I recently bought a set of Koni adjustable shocks to put on my stock spring and ride height '96 Z/28. Anyone have any experience with these shocks. I intend to just use it as a fun weekend street car, and don't intend to do any racing. I have added UMI 3 pt. SFC and 275/40ZR17 on SS 10 spokes, all around from an '02 SS Z/28. Where should I start with the initial compression adjustments? How hard are they to adjust after installation?

 

I run Koni yellows on stock height springs as well. I'm assuming you went with the 4th gen yellow variable adjustment **** setup on all four corners. (Some people run 4th gen fronts but use 3rd gen rears with the externally adjustable 0,1,2,3 click settings as a cost saving measure.)

My recommendation is full soft in the rear. And anywhere from full soft to 1 full turn in the front. Nice thing about the front is it's very quick to adjust. Try running full soft all the way around for a week or two. You may not even want to crank them up.

Koni with stock height springs are a great combo in my opinion. Great handling, yet still nice for bumps, potholes, and objects on the road.

I think you mean "rebound" adjustment. The single adjustable just do rebound. You'd need the dual adjustable to do "compression" and "rebound." But for 99% of the people, the dual adjustable aren't needed.

 

Thanks for your input Gord! Yes I bought the 4 yellow/4th gen version. I bought them online and should be here by tomorrow. I'll get them installed ASAP. I just guessed they were compression adjustable but I'm sure the rebound only will be fine for a street driver. I'm anxious to see what they do for the ride/handling. Have ypu done any other suspension mods?

 

Oh jeez, the difference will be night and day as far as handling goes. For many, these are their favourite mod.

My plans for the car aren't that over the top. Konis, new springs, subframe connectors. Probably leave it at that for awhile. LCA, PHB might be done in the future to finish things up. But I'll probably be happy enough with just the Koni/spring/subframe combo that that will suffice.

I haven't done the subframes yet. But the Konis are absolutely amazing. So much that I immediately looked through their catalog to see what was available for other vehicles, family vehicles, friend's cars etc. They're that good.

Initially I figured that compression would be the one thing you'd want to adjust and not rebound so much. Turns out I was wrong. Adjusting compression is really only important when you've made large weight changes in the car. (taken a few hundred pounds off, or conversely added a few hundred pounds). For most people, the ability to adjust compression is more hassle than benefit. Too easy to screw it up.

Now rebound on the other hand is a nice adjustable feature to have. I know the KYB "AGX" series have a **** on them. But that **** adjusts compression and rebound at the same time with one ****. Making it impossible to get a good setting. And the AGX tend to have non linear adjustments. So they're mostly full soft or full hard. Tricky to get in between...The Konis on the other hand have a nice linear adjustment for rebound.

The streets here are concrete and filled with potholes. So I'm going to stick with full soft settings all the way around. I know of very few people who turn up the rears. But upping the fronts a turn or so is quite common. But honestly, everybody's recommendation (Koni's recommendation too) is to install everything at full soft and get used to it. Only then try adjustments.

It's not just the handling around corners that you'll notice. It's also things like lighting up the tires and getting a little sideways, and then letting off the gas and catching traction. The car will be much more predictable and easier to manage. You won't get that sudden weight transition when the tires hook up. It's things like this that you never even notice with stock shocks that are suddenly much better with the good stuff.

 

Thanks for all the info. I already added the SFC's and wanted to make small changes 1 at a time. The SFC's to make a noticeable difference, especially on rougher roads, and faster corners. It seems tighter now and doesn't follow every crease in the road like before. I added Kook long tubes/Y pipe so I didn't want to lose any ground clearance, so for now I'm sticking with the stock springs. When/if I decide to replace the front end upper/lower control arms and rear LCA. I may check into newer springs then. Thanks again.

 

Great choice, and you have the option with the front Koni SA shocks to set the ride height 3/4"lower by moving the lower snap ring down.
Try 2 full sweep up front(from full soft),1/8 turn in the rear(from full soft). FYI make sure the adjustment window is facing out when you install them.