,
Next, Howard removed the lower shock mounting bolts from the Superpro lower control arm.
The stock shock could then be removed.
When comparing the stock WRX shock to the Tein Flex Z you can easily see how the Tein part is much shorter while still offering a generous amount of wheel travel. This gives you a lower ride height while maintaining your wheel travel. This helps reduce the likelihood of bottoming during hard cornering and ensures that you will have a good ride even when the car is lowered significantly. You can also see that the body of the Flex Z damper unit is much fatter indicating a larger piston. A larger piston means more bearing area for longer life and more valve area for more accurate fluid flow control. 
Howard raises the Flex Z into place and bolts the lower mount to the control arm.
The top mount bolts were tightened down and interior panels popped back in place completing the rear shock installation.
To remove the front struts the upper mount bolts were removed in the engine compartment. 
8 comments
By chance do you have any content where you compared shock dynos of various coilovers for a specific application? Maybe showing say $500 up to $3500 offerings, comparing the linearity of their adjustment, etc. etc. I’m too much of a layman to make actually look at the dynos themselves and make the comparison, but it would be great to read your takeaways/insights from an expert like yourself.
Cheers.
That would be pretty expensive to do, costing about $1000 per set of shocks, and dyno’s don’t tell you everything. Especially with cheap shocks.
Regarding the coilover install, did you guys adjust preload or ran it how it came out of the box? And Are Rear LCA recommended.
Thank you!
We did some minor adjustments of the ride height but did not preload the suspension.
Regarding the install, did you guys adjust preload or ran it how it came out of the box? And Are Rear LCA recommended.
Thank you!
We don’t tune with preload, I don’t agree with that. Preload doesn’t increase the spring rate, it just increases the initial force to move the suspension.
Can you confirm that the new Flex Z’s are made in China. I just bought a set from an authorized dealer & i’m looking at the box & they say designed by Tein in Japan, Assembled by Tein China MFG. Which is odd since they’re advertised at the time of writing this as Made in Yokohama Japan.
Seems they do have factories in both Japan and China. Flex Z’s are majorly produced in China according to their blog page. (https://teinusa-blog.com/made-in-japan-or-china/)
I bought a set of Flex Z for AE100 for a surprisingly expensive price of >$1200 back in Oct 2021. “Made in Japan 日本製” was printed in big letters on the packaging.