[demoe]

Sorry for the explective, I could find no other way to explain the difference my Spyder is, now that she is lowered.

I would go so far to say, if you intend to drive your vehicle in a spirtited way, you owe it to yourself to have the car lowered. I now consider the past year I had the car at its stock height, a complete waste of the year. It was a year of boring, average driving. I have said before, my 2 other vehicles clearly outhandled the Maserati.

the car lowered is a completly different animal. it is/feels completely faster, I suspect that in its stock form, a lot of forward momentum was lost in the vehcle bouncing up and down. lowered, the car remains in a lower , stiffer precise height and has no loss of forward momentum. I cannot stress, just how much quicker in every respect the car now feels.

I can now take right or left turns at 40mph and the car turns in a straight and tight line. prior to this, I would not feel confident as the car appeared top heavy and moved off its line too much.

now, the downside, the car is VERY STIFF. After an afternoon of driving on Friday, I felt like I had just gone 12 rounds with Mike Tyson. I felt beat up. I feel every bump, in some road undulations, the car will jump up and down abruptly. It feels like.....well, a sports car should. ....it went from a well manner daily driver, to an all out, road racer. My fear is that the chasis is taking too much of a beating, it is that stiff.

the car was lowered about 1.75 inches. I am running 19inch wheels, 265/30/19 rear, 245/35/19 fronts. I have not rubbed. I am going to have the shop re-adjust the rears a bit higher, as it was lowered too much, as to cover the top of the rear tires. I want the fender sitting right at the top of the tire, not covering it.

the downside of this all, is that, this car is no longer well mannered. I found the car to be very polite, a car which you could spend all day in...It was after all designed to be a daily driver.....I cannot say that I can see myself driving this car all day or on a long road trip. My GF, would complain the car is now too bumpy. My dog is completely scared shitless in the car now...he just sits in the footwell now.....he used to sit in the seat and look outside..

I had seriously considered selling the car of late due to the quality/service issues....right now, I am having way too much fun to consider selling the car. To me, the car in its stock form was just another car, now lowered, I can see what all the hype is about.

 

[Swiss-Maserati]

I discovered that 3 years ago ;-)

 

[mjeagent]

IMHO - not sure if I would have sacraficed ride quality for a few inches.

 

[masermartin]

Got any pictures? Would love to see it.

 

[MikeA]

I found the same with mine, after getting it lowered. Much more solid tracking, but also a much rougher ride. I suppose for cruising on the freeway I could get out of Sport mode, which would help a bit, but on anything bumpy, you feel everything, including the occasional bottoming out of the suspension. Potholes feel like a collision. Speed bumps in parking lots are a problem as well, this is the first car I've owned where I actually stop and carefully driver over them.
I've attached two photos at the bottom of the corkscrew at Laguna Seca, and you can see how much more the car is leaning in the before picture. I'm a little deeper into the turn in the before picture, so the lean is harder, but you get the idea.
Mike

 

[demoe]

have an appt to raise the rear a bit on Thurs...

here are a few pixs..

 

[Swiss-Maserati]

Woua, that's a lot ! On mine, it is less but the handling is perfect !
In my opinion the next ultimate mod' is to reduce the weight. I track my car several times per year and I do not need more power or more handling, I just have too much weight. The main rival is the 911 or worst, the Lotus Elise...

 

[STARDOC]

Woua, that's a lot ! On mine, it is less but the handling is perfect !
In my opinion the next ultimate mod' is to reduce the weight. I track my car several times per year and I do not need more power or more handling, I just have too much weight. The main rival is the 911 or worst, the Lotus Elise...

The car needs some serious rhinoplasty as it is too nose heavy. Way too much understeer around corners. Weight reduction is needed only in the right areas for proper weight distribution....Maserati, please take a page out of BMW design.

 

[bundas]

lower & lower

all of you are saying sport mode does not give all nessary corrections to go from road to track? nose heavy i will agree with, and whats worse, no warning, as i went looking for groundhogs too quickly.

 

[calcoupe]

Good Day,

Yep, I am at 1 1/2 and the ride is sharp and potholes are killers, maybe 1 inch would be a litle better who knows...

But love it

P

 

[TampaLBOs]

DEMOE - Where did you get the springs? Brand? About how much was it to have the facelift/lowering done? Thinking about doing to mine too...yours looks GREAT!!! Nice job.

 

[demoe]

Scott

thanks for the compliment.

I have a Skyhook suspension, therefore lowering the car only requires turning the Cup which holds the spring assembly, a coil over system.

I had it done at Bauer Porsche in Oakland CA. the owner is a former professional car racer and their shop had several Porsche race cars being worked on.


the owner Chris, said he loves working on these types of cars and the de-engineering aspects. He generally only works on Porsches, however when he looked at the setup-, he felt confident he could lower the car without a problem. He commented at how welll the system is set-up as well as the other components, ie Cambiocorsa system. he took it for a test drive, before and after and liked the way the car handled, he said, it was not as good as the 911s, ...but did prefer the F1 system.

He did find it hard to undue the cup from the Spring assembly which requred him to remove the entire assembly from the car. Others here, have been able to turn the cups while the assembly was still on the car. Apparently, the rubber cups had fused together and would not turn and had seized. My car has 27,000 miles which makes sense that over time the rubber would seize onto the cup assembly.

he said the Italians are the first to come out with technology, the rest of the world follows. he is from Italy himself, and said, working on these cars requires a bit of Italian thinking, meaning when you run into something which doesn't make sense, you stop, take a wine/cheese/espresso break and then continue.

 

[M!]

...
the car was lowered about 1.75 inches. I am running 19inch wheels, 265/30/19 rear, 245/35/19 fronts. I have not rubbed. I am going to have the shop re-adjust the rears a bit higher, as it was lowered too much, as to cover the top of the rear tires. I want the fender sitting right at the top of the tire, not covering it.....

it seems like you are lowering the car on the basis of how much you can drop it and still looks good.

did they corner weight the vehicle? what is the alignment spec before and after?

 

[demoe]

it seems like you are lowering the car on the basis of how much you can drop it and still looks good.

did they corner weight the vehicle? what is the alignment spec before and after?

M

actually quite the contrary. i asked the mechanic to first be conservative @1.25 inches, but told him others had gone as far as 1.75. he played around with it and when I got back to pick up the car, he said he went 1.75inches. My goal, which I should have told him, was to eliminate the gap between the top of the tire and the wheel wells.

I am going back on thursday to lift the rear as it is under the wheel well. I do think the car is much too low at this point in the rear

I asked him about corner weighing, and he said he could do it, but it would be time and money. his position was in racing vehicles, it is done, but with a street car, not nessesary.

he was able to get the alignment within specs on both front and rear. he said the rears have a lot of room to work with in terms of camber

 

[squid]

Scott
he is from Italy himself, and said, working on these cars requires a bit of Italian thinking, meaning when you run into something which doesn't make sense, you stop, take a wine/cheese/espresso break and then continue.

I love it.