Rep Power: 709

OK, so I’ve been meaning to write a review of my new Buddy Club Race Spec suspension for some time now and finally got a chance to sit down and write down my thoughts. The way I like to write reviews is to basically tell you everything exactly the way I see it, exactly when I see it and my impressions at the time, so expect a long read. The good, the bad, goof-ups, stupidities and even the occasional dumb thought that pops into my head while typing. To save you from skipping to the end I’ll say that I love the suspension and the more I run it the more impressed I seem to be with it. I recommend it to anyone.

First off to give you some background. I run time trial races in Ontario also known as solosprint or solo1. It’s like road racing on real race tracks, only you’re racing against a clock instead of other cars so it’s far safer – safe enough that most competitors compete in their daily drivers. I’ve been doing it for several years now and am very competitive. Last year I won my class (Touring 2), set 4 track records, took home about 12 event trophies and won rookie of the year. That car was featured in almost every issue of Inside Track last summer. This year I’m running Super Grand Touring 2 with my Integra Type R powered Honda CRX, lovingly known as the ‘SuperRex’. Currently I’m sitting in first place for that class with 4 events to go. Expect to see the SuperRex in an upcoming issue of Grassroots Motorsports - keep an eye out for it.

The previous suspension I had on the SuperRex was also a Buddy Club race suspension. The shocks were fully race-valved but non-adjustable. I bought them used and ran them successfully for a couple years with no issues. This year with a fresh drive-train, I go off to the races. Only thing is I notice the car is unsteady under hard braking and the front left shock is squeaking. Great. Think I finally blew a shock. Bought a used set of race-valved Apexi N1s. They looked solid, no leaks, but when I put them on the car and the car bounced. They were blown too - how crappy. No time to replace them so I ran the car with the blown shocks. Finished second both days but was over a second off the pace of the first place car. This needs to change.

 
Rep Power: 709

I’ve got 2 weeks till my next event so I do some research. It’s hard finding race parts for EF chassis cars. Koni Yellow makes off the shelf race shocks now that fit onto my car, but having success with my Buddy Clubs in the past I wanted to check those out first. So I opt to force the car to accept ITR suspension components. I tracked down a local supplier for Buddy Club – OptionJDM. It’s located in Markham (OptionJDM.com). Before I handed over my cash I really wanted to know who I was dealing with. I make it a policy never to deal with shady companies. When you depend on your equipment to work for you and need someone to stand behind what they sell you the way I do, I can’t be buying stuff from scammers. So do I do a search on OptionJDM and the Sales Manager John Young. Sure enough his name came up several times in many forums. That’s usually not a good sign. But after reading the posts and feedback, I got a completely different opinion. He and OptionJDM are actually quite well liked by people who buy there. Cool! Usually I hate dealing with performance parts distributors.

So will John get me my shocks in time for my next event? Only had 2 weeks to be ready. Sure thing. He had Buddy Club courier them to Canada and I picked them up a couple days later on a Monday. Sweet! And check this out, Buddy Club agreed to revalve my old set. Double sweet with sugar on top. I wasn’t the original owner and they’ve been bitch-slapped for several years. Life is good. I ordered the new set valved at 12K and ordered them with 10K springs so I would have the option to run 12s later if I needed to. Signed up for a lapping session on Thursday to give me a testing session to sort out my shock settings in preparation for racing on the weekend. True to form, I didn’t get around to installing the coilovers till Wednesday night. I start at around 8pm too so it was already dark by then.

Pulled the old suspension and in go the new ones. In order to run Integra shocks on an EF car you need to have EG or DC front suspension forks since the EF forks are too thin to accept the shocks. The thing you need to remember is the CRX suspension has less travel and a shorter stroke than the Integra Type R. So when you force Integra shocks and springs into a CRX, it’s going to sit high. To get them a little lower I installed the forks right up against the base of the shock instead of the lip that Buddy Club carved into it. Done. I also had the foresight to order shorter springs for the front so that helped a little bit as well. Still, the car sits with 3 fingers to the fenders of clearance between the top of the tire and the fender lip. Not a big deal since I get a longer travel and like to run stupid wide 225s on the car. Plus, no issues from the fuzz. All is good - so far.

So the shocks go in and I’m tightening up the top bolts to the frame. Can’t remember what the torque specs are and it’s late and I’m tired so I figure 60lbs should do it. One side went on fine. The other sided one of the bolts broke. WTF! So off it came. What kind of suspension would give you low quality bolts like this I thought. Pulled the other side and the bolts had stretched so no way I was racing with those. Crap. It’s past midnight at this point. I hack apart a Type R top hats I had sitting in the garage and use those bolts. Hand tightened it, just wanted it to be snug so it wouldn’t come off. I was too tired to swap out the rear, figured it was fine and went off to the track. Went to bed around 4am and woke up 6am to go lapping. I was NOT a happy camper at this point.

Get to the track and was playing around with different shock settings to see what that car liked. Under threshold braking the car was pulling to one side. Not as bad as it used to be, but still not what I liked. Drove home and noticed the car was bouncing on the highway. Man, could my new shocks be blown? WTF! I call John the next day at OptionJDM and tell him I got a bad set of bolts with the suspension and the car was bouncing when set to full soft, so things just weren’t working out with the suspension. Ask him to talk to Buddy Club and find out what grade of bolt they used for their top hats too. So now I’ve got 1 day to sort the car out for the race on the weekend.

I take the broken bolts to a nut and bolt expert at Brafasco. Showed him the suspension and got him to recommend a replacement, which he did. I showed him the bolt I broke and he said that was a super strong bolt – much stronger than the bolt he’d recommend as a replacement. Really? That’s when I clued in. 60 ft pounds is a stupid amount of torque for a bolt that size. I usually torque bolts of 12mm to 30 ft pounds. What the hell was I thinking? I’m such a ****. So forget the bolts the Brafasco guy recommended, if I’m going to be replacing bolts, they’re going to be stronger. I pay like $65 for 8 of the strongest bolts in existence and off I went.

Pulled out the rear suspension and tore it apart to see what shape it was in. Sure enough one of them was blown. Crap. So that’s what caused the braking issues and the bounciness on the highway. OK. So nothing wrong with the new suspension.

Then I figured since I never installed the rear suspension and had replacement bolts for it anyway – why not get all scientific on the Buddy Club bolts and see what kind of abuse they can handle? Let’s do a bolt stress test shall we? I started with the stock ITR bolts. I put a piece of metal thick enough to approximate the thickness of the shock on a vice and started tighten the bolt with my torque wrench. Started at 30 ft. pounds and added 2 ft pounds at a time until it broke. 34 ft pounds and the bolt was snug but showed signs of stretching. At 38 ft pounds it was stressed and looked weakened. At 40 ft pounds it broke. Hmm, interesting. On went the Buddy Club bolt. Less scientific, but let’s try 5ft pound increments since I have a race the next day. 30 ft pounds it was fine. 35 ft pounds it was holding up. 40 ft pounds and it was starting to show some stress. At 45 ft pounds it was stretching a little bit and at 50 it finally broke. Didn’t actually write down my results, so these numbers are purely from memory. Yeah, it’s not be the most scientific method of bolt testing, but hey, I’m not a scientist, but I do remember being really impressed with how much stronger the Buddy Club bolts were compared to the Honda ones. In the future I promise to write my reviews sooner.

Still, had a race the next day at Mosport DDT and hadn’t had a chance to sort out my suspension settings or get used to what for the most part was a new car to me. Should be an interesting event. It was a cool morning and the track was slick. I did my best guessing at what the car would like suspension setting and tire pressure wise and finished just over a second behind the winning car. Unfortunately the competition was pretty tight that day and I ended up placing 4th for the class. First place went to a 400hp supercharged Mustang, second to a twin-turbo 93 RX-7, third to a Mustang Bullet and then me, in my cheap, lowly FWD Honda. Not a bad place to be considering the cost of those cars. I still feel like I should have won, but blame my finish partly on the fact that I hadn’t sorted out the car yet, but mostly because the Khumo V700s I chose for that day were a little on the dry side and the cold weather and track conditions I just wasn’t able to get any heat into them. Yeah, the tires were too slick to be competitive. Drove home from Mosport that night and swapped on a set of thinner but newer RA1s. It’s nice having more than one set of rims and R-compounds.

The next day was a different story. Suspension was sorted out, tires were getting heat into them, things were looking good. Sure enough, I had beat the track record that was previously set for that track. Unfortunately, so did the RX-7. Also unfortunately, his lap record was half a second faster than my lap record - so in effect no lap record for me. Like I could’ve seen that coming. What a bastard! Well, that’s racing for you. Well, next year that record is as good as mine!

But still, for the little seat time I had in the car before the event, I have to say I’m really impressed with the Buddy Club Racing Spec Suspension. I’d recommend them to anyone. I find on the street the 10K springs are very bearable when set at full soft. You have to understand how stupid hard the other shocks were. My kidneys would hurt after a short drive. It broke plastic speaker brackets, popped open gloveboxes, kicked wiring loose including wires in my fuse box, broke 2 fuel pressure gauges – it was nuts. Plus, with less than an inch of travel, the car would literally leave the ground on highway bumps over an inch. And my head – I can’t tell you how many times it hit the headliner. It wasn’t safe to drive without a helmet I tell you. Now with the adjustable suspension, I get the best of both worlds - a super competitive track setup and a firm but livable street setup. In full soft I’d equate it to a stock Corvette or Porsche suspension. It’s firm, but you don’t find yourself on the ground flat on your back waiting for the spasms to stop. I’ve ordered a set of 12K springs for the rear since at the track I run the rear shocks pretty stiff. Figured I’d try a stiffer spring in the rear and see how I like that.

There you go. If you’ve read up to here you’ve either enjoyed it, or have a lot of free time on your hands. I’ve also installed a set of Buddy Club Spec III+ cams. But as they say, that’s another story.