Vauxhall commissions rush-job retune for baby SUV chassis
Vauxhall has responded to stinging criticism of its new Mokka compact SUV by re-specifying and retuning the car’s suspension and steering systems to suit British roads and tastes. But those first in the queue for the Nissan Juke rival will need to be vigilant to avoid buying a car built too early to benefit from the changes.
Having believed the standard European-spec Mokka to be suitable for the UK during the early stages of development, Vauxhall was forced into a hurried retuning program at short notice, after verdicts landed from the first press drives of the car last month.
“We were disappointed by the first press reports on the car,” said Vauxhall Motors Managing Director Duncan Aldred, “but quickly concluded that the suspension tune of the car wasn’t good enough.”
A team lead by Vauxhall vehicle dynamics manager, Gerry Baker, was tasked with bringing the car up to scratch dynamically, and has this week had the resulting revisions signed off. They consist of a stiffer steering gear mounting bush, a new software calibration for the car’s electromechanical power steering, and re-rated dampers for the suspension.
UK-specific dynamic tuning is usual for most new Vauxhall models. It’s normally finished well before cars are launched to the press, but in the Mokka’s case, was delayed by slow right-hand drive supply from GM in South Korea. The delay was just long enough, says Vauxhall, to provide an opportunity to react to press criticism and retune before executives were due to sign it off this week.
There will be no post-launch re-tune for the new Adam‘fashion’ supermini, however. UK Adams are due to get their own power steering software calibration, but will ride on the same suspension settings as European cars, which can be equipped on either ‘comfort’ or ‘sports’ springs.
And, while the vast majority of UK Mokkas should be built late enough to be fitted with the updated parts, when Autocar asked the question, Vauxhall couldn’t guarantee that very early UK cars ordered as dealer demonstrators or for dealer stock won’t slip through the net. A spokesman stopped short of confirming that there would be no erroneous right-hand drive examples in the UK at all, but did say that “individual customers ordering at or after the car’s official showroom launch later this month are certain to benefit from the revision”.