Red Underwear, Cheap Fiats and Other Moto Stuff

[accwai]

22 hours ago, sphinxsix said:

[...] As for the spoiler - remember problem with the first generation of Audi TT and its lack of stability at high speeds (some car journalists had some accidents related to this issue)? To improve it Audi engineers had changed the car's ESP and ASR settings, modified the suspension and added this little thing: 

 

 

which was said to add I think (I may be wrong though) about 20kg at 200km/h.

 

A quick internet lookup returns something like 60/40 weight distribution on the Audi TT across generations. What's the TT's dynamic tendency in general and how does adding 20kg at 200kph play into that?

 

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[...] What I know is that Fiat had no problems with stability, had a really good grip for a 2 wheels drive

 

I heard this is 2 wheel drive as well. Is the grip on it any good?

 

 

13 hours ago, sphinxsix said:

Moving somewhat towards the high end of the price spectrum - if there was an unlimited number of zeroes on my bank account, I would probably get this one, build a private race track (and funded a forest to compensate for CO2 emission) 

 

Looks like something called 918 is in Assetto Corsa's Porsche Pack 1:

 

 

 

Is it anywhere near as good as the one in your post?

[accwai]

20 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

I'll take an Alfa instead...

 

If a clean BMW Z4M Coupé appears on the market, I will probably snap it up.The one below is a E85 roadster instead of E86 coupé:

 

 

After this, the Z4 turns into E89 then G29 ← Toyota Supra V. Yikes!

 

19 hours ago, sphinxsix said:

First of all I would say that quite often the situation in which rear of the car becomes more dynamic/faster than its front isn't a good thing 

 

Hmm... See the video above starting 3:22.

 

11 hours ago, bluesman said:

[...] Lighter wheels and tires can help acceleration, as can a lightened flywheel. [...]

 

Carbon fiber driveshaft seems to be all the rage these days. Combining that with light flywheel, carbon ceramic rotors and forged magnesium wheels could have fairly significant effects. And speaking of carbon fiber, the Lambo Sesto Elemento is almost entirely made of that. The red shimmer on the body color is embedded in the weave of the panels. It is not painted outside or in.

 

The Sesto is in Assetto Corsa by the way. So it's possible to try it out in there.

 

1 hour ago, bluesman said:

[...] There are a few in my clubs and race groups who’ll spend and do anything to win. [...]

 

Somebody on the internet once said some are in there for perfection of form and some are in there for the competition. If one gets caught up in the competitive spirit, spending anything to win might not be that far off. Hardware on the car isn't the only thing to spend money on though. Somebody e-mail'd about this one recently:

 

https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/p/690726

 

And simulators seem to be a rather integral part these days. Price on the high end stuff can be positively serious...

[accwai]

21 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

YES! 

 

21 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

I'll take an Alfa instead...

 

I see

 

46 minutes ago, accwai said:

If a clean BMW Z4M Coupé appears on the market, I will probably snap it up.

 

If you mean taking the Alfa over Radical, something like that BMW would probably be a good daily driver to complement to an Alfaholics, Radical, Caterham, whatever.

[accwai]

21 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

I have driven both the Z3M and Z4M coupes and loved them both. If I had the space I would probably own a Z4M coupe.

 

If one must have that one more car, this would be a rather cost effective option:

 

[accwai]

14 hours ago, Confused said:

[...]

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/cars/news/let-s-relive-the-2019-goodwood-revival/ss-BB18WCeF?ocid=msnews#image=1

 

Wouldn't the GT40 be in there somewhere?

[accwai]

On 9/21/2020 at 9:02 AM, sphinxsix said:

I'm glad someone thinks of that more orless the same way that I do..  

Seems it's still BMW not Audi, at least sometimes..

 

Probably depends more on the model now:

 

 

Now back up a little if you don't mind:

 

On 9/3/2020 at 10:49 AM, sphinxsix said:

[...] As for the red underwear - the later 20V version had standard Brembo brakes as far as I remember, but I don't know if this counts..

 

So what color of those brake thingies would be better performance? Red?

 

 

Or blue?

 

 

Or something else?

[accwai]

On 9/25/2020 at 12:35 PM, sphinxsix said:

Are you joking.? If something is supposed to be fast it just has to be red!

 

So would yellow be acceptable then?

 

9 hours ago, 992Sam said:

[...]

 

[accwai]

20 hours ago, sphinxsix said:

In this car I'd personally be ready to accept it.. 

 

In case of this one ..I'm not so sure.. 

[...]

you-can-own-one-of-tom-hanks-favorite-cars-the-fiat-126p

 

The neighbor a few doors down has one of these:

 

 

It may look really fast but 126 is two numbers higher so yours must be better performance. Everybody knows you can't argue with math right?

 

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What about you.? 

 

I'm no expert but station wagon is more of my thing:

 

 

The wife says cars must be practical and station wagon is as practical as one can get right?

 

[accwai]

On 10/4/2020 at 7:45 PM, sphinxsix said:

I can only agree with that. We've all seen the 126 rally videos..

 

If 2 numbers up is good, up by 5 again got to be better a whole lot more:

 

 

A good Group 4 homologation edition like the above would likely be in the six-figure range though.

 

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[...] I have a friend who sometimes goes to Germany for a faster, highway ride (no speed limits) but for me this isn't fun either, secondary, winding roads e.g. in Alps are (were) my thing.. Maybe some day.. In some other car (with a bike rack, of course).. 

 

This is quite interesting:

 

 

On 10/5/2020 at 9:28 AM, sphinxsix said:

2. Very simple - what's the car of your dreams,

 

 

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and again - why this one.?

 

The pig's just too cute The ASD active exhaust is rather decent too of course.

[accwai]

On 9/25/2020 at 12:35 PM, sphinxsix said:

Are you joking.? 

If something is supposed to be fast it just has to be red!

 

For sure! People are taking selfies in front of this thing:

 

 

So everybody agrees with you. Can't wait to be knowledgeable enough to understand what the thing is. Until then, no selfies for me.

[accwai]

On 11/6/2020 at 5:40 PM, fas42 said:

A more interesting view of a road mentioned earlier ...

 

Sure, being a motorcycle allows the guy to pull those crazy passes. But the road itself is probably interesting enough that spicing things up with those dangerous stunts might not be all that necessary...

 

On 11/6/2020 at 8:20 PM, fas42 said:

Yes ... I wonder what the injury, etc, count is per season, drivers versus spectators ... 🙃.

 

I'm no expert but hasn't rallying been studied as much as track racing? Here is Jilly Broadbent driving a full Group B spec Peugeot 205 T16 under DiRT Rally 2.0:

 

 

For comparison, this is him driving the Porsche 919 Evo at Nürburgring Nordschleife under Assetto Corsa:

 

 

The run is actually faster than when Porsche later took the car there and broke the lap record... There is obviously huge stylistic difference between the two types of simulator runs of course. If nothing else, look at the frantic footwork in the Peugeot run. The Porsche on the other hand is much faster car but doesn't require this kind of paddle dancing.

[accwai]

21 hours ago, bluesman said:

Ahhh! The good old days......when the tires were skinny and the drivers were fat.

 

That was then, but this is now:

 

 

So one needs to be rather more careful with weight now:

 

 

11 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

It would be impossible to link all the great Porsche rally videos on youtube, so I will offer this link instead. May want to set aside a good chunk of time before clicking this link.

 

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=rally+porsche

 

Interesting... Just checked DiRT Rally 2.0 and a Porsche 911 RGT is in there :

 

 

Apparently there is no specific Porsche 911 GT3 version that is Group R-GT homologated. So each car needs to be prepared to spec and granted an individual R-GT technical passport. And there is the old 911 SC/RS too:

 

 

This one is in Group B so it had set itself up against some real savage beasts, like the Peugeot above. Ouch!

 

[accwai]

13 hours ago, fas42 said:

Adrenaline hit for the day ...

 

The video below is from the AMG GT Black Series' new Nordschleife production/street-legal lap time record run beginning of November:

 

 

It's obviously much faster than an M3, but the actual amazing part is the apparent lack of eventfulness. The nonchalance is downright eerie...

 

3 hours ago, Confused said:

I watched the F1 live at the weekend.  The deceleration caused by the front of Grosjean's car going through the barrier cased the back end of the car to spit off.  The front "safety cell" of his car then continued to proceed fully through the barrier.  Still conscious, he managed to climb out and get over the barrier.

 

The scary part here is probably the fire. But in terms of impact speed, it's actually quite a bit slower than Sophia Flörsch's 2018 crash at Macau. The fact that she's back at F3 in 2019 and started driving LMP2 this year is quite a miracle.

 

3 hours ago, Confused said:

[...] I think the engineering involved here is very impressive. [...]

 

F1 is probably pushing every aspect of both machine and people to the outer edge. One example of such extreme is the pitting sequence for tire change. The change itself is like a little more than 2 sec. The mechanism and procedure for doing this reliably is obviously impressive. But to take full advantage of this, the car needs to come from the pit lane speed limit down to a full stop no more than like an inch off where the team is expecting the wheels to be. If you threshold brake to stop for a traffic light, where would your wheels be at the end?

 

[accwai]

12 hours ago, fas42 said:

Yes, the AMG run is almost a computer game sequence; I lost interest very quickly [...]

 

The car is still a physical object. To make this kind of lap time, the driver still needs to do all the right things at the right time. It's in the video for those interested in this kind of thing

 

As for computer game, proper simulators are actually quite common these days. Many are driving the same car both in real world and computer. Principles are very, very similar. This video compares Toyota GT86 at Nordschleife for real vs in Assetto Corsa:

 

 

In this video, the simracer Jimmy Broadbent got thrown into a GT86 and did pretty well in short order:

 

 

Getting up to speed this fast in a manual transmission 86 is no joke. So simracing apparently does help develop certain real world skills. And the reverse is true too. Many high echelon race drivers are training extensively on simulator these days.

[accwai]

On 11/30/2020 at 4:31 PM, fas42 said:

[...] in the M3 clip, the perspective is everything; you see the driver working the vehicle, at the same time, and in the same view, as the reactions of the passenger, and the broad vista of flow of the track and vehicles in front - everything is connected, and keeps one fully focused.

 

Just found this mirror pair Frank. Probably be more to your taste:

 

 

The Lotus side presents better than the Porsche side... And would be nice if they would show pedal cam, telemetry etc.

[accwai]

13 hours ago, fas42 said:

Gotta get the sound happening ... this is an old favourite of mine [...]

 

Speaking of that, I was at the socially distanced supermarket checkout yesterday and the overhead TV panel had a Ford ad with static picture of a group of Ford cars fanned out, Mustang, current generation GT, huge SUV and huge pickup truck and the Toronto CN tower in the background. The ad copy was like no matter your style, we're here to serve you. Yeah right 🤣🤣🤣 Although the Ford GT is made in Toronto, I doubt any significant quantity would be staying. Seen one in the street once ever.

[accwai]

14 hours ago, fas42 said:

Another bit of drivin' ...

 

Hmm... That doesn't look like a very serious run. In any case, I'm quite partial to the gravel stages of Turkey myself:

 

 

And looks like the road version 2021 Yaris GR is all the rage now. But apparently like the previous Yaris 4WD, it won't be coming to North America. Too bad!

[accwai]

14 hours ago, fas42 said:

There are people who fiddle with motors to make them go better ... and then there's, [...]

 

The guy even has a rotary dial pone at the end... That's old school. But making intricate things isn't all that difficult these days. It's even possible to pick up digital design for entire moving model engine for free now, e.g.:

 

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2537602

[accwai]

On 5/23/2021 at 8:33 PM, sphinxsix said:

show me a woman who will not love the car's fuel consumption of 3l/100km!

 

Something that size only doing 3L/100km?? This was from a Prius II:

 

 

By the way, the BMW i8 is supposed to be 3.1L/100km if I'm not mistaking. Saw one a few days ago but it's getting a little rare in the streets these days. Back when it was crawling all over the place around here, some of the drivers were young girls. Surely they love the great mileage...

 

On 5/23/2021 at 5:38 PM, AudioDoctor said:

but I have never once found any car to be a chick magnet. The only people that came to talk to me when driving the Porsche were other guys...

 

Apparently Radical is trying to push their latest road legal model as chick magnet:

 

 

Of course, this warning would likely apply:

 

[accwai]

On 6/29/2021 at 5:30 PM, sphinxsix said:

Helen Mirren behind the wheel in F&F, IMO every car aficionado should see this!

(watch till the very end!)

 

Question to the aficionados about this shot near the end:

 

 

What's the purpose of stomping on the gas and the brake at the same time? Wouldn't that void the car's warranty? And is the gobbledygook across the top supposed to have some deep meaning?

 

On 6/26/2021 at 5:51 PM, sphinxsix said:

Strictly on topic  [...]

 

Please advise if this is on topic or not:

 

[accwai]

19 hours ago, Confused said:

[...] the footage is probably fake .....

 

Now that you mention it, the point of view is such that the camera has to be right inside the door when it's closed. Plus the lighting is way too perfect. And the pedals don't look like the real ones below. So that footage could well be a total studio setup...

 

 

19 hours ago, Confused said:

For seriously silly pedal box action, please watch Le Mans '66, with it's utterly stupid and annoying footage of the driver gradually increasing the throttle half way down the Muslanne straight. [...] From 2min 30s ish ...

 

That particular scene's probably trying to express how hard the driver was trying. To an average audience member, I would imagine trying means pushing deeper the gas... Endurance racing is mostly a game of strategy. That's probably way too subtle to sell movies...

 

 

 

[accwai]

23 hours ago, Confused said:

Sometimes the entire cars are fake, the actors too, see below.  (I just hope Helen's boots are real......)

 

The boots are more than likely real, but the question is whether that's actually Helen's feet

 

And about footwear, these are supposed to be quite good:

 

 

Having the red and white flipped would go much better with this though:

 

[accwai]

Came across these very recently... Red Underwear, [Cheap] Fiat:

 

 

... and Other Moto Stuff:

 

[accwai]

On 8/21/2021 at 2:23 AM, Confused said:

The greatest small cars ever made | Autocar

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To many the Peugeot 205 was the most significant car of the eighties. It was made in huge numbers (5.3 million) over 15 years, the model range was enormous, and it was wide too, encompassing ultra-frugal diesels with high-performance models such as the GTi and Turbo 16 Group B rally car.

 

Road going homologation version of the T16:

 

 

This glass model above doesn't show the 4wd drive train unfortunately, but note what has happened to the back seats... And although not mentioned in the article, the Toyota Yaris has a full blown rally version as well. And speaking of Toyota...

 

On 7/6/2021 at 8:17 AM, accwai said:

Endurance racing is mostly a game of strategy. That's probably way too subtle to sell movies...

 

...they just won their 4th consecutive Le Mans last weekend. Despite their second car got punted off the track right at the start, they still managed to finish 1-2 by flattening the whole field. Toyota had a live stream on YouTube from each of their cars for the duration of the whole race but essentially the pair was circulating the track passing anything in sight in total nonchalance. Not much mention from external coverage other than the occasional Oh yeah, Toyota's still 1-2 overall. While the professionalism that Toyota displayed was jaw dropping, there won't be a Toyota vs The World movie any time soon that's for sure...

[accwai]

20 hours ago, Confused said:

Recently I was negotiating traffic on a multi-lane roundabout. A 205 GTI moved along side me. It is many years since I have seen one on the road in the UK, although at one time they were very popular here. This thing is though, I was very surprised at just how small they are. I mean, in the 80's they were a normal sized car, but here in 2021 they look tiny. Most curious. I guess cars are a bit like audiophiles, who also tend to gradually increase in size over the years.

 

Plus, as mentioned above, the T16 was slightly tweaked versus the standard car

 

The term slightly above is a slightly casual Instead of asking about the back seats, I suppose a more direct question would be what's happened to the engine, i.e. where it is... And the full rally version is wild. The screenshot below links to a DiRT Rally 2.0 demo run with commentary by the simracer Jimmy Broadbent 🍿

 

 

As for size of cars going up, depends on where I guess. Here in Canada, cars have always been big but lately they have been getting taller. Those in low cars constantly got headlight stuffed in their face at night. We once visited a gated community. The gate control was so high up I had to shuffle the car to the right, get out, talk, jump back and dash through the gate before it closed. For most gates and drive-through ATMs, one just needs to reach up a little, but this one seems to be specifically catering for enormous SUVs.

 

The flip side though is that when we were going through southern Europe in the summer of 2018, tiny cars were everywhere. Around here, Toyota Yaris is considered small while Corolla is consider mid-sized. During the trip, the Aygo was all over the place. By comparison, Yaris would be considered mid-size. Corolla was quite rare, and probably considered big. Don't recall seeing a Camry during the trip. Avalon? Forgot that, it's rare even around here. Oh, and came across a *sparkling* Lancia Delta Integrale at a side street in Genoa. Too bad that's before I started taking pictures of cars in the street. And speaking of Toyota Aygo, there is a one-off I Go Crazy concept that's along more or less the same line as Peugeot 205 T16:

 

 

It's only RWD through.