Bilstein PSS10

[AlterZgo]

Other observations at close to 1000 miles. I decided to raise the fronts a bit yesterday and I noticed that the spring perches have two sets of allen screws per perch that locks the spring perch in place. They are located on opposite sides and are easily accessible with a 3mm allen wrench.

Compared to KW HAS, the Bilsteins are super easy to adjust height. The threads on the Bilsteins are about 2x wider so one full turn raises or lowers the spring perch by 1/8" vs. 1/16" on KW HAS. Furthermore, even though the springs remained pre loaded with the car raised, the spring perch turns very easily and smoothly compared to KW HAS.

This 1/8" increase in ride height had little if any effect on ride quality or handling. I did it to reduce the front rake a bit and also to gain a bit of clearance as I plan on adding a front lip very soon.

[supremepower]

Originally Posted by AlterZgo

I had Bilstein PSS10 coilovers installed on my F80 2 weeks ago and have driven on them for about 700 miles. For background, my car is a 2015 6MT with passive suspension. I had been lowered on KW HAS for the past year or so. At first, KW HAS springs were fine. Over time, the damping of the stock shocks started to wear out and I began to really hate how my car drove.

A little background about me... The M3 is the 10th car I've owned and EVERY single car I've ever owned has been lowered w/ everything from front perch mounts to aftermarket springs to full coilover suspensions so I have a very clear idea on how I want my cars to ride and handle. And KW HAS simply wasn't cutting it. The probably wore out the stock shocks faster than any aftermarket springs I've ever used and my car was only mildly lowered.

So after chatting w/ Tam@SupremePower, I decided I needed to bite the bullet and get a full coilover system. KW V3s were out as my experience w/ KW HAS had soured me on KW products. JRZ, Moton, Ohlins and the various Club Sport coilovers all seemed too pricey and overkill for a car that I never plan to track, though I was tempted to buy the used set of Bilstein CS coilovers TAG is selling. Since I've had good experience with Bilstein on a couple of my past cars, I went with the PSS10 coilovers. I also liked Bilstein's monotube design and, IMO the blue springs simply looked better than yellow ones.

So far, I have been very satisifed with them. The very first thing I noticed was the car had significantly improved turn in response. You turn the steering wheel and the car turns immediately. It felt like slop in the steering was removed and steering feel became more direct. Curiously, though, after that initial turn in, the steering seemed to firm up a bit more... almost like the caster angle became more slack. I soon got used to the steering feel and I find that I like it better overall due to the immediacy of turn-in response.

Second thing I noticed was the car cornered much flatter. There was definitely less body roll than with KW HAS springs.

Third thing I noticed was the excellent ride quality. When I first drove off, I was a bit worried because the ride felt too compliant. I was concerned that it would be too soft and wallowy when I hit larger bumps. The car definitely has a progressive spring rate feel, i.e. small bumps and rough road texture is filtered out compared to the stock OEM springs where you felt more of the harshness of road texture. That feeling you get on a stiffly sprung car with linear rate springs - you know, where you feel like you could drive over a dollar bill on the road and feel it - well that doesn't exist with the PSS10s. For better or worse, the PSS10s seems to smooth out all of that texture. Of course, I have not tried driving with the dampers set at 10/10 and that may bring back more of the road feel and harshness, but at my current 4/5 setting, it's very smooth.

As I drove the car more over varied roads and at different speeds, I found the damping to be very well tuned. It was not soft at all and the damping has been excellent for street driving. They provide a massively better and more refined and sophisticated ride compared to my KW HAS on worn out passive OEM shocks.

The PSS10s absorbs large and small bumps in the road extremely well while providing a fairly well damped ride. By this, I mean when I hit a large bump on the fwy at say 80 mph, the car will dip once and take a firm set rather than oscillating or feeling unbalanced and squirlely like w/ KW HAS. When you drive over a series of bumps and other rough road patches, the suspension absorbs it with ease, without bottoming out or packing up on the rebound stroke.

The car rode so well, I began looking for rougher roads so I could deliberately ram through it at speed and marvel at how well the suspension soaked up the bumps. Rough roads that I would have to slow down and cringe when driving over with my KW HAS set up, for fear of bottoming out, I now took at full speed with no issues.

I don't track my car so I can't comment on how well it would hold up on a track, but on the street, it's a great set up. It does not squeak, clank or pop. No odd noises at all. It just works well in virtually all road conditions. So far, the PSS10s are totally quiet and OEM like in refinement.

From a drawback standpoint, the only minor thing I noticed is, at lower speeds (say 10-25 mph or so), the ride can feel a bit rough on poor roads. It's like the suspension seems to eat through the compliant travel of the progressive spring and then takes a firmer set so that it starts following the roadway imperfections more and the ride feels a bit busy or jiggly. However, as your speed increases to 35+ mph, over the exact same roads, the ride quality magically smooths out as the springs and dampers come alive and seemingly flattens the road.

The car truly excels at freeway speeds of say 50-100+ mph. The handling is excellent and ride quality is exceptional at these speeds soaking up all roadway undulations, bumps, etc. Despite the progressive springs and seemingly soft ride, the car does not exhibit any floatiness at all at these speeds even with the dampers set at a relatively soft 3/3. Also, the crisp and quick turn-in I mentioned earlier never feels darty even at higher freeway speeds.

Some other observations:

1. Officially, the minimum lowering is something like 30mm or just over 1". I did not want to slam my car so I had some concerns that 30mm may be too much. Well, I would say minimum lowering is more in the .5" to .75" range, i.e. 15mm rather than 30mm. I would say the overall lowering range in front is probably about .6" or so to 1.75", which is more than enough range for a street driven car.

2. Rear lowering has an even wider range. I'm sure you can set rear at stock height and, based on how much more I can lower the rear perch, you can probably drop the rear by 2.5". In short, lowering range front and rear is totally fine for a street driven car.

3. PSS10s have a single knob to adjust both compression and rebound damping. While not ideal, for a street driven car, it is totally fine. The best thing is, the adjustment knobs are super easy to access and doesn't require removing trim panels in the trunk, or removing wheels/tires to access. The rear adjustment knobs can be accessed easily by laying under the rear bumper. The front knobs are a bit harder to reach just b/c the front end has less clearance, so I had to jack up each front corner to reach the damper adjustment knobs. Still, this is very simple to do and a 3 minute job for each front damper.

4. I tried various damper settings 3F/3R, 5F/6R, 5F/5R and eventually settled on 4F/5R. I felt at about 5/6, the car started to ride a bit too firm and jiggly for street driving and at 4/5, the car was still very comfortable, yet provided a firm, well damped, sporty ride.

5. My car is not slammed. It's lowered maybe 1.2" front and .5" rear. Preserving as much suspension travel as possible, while not as sexy as a slammed car, actually handles better, rides better and prolongs the life of the dampers as well as other things like your front lip, the under carriage of your car, etc.

I would like to also say supremepower did an excellent job w/ customer service and installation. If you're in Southern California, you need to visit them. I was very picky about ride height. I have a heavy ass musicar subwoofer in the right rear corner and told Tam I wanted ride height to be set equally left to right. I also didn't want the car slammed. When I came to pick up the car, the installer had the car sitting on their alignment rack so that it could be perfectly level and I could see if I liked the ride height settings. It was absolutely spot on. The installer also made sure to install the damper adjustments in the rear to face inwards so that you can see the damper setting when you're laying under the rear bumper. Otherwise, if installed as recommended, the adjustment knobs would be facing outwards towards the rear tires you couldn't see or reach the adjustment knobs as easy.

In summary, PSS10s have been one of my favorite mods for my car. I do wonder how they will hold up over time though. Hopefully, I can get a good 20k+ miles out of them before the dampers start noticeably wearing out. When that happens, I can just click up the damping a notch or two and things should be fine. I will report back after I've added more miles on them.

Thank you for the kind words & great write up! Much appreciated

[JamesGames]

Originally Posted by AlterZgo

Other observations at close to 1000 miles. I decided to raise the fronts a bit yesterday and I noticed that the spring perches have two sets of allen screws per perch that locks the spring perch in place. They are located on opposite sides and are easily accessible with a 3mm allen wrench.

Compared to KW HAS, the Bilsteins are super easy to adjust height. The threads on the Bilsteins are about 2x wider so one full turn raises or lowers the spring perch by 1/8" vs. 1/16" on KW HAS. Furthermore, even though the springs remained pre loaded with the car raised, the spring perch turns very easily and smoothly compared to KW HAS.

This 1/8" increase in ride height had little if any effect on ride quality or handling. I did it to reduce the front rake a bit and also to gain a bit of clearance as I plan on adding a front lip very soon.

Did you notice your front perch only has one adjustment collar on the front ? My rear has 2, just making sure yours is the same and mine didn't come defective..

[AlterZgo]

Originally Posted by JamesGames

Did you notice your front perch only has one adjustment collar on the front ? My rear has 2, just making sure yours is the same and mine didn't come defective..

Mine has one up front only as well.

[supremepower]

Originally Posted by JamesGames

Did you notice your front perch only has one adjustment collar on the front ? My rear has 2, just making sure yours is the same and mine didn't come defective..

Just did another that had 1 up front also

[theriz]

Originally Posted by Stryatch

I'm definitely interested in the damptronics version.
Do we know if it's coming out?

Havent been keeping up. Is this version out yet?

[kitw]

Just installed my PSS10 on my passive suspension 2016 M4.

As a bit of history - I've had H&R Sports, KW V3 and Dinan adjustable height springs on my 2015 M3, I did JRZ RSTwo Touring on my 2015 M4, and just did PSS10 on my 2016 M4. I was all set to do the Ohlins, but got the PSS10s for such a smokin deal that I thought I'd give them a shot.

I've only driven a few hundred miles so far, but my impressions, for a street suspension, are overwhelmingly positive. It really reminds me of my 991 C2S that had the sport PASM suspension, 20mm lower with more aggressive dampers and PASM programming, except obviously, the PSS10s are passive. The SPASM suspension (nice acronym, Porsche) is unbearably stiff on Sport Plus (small bumps really upset the car), but is really great on Sport or Normal, and the PSS10s remind me of that.

Slightly more busy than passive stock especially under 30 mph, but very composed and absorbs medium bumps better. I'd say that large bumps, especially a few in a row, feel a bit harsher, but still stockish feeling; this doesn't feel very aftermarket at all, which is a compliment. They don't feel as harsh as the M4's active suspension on Sport+ either.

I haven't tried them in anger or on track yet, but for a street suspension on something you just want to look better and drive with better control, the PSS10 are a great solution. I think that the JRZ RStwo ride a bit better, but they're 50-75% more expensive and require more maintenance.

[JamesGames]

Originally Posted by kitw

Just installed my PSS10 on my passive suspension 2016 M4.

As a bit of history - I've had H&R Sports, KW V3 and Dinan adjustable height springs on my 2015 M3, I did JRZ RSTwo Touring on my 2015 M4, and just did PSS10 on my 2016 M4. I was all set to do the Ohlins, but got the PSS10s for such a smokin deal that I thought I'd give them a shot.

I've only driven a few hundred miles so far, but my impressions, for a street suspension, are overwhelmingly positive. It really reminds me of my 991 C2S that had the sport PASM suspension, 20mm lower with more aggressive dampers and PASM programming, except obviously, the PSS10s are passive. The SPASM suspension (nice acronym, Porsche) is unbearably stiff on Sport Plus (small bumps really upset the car), but is really great on Sport or Normal, and the PSS10s remind me of that.

Slightly more busy than passive stock especially under 30 mph, but very composed and absorbs medium bumps better. I'd say that large bumps, especially a few in a row, feel a bit harsher, but still stockish feeling; this doesn't feel very aftermarket at all, which is a compliment. They don't feel as harsh as the M4's active suspension on Sport+ either.

I haven't tried them in anger or on track yet, but for a street suspension on something you just want to look better and drive with better control, the PSS10 are a great solution. I think that the JRZ RStwo ride a bit better, but they're 50-75% more expensive and require more maintenance.

Thanks for your review, interesting you went from JRZ back to PSS10, I'd think JRZ is at least a minor step up. I'm running the PSS10 on 6 front and 6 rear, originally had them at full soft but preferred the way the car settles quicker on 6 and 6. Might try them full stiff just to feel how jarring it is, what are your settings at currently and have you tried more than one?

[f8xdct]

Subscribed, already itching this mod!!

[M4 GTS]

Originally Posted by AlterZgo

Mine has one up front only as well.

Great review! Thanks a lot. I'll be getting mine soon, and just wanted to ask you if you feel the same since your original review. Thanks

[AlterZgo]

Originally Posted by M4 GTS

Great review! Thanks a lot. I'll be getting mine soon, and just wanted to ask you if you feel the same since your original review. Thanks

Hi. I've had these on my car now for about 7 months and 5,000 or so miles. Still feels great! Damping has not degraded to any noticeable degree. Pulling into my community, there's a gate with a relatively sharp track. The KW HAS w/ stock shocks got progressively worse when I went over the track. Car would start to jiggle and oscillate more over time to the point where it felt like the car was bottoming out on the suspension. It's the one constant thing that I always pay attention to when I'm pulling in and out of my community to see if the damping is still good.

On PSS10, after 5K miles, damping still feels just as good as when new. No problems whatsoever going over that same track. car still very well damped and doesn't oscillate or bottom out. I'm sure it's softened up a bit, but it's not noticeable to me in regular driving. Still controls the car very well on the freeway over large bumps, small bumps, etc. Still zero noise of any kind coming from the suspension. After screwing around w/ the damper settings the first few weeks, I settled at front: 4 and rear: 5 and have had no need or desire to mess w/ the settings at all since then.

This is an excellent product at a great price. Hopefully, it continues to hold up for the long term.

[M4 GTS]

Originally Posted by AlterZgo

Hi. I've had these on my car now for about 7 months and 5,000 or so miles. Still feels great! Damping has not degraded to any noticeable degree. Pulling into my community, there's a gate with a relatively sharp track. The KW HAS w/ stock shocks got progressively worse when I went over the track. Car would start to jiggle and oscillate more over time to the point where it felt like the car was bottoming out on the suspension. It's the one constant thing that I always pay attention to when I'm pulling in and out of my community to see if the damping is still good.

On PSS10, after 5K miles, damping still feels just as good as when new. No problems whatsoever going over that same track. car still very well damped and doesn't oscillate or bottom out. I'm sure it's softened up a bit, but it's not noticeable to me in regular driving. Still controls the car very well on the freeway over large bumps, small bumps, etc. Still zero noise of any kind coming from the suspension. After screwing around w/ the damper settings the first few weeks, I settled at front: 4 and rear: 5 and have had no need or desire to mess w/ the settings at all since then.

This is an excellent product at a great price. Hopefully, it continues to hold up for the long term.

Thank you so much for your input !
I really appreciate it. Now, can you tell me
How 4 front and 5 in the back compare to stock passive suspension
Thanks

[AlterZgo]

Originally Posted by M4 GTS

Thank you so much for your input !
I really appreciate it. Now, can you tell me
How 4 front and 5 in the back compare to stock passive suspension
Thanks

It's pretty much as stated in my original review. Hard for me to remember now exactly how passive suspension felt since it's been so long, but it is definitely very livable and not harsh at all. People pretty much acknowledge Bilstein coilovers for their excellent ride quality. I was worried that meant they might be under damped but I have found that not to be the case. Despite the great ride quality, suspension remains well damped without undue pogoing at any speed.

Let me put it this way... they ride better now than the car ever did with KW HAS even before stock dampers went to crap. Some may feel ride quality is even better than stock passive b/c the damping is much more controlled overall.

Also, setting ride height is just as important in preserving ride quality. The car needs suspension travel to ride well. Mine isn't slammed - maybe lowered about 1" front and .5" rear.

[M4 GTS]

Cool! Thanks again.

[M4 GTS]

Originally Posted by M4 GTS

Cool! Thanks again.

Can anyone can recommend shop for the installation? Also what is approximate cost of installation and corner weighing. Thanks

[AlterZgo]

Not really sure where Del Mar is, but I paid $300 for basic installation in Southern California, i.e. no corner weighting and no alignment. Supremepower did a great job. I've also been to EAS for other mods. They also have a lot of experience w/ M3s and BMWs in general.

[M4 GTS]

Thanks
I'm in San Diego

[M4 GTS]

Did my installation last week and I absolutely love the system. Mine were set and 6 front and back. I'm glad the high speed floating feeling is gone. BTW thanks to Tom from EAS! They did superb job. Thank to everybody for their imputes.

[LukeM15]

So can you slam with these? I’m lookinh at options but I like my car very low. I’m currently on ED springs they are ok(very low) but I wish I could a just the fronts a tad lower.
Seeing few posts people are mentioning 1 inch max drop how is that possible?

[Justin.AutoTalent]

Originally Posted by LukeM15

So can you slam with these? I’m lookinh at options but I like my car very low. I’m currently on ED springs they are ok(very low) but I wish I could a just the fronts a tad lower.
Seeing few posts people are mentioning 1 inch max drop how is that possible?

The PSS10 drop range is not very low, it's because of the number of turns they allow for and the length of the spring plus the spring itself is a bit long

[LukeM15]

Originally Posted by Justin.AutoTalent

The PSS10 drop range is not very low, it's because of the number of turns they allow for and the length of the spring plus the spring itself is a bit long

So which Bilstein model will be the one that lower the most??

[dawei213]

I've had my PSS10 on my Audi B8 S4 for around 60k. Even after 60k, it's still rock solid, does not have the floaty feeling and does not bottom out. The Bilstein coilover is definitely solid and if I am to go full coilover, this is what I would go with.