The Fast & the...........

[jr429]

Re: The Fast & the...........

I doubt many of us here could legitimately claim we have not done exactly the same thing. Can one really be "alive" if one hasn't?

Interestingly, as I get older, and thus have less time left on this planet, I seem to be in much less of a rush (than when I was younger) to get where I am going when I am driving.

In my ill spent youth I used to subscribe to a theory of "intelligent speeding"...picking your time and location to maximize the opportunity, minimize the chances of having it spoiled by the constabulary and their flashing lights, and avoiding interfering with routine civilians. High speed runs in the very early morning hours down the Fraser Canyon highway ranked near the top of the list. It might have been "safer", but it still wasn't really "safe". But then anybody who is actually alive, is making these sorts of choices all the time...and may the government's Safety Nazis always be playing catch up...

Well said!!!

[jk]

Re: The Fast & the...........

Most everyone believes they are a better driver than they really are. That seems a constant whether one owns a Honda Civic or a Cayenne Turbo. I can't think of any reason why people who can afford $450,000 cars would be any different

80% of drivers are above average.

[GRG55]

Re: The Fast & the...........

80% of drivers are above average.

only 80%???

[GRG55]

Re: The Fast & the...........

Well said!!!

While we are on the subject of fast cars on slow streets, here's an all time classic. A morning drive through the streets of Paris in August 1978. When the film was first released the storyline ran something like this:

Rendezvous in Paris On an August morning in 1978, French filmmaker Claude Lelouch mounted a gyro-stabilized camera to the bumper of a Ferrari 275 GTB and had a friend, a professional Formula 1 racer, drive at breakneck speed through the heart of Paris early in the morning . The film was limited for technical reasons to 10 minutes; the course was from Porte Dauphine, through the Louvre, to the Basilica of Sacre Coeur.No streets were closed, for Lelouch was unable to obtain a permit.The driver completed the course in about 9 minutes, reaching nearly 140 MPH in some stretches. The footage reveals him running real red lights, nearly hitting real pedestrians, and driving the wrong way up real one-way streets.Upon showing the film in public for the first time, Lelouch was arrested. He has never revealed the identity of the driver, and the film went underground.

At the time there was much speculation as to the alleged F1 driver's identity...with the popular votes at the time going to Canadian Gille Villeneuve,, his close friend Patrick Tambay, and René Arnoux, who was in his rookie season in F1. But the current story is the film was made using a camera mounted to a Mercedes 450 SEL 6.9 and the soundtrack was dubbed using film maker Claude Lelouch's Ferrari 275GTB.

https://www.facebook.com/video/video...=2043762289244

[photon555]

Re: The Fast & the...........

While we are on the subject of fast cars on slow streets, here's an all time classic. A morning drive through the streets of Paris in August 1978. When the film was first released the storyline ran something like this:

Rendezvous in Paris On an August morning in 1978, French filmmaker Claude Lelouch mounted a gyro-stabilized camera to the bumper of a Ferrari 275 GTB and had a friend, a professional Formula 1 racer, drive at breakneck speed through the heart of Paris early in the morning . The film was limited for technical reasons to 10 minutes; the course was from Porte Dauphine, through the Louvre, to the Basilica of Sacre Coeur.No streets were closed, for Lelouch was unable to obtain a permit.The driver completed the course in about 9 minutes, reaching nearly 140 MPH in some stretches. The footage reveals him running real red lights, nearly hitting real pedestrians, and driving the wrong way up real one-way streets.Upon showing the film in public for the first time, Lelouch was arrested. He has never revealed the identity of the driver, and the film went underground.

At the time there was much speculation as to the alleged F1 driver's identity...with the popular votes at the time going to Canadian Gille Villeneuve,, his close friend Patrick Tambay, and René Arnoux, who was in his rookie season in F1. But the current story is the film was made using a camera mounted to a Mercedes 450 SEL 6.9 and the soundtrack was dubbed using film maker Claude Lelouch's Ferrari 275GTB.

https://www.facebook.com/video/video...=2043762289244

I don't know; seems like he could have gone a little faster.

[Mega]

Re: The Fast & the...........

I had a "Loan" (We repo-ed it) of a 944 turbo for a weekend.....the best balanced car i ever drove!
Mike

[Mega]

Re: The Fast & the...........

It was shot using a Modd-ed camera running a differant speed to give the impression of speed....it was shot from an Citroen esate car that you could walk faster. The film was made to show the film ind what Could be done with their new camera.

Mike

[Mega]

Re: The Fast & the...........

If you thought i was a bit rough on Walker..........
http://www.carscoops.com/2013/12/wri...glad-paul.html

[flintlock]

Re: The Fast & the...........

[QUOTE=GRG55;271605]I doubt many of us here could legitimately claim we have not done exactly the same thing. Can one really be "alive" if one hasn't?

Interestingly, as I get older, and thus have less time left on this planet, I seem to be in much less of a rush (than when I was younger) to get where I am going when I am driving.

In my ill spent youth I used to subscribe to a theory of "intelligent speeding"...picking your time and location to maximize the opportunity, minimize the chances of having it spoiled by the constabulary and their flashing lights, and avoiding interfering with routine civilians. High speed runs in the very early morning hours down the Fraser Canyon highway ranked near the top of the list. It might have been "safer", but it still wasn't really "safe". But then anybody who is actually alive, is making these sorts of choices all the time...and may the government's Safety Nazis always be playing catch up...[/QUOT

I am on the road, usually in heavy traffic, not highways, 3 to 5 hours a day. I learned long ago that excessive speeding doesn't really get you there much faster. I'll watch guys speed past at 90 mph, then pull up next to them 10 minutes later. If you are travelling cross country, sure, but rush hour traffic, it doesn't help much. Yesterday a motorcycle passed me going about 90mph on a 4 lane road in heavy traffic that was moving along at about 40mph. He was driving right down the middle on the dotted line between lanes. Insane. And it was raining and foggy. Future Darwin award winner.

[santafe2]

Re: The Fast & the...........

This article needs to be taken into context. Back in 03/04 when this car was released the fastest cars on the road had 400HP with a handful at 500hp. Nobody drove 600+HP street cars just like no one drives 900HP street cars today (La Ferraria, Veneno, Veyron), yet today every performance street car is now 500+ HP. The problem with the Carrera GT is lack of traction control - even a 250HP car without traction control will get most drivers into trouble much less one dialed in for the track - the contact patch on tires is only so big even if you're running a 335 width tire. If you read other reviews you'll get the same reaction from lucky testers who got their hands on the Veyron, Veneno, etc - afterall they are writing to what their readers want to hear.

I was glad to see you mention that the Carrera GT Paul Walker was driving has notorious handling issues and is probably best suited for a professional driver. I've owned three different Porsches in my life, (currently going old school with a 62 notchback), and the only thing I know for sure is that I have no business driving any of them close to their handling limit, not that I didn't a few times when I was younger. I think for any of us who like fast cars it simply reminded us that he could have been any of us in our earlier, indestructible period.

And I'll weigh in on the mid-engine conversation. From a Porsche driver's point of view, the mid-engine Porsche Cayman S with PDK and PASM might be the best handling Porsche ever built. Just my opinion of course.

And finally, for anyone who loves fast cars but would never consider owning one, this, (or a place like it), should be on your bucket list.
http://www.exoticsracing.com/Exotic-...-vegas_6_1.htm

[EJ]

Re: The Fast & the...........

There's quite a bit of difference between those factors that cause a particular chassis to oversteer or understeer, and how that same chassis responds once that condition starts.

Most any car...front-engine, rear-engine, it doesn't matter...can be set up to bias towards understeer or oversteer. Camber, tire size, wheel offset, the size and pre-torsion on the front and rear anti-sway bars, and host of other things can change the car's characteristics quite dramatically. Those are some of the variables I used to use to "tune" my gymkhana racer when I was a student gear.

So there's lots that can be done to keep that rear-engine Porche well behaved...but if you ever lose that back end you better be damn fast on the steering and throttle for quite unlike a front engine car, that mother is going to want to keep going around for reasons that every first year physics student studying Newtonian mechanics will understand.

While we're on memory lane, when I was a kid living in Texas my Dad owned a maroon Turbocharged 1964 Chevrolet Corvair Monza Spyder exactly like the one in this YouTube video.

The transverse engine was mounted behind the rear axle and was so overpowered relative to the chassis that over time creases tended to form on the rear fenders from repeated articulation of the frame.

Have fond memories of blasting down hot Texas hi-ways in that car. My father didn't temper his enthusiasm overmuch in my presence yet I don't recall any mishaps.

In my car owning life I've owned 27 cars. I've have taken each and every one at least once onto a snowy parking lot or vacant road at speed to test the skid handling characteristics. Right out of college I owned a mid-engine Toyota MR2 back when these were great and race-able cars, now a kind of economy "sports" car. Of all of the cars I spun around in the snow the MR2 was the most tricky. It wanted to slip sideways with no particular tendency for either the front or back to break, but once you started to spin... watch out. With the weight almost perfectly centered the slightest rotational momentum caused the car to spin like a top around and around and around. I once got into a spin on Memorial Drive in Cambridge owing to a layer of oily sludge caused by a fresh misty rain on previously waterless but oil-infused pavement. After watching the right hand side guard rail pass my front windshield six times the car finally came to a stop a couple of inches from the rail facing, by sheer luck, exactly in the right direction so that I was able to gently release the clutch and hit the gas and keep going as if nothing happened. After that I took extra care on slippery surfaces.

[Mega]

Re: The Fast & the...........

Mark 1 MR2 or Mark 2 ?
Mike

[Mega]

Re: The Fast & the...........

Ok, The Report is IN:-
http://www.carscoops.com/2014/01/pol...at-killed.html
As we all knew he was MOVING.......+100 mph.........i think its a 45 mph zone...

[jr429]

Re: The Fast & the...........

Ok, The Report is IN:-
http://www.carscoops.com/2014/01/pol...at-killed.html
As we all knew he was MOVING.......+100 mph.........i think its a 45 mph zone...

That's pretty quick even in an industrial area. At WOT from a dead stop I would say it takes about 7-8 seconds for that car to hit 100mph. I've been there a few times it's downhill with a gradual turn. The street is wide enough to give a sense of security but obviously dangerous enough to be unforgiving if your backend kicks out and you cannot pull it back in. Sometimes pushing the car that extra 10-20% can cost you your life as sadly happened in this case.

[jr429]

Re: The Fast & the...........

While we're on memory lane, when I was a kid living in Texas my Dad owned a maroon Turbocharged 1964 Chevrolet Corvair Monza Spyder exactly like the one in this YouTube video.

The transverse engine was mounted behind the rear axle and was so overpowered relative to the chassis that over time creases tended to form on the rear fenders from repeated articulation of the frame.

Have fond memories of blasting down hot Texas hi-ways in that car. My father didn't temper his enthusiasm overmuch in my presence yet I don't recall any mishaps.

In my car owning life I've owned 27 cars. I've have taken each and every one at least once onto a snowy parking lot or vacant road at speed to test the skid handling characteristics. Right out of college I owned a mid-engine Toyota MR2 back when these were great and race-able cars, now a kind of economy "sports" car. Of all of the cars I spun around in the snow the MR2 was the most tricky. It wanted to slip sideways with no particular tendency for either the front or back to break, but once you started to spin... watch out. With the weight almost perfectly centered the slightest rotational momentum caused the car to spin like a top around and around and around. I once got into a spin on Memorial Drive in Cambridge owing to a layer of oily sludge caused by a fresh misty rain on previously waterless but oil-infused pavement. After watching the right hand side guard rail pass my front windshield six times the car finally came to a stop a couple of inches from the rail facing, by sheer luck, exactly in the right direction so that I was able to gently release the clutch and hit the gas and keep going as if nothing happened. After that I took extra care on slippery surfaces.

The SW20 MR2's were beasts. High 12 second cars modded which was incredible for the early 90's and spun on anything including leaves and loose gravel. Very fun cars but could be unforgiving