Mixing red and yellow Konis - bad idea?

On the same car, but not on the same axle.

Basically, I seem to be able to get Yellow Koni inserts for the front of the Celica (via classic-garage.com, only place I've found them so far), but only reds for the back. I do like the ability to adjust the yellows without taking them off the car, which would come in handy for the occasional HPDE and autocross that I'd like to subject the car to...

Ideally I'd like yellows all around, but I haven't managed to find anybody who actually sells the rear yellows for the RA28/RA29 Celica.

Comments? Suggestions or recommendations where to look for alternative shock absorbers instead?

People change tire pressures and spring rates all the time, so I can't see why this would be a huge issue. Unless you can't control the rear springs with the reds.

Plus, the fronts are adjustable, so you may be able to get the balance you are lookng for.

Back in the day I ran Tokico inserts in the front of my Rabbit, and KYB gas in the rear. My "butt dyno" wasn't as highly evolved then (24 years ago -- yikes), but I never had any issues.

I should be able to control the rear springs with the reds, it's just a little PITA to have to adjust them because they have to be off the car for that.

I've just had a look at the German Bilstein catalog - they list B6 sports for the year. For 10kEur apiece

If we can mix reds with KYBs, I think you'll be ok mixing reds and yellows

Good point...

I also don't see a problem with mixing them. You can balance the suspension in other ways. Did you try Shox.com for the shocks? I would have looked it up for you, but I don't know the year of your celica.

Didn't try shox.com but a quick check there shows that the earliest they list for the Celica is for an '86; mine's a '77...

If you mix reds and yellows, you'll get oranges.

I can't believe no one else has made that joke yet.

jstein77 wrote: If you mix reds and yellows, you'll get oranges.

And that's a tasty combination!

The curves will probably get pretty close if you turn the yellows down and run the reds on the stiff end of the scale. At least according to Konis little graphs.

http://blog.tirerack.com/blog/performance-shock-absorber

I wouldn't worry about it. I've run reds rear, Tokicos front on a CRX. I just set the rears to full stiff and adjusted the fronts as necessary. Not the ideal setup (rides to and from auto-xes were a kidney-buster,) but the reds were FREE.

I nailed a curb in my '95 Neon ACR and took that as a chance to put new Koni Yellows on the front, while I left the non-adjustable Arvins on the back. No problem at all; in fact it was a big improvement.

I've known of quite a few people that have run Koni Reds up front and Tokico Blues in the back of their Accords. Again, not the ideal setup, but the Koni Reds are practically gold. A beat to hell set often sells for $300 or so.

but the Koni Reds are practically gold.

Say WHAAAAAA? Just because they're old?

poopshovel wrote:

but the Koni Reds are practically gold.

Say WHAAAAAA? Just because they're old?

Reds are old? I know at least 2-3 months ago i could still get them for the MX6 at TireRack to the tune of about $50 a pop.

jstein77 wrote: If you mix reds and yellows, you'll get oranges. I can't believe no one else has made that joke yet.

I was thinking of it when I clicked on this thread. Then I was sad to see you already said it

When the tooling wears out, koni quits making the struts for the older cars, but they will still rebuild them. So, eventually you end up with people paying $300+ for a set of blown konis just to send them in to be rebuilt.

I would think you'd only really have a problem if you mixed a shock with little or no compression dampening like Konis and the opposite which would be Bilsteins.

irish44j wrote:

jstein77 wrote: If you mix reds and yellows, you'll get oranges. I can't believe no one else has made that joke yet.

I was thinking of it when I clicked on this thread. Then I was sad to see you already said it