Mazda RX-8 Bilstein B14 PSS Review | Street, Autocross, and Track

本站添加: 2026-05-05

[00:00:00]What's going on guys? We're getting ready for the SCCA autocross event tomorrow.

[00:00:05]We got the fluids checked, got the car packed. We've got the class and numbers on the car, and I've got a spicy new tune from VersaTuner to throw on the car. But that brings us to the episode for today. Now, my long-term viewers are probably tracking that I switched from a upgraded Öhlins Road & Track adjustable coilover setup to the Bilstein PSS B14 fixed valving setup here for 2026.

[00:00:27]I've done two track events and two autocrosses at this point, so I feel like I finally have enough information to be able to share an unbiased review with you all.

[00:00:36]We'll first start off with the street ride quality, and then we'll talk about autocross and track performance, and then we'll end with a roll-up summary on my take on whether this kit is a good buy or not. There's quite a few reasons that drove me towards the Bilstein PSS, including trying to get a slightly more softer OEM plus ride quality, high durability, long service life, and excellent factory support, regaining the awesome OEM factory stroke and suspension travel that the RX-8 comes with, having less sensitivity to corner balancing, having more grip on wet and bumpy roads, an ability to increase the ride height dramatically for potential future use, and honestly a desire to challenge the convention that stiffer is faster. I'm also just plain curious on how much performance you can get out of a truly entry-level suspension. Now, I've used a variety of suspensions on both of my RX-8s over the years. I've run them completely stock. I've run with the B6 Bilstein shocks and stock springs. I've used the same Bilstein B6 shocks with Racing Beat springs and with Eibach Pro-Kit springs. I've run Fortune Auto 500 coilovers with a variety of spring rate pairings, 8K 6K 10K 7K 12K 7K. For a while, I ran with a custom converted coilover kit based on the Bilstein B6 shock and 8K 5K spring rates. And of course, I've run the off-the-shelf Öhlins with the 8K 5K spring rate, but also ran it with an upgraded front spring at 10K rate. You don't have to go overly stiff on this platform to combat body roll because that factory suspension does such a good job of maintaining a good tire contact patch. Now, the Bilstein B14 PSS kit comes with fixed valving dampers, adjustable spring perches that simultaneously adjust both preload and ride height, modest sport touring spring rates, separate assist springs in the front and a progressive rear spring that essentially integrates an assist function into the main spring, and rather simplistic looking rubber bump stops. You have to reuse your OEM factory top hats for the upper mounts.

[00:02:42]One of the first things I do when I purchase new shocks is to check the valving on each shock independently.

[00:02:47]When I tried to push the front damper rods in, I was really surprised. I could barely get them to move. I almost thought there was something wrong with them. By comparison, the rears had quite a bit of resistance, but I could get them to be fully uh compressed. So, what does this tell us? To me, this suggests that Bilstein went more aggressive on the front shock valving than the rears.

[00:03:08]Now, I suspect they did this in order to promote a little bit more stability in dynamic and transient conditions, things like lane changes and slaloms, by introducing a little bit of front bias and a little bit of understeer uh during that initial body movement. For me, this was nice to see because my driving style tends to use a lot of front weight transfer and trail braking at turn-in, and I have a hard time kicking the rear planted in those maneuvers. So, once I assembled everything, I threw them on the car pretty much the way they were delivered, and I was rewarded with the most dumped hellaflush car that's ever graced my garage. It turns out that the provided spring seat locations are definitely not what was intended. But from there, in terms of baseline settings, I settled on a roughly 13 and 1/2 in front ride height measured from the center of the wheel to the fender lip, and I'm running about an 1/8 in of positive rake, so an 1/8 in higher in the rear. I'm running the Progress 32 mm front bar, the big boy, at the middle setting with an OEM rear sway bar, and I'm running matched approximately 3.2° camber front and rear, zero toe all around, and maximum front caster.

[00:04:18]I'll note that I matched the spring seat height on the left and right, and if you do that, you'll end up with pretty close cross weights. Don't go off adjusting the spring seat height at individual corners trying to chase ride height because you're going to end up with screwy cross weights and weird handling.

[00:04:33]It's going to take a short drive for everything to settle, especially with new shocks that are on the firmer side.

[00:04:38]So, before you chase dialing in that ride height just perfectly, take it for a short spin and start to let the kit settle.

[00:04:45]One final thing to note, Bilstein offers affordable rebuilds and revalving. So, if you ever feel like you're outgrowing this suspension kit, you can send the shocks off to Bilstein to have them revalved, and you can pair this kit with higher rate springs.

[00:05:00]All right, let's talk about how it performs.

[00:05:03]I had high hopes for ride quality, especially considering the more sport touring springs that are a bit on the softer side compared to what most people run. Now, I guess I was expecting like a Cadillac soft ride quality, and I ended up with something decidedly less sophisticated. Put bluntly, the ride quality is acceptable, and I feel like most people that are running cheap coilover kits or running stiff springs would even say the car rides nicely. I find that it can be a bit harsh on big bumps. Now, DC roads suck, and even my wife's Honda Fit can feel a little bit harsh on some of our roads, so it is a decidedly challenging environment for ride quality. We found that it just barely passes the coffee test and the knitting test over some of the harsher bumps. Given the soft springs, I think this all comes down to the shock valving that Bilstein went with this kit. They kept the springs soft in order to maximize grip, but they went more aggressive on the shock valving to control the body movement.

[00:05:55]This all works out perfectly from a performance standpoint, which we'll talk about next, but it leaves the ride quality feeling somewhat less sophisticated than the spring rates would suggest.

[00:06:25]Autocross is a transition heavy motorsport, lots of rapid changes in direction and speed over short time and distance intervals.

[00:06:33]As such, the shocks play a huge role in the performance, responsiveness, and balance of a car in these highly dynamic situations. When I refer to balance, I'm talking about the tendency of the car to oversteer or understeer, to lose front traction or rear traction first. I am really pleased with the balance of the car using my guesstimated alignment and uh sway bar settings. This setup is working really well with the rest of the car right out of the gate. The car is nicely neutral in sweepers with just a hair of stability. If you give it a lift of the throttle, the front end tucks nicely, but the rear end never steps out unexpectedly. Now, balance in the aggressive transitions like a slalom is perfect with the right amount of front bias and stability due to the aggressive front shock valving. Not only does this give you heroic stability in the slaloms, but it also lets you to brake later and trail brake aggressively without fear of losing the rear end.

[00:07:26]This is something I've struggled with to always dial out of my RX-8. It feels like the RX-8 electronic brake force distribution has a very spicy rear bias.

[00:07:36]They're using the rear brakes as much as possible, which is great, but it tends to under braking make the car want to slide. With this Bilstein PSS kit, I can really attack braking zones and turn-in without fear of losing the rear. The overall traction of the car feels great, and the braking force at 1.2 Gs is some of the highest I've ever recorded.

[00:07:57]I think the softer spring rates are helping in that regard. Despite the soft springs, the car in transitions feels very controlled from a body movement standpoint. So, even though I'm getting quite a bit of body roll, you don't really feel it because it's well controlled. It hasn't taken me very long to adapt to the feel of the new suspension, and you can't really feel a delay in the car taking a set, again, probably because of the aggressive shock valving. You really don't feel the spring softness. You just get big grip and good steering response. Now, I'm sure on the super 200 rubber that I'm running, the car is making it onto the bump stops, but you don't really feel any harshness engaging the rubber bump stop, and the activation is kind of seamless. From a pace perspective, overall, I placed third out of 60 at my first event and first out of 73 in my second event.

[00:09:21]My first event at the track was actually a rainy track cross at the very slippery Summit Point Shenandoah and Jefferson circuits. I finished first in class during all three heats, and was the fastest overall in the final heat.

[00:09:33]Despite the low grip conditions, the car was predictable, and I could feel the soft springs helping to make the most of the limited tire traction. The shock valving helped to keep the car stable at corner entries. Now, my second event was in the dry, and it let me to really push the car. The balance and handling continued to shine with awesome grip, beautiful cornering balance, and the ability to really attack curbs and turn-ins that used to upset the car a bit more. I was fast enough to chase down and pass much faster cars. Like at the autocross, the braking feel felt particularly good. I was able to rotate the car at corner entry in a predictable manner, and really only lost the rear one time when the rear tires got particularly greasy. To summarize, to compare the Bilstein PSS kit to all the other suspensions that I've run on my white and blue RX-8s, my ratings for the PSS kit are as follows. Ride quality, three out of five. Not bad, but nothing to write home about. It's probably more comfortable than some of the stiffer setups out there, but you're going to know you're on something other than stock. Autocross, four and a half out of five. I'm frankly blown away. I've never driven a setup with all the right characteristics that this kit has.

[00:10:40]Stability when you need it, rotation when you ask for it, excellent grip both laterally and longitudinally. The disadvantages, if you want to call them that, are the inability to adjust preload and ride height independently, and the fixed valving. That said, the valving feels pretty much perfect to me, although being able to soften up the kit on the street would be a nice benefit.

[00:11:01]Track, 4.5 out of five. The track, in my opinion, is a little bit less demanding and sensitive to your suspension than the autocross, except under extreme braking conditions and stability over curbs. In both of those regards, the Bilstein PSS kit performs excellently, allowing me to attack braking zones as much as my big balls courage allows, and allowing me to be aggressive on curbing without upsetting the car. Although it fell a little bit short in terms of ride quality, I've been able to use this suspension kit to run at the pointy end at the local autocross and track events. It's simple to set up, reliable, well supported by the factory, and fast even on today's 200 treadwear tires. While setups costing three, four, five, or more times as much might give you a small performance advantage, it's up to you to decide whether that investment is worth it, or whether it makes sense to save that cash for seat time and to work on the driver mod. Thanks for joining, and be sure to follow along this season to see for yourself how the Bilstein PSS kit continues to perform.