H&R springs didn't lower my SHO?

[Conner Prince]

***UPDATE***
I have no idea why I never paid attention to this but SHOCK ORIENTATION MATTERS HAHA (facepalm emoji). Turns out I had all the springs 180 out from where they were supposed to be. The car is lowered about 1, still not the full inch and a half but much better than it was before.


Didnt see anything this forum about h&r springs not lowering the car so I figured I'd start a thread.

About 2 weeks ago I installed h&r lowering springs on my 2011 Taurus SHO non PP but they only lowered the car about half an inch. I should have taken before measurements but I did take before pictures and visually it only lowered about half an inch when it should have lowered at least 1.5.

Has anybody had this issue and if so how did you resolve it?

I put about a hundred miles on them with no weight and with weight and achieved no more drop.

Image 130526, 130535 are after pics
Image 090001, 090007 are before pics
(Two weeks apart after installing)

 

[SM105K]

Do you know exactly which H&R's you purchased?

 

[Conner Prince]

Do you know exactly which H&R's you purchased?

Yes I got them from stage 3 Motorsports. H&R 51626

 

[SM105K]

I would say you need to drive the car a couple hundred more mile for them to settle. I ended up cutting my rear H&R's because I didn't like how high they still were.

 

[Conner Prince]

I would say you need to drive the car a couple hundred more mile for them to settle. I ended up cutting my rear H&R's because I didn't like how high they still were.

So I talked to h&R today and they said they shouldn't settle much if at all. How long did it take yours to settle? And how much did you cut off the front and back?

 

[SM105K]

Mine took a couple hundred miles to settle. You can't cut the fronts. The rears I cut off 10 inches worth of coil from the bottom.

 

[Conner Prince]

Mine took a couple hundred miles to settle. You can't cut the fronts. The rears I cut off 10 inches worth of coil from the bottom.

How much did I settle after you drove it for a while? (1/2 inch 1 inch?) Also there's a whole bunch of popping coming from the front now since installing the springs.

 

[luigisho]

Check the mounting again. That's probably the springs with a bit of movement. I only heard that when my old car's springs broke after 20yrs. You might have a little wiggle at the top or the perch or install torque is no bueno.

 

[SM105K]

How much did I settle after you drove it for a while? (1/2 inch 1 inch?) Also there's a whole bunch of popping coming from the front now since installing the springs.

Post 3 will show you how my car settled.

 

[FiveLeeter918]

hmm mine changed quite a bit. These are my before and after pics...

Before:


After:

 

[FiveLeeter918]

Excuse the bird shit

 

[Nova]

Looks great!! I'm still jelly of your brakes!

Sent from my SM-G986U using Tapatalk

 

[Conner Prince]

hmm mine changed quite a bit. These are my before and after pics...

Before:
View attachment 12876

After:
View attachment 12878

Yeah mines not even close to that. One of my friends told me to loosen all the controlling arms and stuff like that and set it down on the ground for a min to see if it puts some things in the correct place.

 

[RayD35]

Also there's a whole bunch of popping coming from the front now since installing the springs.

Did you also replace the strut mounts? I usually recommend changing those, when springs or struts are replaced.

 

[Conner Prince]

Did you also replace the strut mounts? I usually recommend changing those, when springs or struts are replaced.

I did not but it wasn't doing this before I lowered the car. I'm thinking I might have the amount oriented wrong which might be causing the popping.

 

[luigisho]

Yeah. You can get popping from the mount, swaybar, endlinks etc. Your car isn't that old, so some of that stuff should be good and hopefully not hard to figure out.

 

[twobitcoder]

Looks good.
Does anyone know if this will cause inner tire wear like it does with a solid rear diff? I assume IRS doesn't have that problem?
In other words, can you lower the SHO without concern for tire wear? If so, then I've been holding off without reason.

 

[Conner Prince]

Looks good.
Does anyone know if this will cause inner tire wear like it does with a solid rear diff? I assume IRS doesn't have that problem?
In other words, can you lower the SHO without concern for tire wear? If so, then I've been holding off without reason.

Obviously you would need an alignment. Even with they alignment they would be able to get close to factory spec but it would still be out a tiny bit. I bought a specialty products 81280 which is an acentric camber bolt and will be able to get it back to factory spec. They're is a forum thread if you Google how to get sho back to factory spec it will pop up.

 

[twobitcoder]

Oh, I see, so my concern was warranted. I just don't want to screw with camber. Had a bad experience with that in my Mustang years ago and it wasn't worth the constant trouble with tire wear.