stirringaxe
Member
I have had my 07 E1 Senator for a few months & have some concerning suspension issues. The car has done 85k & has 20" mags. It is my 3rd Holden & 2nd VE. The others were VT2 Calais & VE Calais V.
With MRC in the off or standard mode, it handles like a big fat elephant on jelly. Suspension is way soft. It wallows around, bottoms out front & rear over most medium sized judder bars or speed humps. It feels like their is no "shock" effect from the front at all. In this setting I get clunks & knocks from the front when driving along going over small to medium bumps. Hitting any decent sized bump produces what I would describe as a juddery reaction that feels like only the springs are working but nothing is happening from the shocks front or rear. A totally horrible ride.
When the MRC button is pressed & light on, it is to the other extreme. Suspension is as hard as. The knocks & clunks disappear. There is very little suspension travel & it handles like it's on railway tracks. Going over the speed humps it just feels hard with no travel. Hitting any decent bumps though produces a huge rebound effect which completely unsettles the car.
At highway speeds the two settings produce the same issues but worse.
On standard, the car under steers, is soft & wallows. Any bumps make the car react with a judder from the springs front & rear. The car will skitter left or right, across the road surface until it settles back down. Feels like all spring & no shock action.
With the MRC button on again it steers really well. Ride is hard but any bumps encountered produce a violent & frightening rebound reaction which wants to spear the car either left or right off the road. It feels like the shock is now so limited & locked down that there is no suspension in it at all.
A 2 hour rural drive I made recently is the scariest trip I have made in a car for a long long time. The suspension condition forced me to drive at 75kms per hour on roads that should have been taken easily at 100kms. I was truly frightened on several occasions during this trip.
The rear shocks are new & the rear springs were re-set to original height when I got the car. This did produce a plush feeling in the back for a while, but they have since sagged back down to where they were. The front springs were replaced with a standard height spring because the ones in there were very low, causing the front to scrape a lot over driveways etc. The front strut bearings & mounts were replaced also. It was wheel aligned by a good & trusted firm afterwards. The wheels & tyres are new. The Nanking tyre is not a hard compound & feels really nice all round. I run about 36psi in the tyres. Any more is impossible to live with at the moment.
My dilemma is that there are so many conflicting opinions as to what to do with it.
The local HSV technician says keep it as it is & replace the mounts & bearings again. What that will achieve in my mind is nothing. I feel the front struts are totally knackered & in need of replacement.
The second option is to remove MRC all together. Install Nolathane rear subframe bushes & reproduce a Munro GT Gas based replica of a standard FE2 type setup. This setup worked well in my previous VE Calais, which was also on 20" mags.
The other option is to install the Nolathane bushes & a full coilover setup. This is more expensive but that's not a limiting factor. I have looked at a few different ones. For example Tein QSF34 5ZSS2 set or the BC - BR GOLD's - Sports Adjustable Coilovers. They are both height & damper adjustable.
My questions are will they be too hard for a road car on the soft setting & too low at their highest adjustment.
I am a 50 year old guy. I like a car to handle & have a sporty ride but I don't like too hard a ride. I am not doing track days & I don't like lowered cars as a rule. I like a sporty damper but want all the suspension travel available. In short a plush but sporty ride & handling. I live in Christchurch which after all the earthquakes has more bumps than you can imagine.
Are coilovers the answer ? Will they be able to be adjusted to somewhere near to what I'm trying to achieve ?
I am aware that I may need have the 130km MRC check removed from the computer & fitting coilovers will require a low volume certificate to achieve compliance.
I am quite prepared to spend the money to fix this but do want to go the wrong way.
Any help or opinions are welcome.
With MRC in the off or standard mode, it handles like a big fat elephant on jelly. Suspension is way soft. It wallows around, bottoms out front & rear over most medium sized judder bars or speed humps. It feels like their is no "shock" effect from the front at all. In this setting I get clunks & knocks from the front when driving along going over small to medium bumps. Hitting any decent sized bump produces what I would describe as a juddery reaction that feels like only the springs are working but nothing is happening from the shocks front or rear. A totally horrible ride.
When the MRC button is pressed & light on, it is to the other extreme. Suspension is as hard as. The knocks & clunks disappear. There is very little suspension travel & it handles like it's on railway tracks. Going over the speed humps it just feels hard with no travel. Hitting any decent bumps though produces a huge rebound effect which completely unsettles the car.
At highway speeds the two settings produce the same issues but worse.
On standard, the car under steers, is soft & wallows. Any bumps make the car react with a judder from the springs front & rear. The car will skitter left or right, across the road surface until it settles back down. Feels like all spring & no shock action.
With the MRC button on again it steers really well. Ride is hard but any bumps encountered produce a violent & frightening rebound reaction which wants to spear the car either left or right off the road. It feels like the shock is now so limited & locked down that there is no suspension in it at all.
A 2 hour rural drive I made recently is the scariest trip I have made in a car for a long long time. The suspension condition forced me to drive at 75kms per hour on roads that should have been taken easily at 100kms. I was truly frightened on several occasions during this trip.
The rear shocks are new & the rear springs were re-set to original height when I got the car. This did produce a plush feeling in the back for a while, but they have since sagged back down to where they were. The front springs were replaced with a standard height spring because the ones in there were very low, causing the front to scrape a lot over driveways etc. The front strut bearings & mounts were replaced also. It was wheel aligned by a good & trusted firm afterwards. The wheels & tyres are new. The Nanking tyre is not a hard compound & feels really nice all round. I run about 36psi in the tyres. Any more is impossible to live with at the moment.
My dilemma is that there are so many conflicting opinions as to what to do with it.
The local HSV technician says keep it as it is & replace the mounts & bearings again. What that will achieve in my mind is nothing. I feel the front struts are totally knackered & in need of replacement.
The second option is to remove MRC all together. Install Nolathane rear subframe bushes & reproduce a Munro GT Gas based replica of a standard FE2 type setup. This setup worked well in my previous VE Calais, which was also on 20" mags.
The other option is to install the Nolathane bushes & a full coilover setup. This is more expensive but that's not a limiting factor. I have looked at a few different ones. For example Tein QSF34 5ZSS2 set or the BC - BR GOLD's - Sports Adjustable Coilovers. They are both height & damper adjustable.
My questions are will they be too hard for a road car on the soft setting & too low at their highest adjustment.
I am a 50 year old guy. I like a car to handle & have a sporty ride but I don't like too hard a ride. I am not doing track days & I don't like lowered cars as a rule. I like a sporty damper but want all the suspension travel available. In short a plush but sporty ride & handling. I live in Christchurch which after all the earthquakes has more bumps than you can imagine.
Are coilovers the answer ? Will they be able to be adjusted to somewhere near to what I'm trying to achieve ?
I am aware that I may need have the 130km MRC check removed from the computer & fitting coilovers will require a low volume certificate to achieve compliance.
I am quite prepared to spend the money to fix this but do want to go the wrong way.
Any help or opinions are welcome.
