Ventura Coil Spring

[epic1400cs]

I came accross 'Ventura Springs' for our 3G Accord in a netshop from www.motorsportworld.co.uk. I am wondering if any of you have tried or heared about it. It says,

Bilstein use Ventura springs in their Sprintline and Streeline suspension kits. They highly recommend them and tell us that they rank them with the very best in the market. In many applications you will find a greater choice of lowering options than other brands offer. You will also find that although these are springs of the highest quality, the prices are exremely good! If you see a car listed more than once in the list below it is because there is more than one set of lowering springs available - click on the application and the next page shows the amount of lowering of each set.

For 3G, 35mm drop available and the price is very reasonable (£82.49
compare to H&R £138.42). If I guess from that fact that they use it for Bilstein's Streetline kit, the spring rate can't be more than 10% increase. Any comment welcome.

[86AccordLxi]

Never heard of those; you should buy them and find out how they are and come back and tell us!! I just quickly read through the site and your assessment is probably correct. You might contact them and see if they actually do make something for the 3g accord. What many people find is that shops advertise 3g parts but in actuality, the parts are on backorder or discontinued. If you do call the company or the manufacturer, also ask about the springrates for those springs. They are signifiactly cheaper than h&rs and if the springrate is not that much stiffer, than they will be a viable alternative to run with tokico struts (which also are only about 10% stiffer than stock). Let us know!

Alex

[epic1400cs]

Yeah, you are right. I have sent an e-mail asking about its spring rate + availability of Bilstein and Koni(out of production but there might be dead stock in a warehouse somewhere in Europe! ) but they don't come back yet. I will ring them today and will let you know.

[AccordAerodeckEX]

hey epic1400,

if you find somwhere in europe red koni for 3rd gen, let me know.

I'm from europe too and I hardely found 2 koni's for front, 2 mounths ago, in germany.

I need 2 for the rear, too

[epic1400cs]

I have spoken to 'Europe Car Parts' who import Bilstein to UK. He said they are very secretive about the spec of spring and he is not sure if it is possible but anyway he will try.

Hi, AccordAerodeckEX. About Koni, I have found 2 front Konis in France (see market place for the detail) but there is no rears in Netherlands, France or UK. You said there is no rears in Germany either. That means we have to try Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece and Poland!? I better use Bilstein in rear instead....

[epic1400cs]

The UK importer doesn't come back to me and I just running out of time so I decided to go for Ventura coil spring, front Koni Specials and rear Bilstein B36 dampers. Will see how things go. I am a bit cautious because with my last 3G Aerodeck, I use tokico damper(Blue in US) and Tanabe H150 spring(50% stiff over the stock), and the ride was a bit bumpy in town. On the Tokyo's roller coaster motorway and widing road in mountain, it was very enjoyable, though. This time I want the sus set up to be a bit milder - I don't go to mountain for 180? hair-pin corner anymore because that doesn't exist in England! I use motorway more often for work - very strainght, no tight bend in England!

I have searched the web but there is no info about the Ventura spring. Only in one Peogeot owner club in Japan messege board, a guy with Peg 406 is describing the Ventura spring as 'soft spring and managed to drop without losing ride confort' but its his own impression rather than based on figure.

Bilstein uses Ventura spring as a part of their Streetline and Sprintline kit but I notices that some shop sells Bilstein with H&R or Eibach as kit, too. Koni sells kit with Eibach but also with H&R. Hmm, I need to try first.

[epic1400cs]

Since my order of the Ventura Spring in September, I still havent received the delivery yet. It is very annoying. I have spoken to Motorsportworld yesterday and after a couple of time of enquiery from me, they found out that they forgot to send a fax to Ventura in Germany! Typical! Anyway, they sent a fax yesterday so I hope I will get them in a couple of weeks.

[epic1400cs]

hey epic1400,

if you find somwhere in europe red koni for 3rd gen, let me know.

I'm from europe too and I hardely found 2 koni's for front, 2 mounths ago, in germany.

I need 2 for the rear, too

Hi AccordAerodeckEX, have you managed to found the rear Konis yet?

[AccordAerodeckEX]

Hi AccordAerodeckEX, have you managed to found the rear Konis yet?

hello epic,

didn't found, but I found here a guy who revalve any strut, for competition. I have some friends who use them on rally cars, they work for about one year...

[epic1400cs]

After long long time, I have finally get the Ventura spring from Netherlands. I am assembling the spring with shocks at the moment. I will work on putting some pics but may take a while. Here are the detial of the spring (based on my measurement). Spring rate are calcuration value based on the Wire diameter, number of coil and Diameter of coil(centre).

Front: Progressive Type Straight Coil
Spring rate: 228.15 lb/in (8% up than OEM)
Drop: 35mm (catalogue figure - not checked on the car)
Wire diameter: 12mm (0.472 inch)
Number of coil: 10.5
Diameter of coil(centre): 78mm (3.071 inch)
Over all length: 275mm (10.827 inch)

Rear: Progressive Type Straight Coil
Spring rate: 83.60ib/in (28% less than OEM)
Drop: 35mm (catalogue figure - not checked on the car)
Wire diameter: 11mm (0.433 inch)
Number of coil: 11.8
Diameter of coil(centre): 94mm (3.701 inch)
Over all length: 330mm (12.992 inch)

[epic1400cs]

I have installed the Ventura spring with Koni front and Bilstein at rear.




Front with Koni, rear with Bilstein. Dust cover are not OE. The rear is good length, no play. The front there is tiny play...


Front strut comparision. Amasing that after 16 years, original one is not rusted too much.


In situ. Looking ok but...



Drop seems to be more than 35mm - may be 45mm. Looks good but might be too much. After installation I went out for a test drive. Good firm but not bone shaker impression until I hit speed bump. At the speed bump I hear big metal hitting noise from both front. What!? It is very obvious that the tiny play of the spring make big noise every time the strut stretchs. Gee, ok I can insert rubber sheet between the spring seat and the coil.

Then I went to street drive for a couple of hours. My conclusion is 'unsatisfactory'. Every time the car go over a bump, the front jumps - seems to be its bottoming and hitting the bump stop. May be the spring is too soft for this amount of drop. Thanks to the Koni, the jump stops only once though. The rear seems to be ok but the spring rate seems to be higher than I have calculated.

Oh well, this sort of things happens some time. Dissapinted by the spring which Bilstein recommends. I will try H&R kit very soon or may be back to OE spring. I am not sure if Bilstein HD can manage the H&R. If anyone who wants to try my Ventura spring and share my experience, please let me know.

[truetune]

I would try them if you were my next door neigbor but umm I live in Florida (aka) the U.S.

[epic1400cs]

Last weekend I have installed H&R spring instead of Ventura and everything is much better now. I have to admit I made an embarrasing mistake - when I assembled the strut with Ventura, I didn't assemble the front upper rubber bush in right order! This caused the gap between upper spring sheet and spring which made metal noise. How stupid!



Apart from this silly mistake, H&R offers reasonable ride in town and I am very happy with the swap. Also this time I set the front Koni as 1/2 turn compare to 1 full turn before. I was afraid of bouncy ride but there is no problem. I have learned that Koni recommend 0 turn from full soft for stock spring and 3/4 turn for 350lb Tokico spring. Then I thought it is fairly reasonable to choose half turn for H&R.



The height is now slightly higher - 5mm in the front and 10mm in the rear compare to Ventura and I really like the way how it is now. I didn't try the Ventura spring properly so I shouldn't say anything decisive however, I am very happy with H&R so I should leave it as it is.