Coilovers. Always a hot topic and a must-have in the performance world. When set up correctly, they are perfect. They offer a lot of adjustability and performance tucked away in one compact, light-weight package. Now, not everyone has always been thrilled with a coilover setup. They do get a bad rap at times. Some misconceptions claim they give your car a rough or stiff ride. This can be true. Anything that is not properly installed or set up correctly will not work properly. We’ll go through three troubleshooting reasons you may not be getting the most from your coilovers

Spring Rate

Spring rate is extremely important for a smooth ride. Without setting this up properly, it’s true — you will have a very harsh ride. So, your buddy is doing some changes to their hot rod. They take off the coilovers that they had on their car and hand them down to you. Now you know that your buddy’s car used to handle perfectly. These coilovers should do the same for yours, right? Not necessarily. You will have to make sure you have the spring rate set up correctly on them. Here is how to check that.

First off,  to know your spring rate, you need to know the weight of your vehicle. If you are a home garage builder and don’t have access to scales don’t fret. QA1 has a helpful chart that can help. Click here to view it.

Shock Valving

Another aspect that can cause a harsh ride is improper shock valving. Not only does this cause a harsh ride, but it can also be dangerous as it causes abnormal wear on your tires. QA1 shocks come in either single- or dual-adjustable one or two knobs. These knobs have 18 damping settings: six clicks per revolution, each knob has three complete revolutions. You can get the walkthrough on how to adjust your shock valves here.

Shock Length

If one of the first two-mentioned issues isn’t the culprit and you are still left with a stiff ride, don’t fear. There is one more thing to check. Shock length could be to blame. The wrong shock length for your ride height can leave you with less than desirable results. One of the perks about coilovers is they are adjustable. However, dial them in too low or too high, and the shock runs out of stroke. This causes it to bottom out, creating a harsh ride.

The best way to find that perfect dial-in height is to stroke the suspension and take measurements. Take a measurement from the top mounting point to the bottom mounting point while the suspension is all the way extended and then while it is all the way compressed.

QA1 has a vast selection of coilovers and shocks ready to go. All you need to do is head over to the QA1 website and enter your year, make, and model to find whats works for you. They also have a strong support staff. So, if you can’t find what you are looking for or have any other questions, you can always reach out to them. Give them a call at (952) 985-5675 or shoot them an email.