Hi, I did a quick search and didn't find anything.

 

Two parts to this.

 

1) Please could someone tell me the standard ride height of the mk1, and where that is measured to.  I have Gaz Gold suspension on my Fabia rally car.  I don't know exactly whether the ride height is higher than std, but it looks it.  I'd like to know how to measure it and what to compare it to.

 

2) The reason for asking that.  One of my rear shocks, offside rear as shown, failed the MOT on a failed lower bush.  (Yeah, as you can see they are pretty rusty).  Gaz can refurb the shocks.   I am considering std shocks in the meantime to get through the MOT.  

Gaz have advised, 'We cannot say for certain whether fitting a standard shock will get you through the MOT process.  If the car runs higher than standard ride height then the standard shock will probably be too short.'  My question is, does that make sense?  Others (albeit not suspension manufacturers  ) have said std shocks would be fine.

 

Thanks,

Jon (currently clueless about suspension but learning)

Your first question is unanswerable, which is why you couldn't find any information about it.

 

The answer to your second question is yes, but you'd probably be better off just buying another pair of Gaz shocks to replace them.

1 hour ago, jonmad said:

 If the car runs higher than standard ride height then the standard shock will probably be too short.

I think this is correct yes, in that a physically shorter stroke will result in a constraint of the length of the droop travel from the rest position.

Edited 27 September, 20214 yr by KenONeill

1 hour ago, sepulchrave said:

Your first question is unanswerable, which is why you couldn't find any information about it.

 

I think there's a std one down the road, I might walk past it with a tape measure and surreptitiously take a note of its height to wheel arch.

 

@jonmadIs the car ever rallied or taken on Motorsport events & put through scrutineering?

 

What is Rally about it?

20 minutes ago, e-Roottoot said:

@jonmadIs the car ever rallied or taken on Motorsport events & put through scrutineering?

 

What is Rally about it?

 

Yeah, I do autosolos and targa rallies.  I bought the car modified.  Some spec details.  It's done 23k only.

• Full bolt-in roll cage inc door bars and single rear diagonal 
• Gaz Gold adjustable suspension with (I think, see above) raised ride height
• Two fixed bucket seats
• Two 4 point harnesses with aircraft buckles (seat belts removed)
• Sparco dished alcantara steering wheel with top centre yellow marking
• 15" alloys from a mk4 Golf GTi (I think), painted white for extra speed
• 4 spare 15" alloys as above (although two don't hold air, but that's ok as I have pairs to carry as spares)
• 6 spare 14" Compomotive MO alloys, painted white
• 1.4, 100bhp but with an induction kit and remap. Maybe 110-115bhp but who knows - I've not been to a Rolling Road yet in it. 
• Rally tripmeter (Terratrip 202) - but never used and think it's missing the correct probe to the wheel that's needed
• Hella Rallye 3000 spotlights (removable)
• 8mm alloy sump and tank guards, both removable (the sump guard has holes drilled in so it doesn't fill with water).
• Spare wheel post in boot for two spare wheels
• Map light for the passenger
• Air con delete
• Rear wiper delete
• Sound deadening removed
• Rear door window mechanisms removed (rear glass is fixed, rear doors still open)
• Custom dash centre panel with horn button (plus three other non-functioning buttons)
• Rear seats cushions present and in place (to meet Targa regs) but strapped down under the roll cage.

Jon

2 hours ago, jonmad said:

induction kit and remap. Maybe 110-115bhp

Seems like a good guess, but the remap is doing more for you than the reduc induction kit.

I don't know if this is much help but this is how high my mk1 sat on standard suspension. Bear in mind its partially stripped. Don't have any measurements of how it sat but it was quite high indeed.

1 hour ago, DieselMonte said:

I don't know if this is much help but this is how high my mk1 sat on standard suspension. Bear in mind its partially stripped. Don't have any measurements of how it sat but it was quite high indeed.

 

Thanks, that is interesting.  I did a very unscientific side by side comparison, overlaying some intersecting lines in Photoshop.  This is when mine was running on the 14s.  Very roughly, not much in it.

Mines Stripped in the back so it rides high because of that, but since your cars also stripped it would also ride a bit higher. Reckon you could get away with it if you needed to. Surprisingly great offroad these are I must say. Just attached a pic of my car bog standard because that might be of some help to you. 

Thanks, helpful again.  I've picked up some std Bilsteins to try out.

 

Agree they are great off road 😁

 

It look close enough for government work. It may be a tad higher but your photo angle would exaggerate the gap slightly anyway.

Assuming the bump stops and shock covers are standard. If you price the standard shocks on eBay, they're £30-£50 a PAIR. Replacements for my Eibach pro-kit cost £190 a pair. If you need the car swapping out the shocks for standard to get it through MOT seems sensible.

 

Mine, shortly after purchase new in 2005.

 

the dimensioned drawing gives a 611mm boot cill height which is easier to measure than the roof height.

 

And here we are on std shocks with 12 months' of MOT 

Looks similar to on the adjustable ones so ride height must be standard (maybe up a little, due to being partially stripped out).

 

And here are the old adjustable ones that I can get refurbed, or replaced for not much more.

 

Thanks all.

 

The ride height is dictated by the springs, not the shocks, you'll notice  LOT of overthunking things goes on here, most threads become bloated with gibberish when the answer to the original question was often just a "yes" or "no".

Yep, I wasn't sure whether my springs were std height or not.  Looks like they are.  So no issues fitting std shocks. 👍