Quote:
Originally Posted by crankaholic
I'm with Mr. Wyndham regarding the suspension travel/height sensors... I was in an accident last spring and had to replace some front suspension components, including sensors, and MRC/Steering were completely out of whack (car was too soft and the steering felt like a 90's Deville. TC might have been impacted as well, but I didn't test) when everything was first put back together. The company that owns the body shop also owns one of the bigger Chevy dealers in the area and they had to recalibrate those sensors for everything to work properly again - this is just what I was told - they called GM engineers to find out what to do and had to load a custom calibration program for the Gen6 into their computer. After the sensors were recalibrated (unfortunately I didn't talk to the guys at the dealership and I'm not sure what that entails) the car started driving like it should.
When installing my lowering springs I measured where the sensor arms sit, so I can do the same with new springs and make shorter connecting rods to keep the sensors in the same position as stock. I never got around to doing that second part so I don't know if it actually makes a difference or if a 1" drop affects anything to begin with. My recalibration experience doesn't make sense if those sensors are just for measuring rate of suspension compression/rebound 
 |
I can see how the sensors could be used to measure ride height so the system can stiffen the shocks the closer they get to full compression or extension, but they most definitely monitor movement and probably the rate of that movement in order to instantly adjust the shocks as needed. In your case with the new sensors that apparently weren't communicating with the computer, the MRC didn't know there was any movement occurring so it didn't stiffen the shocks any at all, resulting in that floaty feeling it sounds like you are describing.
I don't think I would change the rods on the sensors, especially if the system does stiffen the more the shocks are compressed, because if you shorten them on a lowered car, the computer will think the shocks are higher in the stroke than they actually are, and it could lead to a more harsh bottoming of the suspension if you hit a big bump. If ride height isn't monitored, and rate of movement is the only thing being used, the shorter rods aren't going to change anything except the geometry of the stroke, which actually could change how the sensor reads movement.