What do you guys think of how it's sitting? Have 25mm spacers upfront 20mm rear. I think it came out good. I was a little annoyed about the front being higher but it looks a bit more even now... also, thinking about getting 19x9.5 aftermarket wheels all around, not sure if I should though.. OEM looks good too

 

I'm actually surprised how great the car sits on RSR downs. Looks like what OEM should have been. It closes that wheel gap so nicely that it almost makes you reconsider the need for larger wheels. Looks great!

 

The ride is considerably more stiffer than stock. I wish there were some strut bars that would actually help with handling.. car definitely too heavy

 

Out of curiosity, did you use the RWD springs or the AWD springs from RS-R? Also what size are your wheels currently? 18?

 

It was the T197D so it was the RSR Down Springs for AWD (because the car is AWD). The wheel size is the same spec (size / offset) as the F sport wheels. 18x8 up front, 18x8.5 rear. 25mm front spacer / 20mm rear spacer as well.

 

Perfect. Yeah I was looking at the RSR Downs only if I'd step up to 19s since you'd be a little higher off the ground, but it actually looks really nice on the stock 18s. You mentioned that the front was higher initially? Do you have a picture of that? And how long did it take for the springs to settle?

 

It's not strut bars you're looking for, it's swaybars - the car is tight/stiff up top, it's soft/loose down low for suspension compliance.
According to your signature you've already done the RCF/GSF LCA rear mount bushings, but after that there is a lot more you can do to tighten up the chassis with regards to front and rear suspension; sway bars would be the low hanging fruit, but all the other suspension bushings were designed for compliance, at least based on how my car feels to me (2015 IS350 fsport RWD).

The only way strut bars will make an impact is if the front is anchored into the firewall as well as the struts with a "triangle brace" style, the rear would need to be an "X-brace" style mounted to the top of the struts and trunk floor; the ones that span strut top to strut top won't do anything. Then there is the lack of room under the hood for bracing to contend with, and how useless your trunk will become with appropriate bracing. You'd really need to find a fab shop to build them for you since real ones don't exist in the aftermarket (the Toms racing one is just a strut top tie together, & won't do squat).

I've done suspension & chassis work on many cars (primarily Mustang's & Subaru's) Haven't done anything to my IS (yet) though, will likely only do LCA rear mount bushings, as I'm trying not to modify the car; she's heavy and might see the occasional track day, but I'd want to be in something at least 600lbs lighter with less of a luxury bent if that were my goal, and there is no way to get 600lbs out of this car while maintaining daily driver 4 seat sedan status.

Your ride height looks good BTW, I was considering the RSRs, but even at stock height my nose scrape on certain streets in my town, so I'm not going to bother.

 

Here’s my 15 AWD on downs and 19s. I’ve had them on since I bought the car new. People complain about the reverse rake but I think mine sits pretty level

 

Love the Vossens

 

Absolutely 👍

 

Oh also, did you need to swap shocks? I've heard it's quite common to need to swap shocks when lowering but apparently the F-Sport AVS is g2g for lowering springs.

 

Do you mind linking some sway bars compatible with the IS model? Thanks for looking, yeah, I've been scraping more but it's not that bad honestly. Get the bushings, definitely helps with the steering being more solid when braking.

 

RSR has been around for many years for our cars (back to 2nd gen IS) so they specifically make the springs for our struts/shocks. I was at 35Kish miles, struts definitely still have life in them. If the ride gets uncontrollably bumpy, I'll probably go for stock struts again. I feel like I would get rid of the car before I even change out the struts. Changed the struts / shocks in my brother's Honda Accord at 120K miles...

This link has the picture right after the install:
https://www.clublexus.com/forums/is-...down-drop.html

 

Great information on the shocks thank you. And very cool sequence of images displaying the process of settling. It did definitely look like you had a significant reverse rake when settling initially after the first couple hours, but the way it looks now (the first image you posted in this thread) it's very evenly dropped and I personally don't see a rake or at least can't distinguish one. Good stuff!

 

No prob, yeah, I was really upset when I saw that because that wasn't the look I was going for. Honestly, I still wish that the front was a tiny bit lower. There was a member who installed RSR Down springs only on front and his sits really evenly and nice IMO (https://www.clublexus.com/forums/is-...nt-on-awd.html) - scroll down, user name Fashow.

You could also look into Ark Springs which I saw some people using, really even drop as well but not sure about how long they've been around the IS, RSR has been around forever.