How to know when adj. shocks (QA1) are set correctly?

[375instroke]

Installed QA1 Stocker Stars on my '69 Charger R/T, and they are a great improvement.  I could bounce the car very easily by hand before, and when driving this one stretch of road with large ups and downs, along with S-turns, it was hard to keep my car in it's lane.  One would almost get sea sick.  I installed the rears first, and set them at 6 clicks out of 12.  It felt like someone was playing with the hydraulics on a low rider.  I set them down to 2 clicks, and they felt fine.  I added the front, and kept increasing them up to 5, then after a few days, 6 clicks up from dead soft.  Then bumped the rears up to 3 clicks, and it felt bouncy again in the back, so back down to 2.  I'll go up to 7 clicks in the front, and see what happens.  There is an obvious threshold in the back between 2 and 3 clicks, but how does one know where the shocks should be set at?  I can move the rear a tiny bit at 2 clicks, and not at all at 3, but in the front, it doesn't feel bad at all driving, but when jouncing it by hand, it's rock solid.  As it stands now, the car doesn't feel like the suspension is any harsher.  It rides just like it did before with the useless, worn out shocks, but it sure handles better.  I don't see how an off the shelf shock could ever be correct, with them fitting multiple cars, with varying weights and spring rates. 

[HPP]

Determining the settings is a combination of driver preference balanced against suspension specs, intended usage, and road conditions. If your just cruising around, you may want softer settings than if your autocrossing. If the roads are relatively smooth, you may want firmer settings than if your roads are in poor shape. Ify ou have stepped up significantly in spring rates, you'll need firmer settings. Only real way to tell is to go up or down a click at a time and see how you like it and keep doing that until you find the settings that produce the feel you want. Now if your racing, then it is a whole 'huther deal. If you use your car to drive to the local strip and bracket race, then you may end up with two sets of "optimal" settings. Throw in an autocross and you may have a third set of settings or an open track day will give you a fourth set. That is the beauty of the adjustable shock.

I'd refrain from bouncing the car at a stand still for any type of relative comparison. The dynamics of the car at speed can't be duplicated by hand. By bouncing your car by hand your initiating a light load/low velocity situation which you rarely encounter on the road. Most bumps at speed will be light load/high velocity or cornering will be heavy load/low velocity. Which is why on road testing will give you the best feedback on what the system wants.

Yes, off the shalf shocks are a compromise to produce reasonable behaviour under the widest range of conditions. In a performance application, they are often lacking. I've often refered to shocks as the equivilent part of the suspension in much the way the camshaft is the core of an engine system because they are that important yet that overlooked.