Softening The Ride

J

Jobes

Member
My z is perfect on decent roads but here in sunny Huddersfield they are insanely bad. Some of the the roads i like to drive on here are fast bumpy moorland roads which have quite a rough surface. On these roads the car feels very nervous and vague. E.g. There is one particular straight section in the middle of nowhere, my Astravan is super stable down there at any speed but the z at speed never feels planted. On my local built up roads it's very crashy but again the roads here are a joke.
Up in the dales on Sunday it was perfect even on the back roads, in fact it was incredible :D
So basically I would like to soften the ride a bit even if it means a trade off in handling. Would I start with springs?
Tyres are new rainsport 3's, just been hunter aligned and it's running spacers.
Sending it in this week for new bushes all round too.
 
Are you running standard tyre sizes? 17" will be more comfortable than 19" on bad roads.
How many miles have your current shocks and springs done? Are they OEM or aftermarket?
Do you know that both of your rear springs are still intact?
When you say crashy do you mean that it sounds rattley and a bit knackered over potholes or like it's bottoming out?
Do you know that some of the bushes are knackered?
 
It's on 18's just bought brand new tyres and refurbished wheels :D . Car has done 99k but don't know if everything is original. I'll trawl through the history. I've no idea if the bushes are worn but I'll get them done anyway for piece of mind. I'll also get mechanic to check springs etc .
It doesn't bottom just feels like it's more rattly, like harsh.
Does it look lowered?
 

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According to the vin check it has msport suspension, could this be why it's so hard?
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Doesn't look lowered to me but i'm no expert. I can say that i have the same issues in Birmingham with certain roads just making the car feel jumpy and giving me backache.

I had planned on using the Z4 as an everyday car but driving my Ford Fiesta around is so much easier and smoother i'll probably just keep both. It's a fantastic car, but put it on a shitty road with potholes and it feels like it's trying to kill you.
 
m suspension will make it harder than standard se but perhaps your biggest issue is 99k 10+ year old shocks on the car. I would look at doing something on that front to improve things, perhaps b4 bilstein shocks with eibacjhs are they are supposed to give a better ride. Not want you want to hear but if you change the bushes its going to need the alignment checking again
 
Cheers fellas. Paddy that sounds exactly the same as me :D
Good point on the alignment Mack never thought about that.
 
Looks quite low - may be sport springs? Looks even front to rear (mine looked lower at the back when the springs broke). My inclination would be to take a look at the relevant bushes /see what your mechanic says about them and take it from there. Prime suspects (in my humble opinion) would be the front wishbone rear bushes (lollipops) and the rear trailing arm bushes. I'm sure others will be along with more informed views shortly.
 
I just recently changed my springs to eibach pros cut back the bump stops about 15mm and the ride is amazing. No crashiness but feels planted. Much much improved. And i am still running on runflats. :thumbsup:
 
My experience is just like yours. Very happy with the handling, but not the crashiness. I'm about to change mine onto Suplex springs to match the M-Sport ride height (as Eibach lower the car), combined with Bilstein B4s. Plus any bushes that need doing whilst I'm down there. Just need to order the parts and get on with it...
 
M Sport suspension is notoriously hard so could be just the car's setup - although since its high miles it might be worth checking out shocks as Mack and a few others have mentioned :thumbsup:
 
I don't know if this sounds similar but for what its worth, my Coupe at 66k miles has an irritating rattle/knocking which I particularly notice at low speeds driving over bumps. I doubt it affects the handling a great deal but needs to be rectified. Separately it has become progressively less precise, I'd say even wallowey in high speed corners (significantly reducing confidence). I actually notice this more on better surfaces than rough ones but perhaps that's because I'm pushing harder. I put this down primarily to front shocks but at the same time recognising that the there are a lot of moving parts which are getting old and tired and in combination are going to be detrimental to handling. I also have another issue which is an intermittent brake judder (generally higher speed braking e.g. coming off a motorway). The discs are new OEM spec ATE's - they may have warped already but the fact I don't notice all the time makes me wonder if something in the suspension is causing the judder.

I've been gathering various parts over the past few weeks and with a bit of luck will have them changed out this weekend. I'm also taking the opportunity to make a couple of upgrades (shocks/springs/top mounts all round/lollipops/RTAB + limiters/front ARB bushes). In doing this lot I should also be able to inspect the other bushes to see if anything else needs attending to.

I'll let you know what differences I notice....
 
Newbers said:
I don't know if this sounds similar but for what its worth, my Coupe at 66k miles has an irritating rattle/knocking which I particularly notice at low speeds driving over bumps. I doubt it affects the handling a great deal but needs to be rectified. Separately it has become progressively less precise, I'd say even wallowey in high speed corners (significantly reducing confidence). I actually notice this more on better surfaces than rough ones but perhaps that's because I'm pushing harder. I put this down primarily to front shocks but at the same time recognising that the there are a lot of moving parts which are getting old and tired and in combination are going to be detrimental to handling. I also have another issue which is an intermittent brake judder (generally higher speed braking e.g. coming off a motorway). The discs are new OEM spec ATE's - they may have warped already but the fact I don't notice all the time makes me wonder if something in the suspension is causing the judder.

I've been gathering various parts over the past few weeks and with a bit of luck will have them changed out this weekend. I'm also taking the opportunity to make a couple of upgrades (shocks/springs/top mounts all round/lollipops/RTAB + limiters/front ARB bushes). In doing this lot I should also be able to inspect the other bushes to see if anything else needs attending to.

I'll let you know what differences I notice....
Click to expand...

might be too obvious, but have your rear springs been replaced? Could be broken?
 
Marlon said:
Newbers said:
I don't know if this sounds similar but for what its worth, my Coupe at 66k miles has an irritating rattle/knocking which I particularly notice at low speeds driving over bumps. I doubt it affects the handling a great deal but needs to be rectified. Separately it has become progressively less precise, I'd say even wallowey in high speed corners (significantly reducing confidence). I actually notice this more on better surfaces than rough ones but perhaps that's because I'm pushing harder. I put this down primarily to front shocks but at the same time recognising that the there are a lot of moving parts which are getting old and tired and in combination are going to be detrimental to handling. I also have another issue which is an intermittent brake judder (generally higher speed braking e.g. coming off a motorway). The discs are new OEM spec ATE's - they may have warped already but the fact I don't notice all the time makes me wonder if something in the suspension is causing the judder.

I've been gathering various parts over the past few weeks and with a bit of luck will have them changed out this weekend. I'm also taking the opportunity to make a couple of upgrades (shocks/springs/top mounts all round/lollipops/RTAB + limiters/front ARB bushes). In doing this lot I should also be able to inspect the other bushes to see if anything else needs attending to.

I'll let you know what differences I notice....
Click to expand...

might be too obvious, but have your rear springs been replaced? Could be broken?
Click to expand...

The original (non-sport) springs both failed after about 20k miles (of course). I've been riding on Sport springs since then and touch wood they're still holding up. My car's not really bad - it's nicely balanced and I'm only really aware of the problems when it's going faster than it should but I'm conscious it's starting to get a bit floppy and sloppy and would benefit from a bit of a refresh. For a daily driver which all told is pretty trouble free and cheap to run (touch wood again) it's difficult to justify not doing it. (I need to get this lot out of the way before I get too distracted with getting the roof black wrapped and an exhaust like yours!)
 
Cheers all some food for thought here :D Just to clarify it is perfect on decent roads, the handling is incredible :D Might just be me that needs to get used to it.
It's going in tommorrow anyway so I'll get everything checked for wear and tear and see what's what :thumbsup:
 
It might be worth checking the suspension bushes to see if they have been swapped for aftermarket Polyurethane items (they come in various colours with a slick smooth surface) they are more durable and quite a bit stiffer, but will transmit bumps a lot more, combined with sports suspension they will give pretty hard ride.
 
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