Lowered car, wheels rubbing

The title says it all. I bought my gti last weekend and the car has just had all new springs/dampers. Its been lowered and the wheels make a scraping noise when you turn corners at slow speed.

Has anyone had this and what can be done to sort the problem?

Thanks!

2 options.
1 raise the car it's to low
2 change the wheels/tyres to something smaller.

I would prefer standard suspension to be honest. But it seems a shame and a waste of money to take off all new components and replace them.

I have p-slots, and i don't really want to change them either.

Damn.  

p-slots are 14" you maybe able to get away with a lower profile of tyre.
have had the tracking and camber set after lowering the car?

Do the Camber and tracking and put something like 165/45-14 on your P-slots. That should do.

Take a look at www.tyrestretch.com. Some are rather extreme but you get the idea.

The bloke i bought the car from said the tracking had been done after the suspenion was fixed as it was way out.

I'll check what tyres we're running when i get home.

Cheers guys.

Its on 185/60 R14's at the moment.

I'm struggling to find tyres anything like the size that's been suggested.

I just also looked at the new suspension, its new springs and Apex shocks. I'm not taking it all off.  

Can you see where the tyres are rubbing? With that tyre size and the tracking/camber being set correctly you shouldn't have any issues with the tyres rubbing anywhere. No need for smaller tyres I'd say.

Could you put a pic up so we can see how low your car is?

first question i would find the answer to is "where is it rubbing?"  that makes life  a lot easier.

and do you have a clipper kit fitted to the car, cos there seems to be a tendancy for those to rub on tyres

I will try to get a picture up later. The car doesnt have any extra kit added to it.

There isn't a lot of room to see where it might be rubbing, i'll have to get it on a jack to see what is going on. I'll do that, and be back!

An option that doesnt involve too much cost would be great!!

 

whatalotafun said

and do you have a clipper kit fitted to the car, cos there seems to be a tendancy for those to rub on tyres

I've got this at the moment but only on one side! I've cut the plastic on the inside of the arch and still have some rubbing over speed bumps or when loaded with the clan. I'm gonna get the metal file out tonight and make some 'gentle' adjustments.

T :mrgreen:

To be honest, i get it badly on passenger side, but only very slightly on the drivers side. I didnt think to mention that before.

Westcoast13 said

To be honest, i get it badly on passenger side, but only very slightly on the drivers side. I didnt think to mention that before.

Yep, me too!

T

I am considering changing my p-slots for a set of tarantula's and going down a tyre size to stop this problem.

I am looking at 165/55 R13 tyres, does anyone else run 165's on a GTI?

Tian said

Westcoast13 said

To be honest, i get it badly on passenger side, but only very slightly on the drivers side. I didnt think to mention that before.

Yep, me too!

T

And me!!

What wheels are you guys running? that might answer my question about changing to tarantulas!

job 1 is get the camber and tracking set! as I will put 5 of the queens best on the fact these wont have been done properly!

then look at the suspesnion bushes…bet these are old and very worn and sloppy? as this will allow the arm to wonder around alot.

finally how low is it? as if its stupidly stupidly low then it will scrape  :wink:

Yeah its probably been fitted with -60mm springs at the front, or worse still -80mm springs. If whoever did it didn't even make sure the tyres didn't scrape (an MoT failure and a valid reason to issue a VDRN, maybe even a PG9?) where else have they cut corners (no pun intended)? Correct dampers fitted? Brake balance adjusted properly? etc.

The other - remote - possibility is accident damage, eg bent wishbone or its support, due to kerbing (doesn't even need to be that fast to bend something). The geometry check mentioned above would reveal this straight away.

I don't think the car is stupidly low, Here it is, sorry for the bad mobile photo!

If i get the camber set, should i get it done to the standard factory settings?

depends what you want the car for tbh, I swear by -1.5deg on the front as this is perfect but I think factory is a smidge less, so if you want play it safe and go -1deg, but also get the racking done and look at the suspension bushes,arms, ball joints, top mounts….

jack the car up have a look of they look a bit worn replace, grab the wheel and see how much it moves on worn mounts  :wink: