Subaru WRX Econo Suspension! Part 1

A lot of what you see here at MotoIQ are often really high-end mods that many people can just dream about or are so high performance and track level that they are not the most practical for cars that are driven primarily on the street.  We also do a lot of stuff that gives a lot of performance but is very practical as a daily driver but still gives a large boost in performance.  We recently refreshed the suspension on a GD WRX that was previously modified poorly and took it from dangerous to drive to a flat cornering, pleasant to drive fast machine that is fun on the twisties and is capable of a track day.  We used some relatively inexpensive parts from ST Suspension and Whiteline to transform the car.

Our car had come with some el cheapo Chinese suspension that was perhaps the worst stuff we have yet to experience.  The car would literally jump off the ground on freeway bumps and felt very unstable.  For safety sake, we replaced them with some ST Suspension XTA coil overs.  These coilovers represent a great value for the money and offer great durability at a reasonable cost.  The XTA Coilovers are single adjustable with the adjustment affecting mostly the low speed rebound damping.

The XTA dampers have electro-zinc plated steel bodies with a yellow chromate coating.  This treatment greatly resists corrosion and makes the spring seat less likely to stick. The shocks also have main and tender springs and the camber plate has bottom sealed bearings for longer life.  Microcellular urethane bump stops give a smooth end to the travel this is less likely to upset the chassis when bottoming out.

The camber plate has an adjustment scale, is hard anodized for corrosion resistance, and has zinc-plated hardware to further resist corrosion.  On Subaru applications, the bearing is located higher to give more wheel travel on lovered vehicles.   The damping adjuster is the allen screw in the middle of the shock shaft.