KW V3 (short for Varian 3) is a well known manually adjustable suspension setup that is now available for the Cupra Born EV, the Volkswagen ID.3’s sportier Spanish cousin. In lowering the car and stiffening the suspension, the Born will be better through the corners, but KW says its range will get a slight boost too.
According to the company, when a similar suspension setup was fitted to a Tesla Model 3, it improved the range by 7 percent. We don’t know how they tested it, how scientific the test was, but lowering a car does make it cut through the air slightly better, thus improving its efficiency and range.
KW V3 allows for a ride height drop of between 20 to 45 millimeters (0.8 to 1.7 inches), and this is done with a special tool that comes with the kit. You have to do it individually for each corner, raising or lowering the ride depending on the situation - if you were to take your Born to a track day, then you would want to lower it all the way in order to make it as good as it possibly can be around corners.
Gallery: KW V3 Cupra Born
KW is also offering an adaptive suspension setup for the Born. The company offers this kit as a plug and play option for Borns equipped with the factory adaptive dampers. Apparently, they are fully compatible with the car’s factory damper control system, thus allowing you to slacken or stiffen the suspension without adding unsightly buttons or switches inside the vehicle.
What we really want to know is how big an impact the V3 adjustable-height suspension has on range. It would be interesting to test a Cupra Born with it against one that has the factory suspension, just to see how much further the one equipped with KW V3 would go.
The KW V3 for the Born starts at €1,999, while the adaptive setup is predictably more expensive, retailing for €2,594 in Europe.
