UK-POLOS.NET - THE VW Polo Forum

Hi guys and gals

new to all this forum stuff as well as polo modding..bought my polo a while back now and been off road for a while...have upgrated alloys and back lights as well as stereo system...Now after spending this week cleaning and polishing her i have fell in love again..lol..

I have 16 inch alloys on the car and want to now how much i can lower her before rubbage...ah also its 5 door on 99 v reg any help would be awesome

cheers people

Ben

Hey,

Hmm on 16" i'd say you might get 80mm without scrubbing but i'd reckon most definatly with a full load in the back. I'd go 60mm to be on the safe side. I'm not brilliantly clued up on ride heights but I looked into it and they reckon 80mm would be fine on my 13" steels, but then there is another 3" on top of those if you have 16 inch.

if i was you i would get coilovers as you can adjust them to a height your happy with that doesnt scrub.

Furthermore it all depends on the tyre your using, which should be 195/40/16's to get away with scrubbage. If you are, I'd think you could get away with 70mm as I recall a mate doing so in the past in his 5-door.

a good way to test out how much you need to lower by is this:

For this exercise your going to need a tape measure and alot of heavy equipment. I hear bags of cement are good, also bricks work aswell. Measure the differernce between the gap of your wheel to the arch before you throw in copious amounts of weighted goods.

Then drive about for a bit and remove weight or add weight as nessessary. See if theres any scrubbing. Then measure the distance your at and hey presto you know how low you need to go.

The above advice sounds like lunacy, but this is what happens when you dont sleep and drink to much caffeine.

in theory though it should work lol

Mine is down 80mm all round and I am sitting on 194/45/15's. If I have four people in the car, I have to drive like an OAP, she scrubs everywhere hence why I am after a set of standard wheels. As NOZ said above, it also depends on your tyre choice, my previous tyres had a slight stretch and had no problems with arch clearance, my new ones have no stretch AT ALL and with me alone in the car scrubs with assertive driving. As a temp fix I am going to remove my inner arches and maybe look into getting the arch lip rolled.

LeMeph wrote:a good way to test out how much you need to lower by is this:

For this exercise your going to need a tape measure and alot of heavy equipment. I hear bags of cement are good, also bricks work aswell. Measure the differernce between the gap of your wheel to the arch before you throw in copious amounts of weighted goods.

Then drive about for a bit and remove weight or add weight as nessessary. See if theres any scrubbing. Then measure the distance your at and hey presto you know how low you need to go.

The above advice sounds like lunacy, but this is what happens when you dont sleep and drink to much caffeine.

in theory though it should work lol

Couldnt you save hassle and use people instead of heavy equipment?

Standard suspension shouldn't scrub anyway. Unless your loading ridiculous amounts of weight!

yeah youd surly need like a good few tonnes in the back to drop standard suspension 80mm? I'm on 60mm on 15s and it never rubs if its just me in the car, i can take 4 average size people including me fine no problems just crawl over speed bumps, i have to corner very hard for it to rub or on a well rough road it will a bit.

see now you could use people. But youd need some serious lard to bring it down to where you want it, and a polos a small car so its hard to get alotta lard in there. Also if you need to make minor adjustments to the wait youd need a cleaver, and it would get messy. Either that or patience and a treadmill.

My suggestion wasnt a serious one by the way i was just very bored at college and incredibly mind mashed from the lack of sleep and caffeine overdose. Which im still running on right now.

Madness though it may be i still think it would work...

^^ you make me laugh mate instead of being bored studying keep thinking/working on your project

I once had to haul Mcdonalds chilled stock from our store to 4 others in my old polo. Only lowered 40mm suspension but boy did it look crazy with a full load of frozen food Probably got it down to 90mm. I tell you though, never did any of the interior trim stop creaking since

^^ lol mines lowered 40mm and with a full car it goes bloody low, looks more like 80mm. Sometimes i like having a full car, just because of the look ... then speedbumps ruin my fun

Shmosh wrote:then speedbumps ruin my fun

lmao tell me about it theyre littered all over around my uni so i feel cool for about two seconds before the embarresing cringe-worthy scraping kicks in

lol a great big thud makes me cringe for all of 5 seconds but then get a childish knowing my cars decked nuf looooooooooow. However, a big thud makes me worry after the grin that i'm ruining the car like crazy and something might break one day