Frayz's Inferno 182 - Back in the old flame

Yeah, for sure!
The sportster CS's that I have were from a Meg3rs. So needed to use Jon Foz Recaro seat frames + Jon Foz lowered adaptor brackets. Using my deduction of body weight method, mine came to 19.5kg. I think you can +/- 0.5kg pretty easily due to the inacuracy of the mecanical scale that was used.
Did yours come with the seat frames already due to being the aftermarket variety?

Yes, no additional frames needed, just the side adaptors and OEM rails.

Bit of interior tarting: body-colour trim strips and cup holder fitted.




The driver's sun visor courtesy lights weren't working as the positive wire had become detached, so that was soldered back on. A simple but satisfying fix.




A 180-mile round-trip to visit the painters (and view an old Alfa which I'm probably going to buy) proved that the ride was simply too jarring for my taste, even with the rears set to full soft and the ARB removed. I can't complain about the quality of the damping, but the car was just uncomfortably harsh and gave me a headache after a long stint. Given that long road trips are in the pipeline, including with the Mrs, something needed to be done.

Five years ago I solved a similar problem on my LY, when I replaced the AST full coilovers on the car with a conventional beam spring/shock setup. I happened to have lying around a set of BC rear suspension that had never been fitted to a car. I removed the AST rears and fitted the BCs, with the 5mm spacer on the springs which ends up pretty close to the existing ride height.

A 30-minute test drive this morning and it's remarkable how much more compliant the car feels. It now glides over the bumps whereas before you'd feel every single one. Further evidence that for my preference at least, a separate spring/shock setup at the rear is much preferable to a full coilover, even though the spring rates on the ASTs and BC are comparable on paper.



The LY has been on the market for a while without a sniff, so I'm hatching plans to remove some of the tastier bits and re-market it at a lower price. I'm going to whip off the BCs on the front of that car and try them in place of the ASTs in WZD. If I'm happy with that then I'll have a nice set of AST5100s for sale soon.