Just recently bought some Tein type flex coilovers. These have the ability to adjust the ride height separate from adjusting the lower spring perch. So in other words, the ride height can be adjusted without changing the spring preload.
The instructions show a specific distance from the top of the shock body to the centerline of the bottom eye. Then the lower spring perch distance is measured off of that.
Once they are installed and the car is on the ground I believe the first thing to do is set the ride height and second thing is to adjust my corner weights.
My questions are 1) Do I adjust the ride height by changing the overall shock lenght or adjusting the lower spring perch (changing the spring preload)?
2) Do I adjust my corner weights by changing the overall shock length or changing the the spring preload?
Thanks in advance for any input.

 

The spring preload is where you want to center or control where the shock damper is centered for droop and bump. You may want to run more spring preload to increase your bump travel and decrease droop.

The corner weight and ride height should all come from the lower perch. so you will effectively decrease or increase ride height to get the corner weight you want. This will no effect your droop or bump travel at all.

Typical droop and bump travel varies based on who you talk to, but generally most people run a 50/50 or 60/40 or 40/60 (droop/bump) mix depending on spring rates. so if you have 3" total shock travel, when the car rests naturally you may suck up 1.5" of the shock travel giving you 1.5" droop and 1.5" bump.

 

Ok. That makes perfect sense. With this procedure I assume that I shouldn't be over concerned about getting equal ride height from side to side, but more concerned with corner weights?

 

Great info lOOKatme!

You'll need a set of scales (and a PhD, lol) to properly corner weight it. I just take mine to my mechanic friend and let him deal with it.
https://robrobinette.com/corner_weight.htm

Also, you can simply measure from the ground to the top of the wheel arches to determine and set the ride height. Like lOOKatme said, set the ride height using the lower spring perches. Do that before corner weighting, obviously.

 

Here is the process to set your initial ride height if you have coilovers with preload and length adjustment.

Add about 1/8" preload to the spring via the lower spring perch. Do this by screwing the lower perch until it just touches the spring or helper spring. Continue cranking it until you move the lower perch 1/8" higher. Set the preload like this front and rear.

Then set your ride height by screwing the shock cartridge in or out of the lower mount. Before you are done you will want to double check that the front and rear pairs are both the same overall length. Both fronts need to be the same overall length and both rears need to be the same overall length.

What I do is set the shocks to some close overall length to start. Then mark the shock to see how much you have changed. You can typically use calipers to measure the distance between the lower spring perch and the mount to make sure you are keeping the lengths the same.

After that you would corner balance the car by using the lower spring perches. I would not change your preload in an effort to get more bump travel or droop travel. You are just screwing yourself out of travel on the opposite way, and these types of coilovers do not have a ton of droop travel to begin with. If you need more travel raise the car via the height adjustment, and lower the preload if the car is too high. You should not need to excessively preload the spring to set ride height or travel on this style of coilover.

 

i'd do the same as Mr Font, but i like to mark the adjusters, and go by number of turns. a sharpie is fine, you just need to be able to count turns.

so i would set preload by making contact and then going about a half turn*. then for ride height you want to start with each end even (front and rear are different lengths). with these it may be easiest to start all the way down, and then count turns up.

depending on how crazy you are you can stop there, or you can put yourself in the drivers seat and have someone go even out the ride heights, as the car isn't exactly 50/50 front to rear or side to side. once you've got all four corners even in height you can go corner weight it.

once you've done that, it'll sit weird when you're not in it, but be awesome to drive.

*we know the thread pitch of the US made stuff (ground control, etc), and 4 turns = 1", which is really really handy. the teins use a finer thread, and we don't know how many turns does anything

 

I agree about marking the adjusters. I mark them, count turns, and then measure to sanity check.