I have no idea what to do so I thought id ask the experts!

At the moment I have FK Coilovers fitted to my car. Its a hard ride and on bumpy high speed roads the car feels like its bottoming out and therefore it feels i'm going to lose control. On the plus handling is great.

Anyway one of the lower locking rings/nuts has snapped and I'm having major trouble from FK in getting a replacement.

So I was thinking of going back to new standard shocks and 35mm lowering springs. Obviously this is a lot more expense than a locking key and some replacement nuts. But the ride at the moment at high speed is just unnerving! I don't though want to speed loads of money and not make an improvement

I have FK coilovers on my 155 Q4, and have not really liked them from the start.

However, I think some investigation into setting them up properly (same for yours) might be beneficial if you have not already done so.

For example, generally, harshness of ride is related to spring rates, and it is possible to get lower rated springs (softer).

The bottoming out feeling might be related to springs going coil bound, but could also be related to insufficient damping, or ride height too low. Try adjusting the damping a little front and back to see if it makes a difference.

I haven't used the Q4 much in the past few years, but each time I go out I try a little tweak. The car is low but not dramatically so, and I went to softest damping settings and have started to turn them up slightly. It has improved a little as best as I can tell so hopefully I'm heading in the right direction.

FK spares wise, I have heard nightmares with FK customer service over on the alfa155 forum so not surprised you are having problems.

Interested where you go with this as I have a spare set of FKs that I might put on my Coupe if I can convince myself that I can set them up properly.

Hope that is useful.

I don't think, but i'm no mechanic, that my FK's have adjustable damping. The car is low and needs raising at the front. But I would then need all four of the locking rings. Lower and higher rings, just in case another ring fails when I try and adjust them. They were fitted when I got the car, hence why I have no knowledge of them.

Im thinking that if I'm going to have to pay someone to remove the coilovers at the front to fix it and then remove the other coilover if that one brakes and then take both apart to replace the rings with new ones I might as well replace with a new setup.

But I don't want to do that if no difference is made.

Ive also heard people paying for spares from FK which never arrive or take weeks to arrive. As I have the lower ring broken im guessing its not safe to drive??

Yes, shouldn't really be driving it with a lock ring missing.

Wont be a disastrous failure, but without the lock ring, the adjuster ring is likely going to move.

Damping adjustment wise, if they are adjustable, the fronts will have a little flattened pin sticking out of the top of the strut (under the plastic cover that sits in the top strut mount if they are still there). Rear shocks need to be undone at the bottom, compressed, and then twisted to adjust the damping. I forget which way for soft and which way for hard!!

what do you think of the other option of starting again?

Im not driving it at the moment. Its getting paintwork done at the garage and then booked in at the garage for the suspension work. But i'm guessing that the top ring is seized as the lower one was before it snapped

Well, I reckon that unless you are doing track days, the standard Coupe set up looks good and is pretty sharp for road use, so going back to standard springs and shocks, equivalent to OEM should be fine.

I have considered this with the Q4, but it looks like it is on stilts stardard, but Bilsteins and slightly lower eibach springs should be fine. As the Coupe is the same platform, there is probably something similar out there!!

Im looking at standard shocks and either SPAX springs H&R or FCSS springs all are 3.5mm lowered. Only on the fronts though for now. Leaving the backs as coilovers until I can afford to do the back.

I don't do track days and I have two kids and a wife to keep quite, moaning about the ride. But if I tell her the costs involved???

This doesn't make any sense at all

If I were you, I'd go for the standard dampers with FCSS springs, it will transform how the car drives on back roads, no more pogo stick handling that the FKs give you.