Modern suspension is shyte

[They_all_do_that_sir]

As per title really.

 

I was in a colleague's fairly recent BMW 325 diesel M sport the other day. An E90 I believe?

 

I quite like this from the outside. Not to actually own but I think BMW are still the masters of aggressive snarly looking cock wagons.

 

However

 

FUCK ME the ride was appalling! This has the optional (as in you pay extra money for, and actively choose) M sport lowered / stiffened suspension. It crashed and smashed over every bump and road imperfection we travelled across. It jarred my back, thanked clunked and banged over everything.

 

I was only in the car 10 minutes and I considered ending it all

 

Same peice of road in my 130k volvo with its shagged suspension felt like riding on a magic carpet in comparison.

 

Why in the name of all that is holy would someone decide this is an upgrade?

 

how the hell is this car fit for purpose?

[mercrocker]

I thought all modern shite was like this.   Certainly the bloke who gave me a lift home from work in his Bini did his best to discloate my spine.   And the A Crass the Merc specialist gave Mrs Rocker as a courtesy car was actually worse over the rubbish roads in our town than the Minor.  Are you listening Mercedes - 59 plate low mileage "Kwality" car WORSE than a shagged out 50 year old Minor - not a vehicle ever known for cushy ride....

[mouseflakes]

Anyone remember the story (from the late 80s?) of the guy who specified all the sporty suspension mods on his 3 series (I think it might even have been a floppy top) then tried to get a full refund because it was unusable? Well - I do, because I just mentioned it. It made the national press. Apparently he was warned all along about how harsh the ride would be with the set up he ordered, but he insisted on having it (probably because it would be 'the fastest' like that?) and he ended up having to keep it.

[HH-R]

The OMG MASSIV WHEELZ are part of the problem too.

 

Seems that most people find modern stuff crap for various reasons (diseasels breaking expensively and being unsuitable for town driving, unreliability, rock hard suspension etc) but they keep handing over the folding for these types of cars!

[cort16]

Run flat tyres make these feel like you're falling down the stairs with a trouser full of marbles.

[eddyramrod]

There was a time (I'm old enough to remember it) when cars were designed to offer a comfy ride.  Even performance cars.  If you wanted "handling" you had to be prepared to accept some sacrifice of ride comfort.  In the 70s, 80s and 90s progress allowed better and better compromises between the two extremes. 

 

Sadly, in the last 15-20 years, new cars seem to have slid wholesale towards the "handling" end, so that you can corner like a god, at the expense of your back, kidneys and teeth.  None of this excuses the park-bench seats they like to fit these days though.  More reasons I prefer an older car!

 

Incidentally, with all this cornering power, have you ever been behind a new car as it turns into a side street?  You'd think they were driving Tesco trolleys, they take the corner so slowly...

[Junkman]

I was in a newfangled Aldi today, don't ask me which one, it was one of them dark blue estates that cost a lot.

The seats were were about as cosy as an iron maiden and it didn't have any suspension whatsoever.

[mouseflakes]

The seats were were about as cosy as an iron maiden and it didn't have any suspension whatsoever.

 

Yeah, but that's a small price to pay for being 'the fastest' (to the shops, to the school, to the recycling bins, faster than everyone else - yeah!)

[MrBiscuits]

 

 

Incidentally, with all this cornering power, have you ever been behind a new car as it turns into a side street? You'd think they were driving Tesco trolleys, they take the corner so slowly...

I think this is because of the piss poor forward visibility and massive a-pillars...

[RayMK]

Big wheels and engine bays crammed full of computers often leads to a poor steering lock, hence the slow turn in case they can't make it.  Moderns are generally harsh in the suspension department, made worse by low profile tyres, short suspension travel and lousy road surfaces.  However, my kidneys are still finding their correct position after a succession of Rover Minis owned (actually leased) in the last century.

[danthecapriman]

I can't drive moderns for long without getting pain in my lower back. I crushed a disc in my back a few years ago and although it's pretty good now certain things still aggravate it, like the rock hard seats in modern cars on top of the solid suspension and stupid low profile tyres. Even with correctly adjusted lumbar supports about an hour is the limit in a modern before I need to stop, get out for a walk/stretch.

Yet I can drive all my old stuff for hours on end with absolutely no problems! Soft comfortable seats, Soft suspension, decent springs and proper size tyre sidewalls really make the difference.

 

You can't beat the old Volvo seats, like in 740's, for proper comfort and support though.

[They_all_do_that_sir]

I'd be willing to bet actual real monies that over most roads round here an SE spec 3 series with 16" wheels would cover ground faster than the M sport....

 

Just reinforces my opinion that the best cars ever came from the 90's - decent ride, decent mechanicals and we had almost licked the rust issue.

[NorfolkNWeigh]

My 530d estate rattles my teeth on some surfaces with supposedly soft suspension and the smallest wheels with the biggest profile tyres you can get, run flat 225/50 17 s. When I bought it I looked longingly at 19" wheeled MSports for the same price , but even my childlike capabilities of car choosing realised this would be disastrous. Plus they come with sports* seats- I don't have a sports arse.

[Luckythirteen]

Just thinking about my sister's Bini yesterday, reminded me that it was no quicker over a favourite back road than the Clio. Yes, it makes the horizon appear very quickly, but on crappy A-roads it's a twitchy liability.

Sadly, I found out last year that the latest Clio isn't far behind, and its' not got the 'look hard' excuse of the bigger saloons. Why Renault, just why?

I did see a magazine review that said Renault had 'sorted out the previous sogginess'...I wonder if stupid journalists who don't have to live with the car are partly to blame. Along with people who buy them, and wonder why nothing will stay on the dashboard...

[Timewaster]

I mentioned a few months ago the Instignia Sri hire car that I hated before I got it out of the car park.

 

 

Anyone remember the Peter Sellers ad for the Citroen Visa where they're drive it down the stairs?

[dave21478]

Ha, when i went to look at an old 406 estate a few days back I met the dude in a petrol station. Taking it for a test drive I drove out of the pez station as normal and off we went. Came back, didnt buy the car and went to leave in my C2 - I was surprised I didnt bite my tongue off as it crashed through the gutter outside the pez station that the 406 had floated over without issue.

[Junkman]

Yeah, but that's a small price to pay for being 'the fastest' (to the shops, to the school, to the recycling bins, faster than everyone else - yeah!)

 

It was a diesel. Fast is something else.

[MrDuke]

Sadly, in the last 15-20 years, new cars seem to have slid wholesale towards the "handling" end, so that you can corner like a god, at the expense of your back, kidneys and teeth.

 

The thing is, the handling on lower-end cars hasn't actually improved proportionally to the decrease in comfort. If anything, they give you a false sense of what the car's limits are, which only become apparent half-way through a corner. Maybe much of this is due to the massive increase in kerb weight over the last 10-15 years, I dunno.

[UmBongo]

Anyone remember the story (from the late 80s?) of the guy who specified all the sporty suspension mods on his 3 series (I think it might even have been a floppy top) then tried to get a full refund because it was unusable? Well - I do, because I just mentioned it. It made the national press. Apparently he was warned all along about how harsh the ride would be with the set up he ordered, but he insisted on having it (probably because it would be 'the fastest' like that?) and he ended up having to keep it.

 

Sounds like a typical arrogant BMW driver, now, 25 years later, replaced by the ubiquitous arrogant Audi driver.

[STUNO]

Since I have owned it I have come to appreciate the comfort of the BX more and more, It is great on a long trip.

Jon who has my Mazda at the moment has commented on the suspension in a somewhat negative way, as in stiff and bouncy. It is not terrible but the BX is miles better

[PiperCub]

One of the main causes aside from the stupid never-ending quest for 'BIGGARRIMZ innit' is run-flat tyres which seem to be really hard and make the ride awful. A friends Mini (new one not a proper Mini) has these and the ride is bloody terrible for a small car. He isn't even a car-guy (evidently - he's got a Bini) but he hates it too but is too mean to buy a normal set of tyres - plus the car doesn't have a spare which worries him even though he never goes far in it!

 

Add to that the fact even a poxy shopping car for some dreary little house-frau has got to be able to 'Do the 'Ring' in under ten minutes means that suspension that is actually useful and practical for road use everyday (esp.on UK's shitty, piss-poorly maintained roads) is compromised by this stupidity. All you get aside from a crappy, bone-jarring ride is large bills for repairs when the wonderful super-whizzy complicated undercarriage wears out (probably pretty quickly!).

[xtriple]

I really don't understand it. Lotus always used to use soft springs and firm dampers and they were both compliant and handled well. If they could do it 30 years ago, why are we inflicted with this new shit that does neither?

 

Even my modern which is hardly sporty (!) is comfortable and handles okay but bumps and crashes over potholes and speedbumps. When I first got it I was convinced there was something wrong with it as it was so noisy/harsh.

[MarvinsMom]

moderns have nasty poxy rock hard seat i think cos they are cheap to make. similarly they tend to have pretty shitty hard suspension is i think for the same reason, its cheap. that and the likes of twat gear have been telling the sheep for years that this is what they need, like really, really need.

 

and no, you have to have one of those ones with that badge, or that other badge nailed onto to the front of it, and if this dreary piece of foreign crap doesn't have the right badge on, then everyone in the office car park, supermarket car park, golf club blah blah blah.... then they will know that you is a whinnna (apparently)

 

quite why the hun insist on pog hard seats, and no suspension is i mystery to me, off of the autobahns their roads are even worse than ours....

[cobblers]

Too right, This fuckin thing is hard work:

 

I've always driven "lowered" cars, for years. I'm a nobhead so I have lowered everything I have, usually to excess. I'm used to driving low and impractical cars, I have had stuff so low that I had to carry planks in the boot so I could get over them little rubber speed bumps near my mates house, but they could all just about handle a pothole.

 

Nothing has made me cringe over potholes like this Ibiza has. Even medium ones make the stereo skip, and it's USB. The only saving grace is that the wheels must be made out of very good stuff, otherwise they'd be like 50p pieces by now like the TSW ones on my golf were.

On smooth roads it feels absolutely planted, like nothing I've ever known, but show it a bit of a wobble and it'll kill you.

 

There's a few wobbly bits in the road on an industrial estate nearby that I would normally do flat out at about 60+ in my hideously low mk3 golf. I did the same thing in this at half that and it hit so hard that the glovebox fell open and the stereo front fell off entirely.

[mouseflakes]

It was a diesel. Fast is something else.

 

I'm sure it would seem fast to me. I've been driving a Saxo dizzler since 2003.

[robinmasters]

I really don't understand it. Lotus always used to use soft springs and firm dampers and they were both compliant and handled well. If they could do it 30 years ago, why are we inflicted with this new shit that does neither?

The options list on a modern doesn't allow you to add lightness.

[beko1987]

People at work don't get it when they give me a lift and I moan about how hard the ride is in their car, compared to my ZX with ruined suspension...

 

Was even worse in the xm, I used to feel the ride wasn't all it should be, but after half an hour in something else it felt like I was fucking floating!

[Uncle Jimmy]

Need Shitroen...C6!!

[New POD]

The 04 accord is quite comfy, whilst having a reasonably taught balance on a country b Road, soaking up bumps and pot holes at speed mid bend, without much drama. Okay it doesn't have the go cart quality of the BINI, which is better driven fast (you seem to feel the bumps more if you are taking it easy) , but you get to your destination more rested. If only the seats were not so compromised. I want to be an inch lower.   The BINI has the best seating position of any car I have EVER driven.

 

the Mx5 is painful after 120 miles or so, so how people who make then harder and lower cope, I have no idea.  The seats are perfect for an 8 stone woman of about 5 foot 5.

[Honey Badger]

Not all moderns are crap, big lexus (lexi?) still waft along in a very agreeable style, mostly due to the massive side wall on the tyres providing a bit of squidge, though the body roll may make you slightly nauseous

 

Mate at work has a 55 plate Mongdeo Ghia X that he has fitted with a set of glorious 16" steelies and 205/55 tyres, it has completely transformed the car from the 18" Ford split rims with laccy bands round the outside it used to have when he brought it, also since the change over to council estate wheels he hasn't had to replace any exploding suspension springs either.