Help me finally choose my coilover setup

[bavarian3]

Yeah another one of those threads, why not? I've done all the reading in the long suspension rec threads here on the forum and am still looking for opinions to help me pull the trigger.

Context:
-e46 m3
-Weekend car, focus on spirited mountain drives mainly. Driving events on occasion.
-Will go lower than the stock ride height.

Options I've narrowed down to:

JRZ Rs2
I actually have a set of these dampers(incomplete). Bought em' on a whim for a good deal but hard to find reviews on them. It'll cost some $$ and effort to fit springs and camber plates to test them. Not completely against the idea, at some point ya just want to drive the car though...

TCK SA
Had them on my e36. Rode great overall. Kinda pillowy on the rec spring rates? Hard to beat the value, but kind of just want to try something different?

TCK DA
This is where I've have some trouble. Apparently they're "much better than SA" but not clear on how it translates in the real world. Emailing TCK on the differences has not yielded much transparency other than they're "much more robust". Also concerns about clunks.

MCS 1 way
Apparently awesome stuff. Not a ton of reviews out there from street guys. Track guys love em. Priciest option.


Not interested in the "oh it's just a street car" so get new stock dampers on stock mounts. I'll want the ability to dial in the height and camber based on wheel/tire fitments.

Ultimately, if it takes another 1000 bucks over TCK SA to give that extra bit of driving experience I'm all for it. I realize we don't have all the definitive answers but I'd love to hear thoughts. I love over analyzing.

[EthanolTurbo]

Just get Ohlins and a good alignment. You'll be happy.

[bavarian3]

Just get Ohlins and a good alignment. You'll be happy.

limited travel on lowered cars?

[SQ13]

limited travel on lowered cars?

What do you want your ride height to be?

[bavarian3]

What do you want your ride height to be?

Will look to stay within the 13.5 front, 13 rear recommendation.

[bmwfnatic]

Another vote for just get the Ohlins, set it up once and forget about it.

Are they the best thing ever made? No, but for an otherwise stock car they are pretty decent out of the box, and you get a proper quality damper.

At this point in time you basically choose if you want to go down the rabbit hole of suspension tuning or not, if you are not chasing lap times and the car is enjoyable to drive, I wouldn’t.

[Altaran]

Yes, Öhlins is the way to go. Works out of the box for this use case and the quality is top notch. They also have the possibility to get revalved later on should you ever choose to get a track focused setup.

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[Gearhead55]

Ohlins would be a good option, but just to through my experience in there, I street drive my MCS 1WNR with swift spring set up all the time. Great on track and completely reasonable street manners, especially with flat-ride spring rates. Probably unnecessary if you don't plan on tracking though.

[Sid_E46]

Im on MCS one ways with a relatively stiff spring setup and it is incredibly comfortable on the street. More comfortable than my previous TcKline DAs and depending on the setup, probably more compliant than Ohlins.

[liam821]

Im on MCS one ways with a relatively stiff spring setup and it is incredibly comfortable on the street. More comfortable than my previous TcKline DAs and depending on the setup, probably more compliant than Ohlins.

I've found that a quality damper goes a long way to a comfortable ride!

[elbert]

Options I've narrowed down to:

Of your four choices, I would finish building your RS2's. Quality of internals are same level as the MCS, but double adjustable vs single.

[fattycharged]

Rebuild RS, you already have some very premium dampers in hand, just send to Inertia Laboratory and have him spec some springs/plates


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[9kracing]

The JRZs you have are really nice, that's what Dinan used. Pretty expensive, but seeing as how you already have the dampers, this is probably your best bet?

I went with the 3DM Ohlins track day setup and I'm happy.

AST/Moton is another ultra high end option that I don't see recommended on this forum much, IDK why.

https://motonsuspensionusa.com/products/ast-5100-series-shock-absorbers-non-coil-over-bmw-3-series-e46-m3-coupe

[oceansize]

GC Street Coilovers (they are koni/eibach setup and you can customize spring rates) w/ street camber plates and add helper springs. You can get the GC adjustable end links, GC sway bars, and GC ARCA (monoball) all for less than the cost of a high end suspension that given your requirements are no where near necessary.

Done.

[Nate047]

I prefer a 2-way adjustable damper, but I believe something like the MCS single adjustable dampers would be very good and you’ll probably never miss the double adjustability.

But since you already have those JRZs, which are super nice, I would keep those and complete the rebuild. If all you need are springs and top mounts, that shouldn’t be too expensive or time consuming. Ground Control, Swift, BimmerWorld, I would call
those places first and see what they suggest.