My feeling is that the 100hp’s greatest flaw is its ‘ride’. Almost all the magazine reviews either describe very ‘stiff’ suspension or a very ‘bouncy’ ride. What I didn’t notice on my (very short) test drive, but have since been very aware of during all drives, is a constant front to back pitching motion. Although the car’s springs are relatively stiff, they are by no means the worst I have experienced in a road car, and no other stiffly sprung car that I’ve owned has felt so unsettled.
The day after collecting the car, I went for a couple of days of driving in North Wales to put the car through it’s paces. By the end of the first day I was starting to worry that I’d made a big mistake as I was basically feeling sea sick from the constant pitching! On the second day I actually had some enjoyable drives on some of my favourite roads, but I still couldn’t escape the feeling that there was something strange about the ride. For example, over some quite badly broken road surfaces, the car behaved just fine but then on an apparently perfectly smooth road severe pitching would hit it out of the blue.
The more I thought about it, the more it seemed like the car’s dampers were unable to contain the rebound of the springs. This is especially noticeable at the back of the car, which is regularly sent pogo’ing up and down with particular road undulations. The effect is noticeable at the front of the car too, but the weight of the engine seems to add a bit of rebound damping.
Having searched and posted on the Fiat Forum Panda section, several possible solutions came to light. One owner had fitted Koni Sport Dampers and Eibach springs to his 100hp and claimed that the poor ride was entirely resolved. There was also at least one owner who had fitted KW Variant 1 coil-overs, albeit at a higher price than the Koni/Eibach combination.
In order to keep costs down, and for the sake of experimentation, I’ve decided to gradually up-rate my suspension. Tonight I have ordered the Koni Sport dampers for the back of the car, at a cost of £202 from Larkspeed in Leeds. The Koni part code for these is 8040-1347Sport. They are adjustable for rebound on the car and hopefully should not be too much of a pain to fit myself (famous last words!).
If these are a success on the rear but I still feel that the front needs to be sorted out, I will order the front units as well (part codes 8741-1486LSport and 8741-1486RSport). These are around £130 each.
Finally, if I feel that I’m not getting exactly what I want from this set up, I will add the Eibach spring kit as well. If none of it works…well, I’m not sure what I will do! I will post my fitting experiences and results once they arrive.
Panda 100HP 