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Self-levelling suspension

Hi, does anyone know about self-leveling suspension? - more precisely, Nivomat, and what it's supposed to do?

I've asked a couple of dealers, but they seen very vague about it.

I've got a 08 Chevrolet (OK, Daewoo) Captiva with SL suspension (I think, 'Nivomat')

I've read up on the system and can appreciate how it works - but there are a couple of things I need to know in order to work out if my SL suspension is working properly.

1/ When Nivomat refer to 'raising the vehicle to its optimum height', does that mean the unladen height, or something lower than that?

2/ How much weight does it take in the back before the system kicks in? - would two rear passengers be enough?

With two in the back the car drops by about 20mm. after a run (which should get the SL working) the ride height increases by about 5mm - hardly worth bothering with.

So, should I be looking for the SL suspension to recover the 20mm of height lost when the rear passengers climb aboard? - or just a minimal height increase, as in the 5mm?

The handbook is no help - just one line that says it's got SLS, and that's all.

Thanks

Reply to
daggo
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"daggo" gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

How big are these two passengers? Kids or big fat bastards?

What happens if you put half a ton of crap in the back? Does it just go up 5mm or to 15mm shy of unloaded?

I'd expect a bit of slack from the unloaded rest position - otherwise it's going to be working it's nadgers off as the car ages and things start to sag.

Reply to
Adrian

The optimum hight would be lower than the cars unladen hight.

I would think the Nivomats are working all the time the car is in motion, as they have an internal pump which is operated by the compression of the damper.

Certainly. Lightly loaded, the pump would be doing very little. The occasional operation of the Nivomat pump would not really be needed to keep the car at it's optimum ride hight.

OTOH, if the car started at a lower ride hight, with two rear passengers, the Nivomat pump should lengthen the damper in order to bring the car back to it's optimum ride hight.

To me it sounds as if it's working as it should. I certainly would not expect the unladen hight to be the same as the hight maintained by the Nivomats.

I suspect that if you loaded the car even more, you'd get a similar result. Ie the SL suspension would keep the car at about

15mm lower than the unladen hight. Maybe a little lower as the weight increased, but not by a significant amount. Mike.
Reply to
Mike G

thanks very much for that info, Mike - very helpful.

My confusion was about 'optimal' height - I wasn't certain whether that meant putting the laden car back to 'unladen height' (which it's not achieving) or something less.

It makes sense that the Nivo's would allow a certain amount of height loss when ;laden - but then prevent any more significant loss as the weight is increased.

Once again, thanks.

Reply to
daggo

You'll have to buy an old Citroen to do that :-)

Reply to
Duncan Wood

-

Dunno how a Citroen could do that - rise back to 'unladen height', I mean.

Since they settled like a deflated hovercraft when the engine was off, and rose majestically again when restarted, that presumably meant that the Citroen's 'unladen' height was on the floor? ;)

Still, there were impressive...

Reply to
daggo

Err Unladen means without any load, not without the engine running.

Reply to
Duncan Wood

Reply to
daggo

"Duncan Wood" gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

Why not a brand new one?

Reply to
Adrian

Well you could donate money to the dealer, but you might as well let someone else take the 50% hit.

Reply to
Duncan Wood

"Duncan Wood" gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

D'you fancy a _new_ v6 HDi C6 for £20k...? I could point you to a source...

Reply to
Adrian

Err nope, I'd rather have £18000 & a v6 tdi A6 Avant

Reply to
Duncan Wood

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