KW Sleeve Kit for F80 M3 Arrived

[In4mation]

That ride height is perfect!!!! My kit arrives on Wednesday and I’ll be installing it this weekend. Can you please tell me the settings you made (threads on the sleeves) to the front and rear sleeves to achieve a 1.5" in drop in the front 0.0" in the rears? Also what brand spacers are you running? Thanks for your time.

[kitw]

Looks almost exactly what I got with the H&R 50474-6 springs...

what are your current measurements front and rear, 19" wheel lip to fender? I'll go measure mine and compare.

[dmk08]

Don't you think you're messing w/ the handling only lowering the front? There is a reason they set the cars up the way they do.

[phoenx]

Is the front at its lowest setting? Looks great though.

[NorCal f80]

How much lower can it go?

[BigMacSmallFries]

Originally Posted by slalomfever

looks GREAT! how's the overall ride quality?

Hard to describe, about 10-15% stiffer overall if that means anything to you. I'm guessing the spring rate is 20-30% higher than the OEM springs.

Originally Posted by In4mation

That ride height is perfect!!!! My kit arrives on Wednesday and I’ll be installing it this weekend. Can you please tell me the settings you made (threads on the sleeves) to the front and rear sleeves to achieve a 1.5" in drop in the front 0.0" in the rears? Also what brand spacers are you running? Thanks for your time.

No clue what method they used. We just measured the initial ride heights and what I wanted them to be in the end and a few hours later it was done. I don't know where I ordered the spacers from. They're the black ones if that helps. Probably from EAS or IND I'm guessing but not sure.

Originally Posted by kitw

Looks almost exactly what I got with the H&R 50474-6 springs...

what are your current measurements front and rear, 19" wheel lip to fender? I'll go measure mine and compare.

Our fronts are almost identical. Your rear is at least 1/2" lower than mine is.

Prior to drop bottom of wheels to fender was 64.0cm at the fronts and 60.5cm at the rears. It was 61.0cm all around after installation on a level surface. (We did 61 instead of 60.5cm to compensate for the settling). The photos you guys see is about 50km after install. So the car will drop another ~1/4" roughly after settling.

Originally Posted by dmk08

Don't you think you're messing w/ the handling only lowering the front? There is a reason they set the cars up the way they do.

I don't think I'm not messing with the handling, I KNOW I'm not messing with the handling. I take it you don't have a solid understanding of how the suspension components work together. Shocks/struts/sway bars don't care where the initial positioning of the springs are. Drop is achieved in the sleeve which becomes an extension of the strut tower and not the suspension itself. Links/joints/control arms/rubber bushings do not wear any more or less. Alignment is done after the springs settle to compensate for the camber and toe.

Why does BMW set up the car like this? Because the car was designed with a certain ground clearance in mind, and suspension travel. Not because it's better for the car in any way. Unless you plan on offroading often in yours, or have a family of 5 with luggage both these reasons are irrelevant.

The GT3 RS has a fully customizable race suspension. You can adjust dampening, rebound, ride height, camber, and toe significantly. We know a thing or two about suspensions.

Originally Posted by [phoenx]

Is the front at its lowest setting? Looks great though.

Not a clue. Didn't ask.

Originally Posted by dwin_sd

How much lower can it go?

No idea.

[dmk08]

Oh you have a gt3 i dont know why i ever questioned it. Carry on.

Originally Posted by BigMacSmallFries

Hard to describe, about 10-15% stiffer overall if that means anything to you. I'm guessing the spring rate is 20-30% higher than the OEM springs.



No clue what method they used. We just measured the initial ride heights and what I wanted them to be in the end and a few hours later it was done. I don't know where I ordered the spacers from. They're the black ones if that helps. Probably from EAS or IND I'm guessing but not sure.



Our fronts are almost identical. Your rear is at least 1/2" lower than mine is.

Prior to drop bottom of wheels to fender was 64.0cm at the fronts and 60.5cm at the rears. It was 61.0cm all around after installation on a level surface. (We did 61 instead of 60.5cm to compensate for the settling). The photos you guys see is about 50km after install. So the car will drop another ~1/4" roughly after settling.



I don't think I'm not messing with the handling, I KNOW I'm not messing with the handling. I take it you don't have a solid understanding of how the suspension components work together. Shocks/struts/sway bars don't care where the initial positioning of the springs are. Drop is achieved in the sleeve which becomes an extension of the strut tower and not the suspension itself. Links/joints/control arms/rubber bushings do not wear any more or less. Alignment is done after the springs settle to compensate for the camber and toe.

Why does BMW set up the car like this? Because the car was designed with a certain ground clearance in mind, and suspension travel. Not because it's better for the car in any way. Unless you plan on offroading often in yours, or have a family of 5 with luggage both these reasons are irrelevant.

The GT3 RS has a fully customizable race suspension. You can adjust dampening, rebound, ride height, camber, and toe significantly. We know a thing or two about suspensions.





Not a clue. Didn't ask.



No idea.

[BigMacSmallFries]

Originally Posted by dmk08

Oh you have a gt3 i dont know why i ever questioned it. Carry on.

Glad your small ego allows you to openly admit your inadequancy.

[l!ve]

I always thought that changing the front vs. rear ride height changes the weight bias of the car and therefore it will affect handling. Not sure if it's significant though.

I'm curious to know as I too would prefer to lower the front of the M3 so that the gaps in the wheel arches between front and back are equal - looks way better this way.

[karussell]

curious what suspension you have on the RS?

thanks for feedback. are you going to track the car? have you tried it on the track stock? guessing the M3 is more just your DD street car.

Originally Posted by BigMacSmallFries

Hard to describe, about 10-15% stiffer overall if that means anything to you. I'm guessing the spring rate is 20-30% higher than the OEM springs.



No clue what method they used. We just measured the initial ride heights and what I wanted them to be in the end and a few hours later it was done. I don't know where I ordered the spacers from. They're the black ones if that helps. Probably from EAS or IND I'm guessing but not sure.



Our fronts are almost identical. Your rear is at least 1/2" lower than mine is.

Prior to drop bottom of wheels to fender was 64.0cm at the fronts and 60.5cm at the rears. It was 61.0cm all around after installation on a level surface. (We did 61 instead of 60.5cm to compensate for the settling). The photos you guys see is about 50km after install. So the car will drop another ~1/4" roughly after settling.



I don't think I'm not messing with the handling, I KNOW I'm not messing with the handling. I take it you don't have a solid understanding of how the suspension components work together. Shocks/struts/sway bars don't care where the initial positioning of the springs are. Drop is achieved in the sleeve which becomes an extension of the strut tower and not the suspension itself. Links/joints/control arms/rubber bushings do not wear any more or less. Alignment is done after the springs settle to compensate for the camber and toe.

Why does BMW set up the car like this? Because the car was designed with a certain ground clearance in mind, and suspension travel. Not because it's better for the car in any way. Unless you plan on offroading often in yours, or have a family of 5 with luggage both these reasons are irrelevant.

The GT3 RS has a fully customizable race suspension. You can adjust dampening, rebound, ride height, camber, and toe significantly. We know a thing or two about suspensions.





Not a clue. Didn't ask.



No idea.

[bimmer ///man]

Originally Posted by BigMacSmallFries

I don't think I'm not messing with the handling, I KNOW I'm not messing with the handling. I take it you don't have a solid understanding of how the suspension components work together. Shocks/struts/sway bars don't care where the initial positioning of the springs are. Drop is achieved in the sleeve which becomes an extension of the strut tower and not the suspension itself. Links/joints/control arms/rubber bushings do not wear any more or less. Alignment is done after the springs settle to compensate for the camber and toe.

Why does BMW set up the car like this? Because the car was designed with a certain ground clearance in mind, and suspension travel. Not because it's better for the car in any way. Unless you plan on offroading often in yours, or have a family of 5 with luggage both these reasons are irrelevant.

The GT3 RS has a fully customizable race suspension. You can adjust dampening, rebound, ride height, camber, and toe significantly. We know a thing or two about suspensions.

LOL, ride height absolutely affects handling. I KNOW you are messing with the handling.

Have you never heard of corner balancing? That is what some of those nifty adjustments are for on your GT3RS.

Have you never heard of sway bar preload? Bump stops? Progressive springs which your KWs use? All of these items care about the ride height.

I think it is time for you to increase your KNOWledge of suspension before you berate other members that are correct.

[BigMacSmallFries]

Originally Posted by l!ve

I always thought that changing the front vs. rear ride height changes the weight bias of the car and therefore it will affect handling. Not sure if it's significant though.

I'm curious to know as I too would prefer to lower the front of the M3 so that the gaps in the wheel arches between front and back are equal - looks way better this way.

Yes, you are correct and it is negligible as you state. We know the curb weight on the front and rear wheels and the wheelbase so we can calculate how much weight is removed from the rear and taken up at the front by lowering the front. My guess is that it's around 5lbs. Someone with a mathematics background can quickly let us know.

Why is this negligible? Because the with a full tank of gas and a loaded trunk the car can easily add over 200lbs to the rear without affecting the weight at the front. Removing less than 10lbs from the rear and moving it forward to the front wheels will have a neglible difference in handling.

Originally Posted by karussell

curious what suspension you have on the RS?

thanks for feedback. are you going to track the car? have you tried it on the track stock? guessing the M3 is more just your DD street car.

KW Clubsports. I also have the RSS Tarmac series so the entire car has no rubbing bushings in the suspension. It's probably the single best thing I've done to the car. I would highly recommend it, makes a drastic difference. A couple other owners of the RS have driven mine and they loved it. Yup, M3 is a daily driver, very little track use probably.

Originally Posted by bimmer ///man

LOL, ride height absolutely affects handling. I KNOW you are messing with the handling.

Have you never heard of corner balancing? That is what some of those nifty adjustments are for on your GT3RS.

Have you never heard of sway bar preload? Bump stops? Progressive springs which your KWs use? All of these items care about the ride height.

I think it is time for you to increase your KNOWledge of suspension before you berate other members that are correct.

Ok, corner balancing is not an issue because the increased spring rate is on all four corners and not just the front two wheels. This is a function of spring rate not ride height. All four corners have been affected equally.

Sway bar preload? We lowered the ride height equally between the front right and left wheels and so that is unaffected. If one side of the car was lowered more than the other than this would be a problem as well. Again all four corners are affected equally.

Bump stops? The kit comes with shorter bump stops. Did you read my previous post? Since the car is driven without passengers I'm not going to bottom out at any point. Only a problem if you lug around a lot of weight or have a family always with you.

Progessive springs? Again, unaffected. Decrease in ride height is not achieved by compressing the spring or altering it's peformance or characteristics. Height adjustment sits above the spring and has no function related to the suspension. It is static and not part of the suspension.


Any other concerns? Based on your questions, all these issues you have brought up become exacerbated with installing springs that have a greater spring rate, and are not affected by ride height. I think there's some confusion here....

I'll put up another post explaining how these springs negatively affect the handling and ride in another post and why that is. Sorry but you're incorrect in your assumptions above.

[bimmer ///man]

Originally Posted by BigMacSmallFries

Ok, corner balancing is not an issue because the increased spring rate is on all four corners and not just the front two wheels. This is a function of spring rate not ride height. All four corners have been affected equally.

Sway bar preload? We lowered the ride height equally between the front right and left wheels and so that is unaffected. If one side of the car was lowered more than the other than this would be a problem as well. Again all four corners are affected equally.

Bump stops? The kit comes with shorter bump stops. Did you read my previous post? Since the car is driven without passengers I'm not going to bottom out at any point. Only a problem if you lug around a lot of weight or have a family always with you.

Progessive springs? Again, unaffected. Decrease in ride height is not achieved by compressing the spring or altering it's peformance or characteristics. Height adjustment sits above the spring and has no function related to the suspension. It is static and not part of the suspension.


Any other concerns? Based on your questions, all these issues you have brought up become exacerbated with installing springs that have a greater spring rate, and are not affected by ride height. I think there's some confusion here....

I'll put up another post explaining how these springs negatively affect the handling and ride in another post and why that is. Sorry but you're incorrect in your assumptions above.

You cannot move weight or change weight bias in a car by changing a vehicles ride height. The only weight you can affect is the cross weight. The only way to change a car's weight bias is to physically move the weight. EDIT:Technically possible to move weight but it usually only a pound or so at most. Negligible.

All of the aspects mentions above are affected by the kit you installed. My biggest point was that lowering the front and keeping the rear at stock height affects the handling characteristics which claimed it does not.

[kitw]

Originally Posted by BigMacSmallFries

Our fronts are almost identical. Your rear is at least 1/2" lower than mine is.

That's funny, because that's what it looks like based on photos, but our ride heights are almost identical, based on measurements.

[l!ve]

I agree it is most likely negligible. In fact, the little front weight bias may not be a bad thing - more oversteer. I absolutely hate understeer.

Sounds like you have an awesome GT3. The RSS components are awesome. I had them on my 997TT. That car was really terrible in stock form. After the RSS + KW V3 treatment + lot of setup time, much better, but still nothing compared to a GT3 or GT3RS.

Originally Posted by BigMacSmallFries

Yes, you are correct and it is negligible as you state. We know the curb weight on the front and rear wheels and the wheelbase so we can calculate how much weight is removed from the rear and taken up at the front by lowering the front. My guess is that it's around 5lbs. Someone with a mathematics background can quickly let us know.

Why is this negligible? Because the with a full tank of gas and a loaded trunk the car can easily add over 200lbs to the rear without affecting the weight at the front. Removing less than 10lbs from the rear and moving it forward to the front wheels will have a neglible difference in handling.



KW Clubsports. I also have the RSS Tarmac series so the entire car has no rubbing bushings in the suspension. It's probably the single best thing I've done to the car. I would highly recommend it, makes a drastic difference. A couple other owners of the RS have driven mine and they loved it. Yup, M3 is a daily driver, very little track use probably.



Ok, corner balancing is not an issue because the increased spring rate is on all four corners and not just the front two wheels. This is a function of spring rate not ride height. All four corners have been affected equally.

Sway bar preload? We lowered the ride height equally between the front right and left wheels and so that is unaffected. If one side of the car was lowered more than the other than this would be a problem as well. Again all four corners are affected equally.

Bump stops? The kit comes with shorter bump stops. Did you read my previous post? Since the car is driven without passengers I'm not going to bottom out at any point. Only a problem if you lug around a lot of weight or have a family always with you.

Progessive springs? Again, unaffected. Decrease in ride height is not achieved by compressing the spring or altering it's peformance or characteristics. Height adjustment sits above the spring and has no function related to the suspension. It is static and not part of the suspension.


Any other concerns? Based on your questions, all these issues you have brought up become exacerbated with installing springs that have a greater spring rate, and are not affected by ride height. I think there's some confusion here....

I'll put up another post explaining how these springs negatively affect the handling and ride in another post and why that is. Sorry but you're incorrect in your assumptions above.

[kitw]

Originally Posted by BigMacSmallFries

Our fronts are almost identical. Your rear is at least 1/2" lower than mine is.

Prior to drop bottom of wheels to fender was 64.0cm at the fronts and 60.5cm at the rears. It was 61.0cm all around after installation on a level surface. (We did 61 instead of 60.5cm to compensate for the settling). The photos you guys see is about 50km after install. So the car will drop another ~1/4" roughly after settling.

Just to put closure to this:

Mine is 56.5cm in the front and 55.9cm in the rear. So my front is a lot lower than your's as is my rear, but the ratio is almost identical.

The points the other poster made that you seemed to ignore:
- The stock springs are (mostly) linear rate. The KW adjustable kit uses a progressive spring in the front (note the varying distances between the coils) and a linear rate spring (with a helper spring) in the rear.
- by changing the geometry in the front with the replacement sway bar mounts, unless you perfectly lined them up to where the stock tabs are, you'll change preload on the front sway bar. Any change to the static ride height can change preload, as the bar travels through it's range.
- The front suspension does not have that much travel - the bump stop KW supplies will not completely make that up, nor will it have the same progressive characteristics the stock ones will. All you need to do is hit a bump in a corner and you'll touch the front stops.

[fourtailpipes]

Originally Posted by kitw

The points the other poster made that you seemed to ignore:
- The stock springs are (mostly) linear rate. The KW adjustable kit uses a progressive spring in the front (note the varying distances between the coils) and a linear rate spring (with a helper spring) in the rear.
- by changing the geometry in the front with the replacement sway bar mounts, unless you perfectly lined them up to where the stock tabs are, you'll change preload on the front sway bar. Any change to the static ride height can change preload, as the bar travels through it's range.
- The front suspension does not have that much travel - the bump stop KW supplies will not completely make that up, nor will it have the same progressive characteristics the stock ones will. All you need to do is hit a bump in a corner and you'll touch the front stops.

...not to mention dynamic changes. suspension geometry is carefully engineered to change across the vertical travel of the wheel. by starting in a different position, that geometric change will be different from what the engineers prescribed.

i'm not making a case against suspension modifications... just want it to be clear to everyone on here that modifications like this definitely DO constitute "messing with your handling".

[nizer]

I guess one question that remains unanswered is whether ride height - specifically front ride height - was optimized for ride/peformance from factory or whether it was compromised in some way to meet safety/regulatory standards? I recall some cars used to have different ride heights depending on the country in which they were sold (driven by different regulations). Whatever the reason the front fender gap is unusually large relative to past BMWs.

Regarding spring rates, I've seen some whacky numbers posted with almost all showing a signifcantly higher spring rate on the rear vs the front. This made no sense to me given the weight bias on the car. Interesting to see the KW kit is the opposite and more logical 800lb front/460lb rear spring rate:

http://www.vividracing.com/catalog/-...FdHm7AodOTgAfA