German Car Zone

GTA8.5 · 05-22-2006, 10:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Just_me

"Body Flex is a lack of rigidity in a motor vehicle's chassis. It is often something to be avoided by car manufacturers as higher levels of body flex is a sign of structural weakness, and means that the vehicle's suspension cannot work as efficiently - the body takes up some of the 'slack', rather than the parts of the car which were specifically designed for this purpose. Cars of a sporting nature are, therefore, often very 'stiff', while convertibles or cabriolets are not often considered to be good candidates for high-performance sports cars because of their lack of a rigid roof."

Source: Wikipedia

My point exactly, great find Just_me. You have the ability to be even handed, Karma my man...

GTA8.5 · 05-22-2006, 10:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by warot

Have you ever experienced any body flex on any cars? I'm not even familiar with what that actually is (maybe because I haven't driven hard enough). I'm just saying that the 6er isn't going to fall apart as soon as you take a corner.

Yes I have warot, much like what Snake decribed.

NSL · 05-22-2006, 12:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by warot

I can tell what body flex implies (thanks for the explanation though), but I'm asking if most of us have ever experienced body flex and made us cringe when that happened? My answer is no...

I have felt this in a CLK Cabrio actually..... by going fast, turning and going over rail roads at the same time. Also in a Jaguar XJ6, and a whole bunch of Chrysler and GM cars. Ugly sensation that the car is splitting in half.

Palm Springs Life Magazine

... not sure if this magazine can be taken seriously as a reliable source of information on cars other than perhaps which cars are good for driving to South California vineyards... If you read, you can tell this person is actually describing the convertible behavior based on common knowledge of basically chopping off the roof and losing rigidity (which is in most cases what happens with other manufacturers in the lower-range of the spectrum), but the author probably didn't even test drive the 645CiC and mentions the typical body flex response you get from convertibles based on its definition. Even the SL will have that with those premises.

There's a lot of engineering going on at the higher end like SL, 6er, 911 Cabrio, etc that nulls out any of these structural problems inherited by chopping a roof.

Well, back in topic here, I hope Jaguar gets it right this time.

Osnabrueck · 05-22-2006, 12:11 PM

They did or didn't based on your point of view. If you're won over by the irrational qualities of a British coupe, and like the front-end styling, then the shortcomings and high price-tag of the XK will seem moot. The motor also has a soundtrack that sounds like a car sounds in your head. It's like: "VHROOOOMMMMMMMMEEEE...." Quite nice.

German Car Zone

Jaguar XK's chief engineer discusses the challenges, benefits of building with alumin