So I've been collecting parts, and had some made, for my suspension build for a while now. I finally got most of it done. Sadly I couldn't get everything done, partly because of a sway bar mount bolt that stripped and partly because a few things didn't work out like I had hoped. Anyway, lets start at the rear suspension. I bought a set of Hotchkis sway bars made for a Mazda speed3. The bars are 32mm thick, our stock bars are 19mm. These are HUGE bars, and are adjustable. The rear bar will NOT bolt right in place of the X's stock rear bar. Frankly the only way you could use the rear bar is if you drilled new mounting holes for the end links in the stock lower rear control arms. Or, have some custom lower rear control arms built, I went this route. There is a guy with a company called dominant engineering, he builds custom suspension parts for the ford focus and the Mazda 3. So I got a set of his lower rear arms for a focus. These arms are badass. Tubular construction, Heim joints on one and best of all, a height adjustable spring perch. That means I can now raise and lower the front and rear of my car thanks to them and the kw coilovers. Now, calm down, because these also are NOT a bolt on part for the x type. I had to have someone cut off the end that attaches to the hub and fabricate a new end. The focus and the X use different lower rear arms even though they look similar. I also had to enlarge the bolt holes for the subframe mounts because the Heim joints use much bigger bolts. I don't have an eccentric bolt there anymore, but since the arm is now adjustable in length I don't need it. Now that I am using a custom focus lower rear arm, I could bolt the Hotchkis rear sway bar in. I've also replaced the toe arms with upgraded ones for a focus, with Heim joints at each end. They bolted in, but I had to add a spacer to sit between the subframe mounts and the Heim joint at one end. Lastly, I have upgraded upper rear arms also made for a focus from the same guy that makes the lower rears. The uppers also are tubular construction with Heim joints and they will bolt right in no problems.


So, the front. Sadly one of the front sway bar mount bolts stripped on me, and I gave up on it for now until I can get my car on a lift and drop the whole subframe down, not just the rear of it. Btw I've done all this work in my front yard since I have no garage... and my driveway is grass/dirt. I have concrete slabs to but my jack stands on thankfully haha. But I am convinced that the Mazda 3 front sway bar will work since its the exact same shape just thicker, although the mounts need spacers under them (The rear wasn't wide enough to reach the stock end link mounting holes). I did install some factory replacement lower control arms with new ball joints that I had polyurethane bushings installed in. I also installed a set of upgraded sway bar end links for a, you guessed it, ford focus. They are nice, tubular with Heim joints as well. They bolted right in so they can be used on any X type.


I had a few other things I wanted to do in the front end, like some caster/camber plates, but they will have to wait until I replace my coilovers with something more track ready. I love the kw's but they are more street friendly than track ready as far as spring rates and shock valving.


I just finished about an hour ago, I've been at it for 3 days now. Tomorrow I hopefully will be taking the car for an alignment after I set the ride height, gotta let the springs resettle. If not tomorrow then Tuesday. I'll be able to report back on how she handles then. I'm not much of one that takes pictures as I do things, but here are a few pics of parts and a few "after" pics.

 

You should extreme camber your wheels. That would look so badass on a jag. The sway bar sounds nice but a lot of work. Any recommendations on some simple things to upgrade a stock x-type for better suspension/handling? I am installing new outer tie rod ends, but I just went the cheap route and got the euro spare parts. In retrospect that probably would have been a good opportunity to upgrade to something better but at least it will be back to like-new oem (til they wear out again). Probably going to get the Bilstein sport shocks. I'm sure my suspension would be fine but it would be cool to get a better sway bar or something... Drilling holes sounds like more work than I'd like though.

 

I think I just filled my pants.

 

Holy crap dude, some serious suspension work there...curious to hear back on the ride report and how it handles now after the alignment and the parts get settled.

 

Not sure why some pics are upside down haha. Anyway, of the parts I've installed I can only recommend;


springs and shocks, kw coilovers being the best bolt on option


Adjustable upper rear control arms with at least polyurethane bushings, many after market upgrade arms have them already. Focus and Mazda 3 arms work.


Polyurethane bushings, as many as you can afford to do.


Sway bar end links, you can use upgrade parts made for a focus for the front. I don't know what would work to upgrade the stock rear sway bar end links.


One of the best things you can do is replace the stock rubber bushings with polyurethane bushings. They don't flex as much and it really tightens up the suspension.


If you are really serious about upgrading your suspension the first thing I recommend is getting everything in proper working order, but when you find you need something, find the best possible upgrade you can get to replace it.

 

Here's where my car sits for now. I'm going to lower the front about another half inch or so, the rear is as low as it can go. I'm going to order some custom springs that are shorter and a higher spring rate than the kw's springs, I have the front springs already, just can't put them in yet. Getting an alignment Monday morning.

 

Thanks for the write up so far. I'm a pure novice when it comes to the suspension system. However, I just replaced struts, shocks, and got new Kumhos.

Struts: Monroe OESpectrum. $115.00 each thru O'riely auto parts store
Part no. 71391 - Made in Spain

Shocks: Bilsteins for Sport suspension. F4-BE5-2981-H0. $114 each on eshcoks.com

Tires: Kumho Ecsta SPT Ultra high performance summer 225/45 ZR17, Tire Pros shop $703 for all 4 tires, balance & mount, and four wheel alignment.

Much improved ride as far as comfort and a little better road isolation for a Sport model. The shocks and struts I removed were stock in my 2002 X. Getting all 3 things done at once made the overall improvement in ride quality very noticeable. After reading this post and some other info here, I guess I've a few more things to do as far as the polyurethane bushings, tie rod ends etc.

Props for being able to do all the work on grass and dirt! Your car looks nice and low. Would like to see a pic after you lower the back a little more like you said. To me it looks good as it is. Are you looking for the car to be absolutely level, front to back? Even on HRs mine is a little higher in the rear, but lowering and new struts, shocks and bushings is about as far as I will be going.

 

Thanks. I'm going to lower the front more, I can't go any lower in the rear but I'm pretty happy with where the rear sits. Getting custom springs for the rear is more about getting a stiffer spring rate than lowering the rear more. I have the rear spring perches spun down as low as they will go and I'd like to have some room for adjustments so I'm going to eventually get shorter springs so I can keep the ride height where it is, but not be maxed out on height adjustments. I actually have a lot more ideas for suspension work on my car. It never ends... haha

 

That's right, you said lowering the front more, not the rear. Anyway, yes, it looks like you have some extra unused turns in your springs here. Plus, I think your mufflers are little too shiny but they do present a nice image of the grass.

Keep us updated, this info is great.

 

In that pic I do, but turned them all the way down after I got the car on level ground. And yes, those mina mufflers are shinny haha. I've cleaned them up once in the last year, they still look good as new other than being a bit dirty. Totally worth the price.

 

So, alignment got done on Monday. I haven't gotten to really, test the car yet but from the bit of pushing it I've been able to do it seems the understeer is gone. For now I still have the car set to factory Jag specs as far as the alignment goes. Turns out my front caster is way out of whack and since its not adjustable from the factory there isn't anything I can do about that until I can figure out about getting my caster/camber plates to work. I'm loving the way it handles so far. I ended up lowering the front another inch and a 1/4 from where it was in the last pic I posted. I'll get a new one up soon. Probably after I install my mina facelift grill.

 

Nice. I would really like to drive your car. Suspension set up sounds really nice.

I know you have autocrossed your car and don't seem particularly shy with your right foot and your car has 185K. I was wondering if you are still on your original transfer case? Can't remember reading anything that you ever had trouble or messed with it other than routine maintenance.

 

I've had my car for a little over a year, but as far as I know it was all original when bought it. I've probably put about 10k or more miles on it. I haven't done anything to mine but mods and maintenance. Later this year I'm hoping to get a 3.0 and see about making more power. I also want to install a light weight flywheel too. I'd also like to have a 02 03 transfer case rebuilt with the proper preload and whatnot and see how long it lasts with my "abuse" haha. I dont have traction control so I'd like to see how the VC transfer case compares a far as grip and handling goes. I'd really like to look into LSD diffs for the front and rear too, that's a lot o money though.

 

Hey Patterson,

I was looking to get my suspension replaced as well here in the near future. Do you think you can go into a little detail about the shocks and struts you bought. Im somewhat of a novice my self. The way I understand it, the front end uses two struts and the rear uses the 2 shocks?

Also, springs and strut mounts will be needed. Did you use the original springs and mounts? or did you buy new ones?

 

Hi Prodriver, yes it's struts in the front and shocks in the rear. I had a shop do the work, did not replace any mounts. My X already had H&R lowering springs installed about 3 years ago. Post #19 in this thread.

https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...uestion-44431/

At that time I didn't touch anything else, left the old struts and shocks in place until last month when I got new tires, struts and shocks all at once. Here are the part numbers from a post I made earlier in this thread.

Struts: Monroe OESpectrum. $115.00 each thru O'riely auto parts store - install $400.00 (tough job)
Part no. 71391 - Made in Spain

Shocks: Bilsteins for Sport suspension. F4-BE5-2981-H0. $114 each on eshcoks.com - Tire Pro shop installed for $85.00

Tires: Kumho Ecsta SPT Ultra high performance summer 225/45 ZR17, Tire Pros shop $703 for all 4 tires, balance & mount, and four wheel alignment.

Some members here might say my set up is wrong. Wrong shocks or struts for lowering springs, but I did what I did and the ride is great. Cornering is good too, I can accelerate into any turn and hold the road fine. Some people here are very picky and have a lot of knowledge on suspension systems. For me ignorance is bliss even if my set up isn't absolutely perfect, works for me.

 

Hey Justink201 what part is the purple one i have to replace one on my 02 x-type 3.0 sport british racing green ... but I'm struggling to find them.. also where and whom did you get it from?

Thanks,

Cory

 

He states what they are in his original post...
Adjustable toe arms from a focus, I believe.

Speaking of which, justink, any idea how big the spacer was that you had to use for the sub frame side of the mount location? I have these same arms (from Megan Racing) I'm looking to install. My plan is to use a stack of grade 8 or similar washers half the thickness of your spacer on each side of the heim to place the arm in the center of the mount rather than off to one side like you have going on. Opinions on that?

I ask because I'm too lazy to crawl under the and measure if I don't have to haha.

 

Haha, funny you should ask that, I actually knocked out the metal sleeve from the stock toe arm bushing, the smaller one, and used that, its a tight fit, but it worked. Also I had to take out both of the lock nuts in order to get the alignment correct because the focus toe arms are just a bit too long, but once the lock nuts were off it was no problem. We used loctite on the threads and I just marked them and check them once and a while to make sure they haven't moved. One did a few times, and I just turned it back. oh and I went with offsetting the arm on the subframe side like I did because the stock arms are curved, these are not, and I put them to the one side so that the rod ends where at less of an angle in hopes they wouldn't bind. So far I haven't had any issues with them like this, and I've put over 4k miles on my current set up.


Oh and I might have some more updates to this setup this fall, since I'd really like to finish my setup.

 

Did you ever get the front sway bar mounted? I'm wanting to do this swap if it's functional.

I contacted addco about custom bent oem replacement bars for front and rear. I'm hoping they're not too expensive so maybe I can get a small group buy going. They offer like 2000 vehicle applications, I can't believe no one out there makes stiffer aftermarket replacement bars!

 

justink.

Love what you are doing I was hoping for some input do you think these would work? They look like they may be bolt ons without much fabrication.

Ford Focus Rear Adjustable Lower Control Arms / Dominant Engineering