RE: PH Blog: the new driving

[CedricN]

Completely agree, mechanical feedback i long gone, I have accepted that no modern car will be like that any more. So thats why I drive an older sports car for fun and track days and a modern hot hatch with DSG for commuting. Too bad if you only want one car, modern car that is also fun in the "mechanical feedback, steering feedback etc" area and at the same time give the nice thing a new car can give, there is no hope

[Dave Hedgehog]

i can see how modern steering wheels are too thick and side bolsters not supporting you, if your the size of an umpa lumpa, for me there perfect as is

[V8RX7]

Perhaps the point is that most car enthusiasts don't buy NEW cars.

Hence the people making NEW cars don't listen to the enthusiasts.

They listen to the BUYERS who tend to be image obsessed - why else would you buy a new car that will lose a fortune in it's first year.

I have never bought a new car, nor a nearly new car - I could afford to (I own around £40k of cars) I simply don't want one enough to pay the depreciation.

Plus what new car matches my RX7 - 420bhp and 1350kg or my MX5 210bhp and 1050kg - not just in power to weight but FUN ?

[tommy vercetti]

The 'purists', the people who care about how much a car weighs, don't care about gadgets and power and want manual boxes make up a small minority of the market.
Most people on road don't care about steering feel, handling because they aren't petrolheads, and only buy a car to get them from A to B, their not 'clueless tosssers'. And theirs nothing wrong with making loads of types of cars, after all they are a business and their number 1 aim is to make money, its not greedy

[vit4]

This is exactly why the Toyobaru is about the only car on sale today where I would pay my own money to buy new. Sadly not in a position to

[LordPetroleum]

BeirutTaxi said:

Some of the best ever selling cars happen to be simple ones, for example:

Mazda MX5, Volkswagen Beetle, Lada Riva, Ford Model T, Citroen 2CV, Peugeot 205, Renault 4, Fiat Uno and the Fiat 500.

What this guy said, my first car was a Citreon 2CV6, my step father gave it to me with the words, 'if can drive this well, you will be able to drive pretty much any car well' How right he was, it may have had a 600cc engine and had wheels as thin as frisbees but it was a great training cockpit and I had a couple of fun packed years of drifting it through the bends in the peak district as my friends attempted to keep up with me in their much more high powered cars.

Sadly as it was made mainly of tin foil and platercine I managed to pretty much kill it after 35k.

I find myself now after 20 odd years of driving considering ditching my fat bloated modern aircarft carrier and getting myself a middle aged MX5. So either you have hit the nail on the head with this article or I am now fully immersed in my mid life crisis, now where did I put that hair dye..............

[WingNut]

[quote]I have just driven what is, by any measurement, a genuinely gifted sports car. It was fast, sounded exciting and allowed me to use an unexpected quantity of its performance in foul conditions because its chassis electronics were infallible.
[/quote]

Ten pages in and no one has asked what the car was Chris refers to at the start of the piece!

Spill the beans.....

[errek72]

Honestly? It's a mystery? Allow me to help.

Who consistently praises Porsche's efforts as perfect, no matter what the styling, sound or steering? Who has raised up every generation of the king-of-detachment VW Golf as the golden standard of everything automotive?

The same people that have just as constantly shot down Citroens, Saabs and Alfa's for daring not to be German.

Car journo's, that's who.

[itiejim]

I quite agree with Chris. After being brought up on 60's and 70's RWD cars which I have tended to keep as hobby cars, I was getting equally bored with dull, idiot proof daily drivers. Even an E46 M3 and a 350bhp 335D failed to really engage me recently and I have ended up with a 3 litre Alfa 75 which I really love.

It requires concentration to drive well, is an absolute hoot in the wet and is actually surprisingly comfortable and refined. I think I could actually keep this one for some time...

[errek72]

itiejim said:

I quite agree with Chris. After being brought up on 60's and 70's RWD cars which I have tended to keep as hobby cars, I was getting equally bored with dull, idiot proof daily drivers. Even an E46 M3 and a 350bhp 335D failed to really engage me recently and I have ended up with a 3 litre Alfa 75 which I really love.

It requires concentration to drive well, is an absolute hoot in the wet and is actually surprisingly comfortable and refined. I think I could actually keep this one for some time...

Excellent choice. Now look up some period mags and ask yourself if after reading the tests, if you would have bought it in its age. I somehow doubt it.

[nickfrog]

Reardy Mister said:

it has been blessed with 255 section rear tyres and no LSD. (...) No LSD to easily overcome both sides and evoke a low speed slide.

A LSD is device that increases traction, not reduce it so its absence would be a help if anything.

[errek72]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

That depends on your definition of 'rubbish'. I would not know what, pray tell, is wrong with an Alfa 75, Saab 900 turbo or Citroen CX.

[sisu]

FFS this is like some automotive version of Buzzfeed - linking everything to the 90's

Then everyone crying about why things are this way? Pretty much an Automotive version of this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ysyZF-DZFY

[Apache]

errek72 said:

anonymous said:

[redacted]

That depends on your definition of 'rubbish'. I would not know what, pray tell, is wrong with an Alfa 75, Saab 900 turbo or Citroen CX.

was going to say something similar, it's what this thread boils down to, define rubbish. I'm on my second 9000, an Aero and have had two 900 turbos, loved em all. Mercedes, recently have had more rust problems than Alfa too

[herebebeasties]

nickfrog said:

A LSD is device that increases traction, not reduce it so its absence would be a help if anything.

That's somewhat inaccurate. It's merely a device that limits the speed difference between two wheels (or shafts if you must - no reason you can't have a central LSD in a 4x4 arrangement). You can therefore use it to ensure you spin up *both* rear wheels instead of just the inside one, allowing you to *decrease* traction of the outside wheel (which has most of the weight and therefore grip on it), allowing you to provoke power-oversteer more easily and usually in a more easily-controllable fashion.

[will261058]

There are more people that know sod all about these things than there are enthusiasts and so all the products are market driven by the bean counters.

[Cobnapint]

True Chris. The best thing I ever remember driving was a D reg Mk 1 Toyota MR2 - no power steering or ABS - but it did have a relatively hard/thin rimmed steering wheel and went like a go-kart.

Total bliss

[collateral]

The problem is, where does it end? My Y reg Puma has me dodging potholes and/or bending wheels as it is...

Out of the cars I've owned, the one which rode the best was my Dturbo on (iirc) 65 profile rubber. It was chuckable too because of that cheeky rear suspension which also let the boot be nice and big. Driving it back to back with a brand new mk5 Golf TDI was the difference between light and day, and sadly I can only see things getting worse.

[Notanotherturbo]

I've thought this for a long time but was overwealmingly reinforced on a recent car experience day I went on. I drove the latest M3, C63 Merc and a Gallardo and while the Merc was quite alot of fun with its torquey engine and ability to go sideways very easily I was hugely disappointed with the other 2 cars. The Gallardo was fast and beautifully built but the brakes were horribly snatchy and unprogressive and the autobox was very jerky. The M3 I just thought was dull! You had to ring its neck to get it to go and while everything was smooth and it handled well you felt completed removed from the process of driving it. The thing is you need very little driving ability to drive modern performance cars very fast, which is kinda scary in a way.

[nickfrog]

herebebeasties said:

nickfrog said:

A LSD is device that increases traction, not reduce it so its absence would be a help if anything.

That's somewhat inaccurate. It's merely a device that limits the speed difference between two wheels

Absolutely, it therefore optimises traction, therefore increases overall traction. And in the earlier particular example it would have raised the traction threshold even more, ie the point at which the rear end loses longitudinal adhesion, making it even harder to "get the back end out". I agree that it makes holding a slide easier once that threshold has been breached but that's only useful if you can start a slide in the first place...

I genuinely thought the primary aim of a LSD was to improve traction. I doubt it was originally designed as a drift aid.