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The Car Thread


MadManMike

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Strap bike upside down with bars at front of cage, rear wheel strapped to rear of cage, job done :-

On the subject of crazy cars, had a short play on track yesterday in a 480kg S2000 (255bhp) engined beast with a Sadev box and Geartronics setup with paddles. Such a strange feeling keeping your right foot flat on upshifts and not having any break in acceleration, and your left foot on the brake (autoblip downshifts) - was like a real life computer game, haha. So easy to drive quickly as well, was within a couple of seconds of the owner after having only driven 3 laps (one of which was a warm up - more a testament to the car than my driving I'm sure!). Definitely goes in the 'I want one of those' category, highly recommend having a drive of a similar gearbox setup if you get the chance, its just weird (but awesome)...

PS. My 1.4 tdci Fiesta never got anywhere near the book figures, best I ever had was 66mpg, more realistically low-mid 50s. Then the cambelt shat itself a little over half way into the service interval, completely destroying the engine.

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I have a 1.6tdci feista zetec S, and it's slow. I can only imagine the 1.4 is painful!

I want a sequential box so badly Adam, but it's one thing i can say with certainty will never happen in this car! i think a bike engined kit car one day would be my most likely route to a sequential

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Strap bike upside down with bars at front of cage, rear wheel strapped to rear of cage, job done :-

On the subject of crazy cars, had a short play on track yesterday in a 480kg S2000 (255bhp) engined beast with a Sadev box and Geartronics setup with paddles. Such a strange feeling keeping your right foot flat on upshifts and not having any break in acceleration, and your left foot on the brake (autoblip downshifts) - was like a real life computer game, haha. So easy to drive quickly as well, was within a couple of seconds of the owner after having only driven 3 laps (one of which was a warm up - more a testament to the car than my driving I'm sure!). Definitely goes in the 'I want one of those' category, highly recommend having a drive of a similar gearbox setup if you get the chance, its just weird (but awesome)...

PS. My 1.4 tdci Fiesta never got anywhere near the book figures, best I ever had was 66mpg, more realistically low-mid 50s. Then the cambelt shat itself a little over half way into the service interval, completely destroying the engine.

i have been looking at the sadev box that comes in the 620r gets alot better reviews than the quaife units, mega bucks though

was it a 7 like car? 480kg for the s2000 engines cars is very very light as its a heavy old lump!

there is a nice supercharged one doing the speed series at the moment

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Nick - yeah, sequential is awesome, it was the paddles and autoblip that made the biggest difference though. Being able to have both hands on the wheel at all times and both feet constantly on the pedals was amazing.

i have been looking at the sadev box that comes in the 620r gets alot better reviews than the quaife units, mega bucks though

was it a 7 like car? 480kg for the s2000 engines cars is very very light as its a heavy old lump!

there is a nice supercharged one doing the speed series at the moment

Yeah - but it is cheaper than the Quaife and customer service is better...

Aye, a Westfield. LOTS of carbon (including the bellhousing!). This one competes against the car you mention. Those guys are having serious handling issues at the moment I hear!

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not surprised with the power it has!

i good friend of mine sprints in the speed series in his XE westy, john hoyle does very well with it proper rapid road legal machine 143mph last time out on the limiter 300m before the finish isnt bad for a n/a house brick with wheels!

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To be fair it's not the power, it's the ride height and the spring rates. They are lowering the back end too much, giving too much roll couple, meaning they need really hard springs (currently on 300lbs/in with almost vertical shocks!) and stiff ARB to counter body roll, which is giving them no grip. Followed the car round at a track day last year and it looked an absolute nightmare to drive!

Small world - met John at a few sprints last year (and Derek and Garry) :) Which track was the 143mph at, Aintree?

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Indeed. I feel like sending either Derek or Garry a message with some suggestions but I'd feel cheeky...

Ah, yeah Aintree is probably the fastest over-the-line of the season. John must have added some ponies over the winter!

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Mark - I'm not bumming Leon's just because I've owned two and still have one, but a 1.9 TDI is good on fuel and with seats folded down my DMR fits in with no wheel removal.

They're small enough to drive comfortably but big enough to tank along the motorway in.

You can get a decent one for about £1,000 if you're not fussed about getting the higher BHP ones.

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Or if you are, like me, you're better off getting a mk4 Golf as there are so many more of them around that they don't demand such a premium. Shame really; I'd ideally swap mine for a Leon Cupra/FR TDI but looks like I'll be in a Golf soon instead. New and different though, I guess.

Mike's right though. If you don't need big power a 110/115 could fit the bill pretty nicely.

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Indeed. I feel like sending either Derek or Garry a message with some suggestions but I'd feel cheeky...

Ah, yeah Aintree is probably the fastest over-the-line of the season. John must have added some ponies over the winter!

with that much money in a car though they must have a rough idea or be able to have a chat with a specialist to get them in the ball park regards there setup, i presume its the normal IRS rear end?

yes john had a new engine over winter its a fair chunk quicker!

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The rough idea is what gets you into trouble though (I know, I've done it!). You think you know enough to make an informed choice, but there are other factors you don't enough know about. They have tried to get the car as low as possible to lower CoG thinking it improves handling - which it does - but it's totally upset the suspension design so overall it's a negative effect :(

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I could handle an estate, I'm not particularly fussed about that aspect of things. I'd rather have too much car than too little.

Cheers for all the other suggestions from everyone too! Been lurking on various websites today seeing what's around. Doesn't seem to be much in my area that people have really mentioned - there's one TDCi Focus but it's a reasonable distance (i.e. getting a train) away. Thinking of checking out that 1.6 Focus later on today anyway. I can't remember if I said in here but I rode past that dealership last night and it seems in pretty good condition. It's done 141,000 miles though which is kind of a downside.

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Fire in attendance unrelated?

The neighbour showed up in that about 10 mins previous. It was some huge mobile command centre thing.

Reason for scrapping? Del Sols are lovely!

Rot and engine robbery.

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Well held at 3.50 f**k me!!

Cheers :) More in the vid below.

And the front bumper survived? :o

Amazingly it did! New record!

Jesus Christ Alex, that looks mad amounts of fun.

It was the most fun I had in my life. Lot of ape noises came out after each run. The rush you get during a run like that is unreal.

Bloopers and outtakes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXbxVA2IcFo

The clip with telemetry seems like good braking but a lot of poo came out. Grass is full of stumps and on smooth tyres there's no way you can correct where you're going once you're off. Personal favourite is 1:29. On the last clip one can also hear the diff starting to fail, it will not last more than about 5 more miles.

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I think you'll be massively let down with the petrol focus mark. They're reallllly heavy and a 1.6 just doesn't get it anywhere without you having to rag the tits off it. Awful mpg too for what it is.

Have you driven one of the 1.6 Focus's's's's's's's's out of interest? I remembered you said you'd driven a few of them but wasn't sure if that was included. MPG seems to be largely the best for the petrol ones from what I can tell. It only having a 1.6 is a bit of a concern, but I need to get something sorted and it seems apart from that, there's just thousands of 206's people want to get rid of lining the streets of Bristol :P

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Have you driven one of the 1.6 Focus's's's's's's's's out of interest? I remembered you said you'd driven a few of them but wasn't sure if that was included. MPG seems to be largely the best for the petrol ones from what I can tell. It only having a 1.6 is a bit of a concern, but I need to get something sorted and it seems apart from that, there's just thousands of 206's people want to get rid of lining the streets of Bristol :P

i have i work for Ford and get to drive most engine and car combo's and for a daily normal car personally i wouldn't want a 1.6 petrol, maybe fine for my mum who nips to the shops or takes to dog out but there not a spritley machine and you have to flog them to get them to move in reality i would think combined mpg will be around 35-38mpg if you want to go the same pace of normal traffic, if you dont mind playing the mpg game im sure you could get into the 40's but would be painful

on the plus side they are cheaper to repair and less to go wrong over a diesel car

what kind of money do you want to spend?

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Cool cool. Sort of what I expected realistically...

Looking to spend around £1,000 or so. Could stretch a bit more but I'd kind of prefer not to so I can spend that money on fun stuff instead :P There's a Focus 2.0 Ghia petrol piece just round the corner from me but it's around £1,395 plus it needs tax so I'm not sure I'd like to go quite that high.

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