I just found out I have $2k in a "college" bank account. Hello SPL coilovers, Yokohama AVS ES100s/Falken Azenis Sports, the rest of my trackday money, and four extra wheels. Life is sweet.

[[email protected]]

Originally Posted by nightwalker

...and that's how sales are lost.

Unfortunately demand is exceeding supply even in Japan, there is a ~4 week backlog in Japan itself. We are shipping these over by UPS Express, not by sea, so there is nothing more we can do to shorten the wait...

The demand caught us by surprise, honestly I had thought it would be nearly impossible to convince people from sticking with the "big names" like Tein. We had also only recently completed our own testing of the coilovers to determine if it met our standards... that is why we had no stock on hand to meet the recent orders...

[Twinturbozs]

Excellent write up.

[tastyratz]

if all goes well with my sales ill be placing an order in a couple weeks :-) id still like to see some first impressions posts of more members of the board just because. im still convinced with everything i seen here but hey its nice to hear from them...

[coldfire07]

Ordered.

[KA24DESOneThree]

I put a deposit down, they're expecting them to be there in two weeks.

Sweet. Very good guys to deal with. So far I am pleasantly surprised.

[coldfire07]

Originally Posted by KA24DESOneThree

I put a deposit down, they're expecting them to be there in two weeks.

Sweet. Very good guys to deal with. So far I am pleasantly surprised.

Woah shit? Two weeks? When I talked to them yesterday it was still 4-6. Badass, I'll confirm with Kuah tomorrow.

[Nismo_Freak]

2 weeks right now for the S14 coilovers (get em ASAP!)... S13's are now on backorder till the first week of Sept.

[Nismo_Freak]

Originally Posted by nightwalker

...and that's how sales are lost.

I had to wait 4 months for my Tein HA's (which I will soon be upgrading to KTS's) to come in from Japan... there have been times when the Tein's were on back order, likewise for many other companies.

Our coilovers have a similar setup, on paper, to the JIC FLT-A2's but I am confident our shocks are much better from my experience with both.

[coldfire07]

Originally Posted by Nismo_Freak

2 weeks right now for the S14 coilovers (get em ASAP!)... S13's are now on backorder till the first week of Sept.

Hell yeah! I put the deposit down earlier today expecting to wait 4-6 weeks, but with this news, ya'll have made my day.

[Tdimpreza]

This is an amazing write up , someone should move this so we never lose this bit of information...It help me decided between Tiens and These. I would like to see a write up of these compared to the JICs too though.

[citizen]

how much is the deposite?

[KA24DESOneThree]

NISMO_FREAK- I was told S13 coilovers would be in in two weeks. (Or at least a set with my name on them would be in in two weeks.)

Citizen- It was $250 for me.

Expect a Buttonwillow full track test after I get them, plus some input on how they respond on the streets up to Buttonwillow.

[98sr20ve]

What bugs me is no one (besides SPL) has really compared these in ride to the JIC/TEIN or Koni. Sure they look great but looks don't matter to me. I am a die hard Koni fan. So smooth and dependable in every application I have used them in. Any shock can be blown so I don't go by the experiance of those that I assume have lowered the car too far on the Koni struts. I have been thinking of building up a set of shortened Koni fronts for my S13. The lifetime warranty and smoothness appeals to me. I would love to know how these feel compared to TEIN or JIC. I have experiance with those on a couple cars. The JIC are really nice if set up properly (not always the case in my experiance). Tein always felt kinda dead to me. JIC felt nice but reliability seems to be an issue. So that leaves me with Koni's or these. I don't need the adjustable bottom perch. Reliability and smoothness is very important to me. These are attractive because they have all the right parts but in the end a dampner is about the quality of its action to me.

[nightwalker]

For the guys that have bought them or are going to be getting them, please post your comparison notes.