Coilovers vs Lowering Springs — and Why Stiffer Makes Your Car Slower

Coilovers vs lowering springs: which one should you buy, and why can a stiffer suspension make your car slower? The job of your suspension is keeping the tire on the ground. Ride height is only a consequence of doing that job. A tire in the air, even for a tenth of a second, does not accelerate, does not brake and does not turn. Everything in this video comes back to that. In this video: what the spring and the damper (the shock absorber) each actually do, the free bounce test for worn shocks and struts, why stiffening an axle takes grip away from that axle (and what that means for sway bars, understeer and oversteer), suspension natural frequency, why cutting springs is a genuinely bad idea, the three different products all sold as "coilovers", why most torsion beam cars cannot take a real rear coilover, how low is too low, bump steer and roll center after lowering, unsprung weight, and a diagnosis list for what your car is telling you. CHAPTERS 0:00 A tire in the air 2:04 Spring vs damper: who does what 4:33 Stiffer is not grippier 6:52 Why you never cut springs 8:01 Three things called coilovers 10:20 How low is too low 11:10 Why lowering backfires 12:42 The weight that counts double 14:40 What to do first The full map of car modification, part by part and in the right order, is in the Modded Right e-book, Car Mods Explained: https://moddedright.com/ebook Modded Right explains car modification from zero: what each part actually does, what order to do it in, and what breaks if you skip a step, before you spend the money. New videos Tuesday and Thursday.