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      07-09-2007, 10:58 PM   #22
swamp2
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Drives: E92 M3
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: San Diego, CA USA

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Stiffness vs. damping

A spring provides stiffness whereas a damper provides a force in opposition to a velocity or to some function of velocity. The function of each is separate but coupled in that a system should try to reach critical damping for most inputs and this involves the spring rate and damping level. A slight alteration of spring rate and ride height should not affect the EDC system. Consider the case of a car loaded with passengers and luggage. The normal ride height in this case will be substantially lower and further into the travel of the EDC damper. For sure the system will function just fine under this cirumstance. EDC offers tunable damping and maybe some minor stiffness effects as well but the dominant source of stiffness is certainly the spring and you could extract more performance and some benefit to frontal area and drag with lowering springs. All that being said, I almost for sure will not do so personally.
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