Originally Posted by tarheel91,Dec 21 2009, 05:05 PM

Vastly inferior? You sure like to exaggerate. There are trade-offs between MacPherson Strut/Multi-link and Double Wishbone. While the double wishbone will be a bit better in most normal situations, there are plenty of times where it's at a disadvantage. Modification works much better with the former as changing one thing in double wishbone can affect several components. With the Z4 M, BMW used a lot of the knowledge from the six year old E46 M3 to create the Z4 M's suspension, and it works very well.

Edit: A couple of people beat me to it, but I said some stuff they didn't, so I'll leave it.

Originally Posted by Mr.E.G.,Dec 21 2009, 11:15 AM

Jesus Christ, you're a dumbass.

The transmission and supplementary parts make a car awd, not the engine, numbnuts.

Have you ever noticed that they many cars that come in both AWD and F/RWD configurations?

There should be a goddamn entrance exam to get on a car forum. For starters, you should have to know the very basics about cars.

Simply pathetic.

Originally Posted by rioyellows2k,Dec 21 2009, 11:29 AM

"better suspension" depends on the application and how it's developed.

I think the Double wishbones are a better starting point than BMW's struts/Multilink but they get it to work, as does Porsche. It's how its developed is the important part. The Corvette Z06 works with archaic leaf springs. But they've developed it far enough to one of the best handling cars out there.

I wouldn't go as far as saying one suspension design is better than the other because the car's design and cost dictate the suspension. Strut type suspensions are technically less sophisticated, and cheaper to manufacture.

Originally Posted by PedalFaster,Dec 21 2009, 12:04 PM

Yeah, I agree -- it would be interesting to corner a Porsche chassis guy and ask them why they still use struts.

Originally Posted by PilotSi,Dec 21 2009, 03:53 PM

It is, at its foundation, out-dated. By and large, it offers a less dynamic suspension which is overly compensated for with aggressive static settings. The advantage of a MacPhearson strut based system is only 2-fold: space & cost IMO. Not that I'm saying it doesn't work, over time, R&D has made it worked, just like the Vette has done w/ the leaf springs and Porsche with a rear-engined car.

Originally Posted by Mr.E.G.,Dec 22 2009, 05:24 PM

Goddammit. LOL. Your Corvette reference takes the wind out of the sails of your pro-wishbone suspension argument. The Corvette has a wishbone suspension setup, dude. The leaf springs are simply the springing medium (a vastly superior springing medium in the given application) and are not suspension links/ the springing medium like you find in a live axle setup.