About two weeks ago I bought a used set of koni sports with racing beat springs for my 1990 Miata. I got around to installing them this past weekend and everything went pretty smoothly. The car rides and handles a million times better than the original 190k shocks/springs.
When I was looking at the car from a distance it looked like the nose was sitting hight than the butt so today I finally measured the height and I got 5 3/4" front and 5 and a half rear at the pinch welds. Is that normal? or do I have something wrong?
RB springs are known to sag. I suspect that's what happened.
Your shocks have three different settings on the perches. Are they the same front and rear?
I'm not sure. How can I check that?
When I got them i both kinda forgot they had that and figured that whoever put them together set them the same.
Edit: I'm talking about the spring perch. I think I read somewhere someone mentioned the sagging with the springs.
You can check the perch height by looking at the shocks from underneath. There are machined grooves in the shocks with snap rings in them, that's what sets the height. If you can see two grooves, the shock is on the highest point. If you can see one, it's in the middle. If you can't see any, it's the lowest.
You can see the grooves here.
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Front then rear. It looks like the front is at the highest and the rear is at the middle setting if I'm looking at that right.
Well, that'd do it, then :)
Weird that they would be set up that way. Is there a benefit from it? And is there a perferred setting to set the spring perches at for performance?
Thanks for the help too this is the first time I've got to deal with not stock suspension 
Also, am I correct in thinking that the highest notch is the highest ride height?
Guess what? The seller knew the springs were sagged. Check out that big black spacer under the front perch. Not standard. That was put there to try to get the front up a bit higher. Check the coils on those springs for marks indicating coil bind. If you bind the springs on a set of Konis, the perches rip off and the suspension collapses. Look for black lines where the coils have made contact. From the picture, I think you're okay.
Highest position is the highest ride height.
Well that's not what I wanted to hear lol. The black marks like you see in the pictures are all over the springs. It's starting to sound like these racing beat springs aren't the best springs out there, and the ones I have here aren't in the best shape.
All that being said aside from the height the car feels great. Although like I said earlier I came from 25 year old 190k miles stock.
What's the recommendation on new springs on a budget? Should I just continue to use these as they sit? Would you change the perch location? I use the car in autocross, want to do a few track days now that it's not on blown suspension, and I also use it as a dd when the mood strikes.
Thanks again for help. I'm way more clueless than I thought lol
I came across this when I was googling stuff
http://forum.miata.net/vb/archive/index.php/t-282100.html
It seems our miata expert is everywhere! Should I follow the same advise and just move the front springs to the middle perch setting?
With that big block in there, you're already waaay above the upper perch location. Lowering the perch will help if you're getting coil bind, but it's a workaround if you're already concerned about ride height.
I can't view the full size version of the pics (no Flikr account), but the marks to be concerned with will be on the tops and bottoms of the coils, like this:
The Koni shocks work well with stock springs, that's a no-cost option for you. Run them on the bottom perch if you have some good bumpstops, or go with the middle. Other options include the FM springs, which you may find have a pretty good reputation. If you do go with either of those, lose the big spacer under the front perch.
I think I did see a little bit of that towards the top of one or two of the springs, I'll have to double check when I get home today. I dont mind if the car sits lower since I dont have any issues with ground clearence ( I changed suspension for performance, but secretly we all like the no wheel gap look ). I might just stick the fronts into the middle notch depending on how the springs look. I'd like to not go back to stock springs ( wouldn't they be sagging after 25 years and 190k miles? ) so if I feel the need to swap springs I'll probably look into something new. FM springs are probably one of the better bets but I was liking the sub $200 price of the tien springs lol.
Does the spacer help with binding or is that simply to adjust ride height after the springs sagged?
The spacer will increase the possibility of coil bind. It's a workaround for the sagging.
The price difference between the FM springs and the Tein isn't enough to make it worth buying the second-rate parts.
Ok so I think I'm going to try either remove the spacer and leave the springs in the top perch or just move the springs to the middle perch. Or should I just trash the spacer altogether? No concern for ground clearence I still have plently, more concern for reilability and it being done correct. Which is why I made this thread figuring that the front should be lower than the rear.
And that sounds like a solid answer for which springs I should buy if I go for new haha
Thanks for all the help keith.
I'd dump the spacer, but then again I'm not a big fan of stuff that's worth a post on thereifixedit.
Found myself a spring compressor today and set to work removing the spacers and setting the fronts to the middle perch. I looked the springs over they had a very faint look of coil bind. This was the worst bit here. Only on the one side of the coils.
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That was the least of my worries after getting the spring and top hat off the strut thats pictured above I saw this 
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I don't know what could cause that or what do do about it. We went ahead and put everything back together because the car couldn't stay in the driveway on stands.
After a quick test drive around the block the front height is at about 5" and the rear is between a quarter to a half higher. The nose is way more precise from the few miles I drove. Cant wait for the next autocross to really push it. Here it is at the gas station. Looks good! 
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Good work. That's definitely coil bind in the pics, which on Konis usually has bad results. So you've done a good thing by addressing it. The ride height looks pretty normal from the pictures - I usually measure from the center of the wheel to the top of the fender opening. With your setup, I'd hope to see you at 12-12.5" in the front and about 1/2" higher in the rear.
The weird wear is probably from a loose shock nut - the shaft was rubbing on the steel upper mount. It would have been making a squeaking noise along with some rattling as well, I suspect. If the holes in the upper mounts are way oversize (they should be 12mm), I can see how it might happen there as well. If that's the case, a cleverly chosen washer to keep the shock properly located would do the trick.
I did a quick measure from the center of the wheel and I think it was around 12.5" front. The car defiantly felt better. Before I had the feeling when pushed hard it would understeer. Now I think it will be more oversteer biased. Which I prefer
I was kind of thinking loose nut as well. There was wear on the upper mount too. I should have snapped a shot of that as well. I haven't heard anything unusual from it so I'm hoping thats a past issue but one that I'll keep an eye on.
Thanks again keith and others who have posted. Car feels better, I feel better, and I understand more about suspension bits now.
