Looking to buy coilovers soon.....need to decide on type. Can annyone with first hand knowledge/experience tell me the differances (pros vs. cons) between QA1's,stance,phadt featherlights.....?? vendors welcome to chime in please! Thanks in advance,Jeremy.

 

I am currently running Pfadt Featherlight SA's as well as poly bushings.

I started with an F55 equiped 08 manual. I chose this car after finding auto cross so fun but still wanted a car that was good for vacations and daily driving. After 2 years of autocross I had reached the limit of the stock setup and added Z51 sways and poly bushings. The poly sways made a huge difference in ride quality, worse, but at the same time make the suspension much more accurate. Last year I reached the limits of this setup.

This year I one of my F55 shocks failed so I made the jump to the Pfadt SA's. Pfadt told me these springs are about 20% stiff than the Z06, I believe them and my friends with Z06's also believe them. But this springs are much softer than stock springs coming in at 463 front and 600 rear. The difference is they are linear where I suspect that all the stock springs are progressive.

This really affects ride quality and not for the better. The ride is much firmer and depending on the roads, rough. If your car is mostly going to be driving on the street and your roads are bad to fair I don't think I would look to coil overs. If your roads a good to excellent what are you waiting for. I will say though even if the ride is more harsh the car handles it perfectly. I recently took a trip over to Montana and the roads where not good. Regardless of how bad the road got though it went where I pointed. No skittishness to it all.

At the track, well auto cross so far the jury is out because I have had nothing but wet days so far. But there are few things I can say. Slalom are a blast now even it the wet, the car reacts much quicker, I am no longer having to wait for the springs to unload. Gone is the snappy over steer, I can pick the throttle up much harder and can actually drift the car a bit under control. There is still some push but with wet tracks that is to be expected. Oh, did I mention brake dive, reduced big time. It no longer feels like I am picking up the rear end of the car under heavy braking.

Installation, straight forward and easy unless like me you have F55's, a little more work there. Overall I think I made the swap in a little under 4 hours with another few hours spent at the dealer. I can adjust the shocks with the tires on and the car on the ground, though it is much easier with the tires off.

Overall for my application I would give 2 thumbs up for the Pfadt SA's.

 

A decent thread.

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c6-t...coilovers.html

San

 

Keep in mind that the thread linked above was started in 2006. Since then we have updated our coilover design to the FeatherLight Generation Single Adjustable Coilovers. When we began to design the FeatherLight Singles they were from a completely clean sheet and share no parts with any previous generation product from Pfadt. They feature a significantly improved upper mounting system for improved durability, increased gas volume for more consistant performance in a wider range of environments, improved damping and spring rates, and are now being manufactured in house at our engineering facility in Salt Lake City. Simply put, these are the best coilovers we've ever produced!

 

I'm loving my GS suspension on the street right now but I'll be tracking the car next year after I hit my HP goals. If I still want more I know where to go.


This video is what sold me on the new Pfadt BOA design.

 

Out of those choices you mentioned....You get what you pay for, and there is a reason why there is a big jump in price between brands.

QA1s-I am not so sure on quality as they have had some fitment issues.

Stance-These coils are made to go LOW, but not so sure on the handling/comfort aspect. Maybe someone else with these can chime in.

I have Pfadt SA Featherlights and they quality pieces. Handling, comfort, and adjustability do not compare to stock setup. It is night and day difference.

 

I don't know of anyone that puts their coil overs through this much abuse.....





Not only this, but our coil overs have served years of winning duty in SCCA, NASA, and ALMS.

Please let us know if there is any questions you have, always happy to help.

 

After having my LGs for 4 months now, I have to say, I wished I would have went with the Pfadts. The main reason is the inverted design. What they don't mention about the inverted design is you can adjust them without removing the wheels. Or in the case of the rears, you can adjust the Pfadts without having to remove the whole shock. I dd mine and track it once a month so the adj is a big selling point. I have my wheels off switching out pads and rotors before track days, but making adj at the track require removing the wheels again. If I knew these were going to be such a pain to adj, I would have at least gotten the non adj G2s.

Just something to consider. HTH and good luck.

 

This is one of the main things I like about my Pfadts Featherlights so much...I can reach behind the wheel and turn that dampening up or down very easily. Good point.

 

So the lg's cant be adjusted w/o taking off wheels and or coilovers? Cost differance between adjustables vs non adjustables? I really just want to crisp up turn in response and make car feel more planted in (non-perfect) road conditions....car is a Z51 already

 

We have quite a few experience with most of the coilovers available for the Vettes including Pfadt and LG. The 2 brands we recommend the most are LG & Pfadt. Both make excellent products and have excellent support. The only experience we have with QA1's are removing them to install LGs or Pfadt coilovers.... so that should give you some indication

 

No matter which coil over you have, you are going to have to jack up the car and pull a wheel to change ride height.

As for adjusting the shock...you should be able to adjust without pulling the wheel, but it makes it easier. Of course I have had customer run the extensions inside the car to do it that way as well.


Both GT2's and G2's are excellent products...for myself I like the G2's for a number of reason's including the fact they are custom built to order for each customer.

 

I'll have to agree with Anthony on the G2s.

The G2s are some of the best units around being based around a Bilstein shock body which allows them to be rebuildable. Since they are custom built to order you'll know that you'll get the spring rate and valving that's right for your application. Another great thing about them is they offer a long and short shock body for customers who want the benefit of a coilover system without lowering the car too much. What customers love about these is they do not have to adjust them.

We've done about 5 sets at the shop and sold quite a few to customers through out the country. One of our customers Chris Chow is a VERY accomplished drag racer who runs low to mid 8s in his old 1400HP GNX.. he came to us with QA1s and was complaining about wheel hop all the time. We did a Pfadt bushing swap and LG G2 coilover setup and he's been loving life ever since.

 

I run 305s all around for track days, and there is no way to reach the adj for the fronts without removing the wheel. I had the Pfadt Inverted Sport Adj before I had the coilovers. Because they are inverted, the adjuster is at the bottom of the front and rear shock. I would assume their inverted coilovers would be the same. So all you have to do is reach behind the bottom of the wheel. If you are not adjusting that much, then it is not such a big deal. I had adjusted my LG2 rears to the softer side for dd, but I guess I turned them too far and they got locked in and would turn back the other way for upcoming track day. I had to remove the rear shocks last nite to set them to my track setting. I am not touching them again. For me, I am getting rid of the adjustable LG2s and getting the non adj GT2s or the Pfadts Inverted. They are both the same price.

The one track day I did do on the LG2s at RD ATL, turn in was a definite improvement.

I hope this helps.

 

Shoot me a PM or give me a ring at the shop and let's work on a G2 setup for you.

 

GT2's here. Love them. I have buddies and customers who run these at the track. They all love them.

See you tomorrow Anthony

 

GT2's as well. I'm happy with them.

Install went smooth although I had to ream-out the front lower mounts about 1/32 to get the bolts to slide in/out without force.

Adjustments to dampners are simple in front. Rears are a little difficult due to the bending/routing of the adjuster cable. It's a little difficult to hear/feel the clicks. A couple times when changing settings I've had to go full + and count clicks again to verify accuracy...not a big deal.

I've had one track day so far (also has Toyo R compounds, G1 sways, aggressive alignmet) and the car stayed planted quite well over higher speed surface irregularities, off cambers etc. They did get what seemed like a little hot and softened-up a bit towards the end of my longest session that day.

For the street the springs that are installed are pretty stiff. Dialing back the adjusters to 5-6 doesn't help the harsh ride on many of the older bumpy roads around here. For someone that does a lot of street driving on less that smooth roads I would definately recomend purchasing a softer set of Hypercoils.

Overall I'm happy with the performance vs cost. The car now drives and handled like a performance car should.

 

I planned to get the G2's because of the inverted shock and LG already did all the r&d so you dont have to mess with adjustments. I ended up buying pfadt featherlite SA's slightly used because of a price i couldn't pass up. I've been too busy to install them, but i plan to track my car one more time with stock suspension and put the coilovers on for my august track day and see if i can get lower lap times. I've only been tracking for a year so my results won't be that reliable.