Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Morgan Plus Four, Supersport & Plus Six (CX & CXV Generation Vehicles) Nitron suspension and taller tyres

Whilst at Malvern with Mark driving we went for a good thrash around the local lanes in my car to check it out, Mark found for a standrard car mine was one of the best he had driven, so we discounted fitting nitron suspension for now..

I'm planning a continental tour for next year doing the various Swiss alpine passes and around the Italian lakes trying to avoid continental , autohbahns and autostrada's as much as possible, use the major national roads, which can be fun when trying to enter villages and towns with traffic calming measures. We plan to stay in Spa, Heidelberg, Lindau, Lake Como, St Moritz,, Andermatt, St Gallen, Bruges along the way and AI has proven to be very useful in identifying hotels etc., that avoid centres with heavy restrictions or traffic calming measures or humps.

However more ground clearance may prove useful, I still find the standard suspension can bottom out on speed humps etc.as I experienced the other day when sent on a detour off the motorway, which proved uncomfortable for us and the car, going through a village full of speed humps and despite best of intentions I grounded the car once....not nice and got me to thinking about raising the car height with nitron suspension and maybe if possible, with wing, suspension clearance, fit a taller 205/65R15 tyres, that should in theory give me another 3cm 1.2 inches of clearance.

Part of the problem with the standard suspension is it compresses much more than the nitrons. therefore more likely to ground more, even if set at the same ride height.

I'd appreciate any feed back from those with nitron suspension fitted as to whether they raised the ride heiight and has it i(raised ride height or not) mproved the car's ability to handle raised humps, traffic calming measures compared to the standard setup........the limited ground clearanc is the only real bug bear with the CX, and I'm looking for iinput on the possible solutions especially when touring fully laden, when the car will be more exposed to ride height llimitations.especially over traffic calming raised humps

If any have raised the car height, have they noticed any real material adverse difference in the handling of the car, I'm not into racing my car, but I do want to enjoy it to the full when the opportunity presents itself eg the Alpine passes. I'm just trying to find that sweet spot for what is otherwise a great car.

Thanks in advance

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Any discussion of air suspension always seems very positive. No personal experience but surely worth exploring. Pump up entering the village, back to normal on leaving.
I remember https://race-car-replicas.com/ developed a system for their cars several years ago.

Nitrons on a Plus SIx, raised the rear by a few mm. No problems with humps since fitting, and - as they are adjustable - if there were that could probably be addressed.

I hear there are some issues with Nitrons fitted to Morgans causing clunking sounds from the rear suspension area. MMC have apparently impounded their current stock of Nitron shocks. Not sure if it's a generic Nitron issue or an issue with Nitrons being fitted to the Morgan suspension geometry.

I heard they were working with the supplier on the issue when I was enquiring about them at Malvern the week before last. It seems nothing ever seems to be straight forwatd when it omes to Morgans....I'd heard it was something to do with the bushes, but dont quote me on that. Also when talking to Mark, he was quite specific about their preferred settings when fitting them at Malvern.

We have the SSL suspension upgrade for the Plus Six.. its been great as we mainly tour in our car and it works very well for that.. However, we still bottom out now and again in France, as per the UK not all speed bumps are created the same.
The SSL rears do not have the ability for height adjustment, which is the only thing that lets their setup down.. The suspension works very well with and without luggage.. but for ride height there is no real improvement. I did ask a few yrs ago if SSL could make rear coil overs with some height adjustment for the UK, but the answer was no.

One other thing to watch out for when touring and staying in Chateau/Hotels etc.. A lot of grand double entrance gates use a raised metal plate in the middle of the road to secure them shut.. you can easily bottom out on these if you do not notice them..
dave

My understanding is that SSL only make bits for the P6 not 4, and speaking to Dan very recently whilst buying some bespoke dampers, he's decided to drop the CX and concentrate on Trad upgrades only

John H , AI is good for planning trips and hotels but we use the Arthotel in Heidelberg because it has a secure covered car park. Might be worth a look on the line !
Landau is pretty and good for wins but prefer Baden Baden, Hotel Belle Epoque is central with good parking. Sounds a great road trip.Best Michael

Jon thanks for that info, will give SSL a call in a week or so, as I wanted a spare set of of their links for the front antiroll bar.. You are right that it was just the Six that they produced a suspension kit for, I read that the Four from the factory was not bad, so they did not think it was worth trying to improve it at the time.. then came the Nitron's. With fewer numbers of Plus Six made compared to the Four I guess there was little overall profit, and once again there are Nitrons now available for the Six... Pity, as from a touring perspective the SSL suspension is a huge improvement for the Six, just needed the ride height adjustment on the coil over that the Nitron suspension provides.

Thanks for the suggestions, AI is pretty good if you ask a detailed expansive question eg secure parking, low ground clearance even do a complete budget of costs for the journey, even down to recommended refueling stops on the itrip with lowest prices all based on Motgan fuel consumption and tank size.............

I'll try AI for journey planning. I tend to use AA route planner as a start and build in comfort/fuel stops around it and use past knowledge for the route as well.
Scotland trips are over 500 miles home to hotel on regular routes and mrs sospan now wants an overnight stop in the border-ish area so Carlisle/Gretna/Dumfries used on recent trips. The 250 mile rule of thumb for fuel is easy to manage and on a new route petrol stations can be found using online maps to adjust the planned route. They can be put into the satnav as waypoints.