Bmw 640d GC owners - hard suspension

Bmw 640d GC owners - hard suspension

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CMJ

Original Poster:

201 posts

246 months

Monday 27th January 2014
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Based on another thread I know there are a couple of 640d GC owners here. My car 20" wheels, m sport suspension, Dunlop sp max run flats. Suspension is way too hard. Hit a pot hole and sounds like car broke in two. Rear passengers being thrown up out of their seats. Car feels like it bunny hops over ripples on the mway. Around town suspension feels firm but acceptable. It's just when you ask it to do anything extreme. Anyone experience similar ?

GaryThomlinson

537 posts

174 months

Monday 27th January 2014
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I've only test driven this car but I have to say the rear of the car was thumping over manhole covers and jumping aside if I hit a manhole cover or road imperfection while cornering. Its the one thing that put me off the car as I wanted something more comfortable.

Having said that I've read on a number of US forums that a lot of dealers aren't taking out the transport blocks from the suspension which makes the ride quite bad. It looks like the design of the transport blocks on this car isn't helping as it looks like it could be part of the suspension design. Big Blue bits of plastic.

See here: Hope this helps: http://www.6post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=88280...

Jon1967x

7,175 posts

123 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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Be worth checking those blocks. I assume you've not got either suspension upgrade. I've 19" alloys and the adaptive dynamic suspension thing and it's smooth even in sport mode, in fact the ride is the smoothest I've had for a long time

One thing I noticed when I first had it was on one certain roads if I floored it the way the traction control works by grabbing the spinning wheel with the brake as well as other changes made the back end felt odd, I doubt that's your problem.

onesickpuppy

2,648 posts

156 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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As per previous comments, plus get rid of the fking runflats! Wife's X5 is a different car with 'normal' tyres on it.

Jon1967x

7,175 posts

123 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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onesickpuppy said:
As per previous comments, plus get rid of the ****ing runflats! Wife's X5 is a different car with 'normal' tyres on it.
I'm on runflats - I don't think that's the problem here.

5to1

1,781 posts

232 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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I've had mine for over a year now and it's also an Msport on 20's with the Dunlops. However, I do have adaptive suspension.

I can't comment on rear seat comfort myself, as I've never sat in the back smile, but have generally had comments that its very comfortable (with 2 people in the rear, not 3).

Personally I find it a comfortable car, with a decent setup, but I should qualify this by adding I generally drive on decent roads and ones that are familiar to me so I know where to avoid the worst pot holes/etc. I think ones take on the ride will be heavily dictated by past experience, expectations and how bad the roads you drive on are. If like me you're used to large alloys with limited rubber around them and you can avoid the worst bits of the roads you drive, you'll probably be happy with the GC's setup. If you've come from a Merc/Jag, with smaller alloys, a decent amount of rubber around them and drive on "challenging" road surfaces, you may well have some complaints about the setup.

I was dragged kicking and screaming from coupes and more "sporty" cars and I've noted from reading forums that people heading to the GC from my direction seem to be much happier with it. Whereas most of the concerns come from those going from the luxo barge, looking for something better looking/a bit sportier (not saying this applies to you, just an observation). The way BMW have positioned the car is probably leading to this. While it sits in the 6er range, its as big as a 7 with IMO a better standard interior, so I can understand why buyers may expect it to be an effortless glider, rather then a sportier glider (size and weight aside).

Since you now have the car this is probably of little help to you and if you're really un-happy with the ride you'll take a massive kick in the nuts getting out of it. So my advice would be to firstly check the blocks as I've also read a few examples where they've been left in. I would also have a play with the tyre pressures, as I did adjust mine until they suited my requirements. Assuming you bought it new, the dealer should really be interested in making sure you are happy, so have a word with them to see what they can do. Get them to stick a set of wheels with non run flats on, so you can see if that improves the ride for you. If that doesn't help, ask them to stick some 18's on to see if adding some rubber between you and the road works (I suspect this will definately do the job).

Hopefully someone without the Adaptive suspension can provide some feedback. However, I did drive both setups, and while the Adaptive suspension is good, if you hit a big hole theres a limit to what can be done with so little rubber between you and the road. Adaptive or not, you will know you've hit a big pothole and to be honest I probably want to know when the road surface changes so I can adjust my speed/driving, rather then it soaking it up completely and ending up with a cracked alloy :/


Dryce

310 posts

131 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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Doesn't sound normal. There isn't an M-Sport suspension as such - unlike some other models where it's firmer. So basically in the UK it's standard suspension unless you have the adaptive option.

The standard suspension is not great IMO at low speed - juddering rather than jarring over road bumps at urban speeds. But it's fine on the open road and motorway once you get up to speed. Moreover it actually rides better IMO when it's loaded. I've had no complaints from rear passengers.

As has been said in other posts if it's really that bad then it may be down to the transport blocks still being in the suspension. There have been a few cases mentioned in 6 Series forums of the dealers failing to remove them before handing the car over.






London GT3

1,025 posts

240 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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I have a 640d M Sport GC which I got in June 13. The ride is awful - way too hard for my needs. It was my mistake because I didn't test drive the car. As 5to1 has said above, I had a 730d (2011 model) and wrongly assumed that the 640d would be a better looking version of the 7! I used both cars together for 4 months and the 7 was by the far the more comfortable.

I use it to commute into London and there isn't a day goes by when I don't hit a new pothole which crashes through the whole car. It is a major disappointment although entirely my own fault. I have some other sporty cars and even they have softer suspension than this (maybe with the exception of the Caterham!). I can't wait until June 2015 when I will go back to a 7 Series.

I am going to check the suspension blocks but I don't hold out much hope.

Paracetamol

4,225 posts

243 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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Guys- without doubt your runflats...I have a 535 with the same set up but with adaptive damping and you can feel that the suspension is doing much of the work to allow a reasonable ride but as soon as you hit a catseye or a sharp bump it falls apart. Have tried cars with runflats removed and they are totally transformed..

Dryce

310 posts

131 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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Paracetamol said:
Guys- without doubt your runflats...I have a 535 with the same set up but with adaptive damping and you can feel that the suspension is doing much of the work to allow a reasonable ride but as soon as you hit a catseye or a sharp bump it falls apart. Have tried cars with runflats removed and they are totally transformed..
My 6GC is on 18"s normally - currently on 17"s for the winter.

I don't think the runflats are solely to blame for the ride issue on the 6GC.

The telling part IMO is that if my car is loaded with 4 people it's better.

I think the problem is a simple case of the 6GC being exactly rather than more than the sum of its parts and the sum of those parts is not a £60K+ car. It might look pretty enough on the outside and inside to feel like a £60K car - and when on the move at pace on decent roads the suspension setup works it might feel like a £60K car - but the let down is that on many crummy UK roads at lower speeds the suspension compromise isn't up to the job - and it handles them worse than a £20K car.

BMW made a major mistake IMO by not putting in the basic VDC as standard. They skimped - pure and simple. They then handed out cars to the press with the adaptive suspension and that meant the reality of the standard setup didn't get reported or reviewed.

The standard suspension isn't utterly terrible. Cross county journeys are fine IMO. So it's OK some of the time.

But the daily commute becomes a chore. And 50% of my mileage (and probably 80% of my time) in the car is in this type of driving. And put bluntly - after a long day in the office if you don't look forward to the drive home in a car like a 6GC it's a major product fail in this market sector.

My view after nearly a year with my 6GC is that it's an incomplete product. Fantastic drivetrain in the 640d, lovely exterior, brilliant interior but not so hot in terms of steering and suspension. At best it's a 50% car for the money in that it delivers only 50% of the time.

It should be better.







GaryThomlinson

537 posts

174 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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That review is a shame.. and without rubbing salt in the wound I'm so happy I didn't go this route, trading in the (paid for) e89, spending £600 per month with £24k or handing it back at the end. Madness unless the car is spot on and most are saying its not. It does look wonderful inside and out, plus it goes like stink ( I remember a fizz in my brain it was so fast when I drove it ). But I do remember thinking the ride isn't right. It wasn't just stiff, it was shuddery and as you say in a 60K+ car, its a no no. I may yet still go down the coupe route in time, once they're in the 20k realm which suits me better.

Jon1967x

7,175 posts

123 months

Tuesday 28th January 2014
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I was having doubts the adaptive suspension made any significant difference but from the comments on here it seems to change the character massively. All I can say is in comfort+ mode it was nick named seasick mode it was that floaty through to sport which was firm but not jarring. A friend of mine has a 7 and he prefers the 6 setup I have as his does feel a little barge like.

They'd probably be better off discounting the car by less than the near 20k they do now and including the superior suspension setup. None of that I'm afraid helps the OP

5to1

1,781 posts

232 months

Wednesday 29th January 2014
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Jon1967x said:
I was having doubts the adaptive suspension made any significant difference but from the comments on here it seems to change the character massively. All I can say is in comfort+ mode it was nick named seasick mode it was that floaty through to sport which was firm but not jarring. A friend of mine has a 7 and he prefers the 6 setup I have as his does feel a little barge like.

They'd probably be better off discounting the car by less than the near 20k they do now and including the superior suspension setup. None of that I'm afraid helps the OP
I generally use mine in sport/comfort depending on who's in the car with me. I was put off comfort+ as I also read reviews akin to the seasick mode comments. I tried it a few times and quickly changed back as that seemed to be on the mark. But on a particularly rough stretch of road I thought I'd give it a proper go, just to see how much the Adaptive suspension can really soak up. And from my observation if you give it a bit of time it really does seem to settle down into a decent luxe barge type ride. I've since tried it a couple of times and come to the same conclusion, its like riding on a plate of jelly for a bit, then sorts itself out completely. Not sure if its psychological on my part, and its actually me adapting to it, or if it takes a little while to settle down against your driving style and road conditions (it may just default to a very soft setup then tighten up based on your driving style and road input). I still don't use that mode much, as if i'd wanted that sort of ride I'd have bought a Merc/Jag on big rubber.

5to1

1,781 posts

232 months

Wednesday 29th January 2014
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GaryThomlinson said:
That review is a shame.. and without rubbing salt in the wound I'm so happy I didn't go this route, trading in the (paid for) e89, spending £600 per month with £24k or handing it back at the end. Madness unless the car is spot on and most are saying its not. It does look wonderful inside and out, plus it goes like stink ( I remember a fizz in my brain it was so fast when I drove it ). But I do remember thinking the ride isn't right. It wasn't just stiff, it was shuddery and as you say in a 60K+ car, its a no no. I may yet still go down the coupe route in time, once they're in the 20k realm which suits me better.
Actually "most" are not saying anything of the sort with respect to the ride. I've been on several forums in the last year and very few have complained about the ride and setup. And that isn't buyers bias, as those same people have had other complaints (the fact the boot is difficult to close, they thought the boot was big but because its shallow it can be hard to fit stuff in, the fact BMW left it till last to deploy the new NAV/controller in the 6ers, etc).

You'll likely see similar complaints across the BMW forums for all models, I know I've seen the "do I need to ditch the run flats", "will smaller alloys help", etc threads crop up across all model type forums including the e89. IMO coming from an E89 a GC is far less likely to disappoint then any other big luxury car.

WRT spending £600/month +£24k at the end, versus picking one up in a few years for £20k, financially that would suit all of us better smile But you're lucky we don't all let the numbers put us off, or there wouldn't be any cars for you to pick up for £20k several years down the line biggrin

Edited by 5to1 on Wednesday 29th January 09:03

Jon1967x

7,175 posts

123 months

Wednesday 29th January 2014
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I agree totally with 5to1.

Run flats even when they're good its the norm to complain. I've had a 335d coupe, X5 and 2x Z4 all with run flats before this changed all of them to non-runflats when the time came, but that was as much because there are simply better tyres and bigger choice. The ride did soften a little. Today the RFT/ROF tyres have improved a lot and BMW have learnt to tune the suspension better for the UK.

The 6 is probably a little different in that the vast majority of owners opt for a level of suspension upgrade and so most peoples experience will be better than a stock car, hence fewer complaints. But most reviews I've read have the 6 GC as the best car BMW do. Plenty of grunt, great fuel economy, great looking, a great cabin, yes its more a grand tourer but I don't miss any of my previous BMWs (I still own the Z4 as the its the wifes daily driver).

As for 20k motoring, I think you've still got a 3 year wait before that happens.

Dryce

310 posts

131 months

Wednesday 29th January 2014
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Jon1967x said:
The 6 is probably a little different in that the vast majority of owners opt for a level of suspension upgrade and so most peoples experience will be better than a stock car, hence fewer complaints. But most reviews I've read have the 6 GC as the best car BMW do. Plenty of grunt, great fuel economy, great looking, a great cabin, yes its more a grand tourer but I don't miss any of my previous BMWs (I still own the Z4 as the its the wifes daily driver).
If you came to the 6GC from after driving an E89 as a daily drive your perspective might be different. And there are plenty who are so used to 'sports' suspension options on saloons that their perspective may be different as well.

I doubt the number of cars with suspension upgrades is actually that high. The UK market and the deals on the 640d mitigate against it. Plenty of MSports. But the deals mitigate for that. Those buying the car outright or on a traditional finance deal should get any overall discount applied to the options - so adding the suspension upgrade is probably at most a 5% cost premium on the deal. At the other end of the spectrum the contract hire deals will load as much as 20% of the cost of the hire for the upgrade.

As for reviews try finding one where the car supplied to the journalist doesn't have the adaptive suspension. And the ones that get churned out at launch are done on roads in areas chosen by the manufacturer and those early ones are quite likely to be done with passengers as the journos often have to go out in pairs.



5to1

1,781 posts

232 months

Wednesday 29th January 2014
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Dryce said:
If you came to the 6GC from after driving an E89 as a daily drive your perspective might be different. And there are plenty who are so used to 'sports' suspension options on saloons that their perspective may be different as well.

I doubt the number of cars with suspension upgrades is actually that high. The UK market and the deals on the 640d mitigate against it. Plenty of MSports. But the deals mitigate for that. Those buying the car outright or on a traditional finance deal should get any overall discount applied to the options - so adding the suspension upgrade is probably at most a 5% cost premium on the deal. At the other end of the spectrum the contract hire deals will load as much as 20% of the cost of the hire for the upgrade.

As for reviews try finding one where the car supplied to the journalist doesn't have the adaptive suspension. And the ones that get churned out at launch are done on roads in areas chosen by the manufacturer and those early ones are quite likely to be done with passengers as the journos often have to go out in pairs.
Have to agree 100% on the review front. Don't recall a single review based on a car without adaptive drive, let alone just VDC. Moreover, as I live in London and was buying shortly after release I got to see some of the review cars which were subsequently distributed to dealers forecourts as demo's/etc. They were all very heavily spec'd as were all the other dealer cars (don't think I saw a single car much under £80K RRP and many above that). However, surprisingly given the RRP (I can only imagine BMW dictated dealers had to spec to £80K) there were quite a few SE's and cars without AD/VDC. So (at least in London) there was the opportunity to drive both setups (although some dealers wouldn't let you in the car unless you nailed the deal with them first for the order, even within the same franchise, won't be going back to them again). What I couldn't find was a 650/640i to try frown

The point about contract hire is also spot on. As soon as you start ticking options boxes, the value against buying becomes more marginal. So I can see plenty of base spec GC's being delivered by BMW.

Dryce

310 posts

131 months

Wednesday 29th January 2014
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5to1 said:
The point about contract hire is also spot on. As soon as you start ticking options boxes, the value against buying becomes more marginal. So I can see plenty of base spec GC's being delivered by BMW.
When I was looking there were contract hire deals on both SE and MSport - and not much between them. I suspect many buyers will pay the increment just for the alloys. The 6GC looks very good on the 351Ms at 19" or 20". There were also - confusingly - a few prebuilt SE models with the alloys and the camera options.

Since then the headline deals on the MSport models have often been better than the SE. My guess is the actual difference in cost to manufacture is negligible and the finance companies are wary that the SEs will be less attractive to move on.









5to1

1,781 posts

232 months

Wednesday 29th January 2014
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Dryce said:
Since then the headline deals on the MSport models have often been better than the SE. My guess is the actual difference in cost to manufacture is negligible and the finance companies are wary that the SEs will be less attractive to move on.
I think that's very likely to be the reason, as you see it on other models/brands, Audi SLines for example. With respe to base spec I meant more the options like Adaptive suspension where the finance companies won't see much effect come resale time.

London GT3

1,025 posts

240 months

Wednesday 29th January 2014
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This thread is showing how little I know about the car I drive! What are the different suspension options? My old 7 had Comfort+, Comfort, Normal and Sport. The 640d GC has Sport, Normal and Eco+. I am referring to the rocker switch by the gear lever.

From what I am reading here, although the switch looks the same on both cars it seems to serve a different purpose on the 640d GC.

Oh, and by the way, my transit blocks weren't still in the suspension - sadly.