So I think I'd like to drop my P5 about 1.5 inches give or take. What is the best/cheapest way to do this without making the ride worse, preferably improved?

 

quality, cheap, fast. you can only pick two.

on suspension work, i don't recommend you going the cheapest way possible, especially if it is a daily driver. there are a lot of things to consider with suspension since it is so complicated.

first is springs. you want a stiff spring if you are going to drop that much or else you will just end up bottoming out all of the time. for that much of a drop, i recommend a gold line spring. second is struts. you can gauge these by how high of quality that you want the ride to be. i recommend tokico here because there is a lot of versatility from one to the next. you can get blues which are cheap and enough for a daily driver, illuminas which are more expensive, but adjustable (perfect for me because i have kids), and i think there is a mid-grade tokico as well. third is correction. you need to correct the caster/camber of a suspension once you drop it or else your tires will not sit flat anymore and they will wear uneven. for the front, you can get the mount camber correction. they are aluminum brackets that you can adjust the mounting point of the top end of the strut. for the rear, there are better options that you will have to explore more.

these are the basics that you need to do if you are going to drop. additional work to consider would be a rear strut brace, ladder braces, end-links, sway bars, bushings, etc. i will send you to one web-site that is price-competitive, quality, and thorough. do not buy from e-bay, even if it is a brand name. there are a lot of fakes there.

www.protegegarage.com

if you need another site, let me know.

 

Thanks for thecomplete answer wsoape. Much more complicated than i figured. I'm new to all this and thought replacing the springs would do the job. i just want more of a flush appearancewith the wheel to the body and improve handling without making the ride brutal.

Would just replacing the springs leave me with a terrible ride and wheels so out of alignment that it would like they're ready to fall off?

 

the absolute bear minimum that i would recommend doing is a set of springs and correction. i would drive carefully after that until you get a set of struts.

 

I think i'll hold out until i need to replace the struts then.

Thanks for the feedback.

 

that's cool. you can just do what i do when i get ready to do an install. just collect parts for a while until it is all there. i am collecting parts for a suspension build right now and i won't be done collecting for about 2-3 months. my car will feel totally different when i am done though.

 

Yeah, that's the game plan. I just put on new wheels and tires and am having the windows tinted in the next couple of days. The CAI is next and I'm putting together the blue print for the exhaust and suspension. Unfortunately, my patients is not in line with the expendable income.

 

i can definitely understand that. it takes a lot of self-control to collect and not install it too early. right now, i need to re-bush my front-end, but i don't want to touch it until i get enough stuff to do a decent install. i learned the control when i was going back every time i did an install and having to pull stuff i had just installed to drop new stuff in.now i do it all at once.