Spec Miata Announces new non-adjustable Penske Dampers to replace Bilsteins

Mazdaduece and I were texting during lunch about this announcement from Mazda/SCCA/NASA

Since its inception nearly 20 years ago, Mazda’s Spec Miata (SM) has grown to become one of the most popular and competitive classes within the Sports Car Club of America and National Auto Sport Association. The low-cost, high-excitement platform has drawn thousands of racers, and that will continue with today’s announcement that Mazda Motorsports and Penske Racing Shocks have teamed up to produce a new, spec shock package to enhance the SM racing experience in the coming seasons.

Link to SCCA annoucement

Link to Testing Data from Mazda

Highlights of the Annoucement

The new shock price will be set at $198.74 apiece, with the complete upper mount/bump stop kit retailing at $249.90. Parts will be available exclusively through Mazda Motorsports with a total cost for conversion; including four shocks, top mount, bump stops and lower spherical mounts for less than $1,050. Unlike the current Spec Miata shock, the Penske will be tamper-proof, and rebuildable through Penske at $100/shock. It is recommended that shocks be inspected by Penske after 100 hours of track use to determine whether a rebuild would be valuable.

Both NASA and SCCA have approved the new Penske shock for SM competition beginning Jan. 1, 2019. It is anticipated the new shocks will be available starting November 2018 through Mazda Motorsports.  The new shocks will not be immediately required for NASA or SCCA competition. Both sanctioning bodies will communicate with competitors at a later date regarding a sunset timeline for the shock package currently in use. For the SCCA, both the current Bilstein and new Penske shock packages will be eligible in 2019, with the Penske shocks mandatory for the 2019 SCCA Runoffs. The 2020 SCCA U.S. Majors Tour program will follow suit in requiring the Penske package, with continued eligibility for the Bilstein shock at the Regional level.

I think I'm going to order a set for my 99 street/track car, the Price is too good to pass up. 

I see a bunch of cheap Bilsteins coming available in the future. 

spacecadet said:

[edit]

I think I'm going to order a set for my 99 street/track car, the Price is too good to pass up. 

I believe I detect a hint of sarcasm here. I could be wrong but I don't think so...

Stampie said:

I see a bunch of cheap Bilsteins coming available in the future. 

Yep. Diy coilovers are about to get cheaper.

I don't think he's being sarcastic at all. $200 a corner if you ignore the $250 for the fancy top hats. The million dollar question is whether they behave as well as a set of the $$$$$ with the adjustment knobs broken off.

And yes, one million Spec Miata racers just cried out in pain at having to drop $1100 on new shocks. 

In reply to rdcyclist :

ZERO sarcasm, the entire conversation MazdaDuece and I had was about how much of a DEAL these are!

In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :

Already spoken to my buddy who's a SM racer in NASA and he's excited, but that was definitely his first response. 

Word in the SM Facebook Group is Mazda is taking returns on recently ordered Bilsteins. 

You couldn't win with a stock set of Bilsteins, so what this does is save you the effort of having your shocks illegally revalved. Those Bilsteins were always cheap, that was the problem. They were chosen because they were available and inexpensive and were completely inappropriate for the spring rate.

What this is really going to do is bring in a strong track day option at a good price point. As a Miata fan, this is great news. Professionally, well, time to take a good look at the lineup and see what we can do to counteract this! The Mazda presentation addresses some of the things we've always tried to do, such as minimizing time on the bumpstops. I'm surprised they kept the spring rates but I suppose that would be too much change all at once.

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Deuce and I both thought they'd be a great shock for my track toy miata, glad to hear you echo that thought.  

No no no, they'll be terrible!

Keith Tanner said:

What this is really going to do is bring in a strong track day option at a good price point. 

 

I guess I'm misunderstanding what you're saying about the Penske's then Keith. 

Sorry, I was kidding.  You'll want to run SM rates which are a little odd - very little rear spring - but I suspect they'll do very well. I'll have to get my hands on a set to benchmark. Want to send them here first?

The Mazda presentation reads like Bilstein dropped the ball on supply and forced Mazda to look elsewhere, and there was no reason to repeat the mistakes of nearly 20 years ago with something like a Koni SRT.T.

In reply to Keith Tanner :

I wasn't sure!

I'm not ready to drop $$ yet, but if when I get a set I'll drop you a line. Someone said on Facebook they'll be available in November, plenty of time for me to sit and think about it! 

It also read like Mazda,SCCA and NASA wanted a partner who made a better damper, that was willing to be a active part of the series in a $$ fashion to either them or the racers or both. Which I can totally understand on any of the 3 sides. 

Sort of related, does anyone have any insight as to why Bilstein is so far behind making shocks right now? The Miata stuff is big and well known, but they've been saying Accord/TSX shock are six weeks out for the past four months. 

In reply to Keith Tanner :

1993 LE with FM Springs and RacingBeat sways, original Bilsteins.  Very interested in what you find out about how these work with FM Springs and your opinion of them for those of us with street/track setups.  

mazdeuce - Seth said:

Sort of related, does anyone have any insight as to why Bilstein is so far behind making shocks right now? The Miata stuff is big and well known, but they've been saying Accord/TSX shock are six weeks out for the past four months. 

Same deal with BMW stuff, I had a lot of trouble getting E91 Bilstein struts, and I wasn't able to get any for my E83.  With the E91, I actually got two struts from different factories, one of them had a 7mm allen head in the shaft (that holds the shaft still while the top nut is bolted on), the other had a 6mm.  And NOBODY has a 7mm allen wrench.  Well, except for me.  I had one.  

I heard something about a factory change, but the supply has been bad for a year now and there's no sign of the suckage stopping.  Its a shame, I really like B6s for most daily driving purposes.  

stvdilln said:

In reply to Keith Tanner :

1993 LE with FM Springs and RacingBeat sways, original Bilsteins.  Very interested in what you find out about how these work with FM Springs and your opinion of them for those of us with street/track setups.  

If these shocks are valved properly for SM rates, they'll be dramatically overdamped in the front for FM springs. The SM fronts are nearly twice the spring rate of the FM springs.

You would find a set of Koni Sports to be very, very beneficial to your car.

What are the standard spec miata spring rates? Are they changing those at all with the shocks?

Standard spec springs are 700/325. Not ideal.

DeadSkunk said:

Standard spec springs are 700/325. Not ideal.

What would, IYHO, be ideal? Is there room for improvement in the spring rate for SM or are you just saying they're not good for a street car? The Spec E46 rates are far from ideal but the Powers That Be aren't interested in changing them.

Rule of thumb for me is to look for something close to 3:2. So a 750 front would use a 500 rear. If you vary from that, it’s usually in the direction of more rear spring. I don’t know how the SM rates were figured nearly two decades ago - I’ve driven the “proof of concept” car and it had FM springs - but I’d be amazed to see them change. There’s a lot of knowledge about how to make them work and since all the cars have them, it doesn’t matter if they could be better. 

In reply to rdcyclist :

Per Keith's response, the rear springs should be heavier. Also, 700 fronts are too much spring rate for the spec Bilsteins to handle properly, unless you cheat and get them revalved, a practice that is widespread.

Sure but the Penskes will be built for those rates. I think the defacto Xidas setup to go with is 800/500 or like Keith mentioned

Jaynen said:

Sure but the Penskes will be built for those rates. I think the defacto Xidas setup to go with is 800/500 or like Keith mentioned

Might be significant that Penske shocks are relatively rebuild-friendly, and there are tons of shops around the country that can rebuild Penskes.  I haven't seen the internals of these, but I can't imagine why it wouldn't be a minor affair to revalve for a different spring rate.

In reply to unevolved :

On top of that, the rumor is that the coming iterations of cheapish Bilsteins will not be rebuildable with cheap circle track parts as they have been in the past. There's about to be a million sets of old spec Miata shocks that can be rebuilt and revalued on the market, and that's certainly the hot ticket moving forward for now, but watching rebuilders figure out the new Penskes for different applications of the Miata is going to be fun.