The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Lemons Tech → Tips for lowering CG and the whole car...
Stick with the 14's just get lower profile tires that will essentially lower the gear ratio. 195/60 r14 tends to have the best tire choice for 14's now a days.
Ditto that, 195/60R14 are cheap and plentiful. Falken Azenis are a good choice, in my experience. 13" tires are getting hard to find. Plus your brakes may not fit behind them.
Stanza is 4x114-ish and 13 inch wheels will not clear the front brakes on the wagon - in fact, not all 14" wheels will work, either.
Thanks to F&F series there's a steady supply of stock 15" 240SX wheels, as well as Altima alloys. Seems like 195/50r15 tires are actually smaller in overall diameter.
You should be able to reindex the torsion bars to lower the rear. It's trial and error, you pick whichever end of the bar you can remove the easiest, make a pop mark on the bar and the piece it goes into to show your start point, then slide the bar out and rotate whichever piece moves the easiest in the direction you need. Caution: two splines is a LOT.
On all four cars I have helped with, we cut coils by jacking the car up and cutting 1/2 coil at a time using a muffler cutter. Then set the car down, roll, bounce and measure, if it needs to come down some more repeat. Before going hog wild, consider that most suspensions are designed to work best with the control arms level with the ground. Also, having too little travel puts you on the bump stops which means the suspension is nearly bottomed out and could be way too stiff.
If you do go the eBay coilover route, black paint is your friend. 
We ran the 205/60-15 Azenis on our Thunderbird and 195/60-14 on our Civic, very good tire for this!
Edit to correct my brainfart, we ran 205/50-15's on our 'Bird.
The thing that always seems to get the coilover crowd caught is the black paint over top of shiny paint. I bet if you removed the original paint, let the coilovers get a powder of rust on 'em, then sprayed them black you would be okay.
I did not say this. I am not here.
Yeah, cuz the judges never notice adjustable spring perches even when they're rusty and painted black. And they never get pissed when you insult their intelligence.
Y'all need to go back and watch the video of the 540 getting baked at the last BS inspection. Jay had no trust for the team at all more because they painted their EXHAUST black than anything else. His theory: "you're under the car with black paint, what are you hiding?".
We run 2.5" red springs on the stock spring seat with a piece of PVC pipe around the top of the strut tube just to keep the spring centered. You don't need adjustable spring seats, just stiff springs, so buy cheap springs and cobble something together that looks lemons-appropriate.
Hmmm... this thread is loaded with cheat. Not particularly clever cheat, but I like it nonetheless.
Does this make me a bad Lemoner?
The stuff that is cheap or free isn't really "cheat", it's how you're SUPPOSED to set up a Lemons car!
Camouflage paint and 'aged/antiqued' spring finishes? Okay, I'll be sure to tell Phil & Jay that's how we're supposed to set it up at the next BS inspection! (note to self #1: research removing valve cover bolts w/o leaving tool marks; note to self #2: bring excessive bribes/tribute)
Nah, that's not what I meant at all. (If you read above, I specifically mentioned that painting stuff is often viewed as "hiding something" whether it is or not, and thus should be avoided.)
But, cutting springs, swapping in junkyard springs, cobbling together an added swaybar from some other car... those are the "cheap or free" mods that I was referring to.
I'm thinking about forming a front sway bar for the Simca project from a bundle of discarded coat hangers, wound in the style of aircraft cable and held together with twist-ties from day-old loaves of bread that get thrown out at the grocery store. I don't see how this could fail.
Cheaty? 
I'm thinking about forming a front sway bar for the Simca project from a bundle of discarded coat hangers, wound in the style of aircraft cable and held together with twist-ties from day-old loaves of bread that get thrown out at the grocery store. I don't see how this could fail.
Cheaty?
If I were a judge, and I saw that, I would immediately demand to see the spring rate calculations for said bar. I would then bribe _you_.
I'm thinking about forming a front sway bar for the Simca project from a bundle of discarded coat hangers, wound in the style of aircraft cable and held together with twist-ties from day-old loaves of bread that get thrown out at the grocery store. I don't see how this could fail.
Cheaty?
But, if you use all of the coat hangers to create a swaybar, what will you use to weld the cage?
Mulry wrote:I'm thinking about forming a front sway bar for the Simca project from a bundle of discarded coat hangers, wound in the style of aircraft cable and held together with twist-ties from day-old loaves of bread that get thrown out at the grocery store. I don't see how this could fail.
Cheaty?
But, if you use all of the coat hangers to create a swaybar, what will you use to weld the cage?
You can weld PVC?
Loren wrote:Mulry wrote:I'm thinking about forming a front sway bar for the Simca project from a bundle of discarded coat hangers, wound in the style of aircraft cable and held together with twist-ties from day-old loaves of bread that get thrown out at the grocery store. I don't see how this could fail.
Cheaty?
But, if you use all of the coat hangers to create a swaybar, what will you use to weld the cage?
You can weld PVC?
Weld, Melt, basically the same thing.
Stock brake clearance will probably be a problem w/ 13" wheels.
I clear a 9.2" rotor and caliper with a 13", but thats about it.
i think for wheels I'd stay in the 15-17" range, only because high-performance tire availability goes waaay up, peaking in the 17s iirc. not a personal fan of spring cutting but this year that may just be the ticket for us.
Well, maybe some flat black paint then spray everything with used motor oil and go cut donuts in a field. 
Well, maybe some flat black paint then spray everything with used motor oil and go cut donuts in a field.
Remind me not to go through BS with you. Paint? Motor oil? Dirt? I have NO idea what ya'll are talking about. Those KYBs came WITH the car.
Y'all realize that our esteemed judges have seen and heard it all, right? They have x-ray vision that can see through grease, dirt, oil and fresh black paint. They have a sixth sense that detects cheatonium. And they don't believe a word that you say.
Make sure you budget for the oil and paint you use to coat your cheaty parts.
Make sure you budget for the oil and paint you use to coat your cheaty parts.
Ooooh.... you know, that just MIGHT work! They'd get a chuckle out of it, anyway. And anytime you can get them laughing WITH you instead of AT you, it's probably a good thing. Maybe.
I think my biggest problem is that I can't POSSIBLY cheat. There are rear shocks available for the car but not the front ones, for example. The engine has no aftermarket, period.
The car was bought three years ago for a grand total of $250 and, as we found out last weekend, it doesn't even need any cooling system upgrades - the stock rad is huge. If battery box is considered a safety item, then our budget is essentially $250 plus whatever we manage to get off of parts sales. A complete gasket kit for the motor is $30, both radiator hoses appear to be somewhat fresh and crack-free, and my super-size roll of spare heater hose is just the right size for the heater core.
So far our list of potential expenditures contains a $6 piece of steel angle to reinforce the rusted part of the front subframe (that contains two out of 8 suspension carrier attachment points and the sway bar u-brackets). That's about it.
We keep taking off bracket after bracket (I swear those brackets taken together weigh more than the components they support) and we keep gaining ground clearance as a result. It's now over a foot front and rear.
We also keep finding more and more rust. The car is made out of it, pretty much. I think if I go too hard on it with a wire wheel all the metal parts will disappear.
Nissan Stanza Wagon is an incredible POS. I feel proud.
Have you had to change the starter on it yet? Not a fun job.
The 24 Hours of Lemons Forums → Lemons Tech → Tips for lowering CG and the whole car...