Rapide S sluggish/jerky pull away
Rapide S sluggish/jerky pull away
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Discussion

dg73

Original Poster:

45 posts

162 months

Sunday 18th October 2020
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Hello All

I have recently purchased a late 2017 Rapide S.
I'm really enjoying the car, the sound, the looks, its wonderful.
However, I've noticed that pulling away from stationary or low speeds the car can sometimes hesitate or dither before putting power down. It seems to be an intermittent problem as around half the time pullaway is immediate and smooth. It makes driving the car in stop/start traffic around town a fairly unenjoyable experience.

I went to pull out swiftly at a junction today and it hesitated causing me some alarm as a car approached quickly, then jerkily shot me out across the road.
I've had a classic Vanquish before and numerous other high performance cars, so its not like Im green to driving this sort of car.

Just wondering if other Rapide S owners have experienced this issue being a common trait of the car, or if theres an issue with my specific car (which is still under warranty). Not sure whether it could be a hardware or software issue with the ZF 8 speed box.
I asked the AM dealer who sold it to me to have a look and all they said was there were no errors stored on the car relating to gearbox faults, so they kinda implied theres nothing wrong, but I cant imagine this is supposed to be how the car was designed to drive?!



kipv12

117 posts

134 months

Sunday 18th October 2020
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Sounds like it needs to go back to the dealer for a long road test, nothing like it on mine in 30k miles.

dg73

Original Poster:

45 posts

162 months

Sunday 18th October 2020
quotequote all
is yours an 8 speed ZF gearbox? I took it back to AM Works and they just said no gearbox faults showing up on the diagnostics, and implied the occassional hesistancy was 'normal' - others who have been in the car have remarked on it, so I struggle to believe this is normal

anonymous-user

84 months

Sunday 18th October 2020
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Certainly does not sound right. If the dealer wont investigate then the only other route is a good indy, the warranty isn’t tied to the dealer afaik.

SHIFTY

999 posts

266 months

Monday 19th October 2020
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I had the same problem with the Vanquish soon after purchase, problem went away when I filled up with 97 RON Esso.

My understanding is that Esso does not contain any Ethanol which other 97 RON grades do.

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

dg73

Original Poster:

45 posts

162 months

Monday 19th October 2020
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Thanks for that SHIFTY, I will try ESSO Supreme+ 99 and see if that erradicates the problem.

I was testing the issue again today to see if it was down to gear selection being slow to change down from 3->2->1 when slowing down and wanting to pull off but being stuck in too high a gear, but this doesnt seem to be the problem as the hesitancy also occurs when in manual mode in 1st gear around sub 10mph, so maybe it is an ECU/fuel thing?
Will report back after ive run a tank of Esso 99 through the car.
Im open minded but will be surprised if 5% ethanol fuel content is causing stop start hesitancy, we'll see!

dg73

Original Poster:

45 posts

162 months

Monday 16th November 2020
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It seems the issue is down to accelerator factory calibration. Its most noticeable when coasting less than 15mph in town traffic with 0% throttle then applying the throttle, theres a second or so lag before the engine responds.
I test drove another Rapide S and it had the same issue so it seems its just a wierd triat of the car. its only really noticable in slow stop start traffic, and not a gearbox issue.
Wonder if someone like Bamford Rose could address it, or if anyone else on here has noticed this trait of the Rapide S?