Thread: Disco suspension on choppy roads

Ahoy! My D1 has been off the road while fixing some smash damage, so I fixed a few things to it that would have had it off the road anyway.

Before my smash, and since ive owned it, ive noticed on a particular piece of road on my way to work is abit choppy. At 100+kmh i hit this choppy straight bit of road that is probably 200m long, and the whole vehicle starts skipping about the place, trying to rattle the windows out, sometimes even stepping the back out abit. Pretty freaky, especially in the wet around corners. slowing to 90kmh helps, but who wants to put up with that?

Somethings ive done in the past to rectify it were first replacing the 205 buggered dunlops with 225 cooper STs. Big improvement on the wet side of things. It had Rancho RS9000 5speed front shocks, with adjustable damping. Turned that from full slow to fast speed. Suffered from more body roll but made the choppy road more bearable. Then while the disco was off the road I replaced the buggered wheel bearings, rebuilt the swivel pin housings with new seals, oil etc (they were leaking) but didnt change the swivel bearings as they seemed fine. the Ranchos' mounts were buggered, letting the shocks rattle side to side, up and down, rubbers worn, holes flogged out etc. Replaced shocks with Bilsteins with standard rubbers, all went together nice and tight. the rest of the front end setup seemed to be fine, nothing worn or loose.
this work I did eliminate a few knocks i was experiencing, but the chop problem still exists. I was sure the new shocks would keep the tires on the road, no joy. The rest of the ride has improved, but still got chop.

Is this a common disco/full live axle problem? are the shocks under/over-damped? What should I be looking for? Its not just the roads fault either, my dads 05 Courier chews up the chop no worries, and Mums VS commodore even better.
Anyone with the same dramas or any solutions?

Originally Posted by Lucus

What sort of rear shocks are you running? What are the rear end bushes like?

Billies on the back too. Everything seems to be good back there too, which is why i'm so confused/lost. Although havent checked the ball joint at the top of the A-frame swingarm part.