How to check groud clearance on steep hill

[elise2000]

Hi

There is a steep hill/path on the way to my house and I want to calculate if it would be possible to drive a lotus up it. I'm worried about it scraping at the bottom of the hill when driving up/down.

Can anyone tell me how to measure this?

Thanks in advance

[Cats_pyjamas]

You probably can calculate it, but depends on wheelbase/ride height/overhang.

Tbh it's surprising what you can navigate with a low car, it's all about angle of attack.

Could you arrange a test drive with the vehicle or similar car?

[elise2000]

Cats_pyjamas said:

You probably can calculate it, but depends on wheelbase/ride height/overhang.

Tbh it's surprising what you can navigate with a low car, it's all about angle of attack.

Could you arrange a test drive with the vehicle or similar car?

No way to organise a test drive - the hill in question is on an adriatic island, so no lotuses to be seen!

I can find out all the the dimensions of height and overhang, but need to know what exactly to measure on the hill.

Thanks

[donkmeister]

elise2000 said:

Cats_pyjamas said:

You probably can calculate it, but depends on wheelbase/ride height/overhang.

Tbh it's surprising what you can navigate with a low car, it's all about angle of attack.

Could you arrange a test drive with the vehicle or similar car?

No way to organise a test drive - the hill in question is on an adriatic island, so no lotuses to be seen!

I can find out all the the dimensions of height and overhang, but need to know what exactly to measure on the hill.

Thanks

Google Maps link might help people assess.

The issue is generally grounding out at the top of the hill as the front of the car tips over. So just nail it and jump.

All jokes aside, just suck it and see. If it doesn't clear it straight, it might do at an angle. You could also use spring helper blocks to raise your ride height for just the hill. Jack it up and slot them in, then when you drop it back you won't compress the springs so much.

[elise2000]

donkmeister said:

elise2000 said:

Cats_pyjamas said:

You probably can calculate it, but depends on wheelbase/ride height/overhang.

Tbh it's surprising what you can navigate with a low car, it's all about angle of attack.

Could you arrange a test drive with the vehicle or similar car?

No way to organise a test drive - the hill in question is on an adriatic island, so no lotuses to be seen!

I can find out all the the dimensions of height and overhang, but need to know what exactly to measure on the hill.

Thanks

Google Maps link might help people assess.

The issue is generally grounding out at the top of the hill as the front of the car tips over. So just nail it and jump.

All jokes aside, just suck it and see. If it doesn't clear it straight, it might do at an angle. You could also use spring helper blocks to raise your ride height for just the hill. Jack it up and slot them in, then when you drop it back you won't compress the springs so much.

annoyingly google maps hasn't made it to this part of the village!

Top hill is fine, bottom isn't (potentially).

Also quite narrow, so not much room for doing it at an angle

I'll try and get a photo or two!

[elise2000]

Here’s a photo

The hill inclines 25cm in the first 80cm. And 50cm in the first 230cm if that helps

[elise2000]

And the dimensions of the car are:

[Jo-say8k]

Make a mock-up of the car with a piece of wood and some wheels?

[elise2000]

Jo-say8k said:

Make a mock-up of the car with a piece of wood and some wheels?

Ha

[Evil.soup]

elise2000 said:

Here’s a photo

The hill inclines 25cm in the first 80cm. And 50cm in the first 230cm if that helps

What Lotus are you thinking of? I have had access to a few Elise and a Europa S on coilovers, and I would be pretty confident both would be ok on that type of hill as it does seem reasonably gradual. However, for the sake of avoiding liability, it is very difficult to tell from a picture and this is only based on my own experience using these cars.

My current car has a splitter and is quite low, I often catch things and would almost always catch the top of my drive, especially when the tyres were getting worn, but these are throw away items/consumables in my mind and over the years I have had to replace the splitter due to wear and tear. Not sure if this would apply to the Lotus you have in mind, if it is carbon fibre, that could be quite an expensive consumable...

I guess the other question is, is this your drive or is it shared? If it is yours, you have the option to alter the gradient.

[elise2000]

Evil.soup said:

elise2000 said:

Here’s a photo

The hill inclines 25cm in the first 80cm. And 50cm in the first 230cm if that helps

What Lotus are you thinking of? I have had access to a few Elise and a Europa S on coilovers, and I would be pretty confident both would be ok on that type of hill as it does seem reasonably gradual. However, for the sake of avoiding liability, it is very difficult to tell from a picture and this is only based on my own experience using these cars.

My current car has a splitter and is quite low, I often catch things and would almost always catch the top of my drive, especially when the tyres were getting worn, but these are throw away items/consumables in my mind and over the years I have had to replace the splitter due to wear and tear. Not sure if this would apply to the Lotus you have in mind, if it is carbon fibre, that could be quite an expensive consumable...

I guess the other question is, is this your drive or is it shared? If it is yours, you have the option to alter the gradient.

Thanks.

Evora.

It’s a shared road

[esuuv]

elise2000 said:

The hill inclines 25cm in the first 80cm. And 50cm in the first 230cm if that helps

So the initial 80cm is at 17.3 degrees according to my maths.

The first 230 cm is at 12.2 degrees.

From that data the car has an approach angle of eleven degrees - so it'll catch.

[brillomaster]

that looks fine to me, nice gradual incline. can't even see anywhere where you would put a plank of wood to lessen the gradient change.

[Scootersp]

your 25cm over 85cm say is a 16 degree angle and the lotus states 11/12 degrees approach? which suggests no?

But saying that the approach doesn't look flat/level ie is that 25cm in 85cm 'real'

[Evil.soup]

The approach and depart angles will be key if you are able to measure these. The idea of a wooden template isn't crazy either, you won't need to make up
a whole car with wheels etc lol!

Get a block of wood and a length of wood, mount the length of wood at the ride height of the car on the block of wood with the 100cm overhang sticking out from the block. slide the block along the road and see if the front of the stick grounds out.

Hopefully my description makes some sense, it's kind of a rudimentary finger in the wind way of checking, but it should give you an idea of the general clearance.

[Scootersp]

have you been up it in any other specific cars?

[Condi]

esuuv said:

So the initial 80cm is at 17.3 degrees according to my maths.

The first 230 cm is at 12.2 degrees.

From that data the car has an approach angle of eleven degrees - so it'll catch.

It doesn't appear that the road goes from horizontal to inclined at any single point though, ie, in the picture the ramp is already rising above the level of the road on the right, and so it looks (sans calculations) that it should be fine. Your maths would be correct if the ramp had a defined point at which point it deviated from level.

OP - we need better pictures or more information. Or you need to try it out. What is the initial angle when the road goes from flat to inclined, as that is where the issue will arise.

[elise2000]

Scootersp said:

have you been up it in any other specific cars?

BMW 3 series touring is fine. “Normal” cars all are fine

[hellorent]

If necessary just reverse up

[elise2000]

hellorent said:

If necessary just reverse up

Sadly it is a very long hill (much longer than in the photo).

After past experience with reversing up hills in evoras and clutch failure this isn’t an option!