CAR EXPLAINS
Suspension without compromise? It’s here.
Like watching the girl in The Exorcist spider-walking down the stairs or gazing upon The Blue Marble, the photo the Apollo 17 crew shot of the Earth, some images stay with you. For F1 nerds it’s the grainy clip of the Williams crew playing with the FW15C, its active suspension rising and falling in a vaguely sinister manner as if by magic.
Williams’ active suspension was created to maximise downforce. Against inhuman forces and epic physics, its hydraulics toiled to maintain the optimum ride height for peak aerodynamic performance. But the car’s remarkable speed – together, the FW14B and FW15C whitewashed the ’92 and ’93 titles respectively – was proof of the riches that awaited anyone who could mitigate or even eliminate the compromises intrinsic to passive suspension.
Years ago, talking of the Purosangue crossover/SUV/ high-rise fastback (delete as you see fit) at a shareholder meeting, Ferrari’s then CTO, Michael Leiters, claimed his team were working on a ground-breaking suspension technology for the car, one that would enable a tall, rela-tively heavy vehicle to drive like a Ferrari.
Now that we’ve driven it, it’s clear Leiters wasn’t exag-gerating. A third-party bit of kit from race and hypercar engineering gurus Multimatic (who masterminded the FordGTanditsanniversaryLeManswin), thePurosangue debuts TrueActive Spool Valve dampers. Enabling fast and accurate control of the car’s body, the system opens up a world of opportunity when it comes to optimising perfor-mance. It can endlessly manipulate every element of the suspension’s behaviour, including ride height, roll, pitch and wheel movement, while also offering variable damp-ing via its twin spool valves at each corner.
Says
