Fat Cat Motorsports prides itself in being a top-tier suspension tuning company. We provide each and every one of our valued FCM Elite Clients a uniquely-tailored solution for their needs. Whether our customers want a plush ride, a firmer “weekend warrior” track/autocross setup, or a dedicated ‘race-only’ configuration, they find immense satisfaction in all of our offered products.

Below are some recent reviews from our FCM Elite clients:

Jason P. with a Mazda RX-8:

Hi Shaikh,

So, I finally drove the FCM elite coilovers on track 🙂  Massive amounts of fun.  The car is hugely capable now and I am sure will go quite a bit quicker as I get better at driving it.

The balance was pretty much as you predicted.  I went with the Progress Tech Miata front bar, which has a 28.5mm outer thickness and claimed wall thickness of 6.35mm.  No rear bar and the car pushed a little.  Adding the stock RX8 rear bar back and it was neutral to slight oversteer.  I think I would prefer something in between although closer to the latter.

Ride height was set at 14 inches.  Front camber maxed at -2.2 (with castor set to 4.5 to achieve this), rear camber set to -2.1.  Using a tire probe showed the front could have used a little more camber, while the rear was about right.  I ended up with higher front tire pressures to compensate (36.5psi hot vs 32 in the rear).  This is with 255/40/17 Direzza Z2 tires and 17×9 ET45 wheels.

For next time, I am thinking either an NC rear bar or no rear bar, but lower ride height to give me more front camber will be just about perfect.

The damping felt very good on track.  It settled quickly into turns, was compliant and predicable.  More so than stock.  I still have the impression it could settle *slightly* quicker over certain bumps at speed but I think it is at least 90% of the way.  I am also aware that the front bar is quite stiff so this may be a factor.  I tried a drive on the street with it disconnected and the car felt more settled, with less side to side movement over bumps.

On the drive to Thunderhill the car felt perfectly comfortable. It was able to soak up all the nastiness heading North on 680 from 237/E Calaveras Blvd with aplomb.  Loading it up with gear did help a little here, as do the lighter weight track wheels, but the goal of being able to commute daily on 237/880 has been achieved.

A few laps worth of video here: http://youtu.be/2Rl–Q5alis These are with the rear bar connected.  The outer circle on the g-force meter is 1G and I am at around 1.2G in the corners and under braking.

I posted some comments on the balance here: http://www.rx8club.com/series-i-wheels-tires-brakes-suspension-55/new-sway-bar-option-sway-bar-summary-242324/page3/#post4500307

And a short impression of the coilovers here: http://www.rx8club.com/series-i-wheels-tires-brakes-suspension-55/fcm-coilover-reviews-242560/#post4500420

Regards,
Jason

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Allen Richardson, Mazda Miata

Shaikh,

Sorry to take so long to get back to you.  The shocks work brilliantly, thank you.  I should have bought these years ago.

Here are my notes from Topeka.

Temp ~ 90F

Dunlop Direzza Star Spec 35/35 psi (50%+ wear)

1.125 front bar.

3 turns front  2 turns rear

1 deg neg camber front and rear

.125″ toe out in front .062″ toe in rear.

Car stuck amazingly well but suffering oversteer, backed the rear off to 3 turns and seemed much better.  I had also just put new bushings in the front, but did not have time to do the rear bushings.  I’m going to try to get the rear bushings finished before our next local event on Dunlops, and see if that tames the oversteer.  The next two events after that will be at Lincoln on sticker Hoosiers.

As the attendence at HPT was rather slim, they increased the run count to 5/day. With about 15 minutes between runs, it seemed like the shocks performed differently after the first few runs.  Are these very heat sensitive?

Thanks,

Allen