The chase in the early hours of 13 January took place after a raid on the Murco petrol station in Warstones Road, Wolverhampton.

Westwood headed towards the M6, chased by a police car.

He joined the motorway, where he headed north up to junction 13 at Stafford before turning around and then heading southbound again.

In footage recorded from the police helicopter, sparks were seen coming from underneath the car because of the speed at which it was going.

What it is I’m not getting here? Why would there be sparks from underneath the car?

??

I read that thinking the same thing.

Im sure it was more heat realted to the exhaust emmisions.

car being pushed into the ground by the aerodynamics and hitting the occasional bump causing something like the exhaust to hit the ground?

I wouldn’t be wanting that car back if I was the owner!

Exhaust falling off?

if you watch the video, it looks like the ‘sparks’ are actually the hot exhaust gases coming from the pipes, given that its a thermal image camera, and the sparks only appear when he is on the throttle.

tomhoward +1

They’re exhaust fumes

I take it the driving ban only applies AFTER he’s released from nick?

car being pushed into the ground by the aerodynamics

I presume it wasn’t an F1 car? Most normal road road cars lift at speed.

I take it the driving ban only applies AFTER he’s released from nick?

No.The date of his release from prison isn’t certain as governors can release prisoners before the halfway point of sentence on home detention curfew. Disqualifications therefore have to run from date of sentence.

Modified Audi RS5 with splitter/diffusor, is it plausible that those things could generate a decent bit of downforce?

‘Modified’ could also suggest it’s had the suspension lowered excessively by it’s dickhead owner, only causing an issue at 180mph?

I imagine on an 80 grand car the modifications weren’t a max power body kit, and for 180 mph that’s a bloody big turbo and a custom map to remove the 155mph limiter.

Seems a big turbo might not be needed in a car with 450bhp stock.

Standard RS5 is around £60k, so perhaps the Beeb just added up all the optional extras?

The speed limiter has definitely been removed!

Its either exhaust gasses or residual heat from what would be pretty hot tyres on the road.

Its definietly not sparks

Given its got more the 400bhp as standard it will do 180mph with the simple modification of removing the speed limiter

On R4 just now it said it had a Lamborgini engine?!

Westwood? yeah bwoy, he’s got it goin on, in da hood

From what I understand it had the Lamborghini engine used in the Audi RS6 Avante, which is the Gallardo V10, IIRC.
It’s possible that at that speed, on slight dips in the road the car could easily bottom out and something hit the road.
A mate had one of the first Escort RS Turbos, and one night four of us were coming back from a hifi show in That London, getting a bit of a move-on through Savernake Forest. We hit a bit of a dip in the road at 90, and there was a hell of a bang, and a cloud of sparks lit up a car going the other way; you could clearly see the people’s faces lit up like a flashgun!
He found out it was the fuel pump hitting the road… 😯
There are a couple of places on the A4 from Bath where there are shallow dips that my Skoda bottoms out in at 70, so at 180+ I should think a low-riding car like an RS5 with a splitter could easily strike low spots, especially on our crappy road system.

except the splitter will be made of plastic..
its a thermal camera as already mentioned several times – you are seeing heat not sparks.

I don’t think it was modified with the v10 from the Gallardo from the RS6 – pretty sure it wouldn’t fit! It”s more likely the standard 4.2 v8 with a decent re-map and perhaps a turbo (Not sure that would be needed….). The RS6 fully de-restricted and with an optimum re-map would be capable of c190mph if de-restricted – let alone if it was squashed into a smaller (Lighter?) RS5 chassis…

On the A4 count zero? not saying there’s not, but I’ve not found them. Where abouts?
Oh, and with an Audi, 20k of extras would be quite conceivable – my A4 had a 2.5k satnav fitted by the previous owner (and it’s rubbish!) along with 3k leather seats… well, you get the idea!

No.The date of his release from prison isn’t certain as governors can release prisoners before the halfway point of sentence on home detention curfew.

Except he won’t be eligable for HDC. He’s doing over 4 years so will only get out on parole if anything.

He’s doing over 4 years so will only get out on parole if anything.

Same principle applies though – how do they know when he’s getting out to start the ban from?

Do you think the getaway driver usually worked in IT Monday to Friday and rode an Orange at the weekends…?

(I kind of work in IT but not a techie, drive an Audi, but mainly ride a Specialized…)

Same principle applies though – how do they know when he’s getting out to start the ban from?
Well I’d imagine it’ll come into force from whenever he gets released, bit pointless banning him while he’s in custody (but who knows eh?)
I’ll let you know on Monday after I’ve spoken to someone in Offender Management Unit at work. 😆

On the A4 count zero? not saying there’s not, but I’ve not found them. Where abouts?

The particular one I’m thinking of is just after the end of the Draycott Straight, just before you get to Box. A couple of times I’ve hit that going a bit quick and the Octy has made a bit of a thump. used to make my Puma bounce a bit when I had a clear road and hit it fast. Of course, the Octy isn’t that stiff, so does tend to bottom more at speed. Wouldn’t notice it much at 40, it’s barely a car’s length long, but at 70 or so it shows up.
Of course, now the road has a 50 limit I wouldn’t dream of going faster than that at midnight on a clear road…

can we stop facts getting in the way of a good story.

the wrong uns did over a garage. The boot was so full of loot that it was scraping on the floor. They were all doing 200mph+ SIDEWAYS making NeNaw noises.

Then our top boys used the slip road to leap over them hand braked it and shouted Stop In the Name of the Queen you ruffians!!

Job done, where’s Michael Bay this needs a film making

The ban starts the day it is imposed but given it was for Dangerous Driving it will have been for 4 years and “until extended test past” so when he is released he will be unable to drive untill he has taken and passed the bigger driving test for naughty boys.

Rs6 engine won’t fit in an RS5 no matter how hard you try.

My iphone wont play that footage but from experience it’s quite usual for sparks to come from the underside of any car during a pursuit. Minor undulations, surface imperfections speed humps coupled with a low car at high speed will certainly do this. You don’t see this on your commute because you’d never be following an idiot like this at that speed. You genuinely wouldn’t believe what some of these nobs will do to evade capture.

Always thought Ron and Russell looked a bit dodgy

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAzESJ62irI&feature=related[/video]

Looking at the footage and taking the reports word that these were sparks, he must have been running pretty fast as his feet were also giving off these sparks, as we’re every moving vehicle he passed.

I think what’s possibly happend sparks were given off as Mildred has described above and noted in court. However the tabloids have decided the thermal imaging was infact sparks and fire. Interesting to learn today there are 2 RS5’s in the country, my BIL has one and then there’s this one in the news, so that’s it. There are no others in the UK.

Jamj, the stock engine in the previous rs6 is a Lamborghini v10. It hasn’t been modified!

The v8 was the previous more rounded version!

The ban starts the day it is imposed but given it was for Dangerous Driving it will have been for 4 years and “until extended test past” so when he is released he will be unable to drive untill he has taken and passed the bigger driving test for naughty boys.

given that he’ll probably never afford the insurance I doubt very much he’ll take the legal route to get back on the road.

v10 does fit in a rs5 its been done.
Besides any engine can be made to fit any car given a big enough hammer.

It’s definitely exhaust – you can see it drop off as he lifts off the throttle to change gear.

Only 2 RS5 in the country???

I can see 2 from my office window!

(Oh what a lovely burble sound they make on idle!)

Not true xiphon, as I have said perviously there is the RS5 in the news and my brother in law owns the other one. I also know of one at the gym but that must be a fake one re-badged or something.

king-ocelot

If there are only 2 RS5’s in the UK, are these all fake re-badges??

( I’m confused? )

http://pistonheads.com/sales/list.asp?s=1083

Ha ha! 🙂

….ok….