Questions: Replacement Shock/Strut? Gas Mileage? Top Speed?

Post by **ARCHINSTL** » Thu Nov 23, 2006 7:40 pm

While the front and rear springs are different from one body style to another, since rear wagon springs are not available, does anyone know how the sedan rears do on our cars - maybe with takza's beloved donuts?
Tom M.

Typrus · Post by **Typrus** » Fri Nov 24, 2006 10:06 am

Apparently some are modding Grand Cherokee springs to fit. I looked at the front and rear coils on a few GC's and they look similar enough, length aside. So if you could cut some Cherokee's to fit in the back, you could have a pretty level ride with factory-styles in the front, but have a much higher spring rate in the back, allowing for higher loads and such. Might harshen ride a little bit, but I'd bet that if you are riding on shot-out coils, just about anything might be an improvement.

If you put significant loads in the back, I'd imagine that sedan springs might not quite live up to par. You can toss a pretty hefty load in the back of a Terc, being a wagon and such.

I believe Shogun hada suggestion for lowering springs, if you all don't care too much about the ground clearance issue.

jammin1911 · Post by **jammin1911** » Sat Nov 25, 2006 5:20 pm

Just to update and add my figures in here...

Taking my larger wheel diameter in to account the top speed in 5th gear in my tercel is 93mph on level highway, 4th gear pulls higher but I didn't bother testing to see if it would pull to redline or not..

My gas mileage for last 2 tanks was 22.2mpg which included quite a lot of trail blazing, probably at least 1.5 hours worth (not a lot of distance in there but still burning enough gas driving around in 2nd gear most of the time)

And surprisingly, driving to and from work and around town (probably about 25% highway) with no off road driving i got 23.5mpg - not a big different considering i was beating on the car for the first tank and trying to get good mileage on the second just to see how well it could do in my typical conditions.

Moral of the Story: do more offroading.

Typrus · Post by **Typrus** » Sat Nov 25, 2006 9:50 pm

Do you remember to calculate for the bigger wheel sizes when you calculate mileage? If, say you use 4 gallons in 100 miles. 25mpg. But say you then calculate for an 8% error. 108 miles. 27mpg.

sherlock · Post by **sherlock** » Sun Nov 26, 2006 12:06 am

85 4wd with 3.8 gears out of an 83. 185/60/14's on VW GTI alloys wheels, 128K and I just got 37-38mpg on 1200 mile trip going about 65-70.

Mac · Post by **Mac** » Sun Nov 26, 2006 1:20 am

I'm going to do Eibach springs for a AE-86 corolla, they will work fine out back as they both use the same rear end, up front might need some modding, but i'm up for it.

then i want to put on Koni yellows front and rear and a set of 15" konig rewinds with some stickey rubber, ought to make the tercel handle great.

i'm not interested in going offroad anymore, don't want to break anything.

Typrus · Post by **Typrus** » Sun Nov 26, 2006 10:27 am

Do you really have that power wagon in the avatar? Those things are insane offroad, so long as the owner isn't afraid to use the truck.

jammin1911 · Post by **jammin1911** » Wed Nov 29, 2006 5:55 pm

what the hell is a power wagon? haha

and no, i didnt remember to use the +7% for gas mileage calculation.. stupid me.

so, technically i'm getting around 25mpg. not horrible i guess considering the pedal is pretty much on the floor whenever i'm accelerating in 3rd/4th/5th