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The first drive after installing the new suspension consisted of me driving 30-50 miles with a mix of city driving and highway. It was warm, about 85 degrees ambient temp. I pretty much always have the air conditioning on and set to 70-71. After confirming that the car wasn’t making any strange noises and handled well in the city I drove out into the mountains on the interstate. Estimated elevation change ~3400 feet. At the end of that drive, the screen in the car was reporting an efficiency of 220Wh/Mi. I was amazed. I’ve NEVER seen that number so low, and I was driving in an area where the speed limit is higher than the usual California speed limit. I’m honestly not sure what to think about this. It’s come up with more miles on the car, but still more efficient than it was before.
The car seems to handle quite a bit better, but that might not be accurate. It’s entirely possible that it always handled this well, but never felt stable enough for me to find out. Now I’m able to feel comfortable pushing the car harder around curves. It feels much more planted and stable than it did before, and overall is much more confidence inspiring. It’s a big change. As for comfort, this is exactly how the car should have been from the factory. It’s rather impressive just how much better the KW dampers work compared to the factory ones. Every bump is less sharp. Driving over the cobblestones in my neighborhood, the car is quieter/smoother. Sometimes I don’t even feel them, where before it was almost annoying to drive over the cobblestones, even slowly. It’s a night and day difference. I’ve even been able to see the difference when I go to Starbucks. Previously the minor bumps in the road would cause my coffee to slosh out of the little hole in the lid no matter how slowly and carefully I tried to make the left turn out of the Starbucks parking lot. This week I ran out of coffee and went to Starbucks to get us some, it didn’t slosh around enough to come out of the cup at all. That sounds minor, but it’s an obvious sign of improvement if you think about it. I’ve been trying to achieve that EVERY time I go to Starbucks for over a year and never could until now. (I hate having to clean up spilled coffee in my car lol)
The car is dramatically smoother at any speed, seems to handle better, is more efficient and looks better. I couldn’t possibly be more pleased with this purchase! Efficiency numbers using the trip meter:
All stock – 293 Wh/Mi
EV01+/PS4 – 272 Wh/Mi
add MPP comfort coilovers – 260 Wh/Mi for the first week with my typical use
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