Ride or handling? What is your choice? But does it have to be a choice? Why all the questions?
Well, we have been busy this month doing some damper tuning. As always, we have a specific target in mind for how we want the car to feel, but a comment from one of our clients made me realise that ride comfort is not always expected. Indeed, if the car is deemed comfortable it may cause the handling to be questioned even before the car has been challenged!
Our MGTF ‘comfort’ damper kit is a good example of how ride can be improved, without a loss of handling. This is due to the hardware used (Bilstein monotube dampers) and optimised tuning.
The target for one of our clients was to provide an overtly sporting damper performance to enhance control when competing in speed events. However, the car also had to be suitable for daily road use. Having completed some tuning and testing on our own test car (where the strength of body control was in no doubt), we fitted the parts to the client’s car. After the test drive the first reaction was ‘it is much more comfortable’. Hard does not always mean good.
Another damper tuning job has been presented to the client, which I have previously mentioned in the March 2020 blog (‘The best handling MG ZS EV in the world?’).
Our target for this task?
‘’The next step is to add a little more compliance to the front axle and to let the car ‘breathe’ more easily over rougher surfaces. As always, we want to provide comfort with control.’’
Did we achieve our target? Please take a look at our client’s feedback via a YouTube video at https://youtu.be/TlKv_FQIt5w . The first few minutes discuss ride and handling before moving onto other aspects of the car, but the final summary at the end of the video is clear…..’’this is probably the best handling and ride comfort MG ZS EV in the world’’.
Improvements in ride and handling. The best of both worlds.