You can do more with a good set of springs and struts than you will be able to do safely on public roads. Cheap coilovers such as Megans, BC BRs, Fortunes, Stances, etc are all very poorly designed. They are essentially made with random parts grabbed from a parts bin with no real R&D. They ride poorly and are less reliable than and handle worse than properly made coilovers. A good set of springs and struts will be more reliable over all a far less maintenance intensive.

 

DD motor wise. I just picked up a used STi exhaust, and hopefully will be getting that and installing it soon (I still need to find a place that sells the ROL 511180 XXL exhaust hanger. Anyone know where I can get that? My local auto-parts places are of no help). Otherwise, I'd like to do some gauges and a short shifter. That's about it. Down the road maybe and Access Port or a custom tune with a Turbo-back. But that's WAYYY down the road.

While some might not recommend coilovers, I don't mind the stiff ride, and I like the adjustability. One of my first cars was a VW Jetta with H&R Coilovers, front and rear sways, upper strut brace, lower tie-bar, and a roll cage. And it was a DD. So ride stiffness isn't of much of a concern.

After coilovers comes wheels/tires. I'm a wide wheels guy from back in 2002 when I stretched a 235/45-17 onto a 17x10. Back then it was hard to even find a shop to consider doing that.

Anyway, thanks for the advice, but again, a stiff ride makes no difference to me.

 

Been considering Cuscos, Teins, and H&R as options. I'm less concerned with a billion levels of dampening, although some adjustability is nice, and more concerned with ride height adjustability and a good out-of-the-box feel.

 

Cuscos and Teins are not good street coilovers. The H&Rs will fair a little better. You can find nice riding coilovers that perform well, the problem is that they cost an arm and a leg and you're paying for something you will not be taking advantage of on the street. And coilovers are NOT plug and play "out of the box". The require testing and tuning. If you want to go lower, I would suggest finding a used WRX suspension. It will lower you quite a bit.

Please don't. That's a travesty. Wide wheels are for wide tires.

 

I'm not looking to do something like I did back then. I was young, dumb, and this was well before the ridiculous Stance and HellaFlush craze that everyone seems to be so spent on these days. Although had that been around, I probably would have been part of it.

I'm looking for something nice that rides well, fits properly, and offers both the look and performance, without too much sacrificing of the ride quality - or my wife gets pissed.

And I guess I misspoke. I guess what I meant was, with my H&R's on my Jetta, after installation, other than a few weeks of playing with the height and a few other things, they were dialed. On the other hand, I have friends who used other brands, and they were constantly having to readjust and fiddle with them.