Performance ???
Discussion
Gorvid said:
How much difference is there - performance wise - between a Chimaera / Cerbera / Griff ???
I know the stats are listed as different but how reliable are they ??? (the stats that is..)
I'm having great difficulties in deciding what I want....
Quick summary: Ch&Gr are the same car, big jump in performance to Cerb. Performance stats close, (bhp figs=lots of debate but who cares.) £20K will buy a nice example of any of the three but Cerb will cost a lot more to run. All great cars. Good luck.
Somebody correct me if I'm way out but:
Essentially the Griff and Chimaera are the same (in terms of performance). The Cerbera is a different beast. It's got a flat plane overhead cam V8 giving it a much revvier character. To get the power you have be over 4k rpm. I rode in a Cerbera (which admittedly was not in the greatest of health) and it didn't feel that quick up to 4.5k rpm, then it went nuts. The Rover V8 in the Griff/Chim is much more American in character - throbbing, woofling, torquey. The Griff and Chim pick up and go all the way through the rev range, but need changing up before 6k rpm. The Cerb goes on to 7k-something. The Cerb is a hard top and has many more TVR-only parts (engine, ECU, switch gear etc). It's a lot more expensive to put right and service. It sounds like a Ferrari where the Griff/Chim sound like a Camaro.
You can run a Griff/Chim daily for hundreds per year (if you're lucky). A Cerb will almost certainly cost you into the thousands - but you get another league of perfomance especially at the top end. Will you use that performance on a daily basis? Do you want the wind in your hair?
To really muddle things I'd have thought a closer competitor to the Cerbera is an Esprit V8...
Essentially the Griff and Chimaera are the same (in terms of performance). The Cerbera is a different beast. It's got a flat plane overhead cam V8 giving it a much revvier character. To get the power you have be over 4k rpm. I rode in a Cerbera (which admittedly was not in the greatest of health) and it didn't feel that quick up to 4.5k rpm, then it went nuts. The Rover V8 in the Griff/Chim is much more American in character - throbbing, woofling, torquey. The Griff and Chim pick up and go all the way through the rev range, but need changing up before 6k rpm. The Cerb goes on to 7k-something. The Cerb is a hard top and has many more TVR-only parts (engine, ECU, switch gear etc). It's a lot more expensive to put right and service. It sounds like a Ferrari where the Griff/Chim sound like a Camaro.
You can run a Griff/Chim daily for hundreds per year (if you're lucky). A Cerb will almost certainly cost you into the thousands - but you get another league of perfomance especially at the top end. Will you use that performance on a daily basis? Do you want the wind in your hair?
To really muddle things I'd have thought a closer competitor to the Cerbera is an Esprit V8...
Gazboy said:
Results from the last Vmax:
Cerbera: 171mph
Chim 5.0: 157mph
Chim 4.0: 147mph
The Cerb is breathtakingly quick, it truley is in another league.
Nicely put. Griff and Chim are the same car under the skin... Cerb is a different beast altogether... in terms of performance AND wallet bashing.
griffter said:
Somebody correct me if I'm way out but: The Cerbera has got a flat plane overhead cam V8 giving it a much revvier character. To really muddle things I'd have thought a closer competitor to the Cerbera is an Esprit V8...
The Cerb V8 has a single cam in the bottom of the V and an in-plane (or flat) crank. IMHO the Esprit V8 is more of a T350 competitor but I do see your point as it also is a british V8 with a flat crank.
JR said:
Somebody correct me if I'm way out but: The Cerbera has got a flat plane overhead cam V8 giving it a much revvier character. To really muddle things I'd have thought a closer competitor to the Cerbera is an Esprit V8...
The Cerb V8 has a single cam in the bottom of the V and an in-plane (or flat) crank. IMHO the Esprit V8 is more of a T350 competitor but I do see your point as it also is a british V8 with a flat crank.
cerb has 2 cams, one on each head ..
Gorvid said:
How much difference is there - performance wise - between a Chimaera / Cerbera / Griff ???
I know the stats are listed as different but how reliable are they ??? (the stats that is..)
I'm having great difficulties in deciding what I want....
Performance is very much dictated by power to weight, the cerb is about 200kg heavier than the chim or griff so off the line there's not much in it cos traction limits the power effect, but once you stop spinning the cerb has it. at the top end the extra power really pushes through the air where the other two are floundering.
look at these hp figures .. the RV8 guys have to spend a lot of money getting figures like this, but if you want 0-100 in under 10 seconds and 12 second quarter miles this is what you're aiming for :
4.5 CERBERA
1.Ceejay……… 392 bhp - 364 lbs torque (Joospeed engine mods/Emerald)
2.Satman……… 377bhp - 369 lbs torque (Joospeed Emerald)
3.Cyclone……… 375bhp - 365 lbs torque (Joospeed Emerald)…. see note below
4.Angusfaldo……365bhp – 352 lbs torque (Joospeed standard)
5.Katanarog…….365bhp – 345 lbs torque (TVR Factory's Red Rose upgrade)
6.PaulH…………353bhp – 325 lbs torque
7.MarkJ…………352bhp – 326 lbs torque
8.Blue4.5………...348bhp – 344 lbs torque
9.Richard………..346bhp – 348 lbs torque
10.PetrolTed……...345bhp – 342 lbs torque (Topcats)
11.GCerbera………342bhp – 318 lbs torque
12.Cooperturbo……338bhp – 320 lbs torque
13.Bennett24……...337bhp – 332 lbs torque
14.John.s………….336bhp – 335 lbs torque
15.Neilus………….332bhp – 338 lbs torque (Austec injector clean)
Cyclone’s first run, in standard form, made 339 bhp – 338 lbs torque, which when changing the ECU to a Joospeed Emerald, with a map copied from Satman’s Emerald ECU, made +36bhp and +27 lbs torque gains.
Sure, the Cerb is faster but only at high speeds (> 120 mph). Haven't seen a Cerb win the Sprint at the Continental Meeting at Zolder and haven't lost a sprint to one yet (even before the upgrades). Of course good sorted ones, like Joolz is listing, would be faster. But they have a fixed roof ...
Love the Cerb though, would like to run it as a everyday car, but probably way too expensive and there is no dealer around here in the south of France.
Love the Cerb though, would like to run it as a everyday car, but probably way too expensive and there is no dealer around here in the south of France.
Hvaing just been on a track day at Oulton in the standard Chim450. I'd say the cerbs were significantly quicker down the straights. I know there will be a difference based on driver and corner exit speed, but even in the last session when I felt that I was startig to get to know the circuit and was lapping considerably quicker I was still confortably past by cerbs on the straight.
Did manage to hang on to one for a few laps but it was apparent that this was only due to later breaking in the bends, and carrying a little more speed round.
Did manage to hang on to one for a few laps but it was apparent that this was only due to later breaking in the bends, and carrying a little more speed round.
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