Koni Yellow Shocks with Ground Control Coilovers REVIEW
Category
🤖
TechTranscript
00:00So, what's it like to drive with this setup?
00:16Now, I've been driving on this for almost a week now.
00:18I wanted everything to settle and I wanted to give you guys an honest opinion of what
00:21it's like on the road.
00:22Okay, so you will notice right away that everything is stiffer, okay?
00:28It is a slightly more jarring ride, but it's still supple.
00:34That's difficult to explain unless you experience it yourself.
00:36I had to actually experience it to be able to kind of see how it, to believe that essentially.
00:42So the BMW suspension system is very sophisticated.
00:44There's a lot of bushings in the rear and there's a lot of bushings in the front and
00:48it's well insulated from those hard, jarring crashes that you'd get in another performance
00:53car.
00:54So what I have is I have a very stiff suspension, but it's not crashing over the bumps.
01:02It is way softer still than a stock Scion FR-S or Subaru BRZ, if that's a good comparison.
01:10Getting in and out of this car into that car, all of a sudden you'll feel yourself crashing
01:16over bumps like this.
01:17You don't really get that.
01:18I get a little bit of more up and down motion than with a stock sports suspension, but it's
01:22not bad.
01:23Stiffer, but not bad.
01:25Okay.
01:26So with the ride kind of out of the way, performance wise, the first thing you notice is that the
01:31front to back motion is greatly improved.
01:34So when you're accelerating and when you're braking, you don't have as much dip.
01:38You don't have as much dip in the back.
01:39Okay.
01:40So that actually makes a big difference for shifting.
01:43There isn't as much drama in between shifts when you let off the gas, clutch, shift and
01:47get on the gas again.
01:48You don't go like this back and forth nearly as much.
01:50So that is up to the new dampers in the front and the back, how stiff you set them and the
01:56springs and how stiff they are.
01:58Okay.
01:59So essentially that is a combination of the entire kit put together.
02:04However, I did drive the car for about a week with just the rear KONI shocks in.
02:08Okay.
02:09So I can comment on that.
02:11That actually drastically changed the ride.
02:13It made it feel a little bit stiffer in the back, but it controlled that front dip quite
02:17substantially.
02:18That was just with the stock springs.
02:19Okay.
02:20So even though I didn't just do dampers, I can comment and tell you that it does make
02:23a very noticeable difference.
02:25I put just KONI yellow dampers in my Saab with the stock springs and it was like, it
02:30was very noticeable.
02:31You feel it in the corners, you feel it in accelerating and decelerating pretty much
02:35everywhere.
02:36It feels good.
02:37Okay.
02:38So now the rest of the performance aspect of the car, what we have now is we have a
02:42car that is still kind of supple over bumps, but it locks itself in, in the corners.
02:47So you've probably heard people describe BMWs as being on rails.
02:51Okay.
02:52So now with this setup, I lowered it down.
02:55You saw in the picture there, I lowered it down a little bit, not very much past the
02:59sport suspension and I've got the rear shocks set at the medium setting and the front shock
03:03set at the softest.
03:04Okay.
03:05And then what I did was I opened up my front sway bar.
03:07So it was the softest setting and I've tightened the rear sway bar.
03:10Okay.
03:11So that is just my current setup.
03:13I have to test this on the track and I need a corner balance and all that stuff, but it
03:16doesn't matter because right off the bat, you can feel how much of a difference it actually
03:19makes.
03:20So when you enter a corner, first of all, they turn in as much crisper.
03:24Okay.
03:25So there isn't as much body lean when you turn in the front end locks itself in much
03:30more severely.
03:32And then when you start to notice it, the most is as you increase the speed in the corner,
03:36it's almost like the faster the corner, the more you notice it.
03:40So in a high speed sweeper on the track, you'll notice that it really, really locks itself
03:46into the corner.
03:47Okay.
03:48You can feel it on just any conventional corner.
03:49So I've got a couple of sweepers here and I'll kind of describe what I'm talking about.
03:54So I'm in third gear.
03:56So moderate speed around this corner, you get right, boom, right there.
03:59It's locked in.
04:00All right.
04:01And it just kind of stays there.
04:02No drama going around the corner.
04:03I've got a little bit of lean from the front because of the sway bar set up.
04:07Here's another even tighter corner.
04:08Heel toe into second and we go around.
04:14Stuff's moving around in my car.
04:15And there goes the tail a little bit.
04:16Okay.
04:17So that is a complete different feeling.
04:21Stuff is just flying around in my car right now.
04:23So that's a completely different feeling from the stock sport suspension.
04:26This is a highly recommended set of Kona yellows with ground control springs.
04:31When you buy ground control springs as a kit, they come with Kona yellows, but you saw I
04:34had to modify mine, right?
04:36So these are meant to be together.
04:39I have the, don't quote me on this.
04:42I think I have the 450 and 500 pound weight springs.
04:46So 500 pound weight in the rear and 450 in the front.
04:49I'll put the actual numbers in the description because I don't trust my memory right now,
04:53but that is pretty substantial over the stock sport springs.
04:58But to be perfectly honest, I think I could deal with an even stiffer spring in this car.
05:03So if you're really, really looking for track focused driving, you could even go stiffer
05:06than that.
05:07I'm not sure how the Kona yellows would match up with a stiffer spring because from the
05:12reading that I've done, it seems like the Kona yellows are a lot more suited to this
05:16spring weight because this is what ground control sells.
05:19Okay.
05:20So I'm going to go with these, these sweepers again here, boom, right there.
05:26It locks in and there's no more drama.
05:28Okay.
05:29It feels very on rails, but that means it's almost like I just start turning the corner
05:33and my car is now hooked up onto a rail system and it just keeps it going around the corner
05:38without any issue.
05:40There's no extra lean.
05:41There's no jumping and chattering.
05:43It just locks itself into the ground.
05:45Okay.
05:46That's why dampers are important.
05:47They're what keep your tires in contact with the ground and give you the most possible
05:51grip around the corner.
05:52If your dampers are worn out and you have just springs, any little bump will upset the
05:55car.
05:56Okay.
05:57That's what you don't want, especially if you're driving aggressively.
05:59That's how you get yourself into trouble really quickly.
06:02So as I said, overall, this is a very, very good package and I can definitely recommend
06:07it.
06:08Now I looked at Bilstein as well and they're very good, but I like the adjustability of
06:14the Kona Yellows for that price point.
06:18So a big shout out again to Northern Performance in the Toronto area who hooked me up with
06:23these and gave me lots of good recommendations and they're very quick with their service.
06:27Right.
06:28So I've got, again, nothing but good things to say about them and I'm going to go back
06:31there I think for maybe some new brake pads when these are done.
06:35Okay.
06:36So here's accelerating.
06:37Second gear.
06:38I'm going to shift into third.
06:41Okay.
06:43So there's a pause and a thump in the back, but I don't, I'm not going forward and backward
06:47very much, which is quite noticed as actually very noticeable.
06:52That's the first thing you notice, right?
06:54Now as for ride height, I don't want to go much lower because I heard of a guy who went
07:00over a speed bump too quickly when he had his Kona Yellows dropped down and it damaged
07:04them to the point where he couldn't adjust them anymore.
07:07We don't want that, right?
07:09So I'm going to keep the ride height as low as I can without thinking that I'm running
07:12out of travel room on the shock and I'm going to get it corner balanced.
07:18Again, a corner balancing is very important if you are serious about balancing the car
07:22properly.
07:23Okay.
07:24So I'm going to drive this car and I'm going to track it right now because I can't get
07:26a corner balance appointment until like the end of this year, maybe even next year, right?
07:30Because the guy that I want to go to is very busy right now because fair, he's very good.
07:36So I want to make sure that I get this done properly.
07:39So I just got an alignment done to make sure everything's going straight and it is, everything's
07:43fine now.
07:44I'm running zero tow and like negative 1.6 degrees of front camber.
07:48Okay.
07:49Which is about the same as my rear camber.
07:50I want more negative camber for more front grip, but I don't have the ability to do that
07:53right now because I've maxed out the built-in adjustments.
07:57By the way, when you lower the car, you get a little bit more negative camber just because
07:59of the suspension geometry.
08:01So that is about all I have to say about the Kona Yellows and ground control springs.
08:08I think that if you are considering doing this and you don't do your own work, it's
08:14not a bad idea to save up and do the whole package at once because then you don't have
08:18to pay someone labor on two separate occasions to put the, your regular springs on your new
08:24shocks and then take the shocks out again and put the ground control springs on.
08:29So I know it hurts, save up a lot of money and do it all right at once because it's,
08:35it's just going to be a better overall thing for you.
08:37It's going to cost you less in the long run.
08:39I've been where you are before.
08:40I know what it's like.
08:41He's like, Oh, but I just want to lower my car a little bit.
08:43That's fine.
08:45and too low of springs on the stock shocks, then we have the potential issue of blowing
08:49them and depending on how old your shocks are, obviously, and those springs probably
08:54won't be matched for the damping rate of the shock.
08:57Okay.
08:58So you want to sport shock with the sport spring, make sure they're matched, talk to
09:01both manufacturers and make sure that your springs and your shock choice match with each
09:04other.
09:05So that's about all I have to say about this.
09:09I've got lots more reviews coming on performance parts.
09:13Okay.
09:14So over the winter, I'm gonna be doing a lot of maintenance on this car and I'm gonna keep
09:17up with my car reviews.
09:18We've got lots of cool stuff coming in that front, by the way.
09:20So ideally I'm going to do just off the top of my head, I'm going to do Vano seals for
09:24sure.
09:25I'm going to do window regulator to the zip tie method, show you how to do that.
09:28I'm going to maybe do spark plugs.
09:30I'm going to do some, there was something else.
09:35I don't remember what it is.
09:37I'm sure you'll see the video at some point.
09:39So big news, apparently I got approved as a tribe leader for drive tribe.
09:45No idea what that means exactly yet.
09:47They're going to tell me really soon.
09:49And I don't know if I'm going to be allowed to post content from here on there and vice
09:53versa.
09:54I don't really know how it works, but hopefully you can follow me on drive tribe as well.
09:59Because that's going to be pretty exciting.
10:00If you don't know what drive tribe is, that's Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, James May's
10:04new online motoring platform, which should be pretty big.
10:09Apparently I've got millions of subscribers to it already.
10:11So I made a bid to be the E46 BMW drive tribe guy and they accepted my bid.
10:16So I'm now the tribe leader for E46 BMWs, I guess, which is pretty crazy.
10:21Didn't think that was going to happen.
10:22So I, this is a bit long winded, I'm sorry.
10:25I will talk to you soon about more mods coming.
10:28I'm going to do a review of my rear trailing arm bushings as well, which I just installed
10:32and lots more to come.
10:34See you later.