KW COILOVERS FITTED

[gobiman]

I had problems with my air suspension back in November. Basically it would drop on both sides at the front when left for a few days. Spent the best part of £500 trying to diagnose the problem with my friendly indy with no luck. No obvious leaks and seemed to be temperamental.
The only process to resolve the fault seemed to be to keep changing components in the air suspension until the problem was solved. Having looked at the prices of the various pieces of kit and conscious that this is a 9 year old car with 73k (albeit one I particularly like), this just did not make economic sense. At this point I consulted the forum again and decided to follow Raj down the KW Coilover route. I want to keep the car for a few more years and was keen to resolve the suspension issue once and for all. 
Raj has been fantastic in sourcing the kit for me and fitting the various pieces. I got the car back at the end of last week and I have to say I'm impressed. The ride is definitely better (the air bags definitely lose flexibility with age)and I like the feel of the handling.
The car is riding slightly lower but not noticeably and I'll get an alignment done in a week or so once the suspension has settled fully.
So big thanks to Raj! 

I'll get round to selling the air bags, struts, reservoirs and the compressor on ebay but if anyone wants any of that kit do please pm me in the next week.

[Riggie]

Does it improve the hard ride? Mine is a sport with 20s, so ok on m'ways and similarly smooth surfaces, but a pita (literally) on our poorly maintained Roads generally.

[gobiman]

Always difficult to tell without a side-by-side comparison but I think it has improved. It is certainly firm but progressive and less crashiness over major bumps. I do think the rubber air bags get a little brittle over time and lose flexibility.
I certainly didn't want to have a worse ride and so far I've been pleasantly surprised.

[Riggie]

Mine only has air at the rear, anynidea ofvreplacement cost?

[Raj]

Cheers for the kind words Jonny. Glad I could help tbh and even more positive with your comments.

I love the ride of the KW's and like Jonny always felt the air suspension let the ride down quite a bit. To me always felt like the airbags either had to little or too much air in them which caused the ride to be very unstable.

Glad we have a different option tbh over having to just keep paying up to have the standard air suspenion bits constantly replaced and the worry of seeing the error message appearing.

I did start taking some pics of the install but gave up with it due to constantly having to take off gloves, etc to not get the camera dirty.

[Raj]

[quote="Riggie"]
Mine only has air at the rear, anynidea ofvreplacement cost?
[/quote]

If you're just looking to replace the rears for OE 3.0i springs then possibly about £200 all in for the bits, but you can certainly recoup that cost with selling the air pump, etc.

You'd need rear springs and the perches that hold them in place.

I'f you're looking to lower a touch then a full set of aftermarket springs, like Eibach, etc and again the rear perches, so slight increased cost.

[shadrack]

[quote="gobiman"]
I had problems with my air suspension back in November. Basically it would drop on both sides at the front when left for a few days. Spent the best part of £500 trying to diagnose the problem with my friendly indy with no luck. No obvious leaks and seemed to be temperamental.
The only process to resolve the fault seemed to be to keep changing components in the air suspension until the problem was solved. Having looked at the prices of the various pieces of kit and conscious that this is a 9 year old car with 73k (albeit one I particularly like), this just did not make economic sense. At this point I consulted the forum again and decided to follow Raj down the KW Coilover route. I want to keep the car for a few more years and was keen to resolve the suspension issue once and for all. 
Raj has been fantastic in sourcing the kit for me and fitting the various pieces. I got the car back at the end of last week and I have to say I'm impressed. The ride is definitely better (the air bags definitely lose flexibility with age)and I like the feel of the handling.
The car is riding slightly lower but not noticeably and I'll get an alignment done in a week or so once the suspension has settled fully.
So big thanks to Raj! 

I'll get round to selling the air bags, struts, reservoirs and the compressor on ebay but if anyone wants any of that kit do please pm me in the next week.
[/quote]

wheres the pictures!

[Raj]

[quote="shadrack"]

wheres the pictures!
[/quote]

Hopefully Jonny will post up his X how it currently sits but you can see my build thread pics of the coilovers, etc themselves as they are the same.

[gobiman]

Apologies - will get some snaps at weekend