Springs or coil overs

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Gardnaaa

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Hello everyone, I didn't have much time to search due to being very busy at work lately. I daily drive my my car around a total of 80 miles and it's a 14 si sedan. I want to lower it and then do a wheel and tire set up. But I wanted to know what was the best and what will do less wear and tear on my car. So springs or coilovers? Give me your opinion, anything helps. Thanks guys
 
Gardnaaa said:
Hello everyone, I didn't have much time to search due to being very busy at work lately. I daily drive my my car around a total of 80 miles and it's a 14 si sedan. I want to lower it and then do a wheel and tire set up. But I wanted to know what was the best and what will do less wear and tear on my car. So springs or coilovers? Give me your opinion, anything helps. Thanks guys
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Most important thing regarding adjustable coilovers...do you live in an area that gets snowy and uses salt? If so, you can pretty much forget being able to easily adjust your coilovers after the first year let alone subsequent years.
 
Yeah I love in New York haha, and I take the nys thruway to work everyday. 40 miles to work and then 40 miles home. So I should probably go with the ebaich pro kit? For a good highway ride?
 
Gardnaaa said:
Yeah I love in New York haha, and I take the nys thruway to work everyday. 40 miles to work and then 40 miles home. So I should probably go with the ebaich pro kit? For a good highway ride?
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I have and am very happy with H&R. Decent drop, but not too low. Did a long distance trip recently and it wasn't uncomfortable in the slightest.
 
Yeah I've heard that ebaich and h&r are the best. I plan on getting rims after that. So I want it to look low, but not deal with the rubbing
 
Gardnaaa said:
Yeah I live in New York haha, and I take the nys thruway to work everyday. 40 miles to work and then 40 miles home.
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I used to live in Upstate NY. The salt and sand will eat parts. I ended up with a spring/strut combo instead of coil overs for that very reason. I was pretty certain that the nice threads and adjustments would be destroyed in short order. The H&R or Eibach springs will be good all around. They are a mild enough drop that you should be able to get away on the stock struts for a while. Certainly they will wear out quicker than normal but at that point you could consider an upgraded strut. Just do things in stages if you need to.

As far as tire wear goes that is going to depend on your camber and toe settings. Once the springs are on get an alignment to make sure things are in spec. The springs will settle and then you'll possibly need another one. The camber is not adjustable from the factory but the toe is. The fronts have a little wiggle room for camber but only like +/-0.3 degrees. A set of camber bolts for the front will allow you to adjust as wanted. More negative camber in the front means improved handling. A little is good, too much means tire wear. This is all personal preference. From the sounds of it you are commuting a pretty good distance. I would say to get the camber as close to 0, maybe -0.2 or as slightly negative as they can with the stock parts. Run 0 toe.

For the rears, as you lower the car the multi-link suspension gains negative camber naturally. At this point you have to decide if the neg camber you end up with in the rear is acceptable to you or not. If the camber is more than you would like, you will need to buy camber arms. This is very subjective and depends on you. Stock rear camber is around -1 to -1.5 with a non adjustable arm. Once you put the new springs on you'll need to get that initial and followup alignment to see where you end up. I personally would not run more than -2. If your car ends up around -2 in the rear I would suggest getting camber arms. At that point I would also dial the camber back out to -0.8 or -1 degrees. That will help with tire wear also.

Again, if you fall in that middle range of -1 to -2 degrees you will have to decide if the cost of camber arms is worth it. Alignments can be costly. I bought the three year package deal from Sears. I have used it multiple times. They were willing to do a custom alignment as long as I never wanted the numbers changed and didn't swap any parts. They were also cool enough to put my car on the rack and just give me readings before I decided what to do. Ask around and check your local shops. If they are nice and willing to give you numbers first thats awesome.

I told them if the numbers were close enough I would just buy the one time alignment and have the toe set to 0. If they were off I would buy the 3-year package and be back for custom settings with new parts. I made sure they knew they were making a sale either way. That seemed to help a lot.
 
Nix that is some great info! I really appreciate it! I want to go pretty low but with a good commute. And where abouts did you live? I'm from Hurley which is right next to Kingston. I work in Newburgh though.
 
Glad it was helpful! I run neuspeed sport springs, which I have not seen made for the 9th gen civic yet and they ended up being about a 2" drop. Much more than the 1.6" stated. I never had issues in snow but I always ran snow tires. I had also run Eibach Pro Kit before that. The H&R I think is a slightly lower drop than the Eibach and might be the right balance of low/function for you.

You shouldn't have any rubbing issues with the stock wheels and that drop. When buying new wheels and tires the offset of the wheel will be a consideration to avoid rubbing.

Kingston is Hudson River area? Downstate/eastern near Poughkeepsie? I used to live in Syracuse and then Rochester. Moved to Kentucky last fall.
 
Yeah it is man, the snow sucks lol. But I do plan on getting a pair of wheels after my drop. I have to research a good offset to get though. I want it to be flush with the fenders but I don't want to end up messing up the fenders if they hit. So much research is needed haha. I can't wait for tax time! That's when I can buy the wheels! :)
 
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Buy a set of coilovers and soak the threads with an anti-corrosive after cleaning your case. You'll be fine.
 
You can avoid hitting the fenders with camber adjustment. I thought you live close to Port Jervis. Hawk's Nest is a nice place to drive aggressively.
 
I drive hawks next every Saturday for work. That's a pretty sick road lol, wouldn't want to go through the rock barrier, that's a high fall! Lol
 
A good tire and suspension setup can make a good canyon car. Lol. I drove there with some of my buddies two Saturdays ago. It was a blast driving there.
 
It's a narrow road to drive a armored truck lol. I'd love to do those turns flying in my si lol
 
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