Quote:
Originally Posted by ntgarage44
Just picked up my car with MP HAS on my non-cp car w/ EDC shocks yesterday. Max drop in front, not sure about the rear, but it's not maxed out. A little higher than my previous lowering springs were, so somewhere in the -10 to -15mm range. Also corner balanced and aligned. Full list of suspension iterations:
- Stock - ~5000 mi
- Macht Schnell lowering springs - ~2500 mi
- Bilstein B16 Damptronic coil overs - ~1500 mi
After a roughly 50 mile drive home, I have to say I'm impressed so far. I'm not sure if it's the bump stops, springs rates, or combination of both, but the rear doesn't crash like my previous MS springs felt. I'm experiencing the ideal 1 compression/rebound far more than the MS springs. Maybe the MS were too low/soft and just riding the bump stops? I'm sure raising the rear height relative to MS springs helped as well. But the car still feels stock in a good way.
Compared to B16, it is more comfortable. I'd say that B16 in comfort is between Sport and Sport+ with MP HAS. The B16 damping is incredible, among other things, but I think it was too much for my wife, so I changed to MP HAS to be able to drive the car more with her in it. I can't compare any track impressions, because my car is 100% a street car, but I did lose some steering feel switching to MP HAS from B16.
I know this kit has had overwhelmingly positive reviews for a long time already, but so far, all I can say is I wish I did this first instead of the lowering springs. Whoever designed this kit definitely did their homework. Just feels so much better engineered. There's a few roads around me with larger dips that the stock and MS springs sucked on, but B16 fixed. I'm going to try going over those roads again with this kit to see if this is just the honeymoon phase, or if it really did sort out the floatiness I experienced before the B16 kit.
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I'm glad you kept your MP HAS kit instead of selling it!
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My review below:
Similar to what others have said, i'm very happy with the MP HAS.
Car is a 2018, non-zcp, but has adaptive suspension. MP HAS is lowered all the way in the front, and the rear coils has the gap set to equal to the thickness of the included adjustment spanners (1/4 inch or less). This resulted in a ride height (from fender to ground, on OEM 18s) of 25 10/16 inches in front and 25 13/16 in rear. Gap between fender/tire is equal on this setup. Minor rake in front, but i dont mind the look.
Ride Quality:Comfort on MP HAS is similar to Sport/Sport+ on OEM suspension (probably closer to sport+), so do keep that in mind if you're trying to maintain as 'lexus' of a ride quality as possible. HOWEVER, there are no spine shattering "hits" on big bumps. You feel more of the road, but not to the point it takes away from the experience and crosses over to discomfort. Overall i'm pleased with the ride quality and its definitely not as raw as lowering your car on a track oriented coilover (e.g. ohlins). FWIW - my wife has not said anything regarding a change in ride quality, and i didn't even mention the car has been lowered. She noticed right away on previous rides.
Install: Huge shout out to Tommy L Garage on Youtube, and everyone else who compiled install threads on this forum. I'm only a weekend wrencher and have done a few coilover/spring installs on previous rides, which were mostly japanese. This definitely was on the easier side, with not many bolts having to come out, and components lining up easily afterwards. Biggest tip is to make sure you have 2 specialty tools, the 18mm strut socket for the fronts, and also the spindle separator socket for the fronts as well. Note that in the rear, the nut holding the alignment bolt cant be accessed using an impact so you'll probably want to break the NUT side loose by hand (dont advise trying to back it out from the bolt side using an impact, the tension from the suspension is holding down the bolt quite tightly). Much easier to take the nut off with leverage, jack up control arm then whack the alignment bolt out once tension is relieved. Otherwise, install is very straight forward.
Negative: Biggest negative, and this can be solved by simply raising the fronts, is that my lightweight lip scrapes everywhere with the fronts set to max low and on OEM 18s. I dont mind since the lip is durable, but if it was a carbon lip, it would be destroyed by now.
Anyways, enough typing. Hope this review helps someone who is on the fence of whether or not to move forward.