Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Rough roads!!!

Hi all,

So, my mum and dad went out in there 4/4 today and me and Dorothy in my mx5 to chase each other round north wales, cup of coco and cake to warm up and home.

Some of the roads were rough and my dead dropped back quite a bit not wanting to hammer it over potholes and the likes and it got us talking. 'How tough is a Morgan?'

My opinion was that the Morgan was designed when roads on a whole were rougher than they are today. So dispite his understandable corsion, it was likely that his Morgan, solid rear axel on cart springs and whatever you call the funny front suspension is tougher than the double wishbones and coil springs on the mx5. We were undecided about wire wheels vs alloys but suspect they were the week point.

We don't know though. Nether having enough experience. What are the collective opinions on here? HOW TOUGH IS A MORGAN???

Look forward to your thoughts,

All the best,

Leon

The short answer is as tough as anything built with a separate chassis & a body coach built with ash and aluminium, I guess. It's the short travel of the Morgan suspension that dissuades speed on bumpy roads, hence the reason why the Dakar racers have wheels on stilts.

Poor old dad..

I wouldn't worry too much Leon they are used frequently in Trials such as the Edinburgh, Exeter and Lands End they are pretty tough. It is vital to keep the front end well greased though minimum 1,000mls and more regularly if on dirty rough surfaces. Check the U shackles on the rear axle too.

A fine brace of cars enjoy your fun together .

O. Nothing approaching Dakar levels of roughness. Had my midget not been in bits I'd have been in her. She has gone a lot faster than us over the same roads. I had my daughter in the car so I was not pressing on properly.

In the years of thrashing my midget I have cracked the odd leaf in the rear suspension, shared a boult on the front spring pan and mangled a lower wishbone. All problems that have to reoccurred with new leafs, HT boults and fully welded wishbones (as apposed the tack welds they come with)

I'm not worried just curious of other people's opinions.

Having fallen asleep once and run alongside the M5 demolishing bushes and the like I can confirm they are tough, really tough my then company car would have been in bits. Never fallen asleep before or since?

You can get a better front end by fitting the Suplex suspension and the wire wheels will give a bit of flexibility and additional springiness, all helps, the back end is the problem as this is not great in modern terms, I added spacer blocks and a pan hard rod which improved matters hoped the Norwegians or Pete Ballard might have come up with something, needs progressive springing and a longer travel then could ride the bumps better, in my biking days I had a Fournales air rear struts and that helped the ride a lot so I do not despair, one day Morgan will get the right idea although petrol motors may be banned by then.......

That's interesting you say the back end is the problem. Do you think the rear suspension is week in regards longjevity or a problem when it comes to comfort?

Leon. The difficulty with the rear suspension is the amount of travel available. With the trad chassis Morgan have never moved away from having the rar axle situated above the chassis, this means that rebound will always be limited and often the hit you feel is the axle hitting the rebound rubber blocks. They don't have a lot of movement in compression either but good dampers will help.

Chris444.
Peter Ballard has come up with something for the rear. It was originally marketed as the Suplex 5 link suspension but since Suplex moved out of that market all both the front and rear suspension systems are now made by Peter Ballard and Dan White (ex Suplex UK GM) and their company Suspension Supplies Limited

I have no connection other than being a happy customer.

Thanks

I'll hopefully get to crawl around under the car soon to see all this myself though looking at a selection of pictures online I can see how it's set up. The spring hangers are upside down, are they called spring towers or pedastulls now. Hehe. They allso look a long way from the thin section of chassis under the axel. It works though.

Leon great photo similar to our collection wife = Mx 5 me Mog +4 narrow bodied good to see an MX5 topless!

Your assumption about road surfaces is quite wrong. When I was a young man, UK road surfaces were good and smooth and indeed we used to buy French cars for their supple suspension designed to deal with badly made French roads. Since our road taxes are now wasted on the railways or on things like bike lanes and speed cameras, the tarmac is ignored and is far worse than it used to be. European car makers now test suspensions on british roads because of their roughness!

The question you ask is an intriguing one. The structure of a trad morgan moves and flexes in a way that doesnt happen in a modern car, and with pretty basic suspension with limited movement, it needs to do so. But toughness is about more than just initial problems, its also about repairability and the large number of old Morgans still running says something about that.

Maybe instead of thinking aboutn speed over a rough road you should ask yourself who, you or dad, was having the most fun. My bet would be your dad because the Trad Morgan has one thing that the MX5 doesnt have - character.