FYI, Consumer Reports found the clearance to be a meagre 3.5"! The low clearance is a problem for me on a long, winding dirt road that I need to drive on sometimes. My wife also scraped the bottom once going into a friend's driveway. I wish it had height-adjustable suspension, such as from air shocks or even better a system like Citroen's hydropneumatic suspension.
At what point does the front bumper cut the air?... how low is it? I can see that they may want to remove the air at a point lower than the underneath of the car. I can see how cavities etc could catch air to slow it down.
15"?!?! damn.. what were you driving? A Discovery? (sorry, I forgot what you drove). Yeah, I've bottomed out several times but it was with a full load and going over a speed bump.
Hmm Wonder if low tire pressure contributed to both CR's mileage findings and their clearance measurements
You folks haven't broken in your cars till you go over a big speed bump that has a huge pot hole on the other side! I thought the whole bottom of my car would scrape off! (It was raining so didn't see the hole!) Only other time I have problems is with driveways going down hill to the street, and I have learned to drive at an angle where the grade changes. Also had to learn to park so I don't overlap curbs. One other thing: Had to buy new ramps and jacks for low clearance cars! Got the ramps at Autobarn.
My 2000 GMC Sierra SLT 4x4 had lowest clearance of about 9.25 inches at the front axle skid plate. Is your SUV jacked way up?
I know 800 is max but I've hauled at least that much in my Prius (loaded to the brim with parts out of a 671 Detroit Diesel) plus My dad and I in the front seats. It was sitting low, the back scraped on a few shallow bumps. My guess is the clearance then was about 3 inches
Humm.. I think I'll install hydrolyics on mine so I can raise up my car while going 60MPH when I see a pothole coming! :lol:
Yes, it has 5" of suspension lift and 33" tires (4" bigger than stock), so it's about 7" higher then normal. Here is a pic. The license plate was the lowest part, but now we're in Florida and they don't require front plates.
Wow, I guess I must have lucked out when hauling debris to the compost site. It was a rutted, potholed, mud quadmire that I did my best to avoid bottoming out. I was successful, but with such low clearance maybe I shouldn't tempt fate too many more times there. Perhaps since I used to drive a Celica, which I always thought had low clearance, I was more aware of the possibility.
