Following on from the news that Vectra (Non V6) does not have TC as standard anymore (Due to advance's in chassis development etc on the new model) I decided to carry out a test on the old and new.
The test cars were my new Facelift Vectra 1.9 CDTi 150 and my old SRi 1.9 CDTi 150 (As my brother now owns it)
OK mine has done less miles, but his has just had 4 brand new new dampers fitted as he will be towing with it and he is a bit OTT with these sort of things. It is worth noting that my old car is kiited out with the suspension and steering mods required for 18" and 19" wheels due to it having 18" wheels originally from the factory.
To make things fair I put all 4 of my 19's on his car and took it for a 'quick' run round the local bypass in the wet (within local speed limits). I then put the wheels on my car and did the same. There was some interesting differences between the two cars.
With my old pre face lift car, going into the island the car does try to initially understeer which starts to trigger the TC and there was a couple of TC light flashes, upon exiting the island the TC light goes mad as it is not getting the grip it wants. Also the steering lacks the feedback you would expect and feels a little detached from the chassis. The only way I can explain it, it feels like you turn the steering wheel then the car turns.
On the second run, I tried a more faster flowing entry and exit from the same island and the back was getting very twitchy and stepped out with a slight bit of over steer. But over all I thought a very good and competant car.
So with the new facelift SRi, doing the same runs at the same speeds and the roads maybe a slight bit wetter.
Going into the island, instantly the steering is more sharp and instant and not a slight bit of understeer, the front end just gripped going in and not a hint of wheels spin coming out, the whole car was more composed throughout which gave me more confidence.
2nd run, as before another fast flowing entry and exit, again more grip and not a slight step out of the rear end, I went back to try and to get the back to step out like the old car, I had to go just under 10mph faster around the island to upset the rear end, which was still not bad enough to worry.
My conclusion, is that maybe Vauxhall have deleted TC as their work on the chassis has done the trick. Or could we look at this another way, with the old car, was TC added as because Vauxhall were not 100% happy with the chassis?
The confidence in the new car is far higher than the old one which I rated highly anyway. OK we have lost a few 'toy's but they have given us a better drivers car.
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