Cars that can go fast in a straight line are dull.

Really?

Don’t you mean only go fast in a straight line

And even then power’s still fun. Can’t imagine a drag car being boring!

Corners are just more fun

I think the 1.8TT was recalled due to a lot more people looking like cocks on the road – wasn’t it a “reconsider your choice of car” type recall?

Touche!!! 🙂

Actually looking at trading it in ATM due to impending baby arrival, maybe an S3 is one to look at….. definitely ticks all the performance boxes as well as a bit more practicality.

By that reasoning we should not be able travel any faster than at a quick jog. Just in case

If you’re a **** in a hurry then I’d be very much happy indeed if you were to only travel everywhere at a quick jog. Can’t help feeling you’ve deliberately missed the point though…

molgrips – Member
No matter how good you think you are, no matter how safe you think it is, please just don’t **** about on public roads. One day you will make a mistake.

Like jumping the overtaking “queue”?

If you’re a **** in a hurry then I’d be very much happy indeed if you were to only travel everywhere at a quick jog. Can’t help feeling you’ve deliberately missed the point though…

😆

I can’t help feeling you’re trying to ask the same question I did earlier, but by making it a statement and adding extra swearing. 😉

I really should know better than to post in here, but…

speed is almost always a contributing factor in accidents

I’m surprised nobody’s mentioned that according to government figures, exceeding the speed limit is a factor in 5% of accidents (albeit a bit more likely to cause fatalities). Travelling too fast for the conditions comes in a little higher at 7% but basically the biggest cause of accidents is people not paying attention – “failed to look properly” was a factor in 42% of accidents.

I drive a fairly slow car, but I do ride a motorbike which tends to make me a little more wary of what other road users are doing. And the thing that I’m most wary of are people arguing, telling off their kids, on the phone, etc. Personally, the few times I’ve seen/had a near miss (not that near, fortunately) have involved someone suddenly slamming on the brakes for a turn they missed, pulling out without looking, or suddenly turning without indicating. Unfortunately these people think they’re safe drivers because of the widely-held belief that only people who exceed the speed limit/drive fast cars/ride motorbikes are dangerous.

Source:
http://assets.dft.gov.uk/statistics/releases/road-accidents-and-safety-annual-report-2011/rrcgb2011-04.pdf

Unfortunately these people think they’re safe drivers because of the widely-held belief that only people who exceed the speed limit/drive fast cars/ride motorbikes are dangerous

Steve, couldn’t agree more. Unfortunately because of the government taking the lazy option when it comes to road policing then speed has become the one thing they seem to focus on above all others. The constant anti speed propaganda has brainwashed many (including people on here) into believing that provided they don’t speed then that makes them a good driver. This couldn’t be further from the truth of course.

I’d far rather my kids get into a car with a driver who is observant, confident yet often breaks the posted speed limit than someone who dithers, knows little about cars or driving, has poor observation, yet who never speeds.

It’s also worth bearing in mind that someone driving faster than you, in a fast car may just be a better driver in a more capable vehicle?

To compare with biking, my mum’s not confident on a bike so for her riding fireroad would be a big adventure. She thinks it’s crazy and dangerous when I go out to the Peak District to tackle Jacobs Ladder on my XC hardtail. I’m confident on a bike doing XC but think that people doing gap jumps in Morzine on downhill rigs are crazy and are putting themselves in danger. But for these people gap jumps are the norm and they feel perfectly confident doing them.

It’s all about skill and perception – same with driving.

speed is almost always a contributing factor in accidents

Stationary objects tend not to crash so yes, it is normally a factor.

Agent007 are you in fact Surfmatt because surely they cannot be 2 people who are so awesome on this planet.

Pimp mentioned the IAM. The problem with giving people membership of such a club is that it makes them think they’re better drivers when in fact they’re governed by the same rules of physics and reaction times as everybody else. Learned reflexes help but not much when the unexpected happens.

IAM R8 m**der

Do performance cars road cars stop better? A little in the dry but many are no better than a standard Clio in the wet and will aquaplane before the Clio.

Do performance road cars handle better? IME, all too often, no. They might have more grip but performance road tyres are vicious things and some high performance cars suffer limited steering lock. The big difference between race tyres and road tyres is what happens at the limit – the race tyres continue to offer grip at high slip angles, road tyres break away then snap back. Driving a rally car accurately when very sideways on Michelin TB 15s was very easy, accurately drifting a road car on road tyres is not.

Accelerating out of trouble, nope, accelerating was what got you into trouble.

So go to a track day; enter a race, rally, autotest or whatever, you’ll soon find your “performance road car” is quite a handful and doesn’t perform very well even when there’s nothing coming the other way, nothing pulling out, no pedestrians, no cyclists, no diesel on the road, no white lines, no kerbs… . It’ll probably make you slower on the public roads, not faster.

I’d argue that a golf gti handles better and stops faster than a standard golf, and that’s the type of car we are talking about really, not a Ferrari / R8.
Of course , the bigger brakes / tyres etc are there to control things at 100mph, and indeed that sort of speed is why people buy them. However, that doesn’t prevent them being safer at 50mph than a car with rock hard tyres and tiny inefficient brakes.

I’d also love to know what kind of situations are requiring high power card to get out of. I can only think of ones that the higher power has caused me to get into!

Bigger brakes don’t stop the car sooner, they’re only there to cope with more the more frequent stopping that’s possible with the more powerful engine. All modern car braking systems are capable of maintaining the car near the limit of adhesion from the point you stamp on the brakes to the moment it stops, even at 100mph. Check out the stopping distances published for cars, you’ll find some very humble ones that do very well. And some that do very badly, the Land Rover Discovery for example (M&S tyres).

Wider tyres will make things worse in the wet especially as they wear.

I can’t find a stopping distances chart, certainly not an actual one, just published figures. Any links? If not, we’re going to have to agree to disagree.

Narrower tyres being better I the wet,, I’m assuming you mean aqua planing? If so, you have to be driving like a proper tit to aqua plane any car. Non aqua planing speeds, anything other than snow/ice, I’ll take the extra rubber thanks.

An example, a big people carrier thing on relatively narrow tyres stops better than a sporty Mini.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USr-sUzdChY[/video]

iolo – Member

Apparently the S1 is no slouch either.

I would quite like to have a drive in one.
For the record, the little M135i is quite swift too. The g/f has bought one and it can get a trot on. Very different drive to my old 911 though where you felt the car stick more to the road. The wee M pitches about a bit more but boy does it go around bends well.

Sorry, but I couldn’t work out model type or the size from that video. Minis go from underpowered rubbish shopping carts to fast hot hatches. Which one was that?
Ditto the Mazda (close up of front badge so I know what make it was), I know nothing else about it and I have no idea what that test means.

As a mostly vulnerable road user – pedestrian and cyclist I’m so glad that there’s so many ace drivers on here making progress, drifting round corners

confident yet often breaks the posted speed limit

etc etc.
but you all live up north somewhere so I’ll let you be oarsum up there rather than where I live.

Tinybits – I looks like a Mk2 Mini Cooper S to me.

Not sure what the video was all about though.

Braking tests generally demonstrate that performance road cars don’t stop better than more staid models. When the French magazine Sport Auto did performance and braking tests on supercars, they included a 150DCi Renault Scenic for comparison purposes. On the 200-0kmh brake test the Scenic was only bettered by one of the supercars. Well it’s either Sport Auto or Match when I visit the dentist.

No matter how ‘safe’ you think your fast car is, by driving it faster you are removing some of that safety.

You could have the best brakes in the world but it still takes you half a second or more to apply them. At 90 on a B road this is 20 metres. The difference between life and death is often inches.

If you wanted to be safe, you wouldn’t drive fast. You want to drive fast because you enjoy it – all this waffle about better brakes and suspension is just an attempt at excusing yourself.

I also want to drive fast. I love it, and I’ve done it. I just don’t any more, because I’ve realised how much more dangerous it is than driving sensibly. I want to reduce the odds of my accidental death as much as possible. If I want to push things to the limit I’ll do it on my MTB where I’ll only be doing 20mph and if I come off I’ll just bruise.

That’s not what I’m saying Molgrips, not at all. I’m not advocating driving faster due to a better car, I’m saying (although I can’t find any data on it) that a faster, better handling and braking car is safer for a given speed. The actual speed I used was 50mph. I was assuming that wouldn’t be in a 30mph zone…

You’re quite right, at any given speed a sports car may well be safer. And I’ve got no problem with sports cars being driven sensibly.

But that’s not what this thread is about, is it? Surely ‘pushing it’ on a twisty B road in a fast car means significantly higher speeds than normal?

I came off my mtb at less than 20 on 2nd Feb and have still not recovered. Indeed Mr surgeon man says I need more surgery…otherwise, broadly speaking I agree with molgrips! !

But you didn’t risk hurting anyone else.

I fell off my bike two years ish ago. Pretty innocuous crash very low speed, just indecision of which way to go. I landed on a rock, solo, face (cheek) first. I tried to bite my way out of my own face! I had tweety pie dancing when I came too.
I’ve chattered down that same trail at 20+ mph previously without incident. These things happen, people overtake, people crash, nothing is going to stop that.

Meanwhile back on topic, I took my new S3 out tonight for a wee blast in full dynamic mode (full exhaust, increased throttle response, heavier steering, higher revs before STronic shifts)…… Very fast but still lacking any dynamics. Very nice environment inside however with the full bang and olufsen sound system pumping out some deep house on the way back from the forest with the bike secured on the roof…..nice!

Well this has gone totally off topic!

The new S3 does indeed look like a good package. I think it looks quite smart although slightly dull. Not keen on quad pipes though on a hot hatch with a four pot. I’d expect it to pretty brisk with 300 ponies under the bonnet.

Not sure about an RS4 showing it a clean pair of heels given the well documented coking issues and them putting out around 365bhp or so. Given the extra weight it’ll close the gap. That’s not to say that I don’t love the B7 RS4, because I do. The one I drove was ace fun and sounded amazing. I’d like to replace our 330 with one soon.

The B5 is ace too. Saw a red one yesterday and it looked fab. The big downside to modern hot hatches is the four pot engines are just so dull and soulless. The big draw for the RS4 is that engine…the noise is amazing.

I’d go for a Scirocco personally. 170bhp tdi should be fast enough without being silly.

As this thread is going off topic…….

A couple of years ago my mate had one of the last B7 RS4’s that had the full ABT engine/dynamic treatment and de-chromed, when pushed hard it left me feeling rather ill – the acceleration from such a large lump of a vehicle along with the cornering speeds were astounding – as per the original coking issues with the valve system above it did suffer from this but Audi/ABT UK picked the vehicle up and left an ABT TT Quattro in it’s place for the 5 days it took to remedy the issue so they were very decent. And before we get any wet hand wringers he was an RAC rally champ twice in the 90’s with his BDA Escorts and we often went to the ring and spa on track days. (towed the RS4 with his partners ABT Q7) and on normal roads the RS4 was driven with due care.

I had it advertised on the for sale forum on here but despite a few tyre kickers no one wanted it and he eventually sold it for £30,000, cheap for a one owner 2007 RS4 with 6000 miles and full ABT service history on it but no-one was interested in such a car, you may be able to afford one but the running and servicing costs put most folk off.

The ABT Q7 is an awesome barge, pretty ugly but a very nice place to be for extended journeys, especially compared to my 30yr old MK2 Golf Gti which is rather agricultural to say the least, the Q7 can easily do 150mph+ on the autobahn and even at that speed it feels rock solid.

I fell off my bike two years ish ago. Pretty innocuous crash very low speed, just indecision of which way to go. I landed on a rock, solo, face (cheek) first. I tried to bite my way out of my own face! I had tweety pie dancing when I came too.
I’ve chattered down that same trail at 20+ mph previously without incident. These things happen, people overtake, people crash, nothing is going to stop that.

The massive difference between riding a bike and driving a car (either sensibly or in a ‘spirited manner’ with a desire to ‘make progress’) is the duty of care you owe to other road users and the potential consequences of your own actions, lapses of concentration or being pissed up giving some beans.

People on bikes kill .5 people a year, motorised vehicles kill far more frequently.

Somafunk that looks the tits.

I think its a car that’s aged really well and still looks chunky and fast without being OTT with loads of silly bulges and wings.

The chap I knew with the RS4 has replaced it with a V10 RS6. Now that thing has scary running costs (he’s recently had a £7k bill). But it’s hilarious that a car that big and luxurious can move so damn quickly.

And before we get any wet hand wringers he was an RAC rally champ twice in the 90’s with his BDA Escorts and we often went to the ring and spa on track days. (towed the RS4 with his partners ABT Q7) and on normal roads the RS4 was driven with due care.

I didn’t think an Escort had won the RAC rally since the 1970s.

Also an RS4 seems like a strange choice for track days as I would have thought it was too heavy and not nimble enough. Having said that, I’ve only driven UK circuits and not somewhere as fast and long as Spa or the Nurburgring.

He has a thing for Audi’s (quattro’s especially) as Ari Vatanan is a sort of idol/hero to him, he previously owned one of Ari Vatanans group B Quattro’s that he cherished like a child and that was quite possibly the most terrifying car i have ever been a passenger in, but yet it was also a strangely calming place to be after a few laps as my senses seemed to switch off, or i imagine they resigned to being a totally helpless passenger – unfortunately it proved to be rather impractical to use as a track/part time rally car as it needed a surgical team around it to keep it in full tune and it cost an absolute fortune to run such a vehicle – his biggest regret in his life so far is selling it and every car since has been chasing that experience so to speak, the RS4 was his ultimate road car but it still left a lot to be desired compared to previous cars as it was a tuned road car at heart.

gachet : he won his class numerous times, beating quite a few 4wd cars on certain stages. He owned a very well regarded car repair bodyshop in brick lane which proved useful as he drove 10/10ths everywhere, sometimes with alarming results which had to be turned round in time for the following weekends racing.

He’s thinking bout a no expense spared return to his fav car ever though – MK2 Escorts – i’m looking forward to this if it comes off 😀 .

mindmap3 : We went across to to Nurburgring for an ABT invite weekend last year and got to play in a variety of cars (i was merely a passenger unfortunately) and the R8 full ABT spec road/track car was so fierce at acceleration and pin sharp turn in that i doubt it would be happy being driven at normal speeds on the roads, but saying that if someone was to give me one i’d certainly try 😉 , the RS6 i imagine is very similar.

As we are now speaking of RS I can vouch for these having driven one, another level up from the S.

But that’s not what this thread is about, is it? Surely ‘pushing it’ on a twisty B road in a fast car means significantly higher speeds than normal?

Define ‘normal’. Molgrips don’t-you-dare-overtake-me-i’m-next-in-the-queue ‘normal’, doddery grandad 40 mph everywhere normal, dumb teenager 100 on the straight, 20 in the corner normal? Or, just driving to the conditions?

I’m still amused that people would rather meet a carelessly driven yet slow car rather than an observantly driven fast car. Presumably the former is less disturbing for high horses.

The very big “if” though is that a quickly well driven car is better to meet than a poorly driven slow one if the driver is as much of a driving god as everyone on stw is. I would certainly rather meet a poorly driven slow car when out on my motorbike than a poorly driven fast one and most cars are poorly driven. Just because someone can drive quickly on a track doesn’t mean they have the skills to drive well on the road.

Sensible is around the speed limit without hard cornering and braking, and slowing when you can’t see ahead. Isn’t that obvious? It’s what the majority of people do it seems.

PS I don’t drive at 40mph everywhere.

I’m still amused that people would rather meet a carelessly driven yet slow car rather than an observantly driven fast car

Who said that? I certainly don’t agree. I would rather meet a carefully driven car at sensible speed. Care and speed are not inversely proportional.

No Molgrips, sensible is to drive at a speed that’s appropriate for the conditions, not to blindly follow what the signs say.

So it would seem that people on here who’ve never had any additional driver road training really can’t see how it could possibly make anyone a safer, more capable road driver? Well stick your head in the sand if you want but I’m afraid you’re very, very wrong – by the same logic you may as we’ll say that the British Cycling team would have done just as well at the Olympics without any form of coaching.

Similarly with fast cars, the level in grip, performance, real world braking, tyres etc (despite what Un-Educator is trying to prove) between these and regular models is astoundingly different. So those saying otherwise have clearly never experienced it for themselves. Many of the safety features found on your regular shopping hatchback today were first introduced on higher performance cars, and have gradually filtered down the chain to benefit everyone.

I had my RS de carbonized and it was a significantly more pleasurable drive after that