If you strip Legend shocks GET THE LOWER MOUNTS!
Hmm well turns out the Legend lower shock mounts are not identical to the Accord's because the shock itself is a few millimeters larger in diameter. No big deal but if you are stripping shocks off a Legend grab those too. :banghead:
Guestimating with springs and shocks is frustrating
Guestimating with springs and shocks is frustrating. I think its funny I had much more success putting Honda springs on a BMW then a Honda I am currently trying to find some sort of article examining dampening vs. spring rate in more detail.
Shocks convert mechanical energy into heat energy right? So putting too much stress on a shock probably overheats it. Ever notice how old shocks have burn-marks on the piston sometimes? When shock oil overheats it probably leaks through the piston-seal. When oil escapes the shock becomes less efficient in absorbing heat. Everytime oil escapes it also increases the piston speed and travel within the shock body which reduces its dampening effect. (The progression of shock failure probably increases exponentially once its been overheated.) Eventually the dampening valve will be completely overloaded and then its game over. The dampening valve itself will fail and the shock piston will bottom out inside the strut housing making a horrible tinging-sound.
Obviously this overheating effect can happen both in the compression stage or in the rebound stage. I dunno if pushing or pulling on a shock is worse either way... but it seems logical to think that there is an ideal dampening rate for a particular spring and varying from that is just gonna kill your shocks. Adjustable shocks were obviously made so you can achieve this harmony with a variety of different aftermarket springs but you have to wonder how those settings compare to the stock dampening rate?
For instance, is setting "1" supposed to be equal to stock dampening or is setting "4" supposed to be equal to stock dampening? I dunno why anyone would want a dampening setting weaker then stock because why would you ever put weaker springs on a car???
Even if you use stock springs and reduce the dampening below stock that isn't gonna make the springs any softer it'll just increase the rate of spring travel to the point where the springs are no longer working within the range they were designed for ruining your handling and your springs at the same time. Also it seems like using an adjustable shock to increase the resistance of the shock without increasing the spring stiffness is just gonna overheat the shock and ruin it.
The only shock I can think of that could actually change the dampening rate of a spring while also preventing overheating are those magnetic-shocks with the particles inside. The valves in those shocks actually change the flow-rate of the valve based on the strength of the magnetic field in milliseconds! Therefor you can always change resistance to piston travel without actually putting stress on the valve. Either the oil is allowed to flow quickly through the valve or it isn't. In other words, that shock can change dampening/rebound rates independently without changing the actual volume of oil inside. If you time that right you can probably prevent or at least significantly reduce overheating.
Remote-resevoir shocks probably work on another concept that says if you give the oil inside the shock-housing an option to leave the housing at a measured rate you can change the dampening rate without overstressing the valves and overheating the oil.
I have no idea how coilovers work better then manually adjustable shocks w/adjustable springs btw... That's another thing I'll have to read up on...
Oh, and I just went on another run with lower tire pressures. Much better! ...but the car is still too stiff for certain sections. I think maybe these current settings balance out with stock... meaning that the stock setting will handle better in certain sections and the current setting will handle better in others. In other words it is not an improvement overall on my home course but it should be an improvement at the track or some other form of competition on smoother/flatter tarmac.
