I deserve a lot of the blame for this as I have not always been able to separate Opinion John (tm) who hates bad suspension parts from Moderator John (tm) who should be more positive and be more, er, moderate. This is bad. I am trying to fix it.
I will try to get together a longer post to try to bridge the divide, but for now, keep it clean. Instead of flaming someone you disagree with, link to some sort of resource or whatever. If you are doing something that you know will hurt the car's handling and don't care, you should expect a little bit of static but it needs to be constructive. If you don't care about the car's handling and you are just lowering it for looks, fine, just say so.
If you see any posts that are not in this spirit, please report them with the little "!" triangle. (edit: including mine! I'm not a mod anymore, so the mods in here can actually give me points if I'm being a jerk!)
I would propose rough "rules of engagement":
If you're one of the people who doesn't care about handling, is trying to do something aggressive, or wants coilovers, or whatever
Please, lay out your goals. If you are more worried about looks than handling - SAY SO! This should help people avoid getting annoyed with you. A lot of people (including me) don't understand why people would take a perfectly good Impreza and mess with the suspension geometry. And a lot of people (probably including you) don't understand why people would leave their suspension stock, or why they would spend $3K on shocks but leave the stock turbo, or why they would run the rear ride height higher... we don't have to understand each other. We should sort of respect that.
Try to avoid using the word "hater". Try to avoid freaking out. Just remember that this is the suspension/handling *technical* forum and there are a lot of folks who think that means it should be focused on making your handling better rather than fitting big tires.
You will be better off if you do some of the homework, i.e. reading the stickies, so you can understand some of the tech behind stuff here. If you don't care, okay.
Please note: this is still NOT the member's car gallery. This is not where you do pic requests.
If you're one of the people who can't understand why people want to run 215 tires on a 10" wheel while lowering their car 3" from stock just for daily use
I understand. Why would someone compromise function for aesthetics? Whatever, people do. I think this quote sums it up:
http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=398276
Quote:
It's your car, your property. You can do anything you like with it, and better yet, you don't really have to ask anybody else if it's ok. My cousin used to throw hatchets at his car door to see if it would stick. I didn't think it was a good idea, but it's his ride.
No need to yell at them. They probably already know that what they're doing is suboptimal handling wise and don't care. You're very unlikely to change their mind. It's like getting angry at the weather. It's your car, your property. You can do anything you like with it, and better yet, you don't really have to ask anybody else if it's ok. My cousin used to throw hatchets at his car door to see if it would stick. I didn't think it was a good idea, but it's his ride.
thanks,
john