I currently have an old Ford Mondeo. It has few graces but one thing it does do is glide over speed bumps as if they are magically removed from its path, the only exceptions being some particularly fascist ones in Oxford. It also copes remarkably well with the general lack of repair on the roads. So I am projecting myself forwards to March when I get my gleaming new machine and wondering whether I am going to have to chicken out before the slightest rise in the road. I am especially worried about potholes because some of those on my way to work are starting to look like the Great Rift valley.

What are peoples experience with speed bumps? I remember a VW Jetta I had was awful because both the sump pan and the lower wishbone arms were poised to pounce upon anything that wasn't ironed down flat on the asphalt.

Also how good is the Octavia at maintaining its steering geometry when driven over rough roads (asphalt roads but Oxfordshire asphalt, those who live here will know what I am talking about but if you don't just think Emmental cheese).

Report the potholes on your local highways website, once they are reported they have to be filled within 48hrs. Never fails here, I have reported all the local ones and they have all been dealt with. If nobody reports them, then how are the highways team going to know they exist when working from their office.

I drive over speed bumps without slowing down, and have been for more than 3 years in the same car. So far, no suspension issues to report in more than 90K miles.

Report the potholes on your local highways website, once they are reported they have to be filled within 48hrs. Never fails here, I have reported all the local ones and they have all been dealt with. If nobody reports them, then how are the highways team going to know they exist when working from their office.

I drive over speed bumps without slowing down, and have been for more than 3 years in the same car. So far, no suspension issues to report in more than 90K miles.

Well that is re-assuring thanks.

I seem to be catching an awful lot of humps, its only when I have three or 4 in the car, and it seems to catch the black plastic flappy bits which are under the car on each side. I did post a Q on here asking what they are for but no one got back. Even going over them slowly, it still catches so I now avoid certain routes inc the top of my road! Never had a prob with my Mondeos or Mazda6.

Going back a few years I came to the opinion that this isue is particularly relevant to the sportier, but mainstream models from the VAG. (VW, Audi, Seat, Skoda)

I have personal knowledge and experience of disproportionate levels of damage, especially to the sumps, on cars from the VAG range, caused by traffic calming measures, kerbs etc.

I believe they have a tendency to "submarine" under harsh braking and then "wave" as the suspension settles back.

Also, the suspension tends to sink lower than on other makes of vehicles and even slight variances on opposed suspension, i.e the front offside and rear nearside being on different levels, causes the floorpan to scrape on certain surfaces.

Similar type/spec vehicles from other manufacturers do not seem to be as prone to this as VAG vehicles.

I know people will say " Well it's how they were being driven and to a degree they are quite right, driven in a normal manner and taking the road conditions into consideration you should not have to many problems. This does not change the fact that it rarely happened to any of the other vehicles we used in the same circumstances.

My own previous vehicle was an A4 Avant S line. When reversing onto a neighbours drive which had a very slight apex to it, the underside scraped on the apex. The wifes focus was fine. Another neighbour with a similar drive would scrape the underside of his A3. His mini cooper suffered no such problems.

Similar problems have occured on slightly more aggresive speed humps that cause no problems to other makes of vehicles. Where my son trains for football I had to crawl one wheel at a time over one that again caused no problem to other vehicles. I will find out tomorrow how the VRS copes

Edited 16 January, 201016 yr by pg220

Fords have a higher ride height than Vag's

I've never scraped the underside of the car and I drive like I stole it.

Mine seems to be ok with the rectangular 'blob' bumps, although I do slow down to 20mph, but the long plateaus and the short yellow plastic jobs I usually take slower.