Last Minute Ride Height Adjustment - using Coil Spring Spacer

I did this Friday, a day before my track event. Track day report will be posted soon!

You may remember from my previous entries that my left front tire is rubbing when given a good amount of steering input. A little bit of rubbing is fine, but I was rubbing pretty bad in right hand turns. I found out that the outside edge was rubbing on the fender, when I mounted my camera on the fender. Before, I tried sticking my hand out with the camera but the angle wasn't right. Don't try that at home!

I spent a few hours rolling and pulling my fender with a PVC pipe. I didn't have much time because I was trying to solve my problem a couple of days before the track day. My car already kind of looks like crap so I didn't mind my bad fender pulling job. It wasn't going to work. Time to raise the ride height. But Doh! I don't have an adjustable spring perch.


I went to Advance Auto Parts and picked up a coil spring spacer. These spacers are supposed to fit between the coils of a spring and effectively remove that spring. I wasn't going to do that, but place it on the bottom or top spring perch. I sliced them in half, cut them down to the appropriate circumference (if you forgot everything you learned in middle school like I do sometimes, that is Pi*2r). I drilled holes into them to secure the ring with zip ties. 

Installation procedures: 1. Remove shock shaft nut on top of the suspension 2. disconnect sway bars (to save time, jack up the entire front end and disconnect on both ends so re-installation will be easier) 3. pry the upper control arm down 4. move spring up and slip in spacer on the bottom shock perch. 5. secure zip tie. You will need three limbs to do the last three steps, so a friend can help a lot.

They don't sit flush on the perch. Make sure the holes are drilled far inside so they don't rip, and that you tighten the pretty well. But not so that the zip tie will fail. On testing, the tires stopped rubbing at mild speeds, and didn't slip off. They held up fine at the track day as well. I don't recommend this though, but it sure beats getting a ring machined for 50 bucks. Do this at your own risk!

Final ride height: Front 13" Rear 13"  (front was raised about 0.5 inches)