Hi, I think I've asked this before, but never quite got to the bottom of it. I need to uprate my springs but definitely don't want to lower the car from standard sporting spec - whilst doing a road rally last week I was bottoming out on relatively tame lanes. Its not a shock absorber issue - the lanes are just overgrown in the middle as they only ever see farm traffic.
There is a set of Cinq 40mm lowering spax stuff on sale here at the moment but after the event I think its probably going to be a big no no.
Also the amount of body roll is comical now I've just fitted a new set of A539's
Does anyone produce/have anything to fit the bill.
Although I compete mainly on tarmac autotests, I don't want to be swapping everything for the grass variety or future road rallies I am doing.

Do you still have the ARB fitted?

D

Yes its still on

OEM shocks with Eiback Pro springs all round. Best handling cinq/sei I've driven.

I have the apex shocks and springs and it is barely any lower than standard sporting, if at all.

Handling is generally good, but the body roll is horrendous!

The Apex should be 40mm lower.

Mine evidently was as the car sat on it's bump stops. The fronts had been trimmed but I eventually trimmed 40mm off the bottoms of the rears.

That maybe increased the roll a bit but was a more comfortable over the road humps and general bumps.

The Apex shocks are shortened and firmer, especially to go with the apex springs that are also shorter and firmer.

As far as I could find out, the Eibach springs are standard firmness, but shorter, to go with standard shocks, apart from the possible problem of them bottoming as they are not 40mm shortened shocks.

Apex seemed to be the only people selling matching firmer springs and shocks for the Cinq.

Metalguru3 said:

Yes its still on

Click to expand...

Take it off for road rallies

D

Crashtest33 said:

OEM shocks with Eiback Pro springs all round. Best handling cinq/sei I've driven.

Click to expand...

Did it reduce body roll to a decent level?

rallycinq said:

Take it off for road rallies

D

Click to expand...

How do they behave after its removed?

Metalguru3 said:

How do they behave after its removed?

Click to expand...

Much better, the effect of the outer wheel lifting the inner wheel is removed.

Cheers

D

Metalguru3 said:

Did it reduce body roll to a decent level?

Click to expand...

It does. The springs aren't just a quick botch job like most other "racing" brands that do an oem replacement. They feature a very well tuned progressive spring rate that changes the character of the spring depending how hard you drive them.
I've done motorsport at national level and I can assure you that on the Cinq/Sei, a quality gas shock (KYB, OEM, etc) combined with the Eibachs is great.
Sticks like s**t and breaks with warning.

Were those Eibachs lowering? If so did they cut back the bump stops or was it dropped onto them? Dropping onto them reduces body roll but can cause the vehicle to bounce off the crest of bumps, sometimes off the road surface with a resulting sideways step.

If choosing for firmer springs then the shock absorbers would generally need a softer bump setting and a firmer rebound setting.

Before I replaced the Apex with more Apex, I looked at KYB's monotube high pressure gas shocks, apparently with firmer valving, which might simply mean too stiff in either direction, but KYB told me they were only for standard height springs and shorter ones might cause the inner rod to bottom and ruin it. So perhaps these would would well with standard height springs?

From what I could ascertain, Apex also have a good reputation with springs and they developed the shock and spring kit on a Cinquecento, not just making some generic guesses. They seemed to be the only people who were.

Not that this applies this this thread, but to really get the best out of lowering it should probably have drop links for the steering and wishbones so as the keep the geometry at angles that work.

Some good stuff there, Ian. The Eibachs do lower but it's minimal. 25-30mm.
I've just taken the bumpstops down a little but I've never hit them even when I didn't.
Obviously, MetalGuru3, you need to work out your budget.
A fully adjustable setup will give you much more options.
All I know is the Eibachs work perfectly with a stock setup.