Fitted Whiteline kit.

[JimX]

Well, I took delivery of the bits last night, and here's the lowdown:

Firstly, I love Whiteline! The price for their handling kit went up to $750 on the 1st of July, but they sold me their handling pack at $15 less than the pre-July price of $615 as a favour because my shock isn't covered by warranty.

They also gave me a big discount off the shock absorber, and also a discount off 2 rubber boots to stop the same thing happening again. They only had 2 boots in stock or else I would have gotten 4. The rears are the imporant ones anyway.

I was so excited I spent 4 hours last night doing the following in this rough order:

Pulling the rear seat and parcel shelf out, pulling both rear shocks out, dissassembling them both to fit the rubber boots (plus replace the old temporary shock with the new one of course), fitting them back up again, plugging a hole in one of my tyres (picked up a screw), drove my gf's car to the servo with my wheel to re-inflate it, putting back seat and parcel shelf back in, taking old rear sway bar out, assembling new sway bar and putting it in, then stuffing around with different bolts working out how it was supposed to go together. Oh, and I also ate dinner briefly at one point in there.

I was also going to put the front swaybar in but by this stage it was 1:30am (I started at 9:30pm, went shopping!) and I had to come to work today, so I'll do it tonight or tomorrow morning. I haven't road tested the car yet but it all seems good.

[craz0]

Good to hear, so the sports packs don't come with the rubber boots to protect the shocks? How much do they charge for them normally with out your discount? Lucky man.

Good to see you had dinner, know all you have to do is stay away from them rocks.

[JimX]

You're meant to re-use the old rubber boots and bump stops with their suspenion kits. My bump stops were fine, but the rubber boots had long since disintegrated.

[craz0]

Yeah but my boots are nackered and my bump stops are also nackered.

I might get in contact with Whitline to see what they can do for me.

[DJ_L3ThAL]

what come sin this handling kit, i just had my shocks and springs and bup stops/boots all replaced with new koni/king stuffs and i love it, but im planning on getting front and rear camber kits, front castor kit and sway bars soon, have been quoted an extra $1000 (fitted) for the rest of the stuff, seem resonable ?

[JimX]

The kit you describe is the same thing I got and is indeed $1000 fitted. If you had bought it before the end of June you would have saved around $135.

$250 is the labour cost for fitting everything and I think a wheel alignment included. Since I'm doing my swaybars myself I hope to save a bit on labour putting the adjustable bushes in at a later date.

[craz0]

I just rang Whiteline about the shock boots and bump stops and they told me that they come in sets front and rear and in each set you get the shock boots and bump stops. The cost is $49 a set so $98 for front and rear.

[JimX]

Argh. I tried putting the front swaybar in tonight - forget it. There's some sort of support rod going from the chassis to the lower suspension arm which is in the way of the front bolts holding the old sway bar in. I tried taking this off but the nut wouldn't budge. Rather than **** around with it I think I'll just take it to Whiteline for them to do along with the bushes.

[FLIP]

where is awhiteline located? what sort of shocks do they offer are they damper adjustable?

[JimX]

They are in Minto (south-western Sydney) and they have Koni shocks for adjustables.

[rsx84]

i've just gone the swap for new gear my car is a little older though but for adjus konis front and rear with H/D king springs and whiteline sway bars front and rear all up it was 1800 fitted, it also included new race brake pads and fitting of new dba slotted rotors as well. now with a older car it is but everthing was there with in a week and installed within 1/2 a day. its like driving a brand new skyline.

[benm]

Anyone used the whiteline camber kit? Im wondering how much difference it would give on a track...

[Roy]

ben, next to no gain on the track, does help tyre wear though.

[Duncan]

really roy? I thought it would help heaps. The stock camber's about negative 1, that is not enough and it wears the outside of the tyre too much. Surely if the tyre is flatter on the road there is better grip as well :confused:

[JimX]

Usually you want a bit of negative camber on the track for the corners. Less camber will help you get better traction on the drag strip. So yeah, I've got a rear camber kit, but I'm only fitting it to help preserve my tyres

Btw, bad toe alignment will wear your tyres out faster than a bit of negative camber. If you're chewing out the rears too much then do a 4 wheel alignment before checking camber.

[benm]

Yea i woulda thought abit of neg camber on the front would help with turn-in better, maybe not.

[Roy]

This is from my experience with my car.

I drove my car with stock as a rock susp around Wakefield 3 times . (Went from 1:20s to 1:17s... you up the back, yes you! STOP LAUGHING:( )

Then decided to get the Whiteline Works Pack

Then i returned to Wakefiled expecting the car to be 2-3 seconds quicker.

The car was lucky to be 0.5seconds quicker. So i agree the suspension settings help the feel of the car, and the life of the tyre, and on paper make the car quicker around a track.

Before this next statement a disclaimer - i am not the greatest driver, and not casting dispersions about anyone elses driving ability-

But as a mod to go quicker around a track, looking purely at lap times i dont think many of us could physically tell the difference in the handling or register quicker lap times. As for the seat of the pants feel, i believe it is subtle enough that unless they are tested back to back in the same day then youd be forgiven for fogetting that it has been done.

That said it does do wonders for tyre wear.

So in an around about way it does give you are sharper tool and should be on the list of things to do. But as for measuring an increase in lap times, if your like me then any possible improvement will be lost by the lack of driving ability to take full advantage.

Does that make sense...? Basically dont be disapointed if your lap times dont improve... but this isnt a reason not to do it, you should.

[benm]

Sounds like im in a similar situation as yourself..... Have pretty much enough of the right gear just need to go round n round n round n round for the next 12mths gaining experience.

I'd love to have Duncan do afew hot laps in my car 1 trackday just to see what he can do in it. I'm sure he would instantly wipe 20sec off my laptimes (like he did at Eastern Creek 6mths ago) infact probably even more with my car having more power and better brakes.

[Roy]

Well in an 18 month window of no mods i took 4 seconds out of my lap times at wakefield, and another 4 seconds at Eastern Creek.

As it stands now on road rubber 1:13s at wakefield, and 1:56s at Eastern is where im at, and im comfortable enough that i can now throw more mods at the car and be able to reap some of the benefit, instead of any car improvement being lost on its driver.

... and hopefully i can tell the difference after my next wheel alignment, as 3deg neg front camber with 6.5/7.0deg castor results in plenty of understeer. Thats the prob having a car setup for D01Js but running road rubber... that and terrible wear on the street.

[benm]

How many laps would you say you have done of each track?

So far im at ~20 laps of Eastern Creek, I had "ok" brakes for about the first 8 laps hehe the rest was just "this is cooool, shiiiat im losing my brakes". So my best is a 2:16, with hopefully a full 10sec disappearing next time im out (will have brand new semi-slicks instead of 20,000km old Faulkens)

My biggest problem is unless im in peak hour driving to work im a pretty much inexperienced driver. I barely even changed gears at EC for fear of getting it sideways or doing something wrong and ending up nose first into a wall hehe. But then again I didn't once get the car sideways or even loose traction (well ok I had abit of a chip when trying to change down into 2nd at turn 9 at EC haha) so for the remainder of the day it was just 3rd n 4th gears