do i have worn shocks?

my recently obtained 99 civic rides looser than my 92 civic (the 92 steers
and rides tight for bone stock 4-dr eco-car!) mainly noticeable on the
highway and s-curves. i get pushed around by the wind pretty bad, and when i
turn through a long curve or s-curve i feel the car pull to the oposite side
from where im turning once the body wieght transfers over. i dont get the
typical lowrider hop hitting bumps and (although the civic is probably half
the weight of an 60-80's gm car) and i don't really notice any extreme
nose-diving. are there any other symptoms i can look for? or am i completely
in the wrong direction? any help would be greatly appreciated

 

maybe, but not necessarily. unfortunately, the 96-00's are crap like
this. i don't know what honda did, but my 2000 was junk from day 1,
terrible in cross winds and sloppy as heck. after spending a small
fortune on the full oem si sway bar kit, it tightened up a lot, but was
still not as good as my 89. i took the kit off again before i sold that
car and still have it. you live in norcal? if so, you can buy it if
you want it...

 

Tires can make a huge difference in handling - check the pressure first
- I keep mine at the max as printed on the door plate.

 

Uh ... The number on the door plate is a MIN, not a MAX. Max is printed on
the tire sidewalls.

 

Wrong. The number on the door jamb is the pressure as recommended by the
car manufacturer. The number on the tire is the maximum pressure specified
by the tire manufacturer. Common practice is to follow the car
manufacturer's recommendation.

 

uh, the door plate is the MAX range for that car - with two values for
differing speed ranges. the tire has max for the tire and has /nothing/
to do with the characteristics necessary for the correct handling of the
car.

 

i did. like i said, the car handled like crap from day one. 3 sets of
tires and 6 alignments and it still handled like crap. the sway bars
and a set of mugen honda hard bushings helped a lot, but then the ride
was too harsh for my taste. i've had 4 88-91's, and the contrast is
huge. /those/ things are comfy, handle like they're on rails, and are
impervious to side winds.

 

What? Where are you getting this stuff? The number on the door plate is
the pressure recommended by the manufacturer (of the car) to provide a
comfortable ride. while it will provide adequate handling characteristics
with the OEM tires, it absolutely does not provide optimal handling
characteristics (unless you have a Ford Explorer or a BMW). My experience
with the number on the door plate is that if you keep your tires that low,
they wear out faster than you can buy the replacements, and always with
under-inflation symptoms (outside edges gone, middle tread still in place).

I have never seen a car with two numbers for the same tire on the door
plate. They do sometimes have different numbers for the front vs. rear, but
that is not a range. On what specific car have you seen this?

The number on the tire is the maximum cold inflation pressure that the tire
is designed to support. I agree it does not specifically relate to handling
of the car (unless you exceed it and they pop).

 

i check the pressure regularly, especially before long trips. is there any
symptoms i can look for as to why this car teeter totters side to side? is
this typical of this year era? surely not it feels borderline of unsafe!!
Tires can make a huge difference in handling - check the pressure first
- I keep mine at the max as printed on the door plate.

 

Could be an alignment problem. Best to have it checked out. Where I
live, the state safety inspection is very thorough, and a pretty cheap
way to go for any non-alignment problems.

 

well when going down the highway it'll drive itself straight, and i can jerk
the wheel back and forth and don't notice any slack,i guess i'll have to
crawl underneath and look around. hopefully something will catch my eye!!
thanks for all the help!!
Could be an alignment problem. Best to have it checked out. Where I
live, the state safety inspection is very thorough, and a pretty cheap
way to go for any non-alignment problems.

 

A bad rear tire that's low on air can cause the bad handling behavior.If not
(and you're planning on keeping the car for a long time), get Tokico &
Eibach. After the spring&shock modification on the 99, the ride should
become more akin to the 92 Civic, but handling will be scientifically better
then 92 and it'll do a better job a soaking up the big bumps/pothole.

btw, 99 Civic weights as much as Sunfire/Cavalier. With the GM, the weight
is spent on fattening it up, while the Civic has a very sturdy suspension
system to blame (except for shock&spring, which needs to be improved in
order to do the suspension system justice). Using role bars can cover up for
the weak shocks&springs, but bad weather performance will suffer if you go
that route.

Pars
98 & 2000 Civic

 

well i do have an odd ball tire in the rear, a bartam? but the pressure is
good, @ 40 right now, the michelins call for 44 cold and i noticed a slight
difference from 35 psi. but it slops around like im running on 10 psi. and
the tires are oversized 195/60 compared to 185/65 stock. even though they
are lower profile ratio than stock, is the extra width causing me problems?
i haven't got the 1 replacement for $100 cause 2 bf goodrich in the stock
size will be $50 ea. $100 more and i'll have a whole set. if the shocks
aren't the problem @ $50 ea. i can swing a set of tires. any info would be
greatly appreciated


A bad rear tire that's low on air can cause the bad handling behavior.If not
(and you're planning on keeping the car for a long time), get Tokico &
Eibach. After the spring&shock modification on the 99, the ride should
become more akin to the 92 Civic, but handling will be scientifically better
then 92 and it'll do a better job a soaking up the big bumps/pothole.

btw, 99 Civic weights as much as Sunfire/Cavalier. With the GM, the weight
is spent on fattening it up, while the Civic has a very sturdy suspension
system to blame (except for shock&spring, which needs to be improved in
order to do the suspension system justice). Using role bars can cover up for
the weak shocks&springs, but bad weather performance will suffer if you go
that route.

Pars
98 & 2000 Civic

 

I'm running Toyo 195/50/15 on my car (which I think is an ideal size for the
5sp DX tranny). My tires and wheels are perfectly balanced. Enough so, that
if I was 5 PSI off on one of the tires, I'd be able to feel it. In your
case, the mixmatching tires could return abnormal behavior. Perhaps in stock
size, there wouldn't be enough mix-match grip to register, but at 195/60, it
could be an issue. My personally motto is to never cut corners (or cheap
out) on the tires since they're the most important factor governing you cars
driving/handling.

Pars