My hit car colour of 2010 December 31, 2009
Posted by richard in : News clues , 3commentsBrown – I predict it’s going to make a comeback in 2010. Seriously!
Well, not brown. Anything but brown, in fact: instead, think Rich Chocolate, Frothy Latte, Cappuccino, or anything else that’s fancy, tasty and, err, brown in colour.
Two things make me predict this: the first was the stunning Porsche 911 Turbo I drove late last year. Resplendent in metallic, ahem, brown, it looked delicious.
Second? Audi showed the R8 Spider in metallic, cough, brown – and, as Audi has kinda led the trend for car-colour-hit-setting over the past few years, it’s surely thus only a matter of months before we get a Frappuccino Fizz Ford Fiesta.
I could be wrong. But, you must admit, the R8 Spider above does look pretty good, no..?
What’s your car colour hit prediction for 2010?
Another most amazing save of 2009
Why Japanese cars are square December 28, 2009
Posted by richard in : What I learned today , 1 comment so farWHY are Japanese cars so often the shape they are? Embracing the square, the angle, the straight edge?
I discovered why when visiting the Tokyo Motor Show back in September. Absolute magic dream, it was, to spend a few days in busiest Tokyo.
My, though, was it different. A bigger culture shock than any other country I’ve visited. Two examples: navigation is impossible, as all the signs are in Japanese. And you can’t expect, as we Brits usually do, that someone will speak English to help out. My walk, one afternoon, was thus eventful. And long.
Most striking discovery, though? That the whole of suburban Japan embraces the straight edge.
Square spaces, gaps, walkways and, indeed, holes. Into which round pegs just don’t work. Land prices, building regulations, plain lack of space – whatever the reason, square is the shape.
This geometricity somehow becomes natural, obvious, sensible. To see cars with curves thus becomes wrong. How one earth are they going to fit THAT easily into a parking back? Think of the wasted metal on display in THAT. And so on.
And this is thus why Japanese cars are square.
Another most amazing save of 2009 December 28, 2009
Posted by richard in : Motorsport , 1 comment so farGRAHAM Rahal proved that you can be Plato-esque in an IndyCar single seater too.
This really is quite incredible: how sideways IS the boy? Given the dynamics of FWD v RWD, which do YOU reckon is the more impressive?
Internet of Things joins motorsport
Why Barry Ferguson should look to Lewis Hamilton
The most amazing save of 2009 December 26, 2009
Posted by richard in : Motorsport , 2commentsJASON Plato did it, at the Brands Hatch BTCC race, in a Chevrolet Lacetti.
Check this out and enjoy! Oh, and if you have any that are just as good, please share them here…
Internet of Things joins motorsport
Why do people hate the Lotus Elan?
How can good ride be stiff ride? December 19, 2009
Posted by richard in : Minutiae of cars , 1 comment so farRIDE, schmide. It’s just about the uncoolest thing in the car world you can obsess about.
But, just as I caught myself wearing socks and sandals while queuing up at the cashpoint last night, so too do I love a nice ride (arf).
What makes a good ride, though? Surely it’s just about soft springs and marshmallows under the wheelarches? Soft = better; it’s a linear and direct connection. Well, that’s what I used to think.
Then I drove the somewhat stiffly-sprung Porsche 911 GT3 RS, and ohmylikeGod fell in love with it – despite detesting it at first, because of an intolerably stiff ride. Utterly inexplicable at the time, it was: me coming back and enthusing over its absorbency, damping quality, sheer depth of talent.
A few years later, I went on my one and only Maserati launch – the Quattroporte GTS. Similar experience; on the taut side, I thought, when I first drove it. Only to emerge at the other end wanting to marry chief engineer Paul Fickers. Luckily, I instead asked him what was going on.
Yet again, the same thing I asked to another chassis top cheese a few weeks ago – and, like Fickers, he said it’s all down to bump steer. See, at speed, it’s not so much the disturbance of ruts on our sensibilities, but the way the car physically reacts to them, that upsets us.
You can have a pretty stiffly set up car, that still seems more than fine, simply because it’s rock-solid assured over even the nastiest of surfaces. This is what the Maser does so well – and, probably, what the Porsche excels in, too.
Chuck in modern cars’ absorption of the nasty harshness that used to so pain us, plus iron-fisted control from decades of damper experience, and you’ve a stiff ride that’s also a good ride. Bizarre but true.
Such as setup also bypasses the other disadvantages of softly sprung cars that made their ride qualities so illusional:
• Roll
• Pitch
• Lean
• Free and easy body damping characteristics
• Uncanny ability to excite toddlers’ stomachs
• The way they suddenly run out of ideas when roads get really challenging
See: Ride CAN be cool. Kinda.
Land Rover’s ride quality secret
Vauxhall gives new Astra suspension a twist
Rover 200 makes the 95 news December 13, 2009
Posted by richard in : History , 2commentsROVER’S unveiling of the 200 made for a fascinating news report by Julian Rendell back in ’95.
He was reporting from the London Motor Show, at which he spoke to the car’s designer, David Saddington. There, the Rover man explained the internal soul-searching that had been preoccupying all at Longbridge for months.
Apparently, it was a question of grille or no grille. They tried all sorts, eventually setting on a body-colour version of the chrome grille. This would appeal to the younger buyers Rover was targeting – while remaining ‘recognisably Rover’.
‘We’re stretching the perceptions of Roverness so the grille is very important to establish the Rover credentials.’
Younger buyers? Apparently, then-boss John Towers wanted 20s and 30s, rather than 40, 50 and 60 year olds. People like me, then: had I been older, I’d have been receptive to this ‘significant message in a new era of Rover products’.
People such as me are the reason why Rover fitted extra-long seat runners: boosting it for those up front, and sacrificing rear space. Mind you, a properly shorter wheelbase than the 306 Rendell compared it with was also a factor here. Also led to a small boot.
As we know, the R3 project cost £200 million, through using bits from the parts bin, and making sure 3dr and 5dr use lots of common bits: front end, roof, rear hatch and glass are the same for both. Only the side pressings and doors are different.
Rendell also pointed out the front bulkhead forwards was the same as the R8; new press tools built an all-new floorpan.
Suspension, he explained, was modified 200 struts at the front, and a H-frame rear torsion beam we now know is from the Maestro. Despite grannies driving that, the firm tuned it for handling: project chief Bill Owen told Rendell it ‘just turns in and grips.’
Neutral rear steer tuning for the rear combined with ride comfort ’very similar’ to the 400 over smaller bumps. Over bigger bumps, it was just behind. Roll bars make an interesting comparison, tool
• Standard: 19mm f, 16mm r
• Diesel: 23mm f, 16mm r
• Vi: 25mm f, 18mm r
Why the big jump for diesels? To counter the extra weight of the engine: unlike the all-alloy K Series, the then-new L-series was decidedly ferrous. Diesels came in 86hp or 105hp: electronic control for the injection system gave the more powerful one its boost.
More tech: the 1.6-litre got a CVT, from Belgians VCST – the same chaps who made it for the Metro CVT. Impressive example of scaling-up here: indeed, it would also later appear on the 1.8-litre MGF Steptronic.
Overall, Rendell was most impressed with the 200. Should see queues forming outside dealers, he reckoned. See: even as late as ’95, Rover could still do it.
A decade later, alas, it would be no more.
Land Rover’s ride quality secret
Mat point December 3, 2009
Posted by richard in : History , add a commentVAUXHALL, in 1963, used to offer 512 different types of carpet to its Victor model. Blimey.
512! Imagine the logistics, the waste, the need for systems management, the storage demands, sheer difficulty of co-coordinating and perfecting this in the days way before computers and JIT. To a production manager today, it plain doesn’t bear thinking about.
But, know what? Direct comparisons can be drawn with today, believe it or not. Yes, I am using carpet as an example of modern lean car production.
Modern cars, you see, usually have but one basic type of carpet. None of that multi-colour, multi-grade stuff nowadays: you may have gotten posh plush shag in a 1979 Ford Fiesta Ghia, but in today’s Titanium Individual, it’s exactly the same bum-fluff stuff (© Russell Bulgin) that’s in the boggo Studio.
This is why price-list spotters now note something very significant on the official car manufacturers list: carpet mats. Yes, really. Car makers have made them a factory-fit option, or a factory-fit upgrade on the posher variants.
Why? To simplify production, cut costs, ease the supplier chain, yet still ensure there’s sufficient margin to trade up on posher trims. Genius.
Particularly as this is a fitment that’s entirely flexible. You could even do it at dealer level, as part of the PDI, rather than needing a specific process on the production line. Brings a dose more uniformity to the production process, that probably saves £millions.
Clues like this abound in price lists. Cars are more tech-packed than ever, yet the fact they are still priced relative to models in the past is only partly through the cost of tech coming down.
Car makers have worked out how to make cars more cheaply, without you noticing. Bet you 512-to-1 that this carpety thought had never crossed your mind…
How to do motor industry PR brilliance
