Sports Suspension - Factory Option

[gauldrymini]

What are people's thoughts on having Sport Suspension chosen as an option on a new factory built car? Does anyone have an R56 Cooper with this option?:confused:

Cheers
Andrew

[ianking]

I certainly wouldnt want it. The JCW is hard enough without adding the harder set up.

[Fairy]

Hiya - I had the Sport Plus Suspension on my second R53 'S' and oh my god it hard as hell!!
Very hard suspension and with runflats to boot made for a very firm ride although its just another way to make the MINI like a go-kart IMHO

Loved it but would suggest having super soft seats (preferably the Recarros) to minimise back pain and ar*e pain when going over bumps in the road!! The guy that had the car before me had upgraded the suspension but had kept the standard leather seats and so the full force of the bumps on the road (at speed) was a real hard hit

[Bazthemod]

Andrew our JCW has sport suspension on the spec sheet so i would imagine it would be same?

[atnova]

can i ask how can u tell if the suspension is the sport one or not?
cause mine is a r53 mcs second hand but my sister says that mine's is more bumpy than her friend's r53 mcs
thanks
Alex

[Craig]

Guess who I just bumped into in JC's Andrew ? :lol:

[The Dogfather]

The sport suspension on the R56 is a lot softer compared to the sport suspension plus on the R53/R50, its firmer but not massively so

[MINI William]

I've got sports suspension on my Cooper. Makes the ride a little firmer but better in my opinion.

[badwolf340]

I have the sport's suspension on my JCW and it's fine,also has sticker on strut ,so you can see if a car has it fitted.

[AndyP & Lenore]

The sport suspension on the R56 is a lot softer compared to the sport suspension plus on the R53/R50, its firmer but not massively so

What he said. /\/\/\/\

'scuse the wording but..... Lenore and I like a good hard ride:blush::eek:....... and we had Sport Suspension in our R53 and also specced it in the R56. R56 was very soft compared to the R53. It has actually tightened up a bit as time went on - go figure:confused:. Putting 18 wheels on helped get the ride more firm.

A.:thumbs up:

[Bazthemod]

What he said. /\/\/\/\

'scuse the wording but..... Lenore and I like a good hard ride:blush::eek:...

There's an image we really didn't need haha! ;)

[gauldrymini]

Guess who I just bumped into in JC's Andrew ? :lol:

Sharon no doubt? ... Sharon said she was speaking to you yesterday...hope JC are able to sort your MINI in time for your run on friday.:thumbs up:

[Ally S]

I certainly wouldnt want it. The JCW is hard enough without adding the harder set up.

is the Sport suspension on a JCW different to Sport suspension on a cooper? or is that the sport plus then


can i ask how can u tell if the suspension is the sport one or not?
cause mine is a r53 mcs second hand but my sister says that mine's is more bumpy than her friend's r53 mcs
thanks
Alex

I got a spec sheet with my car that lists all the options. Has Sport suspension listed. You should be able to get the spec sheet from a Mini dealer

[ELFMAN]

I had Sport Suspension Plus on my 2003 R53 S (with 16's - as I had on my first Cooper in 2001 - but the early 'Plus' setup on the Cooper was even harder!) which was just too jittery for its own good even on the smaller wheels, so I changed it for the JCW setup which was quite an improvement as it was set up for our roads as opposed to smooth German autobahns.

My new(ish) R56 S has Sports Suspension with 17" Runflats - which I find a bit too stiff sometimes, especially on many of our lumpy backroads - when you have to back off sometimes as the ride gets, shall we say, 'interesting', however, it's great on a decently smooth surface. I think on 16's it would be better more of the time, but the R56 looks better on 17's...... I was looking into the JCW Suspension for the R56 to see if it would give the same sort of improvement as it did on my old car, but I haven't been able to nail down enough info on it yet. I know Ian King reckons his car is fine without the Sports Suspension. I also reckon the ride height of the car is too bleedin' high and they've made it too stiff to stop it rolling - but that's probably me just havering. A setup which seems to be good for the R56 is Koni FSD Shocks with Eibach Springs and a few other Anti-Roll type bits - I'd love to try it just to see if it's as good as its made out to be.

It all depends on what you think is too stiff - I don't think any MINI is actually 'soft', so it's up to you how hard you want to go! With the way the economy is, the roads are going to have b**gger-all spent on them, so stiff suspension might be a bad idea.