Koni  STR.T Street Strut

After driving my car for over 180,000 miles with stock struts and Tein H-tech lowering springs, I felt it was time to upgrade. I wanted a lower look, but not too low and I wanted some dampers that would be suitable for daily driving. The combination of the Koni STR.T paired with H&R Race Springs are good as of now (I only tested these for 30 miles). Probably better than I expected. It is firmer, but it is not unbearable. Along with these parts I replaced the strut mount, and both upper and lower spring insulators. These struts also came with new upper bushings for the strut mount which is great. However The I do have a couple of complaints. When I went to install the strut is that the lower bushing did not have a true 100% fit, and I had to find washers that I luckily had laying around that would work, to make it fit like it should. And that the paint easily chips on the struts, unlike the OEM black coating, I do not expect the paint to protect it as long. (note: I haven t had an alignment yet, the camber and toe is definitely off)

Not a lot of miles yet, but pleased so far. Track day at Buttonwillow this weekend. Will update later.

My original struts were worn out. Since it was time to replace them, I wanted a sportier set-up without the "slammed" look. Also, since the streets fill with water when it rains hard, the last thing I need is to have the car much lower. This combination is a vast improvement- even over the as-new original setup. Cornering is much flatter, wallowing is non-existant, nose-dive and rear-squat have been drastically reduced - all while keeping a decent ride and plently of suspension travel for large bumps/potholes or when the car/trunk is full of people/stuff. Since my Civic is the LX, there is no rear anti-sway bar so I don''t think I''d see the benefit from going lower without making the control arm swap necessary to install a rear sway bar anyway. Overall, I am very pleased with the ride/handling tradeoff this suspension setup provides me for my daily driver. If I was into racing/auto-crossing, then that would be different, but then again, I''d modify a different car if that was the case....