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Rough ride
- Thread starter Union Pacifik
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- Driving Dynamics Model S
dgpcolorado
high altitude member
Temperature? My ride seems rougher than it was last summer and it may be due to very cold shocks or tires. Or it may well be that the roads really are rougher this time of the year due to the cold and snowbergs. [2014 S60, coils, 19 inch, Goodyear Eagle RS A2]
Funny I found this thread.
P100d w/ air, my ride is rough. No one has complained but I'm a picky driver and It's pretty rough. I can feel it in my back.
I'm currently on 19's with winter tires. I own 30 vehicles so I have a pretty good idea of what 'rough' is.
When I first got it, I love the ride but the tire guys filled the tires with 35# so it was good but lights were on.
I filled to 40# and it wasn't as smooth but not horrible. Got cold and got the warning light for 39#. I then filled to 45 and it's too rough. I'm going to reduce pressure to 41-42 I guess.
I'm going to be hurting come winter with 21's on it;(
P100d w/ air, my ride is rough. No one has complained but I'm a picky driver and It's pretty rough. I can feel it in my back.
I'm currently on 19's with winter tires. I own 30 vehicles so I have a pretty good idea of what 'rough' is.
When I first got it, I love the ride but the tire guys filled the tires with 35# so it was good but lights were on.
I filled to 40# and it wasn't as smooth but not horrible. Got cold and got the warning light for 39#. I then filled to 45 and it's too rough. I'm going to reduce pressure to 41-42 I guess.
I'm going to be hurting come winter with 21's on it;(
Joe F
Disruption is hard.
S90D recd Dec 30 2016. 19" Goodyear Touring no SAS. Can't reach out to select something on the screen reliably the car bounces so much. No car I've ever owned in over 50 years of driving has been this rough. Had 41 lbs in tires, increased it to the recommended 45 lbs. Haven't driven much since, but it felt worse. Had I test driven before buying I might not have purchased it. Bought it mainly for road trips, but if I can't get a resolution that's now questionable.
Will have to try varying pressures and reach out to Tesla service soon...
D/L Vieira accelerometer but see no way to scroll or save waveform on IOS on iPhone? Seems crippled.
Will have to try varying pressures and reach out to Tesla service soon...
D/L Vieira accelerometer but see no way to scroll or save waveform on IOS on iPhone? Seems crippled.
mspohr
Well-Known Member
I found one for Android and iOS that seems to be much better.
VibSensor
Live Display: See tilt and vibration data in real time.
Acquisition: Timed or vibration activated acquisition, with settable delay, duration, and trigger level. Collect raw accelerometer data for up to 10 minutes at max rate allowed by device. Also analyze low frequency vibrations with periods up to five minutes.
Data Storage: Acquired collections are stored on the device, with date and time stamp for later retrieval. Collections can be named for easy identification.
Analysis: Each collection can be viewed to see the raw accelerometer data, processed tilt and vibration, and calculated power spectral densities, both in graphical and report format. Units can be selected to be either g or m^2/sec.
Email Access: Users can email raw or processed data in text (csv or tab-delimited) or MATLAB format
VibSensor - Now Instruments + Software
mspohr
Well-Known Member
I'm not sure this is a problem. The limit seems to be about 35 m/s2 which is more than 3x gravity. I'd think that would indeed be a very rough ride.
Will be hard for you guys to get apples to apples comparisons unless you know other local owners who can drive on the same roads back to back.
The variability from one car to the next is a conundrum for you guys. It could be manufacturing tolerances on the shocks themselves, which would be a bummer. I wonder, however, if something is up with the assembly side of things. I haven't eyeballed this a ton, but, as an example, when replacing suspension components you generally want to tighten the various bolts on "moving" parts like control arm bolts, when the suspension is under load (i.e. wheels on ground or lower control arm lifted on a jack supporting weight of car) at rest. If you don't you can get suspension "bind" at things like the control arm bushings. While it is commonly accepted that this will slowly destroy the rubber bushings, I think I have read that it can alter ride height and even "spring rate" to an extent (although not sure how much). If the former were true, then it could place the shock shaft slightly out if its ideal operating range (perhaps relevant but maybenot - depends on shock design I suppose) and impact ride/handling slightly. If the latter were true, then the same impact could occur. I would expect both to be noticeable, but not dramatic. JUST A HYPOTHESIS!
The Tesla suspension is pretty basic - not a lot here to work with besides the dampers and basic assembly...
The variability from one car to the next is a conundrum for you guys. It could be manufacturing tolerances on the shocks themselves, which would be a bummer. I wonder, however, if something is up with the assembly side of things. I haven't eyeballed this a ton, but, as an example, when replacing suspension components you generally want to tighten the various bolts on "moving" parts like control arm bolts, when the suspension is under load (i.e. wheels on ground or lower control arm lifted on a jack supporting weight of car) at rest. If you don't you can get suspension "bind" at things like the control arm bushings. While it is commonly accepted that this will slowly destroy the rubber bushings, I think I have read that it can alter ride height and even "spring rate" to an extent (although not sure how much). If the former were true, then it could place the shock shaft slightly out if its ideal operating range (perhaps relevant but maybenot - depends on shock design I suppose) and impact ride/handling slightly. If the latter were true, then the same impact could occur. I would expect both to be noticeable, but not dramatic. JUST A HYPOTHESIS!
The Tesla suspension is pretty basic - not a lot here to work with besides the dampers and basic assembly...
mspohr
Well-Known Member
Yes, there are a lot of variables... tires, tire pressure, temperature, road surface, etc.
I would hope that there would not be too much variability due to manufacturing tolerances of shocks and assembly. This should be under control.
If we get enough data from various cars (with notes documenting tires, tire pressure, temperature, road surface) we can start to draw some conclusions and look for outliers.
I'll start as soon as I can but right now we're in the middle of a bunch of snow storms which make the road surface problematic. Hopefully it will clear in a few days. I'll use the VibSensor app (and also test if it's reaching saturation of range).
I think cab's idea rings true for my brand new s60d (coils 19 Goodyear touring set at 41 psi) if the body panels are any indication of attention to detail during assembly. The trunk, hood and right doors are misaligned greater than 1/4 inch! I hope this is not because of the frame!
I put the accelerometer in the trunk and then the frunk and jumped up and down 20 times on the sill and it felt like something loosened up. The vibration readout shows wide wavelength generally constant 1 to -2.0.
Then I road tested( they are snowpacked) and it was reasonably smooth. I went to a concrete road with joints, accelerated to 40mph and then coasted back down to 20 mph. A harmonic developed and the headrest pounded my head in rythm. The vibration wavelength was very narrow and spike to -2.0 but consistently rebounded to 1.0.
My vehicle has a regen breaking option of standard or low. I switched to low and repeated and I felt like it was smoother but the vibration readout seemed similar with slightly less amplitude.
I switched back to standard and repeated 10 times but could not get the rhythmic headrest beating to come back. The rough ride is very intermittent and hard for me to consistently repeat.
I put the accelerometer in the trunk and then the frunk and jumped up and down 20 times on the sill and it felt like something loosened up. The vibration readout shows wide wavelength generally constant 1 to -2.0.
Then I road tested( they are snowpacked) and it was reasonably smooth. I went to a concrete road with joints, accelerated to 40mph and then coasted back down to 20 mph. A harmonic developed and the headrest pounded my head in rythm. The vibration wavelength was very narrow and spike to -2.0 but consistently rebounded to 1.0.
My vehicle has a regen breaking option of standard or low. I switched to low and repeated and I felt like it was smoother but the vibration readout seemed similar with slightly less amplitude.
I switched back to standard and repeated 10 times but could not get the rhythmic headrest beating to come back. The rough ride is very intermittent and hard for me to consistently repeat.
Joe F
Disruption is hard.
Installed VibSensor for iPhone and tested by hand only. I think I'd have to find a Monster Truck dirt mound and jump it at top speed to hit any measurement limits.
Will have to wait a few days with the road conditions after the snow and salt covered roads here improve.
Agree comparisons impossible, so plan testing on our 3 cars on same road(S) and speeds. Am going to suction cup mount mount phone to lessen movement in place.
Will have to wait a few days with the road conditions after the snow and salt covered roads here improve.
Agree comparisons impossible, so plan testing on our 3 cars on same road(S) and speeds. Am going to suction cup mount mount phone to lessen movement in place.
It will be interesting to see if these tests will provide info that will help us owners who are in this "rough ride" group. My July 2016 S 75D has the worst ride of any car I have ever owned. if I am on a newly paved asphalt road it is fine. However, roads with a lot of patch work then the ride is really "bouncy". Now on a concrete road that is poured in sections ( as they are made that way) the bouncyness? at speeds of 60-75 mph is UNBEARABLE. I've owned 4 trucks in my lifetime and this S is nowhere near as smooth as any of them. My wife hates this car. Hurts her neck. Its interesting reading what owners have done to try to improve the ride (like tire pressure changes) and I will see if that helps. But I'm really wondering if I made a huge mistake not getting air suspension. Also, I agree with thought that the car sets up some kind of harmonic motion..it kind of feels like that. Terrible, terrible ride for what we paid for this car.
Tire pressure does not help to any great degree. I've had them as low as 37 psi and up to 45 psi (currently).
I took some preliminary measurements on a moderately bumping city road yesterday. The S had over 2x the average vertical acceleration as my wife's X5. Going to run some tests on highway today. Will post charts and data after I collect more samples.
My best guess is that the problem is with the dampers. I have a really good "all car" mechanic that might be able to give me an unbiased opinion of what is going on.
I took some preliminary measurements on a moderately bumping city road yesterday. The S had over 2x the average vertical acceleration as my wife's X5. Going to run some tests on highway today. Will post charts and data after I collect more samples.
My best guess is that the problem is with the dampers. I have a really good "all car" mechanic that might be able to give me an unbiased opinion of what is going on.
We took some measurements in a car with coils and a car with air suspension yesterday. Too me, they were both rough on the roads that we tried. It will be interesting to see if the data shows any major differences. Hopefully we'll have the data up in the next day or so.
I want to summarize the comments so far, please confirm or clarify:
- The rough ride is unusual based on users diverse lifetime driving experiences, including other Teslas;
- The rough ride is unacceptable for our current owned Tesla cars;
- The rough ride is usually characterized by bouncing;
- The rough ride may be intermittent;
- Most complaints are coming from all wheel drive "D" dual motor options;
- It happens on either coils or air suspension without clear distinction;
- It happens on any battery size model without clear distinction.
- Tire balance
- Wheel alignment
- Assembly of parts into vehicle (non loaded torquing of suspension connectors, mis alignments)
- Defective parts (dampers)
Does Tesla spec different suspension for dual motors vs rear wheel drive? It seems the weight and torque (including regen breaking) added to the front axels would have significant impact on the suspension.
mspohr
Well-Known Member
I have an 85D and don't have any complaint about the ride. The problem seems to be with some cars or owners. I think it would be good to try to gather some objective measurements to see the dimensions of the problem
The fact that you don't have any complaints is the reason we are hopeful and trying to figure this out. Those of us with complaints are reasonable and knowledgeable.
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