Urban myths about cars

[Strawman]

dougc said:

And the old classic

Henri Toivonen once lapped Estoril in a Lancia S4 quick enough to get a decent grid position in the GP that year.

Which people still argue about....

Apparently the time quoted while good enough to get high up the grid, is not for a full lap, he took a short cut via a dirt road across the middle of a section missing out some bends, still a good story though.

[tali1]

Jderh said:

tali1 said:

Poledriver said:

The Mitsubishi Stallion should have had it's model name communicated in writing, not verbally!
BTW, are there any Starions still on the road?

Pratt Clarkson wrecked the last Starion sold in UK
http://www.starion-turbo.co.uk/ 

I am pretty damn sure that the rally prepped one wrecked in that episode was in fact not the same car, given that I saw the red car alledgedly used or that episode for sale some time later.....

Yes you're right J546 MDD- is still on road

[Twincharged]

dougc said:

Not sure whether they are true or not but often repeated:

The Toyota MR2 is called the MR in France on account of the French pronunciation of MR2 sounding like the word 'st'

MR2 would be em-err-du- similar to "merdes"


Another one- the Vauxhall Nova was called "Corsa" in european countries due to nova meaning "doesn't go" in spanish.

[cslgirl]

The M3 csl has a cardboard boot floor....

[heckler]

Poledriver said:

The Mitsubishi Stallion should have had it's model name communicated in writing, not verbally!
BTW, are there any Starions still on the road?

Saw one this week in Leeds - was worthy of a double take!

[Xenocide]

Twincharged said:

Another one- the Vauxhall Nova was called "Corsa" in european countries due to nova meaning "doesn't go" in spanish.

Irony

[DippedHeadlights]

What about the 80s VW one that the Golf was originally going to be called the Gulf - theory being that the cars were named after winds and they had the Jetta and the Scirocco.

[Hooli]

DippedHeadlights said:

What about the 80s VW one that the Golf was originally going to be called the Gulf - theory being that the cars were named after winds and they had the Jetta and the Scirocco.

i thought it was the rabbit? or was that the original name for the polo?

[MrKipling43]

The McLaren F1 is the best car ever made.

[Skodaku]

Poor old Chevrolet with their Camaro, which translates as Donkey in Spanish.

[Strawman]

Hooli said:

DippedHeadlights said:

What about the 80s VW one that the Golf was originally going to be called the Gulf - theory being that the cars were named after winds and they had the Jetta and the Scirocco.

i thought it was the rabbit? or was that the original name for the polo?

The Golf was only called Rabbit in America AFAIK then switched to Golf later on.

[humph]

cslgirl said:

The M3 csl has a cardboard boot floor....

So is that true or false?

[Whynot]

Mitsubishi Pajero (the other name for the Mitsubishi Shogun), in Spanish a Pajero is a manual labourer in a field but more commonly means 'wr'.

I used to own one...

[cslgirl]

humph said:

cslgirl said:

The M3 csl has a cardboard boot floor....

So is that true or false?

False.

"Fiberglass-reinforced plastic is used for the rear bumper supports and this material is also "sandwiched" with thermoplastics and foam to create the trunk floor and rear bulkhead. "

I had the OEM exhaust in the boot when it was changed over to the Gruppe M and that weighed a hell of a lot so it can take a lot of weight.

[Hooli]

cslgirl said:

humph said:

cslgirl said:

The M3 csl has a cardboard boot floor....

So is that true or false?

False.

"Fiberglass-reinforced plastic is used for the rear bumper supports and this material is also "sandwiched" with thermoplastics and foam to create the trunk floor and rear bulkhead. "

I had the OEM exhaust in the boot when it was changed over to the Gruppe M and that weighed a hell of a lot so it can take a lot of weight.

see its fake plywood really

[cslgirl]

Hooli said:

cslgirl said:

humph said:

cslgirl said:

The M3 csl has a cardboard boot floor....

So is that true or false?

False.

"Fiberglass-reinforced plastic is used for the rear bumper supports and this material is also "sandwiched" with thermoplastics and foam to create the trunk floor and rear bulkhead. "

I had the OEM exhaust in the boot when it was changed over to the Gruppe M and that weighed a hell of a lot so it can take a lot of weight.

see its fake plywood really

[ELAN+2]

The one that really annoys me(anorak mode) is that the Lotus 900 series engine was based on the Vauxhall slant 4 of the same era, in reality Lotus noticed the bore centres of the Vauxhall lump were the same as thier new engine and used the vauxhall blocks to speed up head development. A variation of this engine was used in the Europa shaped race cars. The engine Lotus supplied to Jensen was a totally Lotus design with an alloy block as also used in the Elite/Eclat/Excell and Esprit. A derivative was also used in the Sunbeam Lotus.

Vauxhall, however did use Lotus heads on thier HSR rally cars(cheating) but came up with thier own design later that was also used in the 16v HSR Chevettes!

Another one is the Rover SDI its actually SD1 (special development 1 IIRC) SD2 was the TR7

Another Automotive Lotus myth is the "Black Badge Models" supposedly the black badge was introduced on the death of Jim Clarke..not true... reality is that Lotus had a large batch of black badges made for the JPS sponsorship tie up and they were going to be fitted to the Elans/Europas/Plus 2s when stock of the original green/yellow badges had run out, some where fitted in error(possibly as a personal tribute to the late Jim Clarke by a production employee) and Mr C did his nut, demanding the yellow and greens were used up first. I pity the poor fools who pay a premium for "black badge " models, the two badges are interchangeable and the black one is cheaper!!

All of the above tales feature regularly in well researched magazine articles and it raises the question over the accuracy of other articles about other marques when these glaring mistakes are made!

Mark

[dr matt uk]

Some really good ones on here!

Now someone help me with this one I heard recently.
The RR badge on a Rolls Royce started out red
When Mr Rolls and/or Mr Royce passed away, it was then changed to black.
True or false?

I know I could probably look it up on the RR website, but I'm a bit lazy really..

[Gemsbok1000]

dr matt uk said:

Some really good ones on here!

Now someone help me with this one I heard recently.
The RR badge on a Rolls Royce started out red
When Mr Rolls and/or Mr Royce passed away, it was then changed to black.
True or false?

I know I could probably look it up on the RR website, but I'm a bit lazy really..

False Im afraid. It was changed either in the twenties or thirties and was purely for aethetics.

Edited to add link;

http://www.content4reprint.com/cars-and-trucks/cla...

Edited by Gemsbok1000 on Thursday 13th March 22:40

[fourwheelsteer]

dr matt uk said:

Some really good ones on here!

Now someone help me with this one I heard recently.
The RR badge on a Rolls Royce started out red
When Mr Rolls and/or Mr Royce passed away, it was then changed to black.
True or false?

I know I could probably look it up on the RR website, but I'm a bit lazy really..

Myth, as is the story that R-R dropped the red badge because red was the colour of the communists in the Russian Revolution. The truth is that red didn't always go with the colour of the coachwork so the badges were changed to black, which went with any colour.