Rep Power: 0

Morning everyone. I lowered my Civic this weekend, two inches to be precise. It looks great and handles even better. Now for the down side. The back keeps bottoming out. Even raised the rear almost to stock height, which helped the ride considerably, but I still hear it bottoming when I'm just driving around town, doing the speed limit down a street without any major bumps or potholes. To clairify bottoming out, I don't mean I'm dragging frame. When I hit a little bump or something and the wheel has to drop a bit, it comes back up and the top of the shock is slamming into the top plate of my coilovers and giving me a nice jolt and "thunking" sound resonating in the trunk. I'm not sure how normal this is, but it makes me nervous and it's really pissing me off. I know I have to sacrifice some ride quality for the stiffer suspension, but unless you all can give me some shread of hope that something can be done to fix this, then screw it I'm going back to stock.

Thanks.
-Fitz

 
Rep Power: 359

Trim the bump stops on the shock strut so you get more play out of them. If I understand your bottoming out issue correctly that should help you out.

 
Rep Power: 0

I completely removed the bump stops. Should I try putting them back in?

 
Rep Power: 359

They were made to protect the strut.
You hit sooner than now.
Our cars have shitty strut / shocks
I don't know?
Maybe your strut / shock went bad.
I didn't have my car lowered that low.
I'd wait for someone with a 2" drop to respond to this better than I.
Sorry.

 
Rep Power: 0

I completely removed the bump stops. Should I try putting them back in?

 
Rep Power: 0

Oops. Let's try this again.

Thanks anyway.

 
Rep Power: 310

I would put the bumpstops back in. Without them when you hit bottom out the top of the strut is smashing the top strut tower. It wont be long before something breaks or gets seriously damaged. Whats weird though is you mention even small bumps do this. That makes me wanna think you have a blown strut(s).. hrrm. Small bumps shouldnt bottom out unless your really low.

 
Rep Power: 298

i have recently developed the SAME problem. My rear strut went bad, check your strut for leaking oil. That should tell you whats wrong.
Even if you did have a bumpstop in you would still be bottoming out, it actually gives you less susupension travel, but put it back on! just in case!

 
Rep Power: 0

I decided that the worry of voiding my warranty just wasn't worth it at this point. I took it back to stock and figure I'll have another go at it when the car is paid off, the warranty runs out, and we've got some more mods available. Guess I'll just enjoy the fuel mileage for now. My struts were fine, I think I just tried to go too cheap on the coilovers. Thanks for the advice though!
-Fitz