scathing

I'm assuming we're talking about the 4 pot and not the V6... The ergonomics leave a lot to be desired. The steering wheel is angled like a bus, and the seating position exacerbates the feeling that you're driving a van. The plastic cover over the instruments is at the perfect angle to catch the light and turn opaque. I found the throttle too touchy when commuting; it was hard to make minor speed adjustments. The "tallbody" style also catches crosswinds very easily, and doesn't have the weight to keep it steady. I almost turned off the F3 and went back to the dealer because of how uncomfortable I felt, but as soon as I hit the Old Pac the thing just wrapped around me and read my mind like a psychic nymphomaniac gymnast. They're an awesome car to drive. I got to test drive it up the Old Pac and, even after not driving for 2 years, I hopped in to it and was instantly fast. The thing is just so chuckable, and the motor itself makes a fair amount of power (even without its lack of weight). The handling is good, but might be a little touchy for some. It'll oversteer at the drop of a hat, but with FWD you can just keep the boot in and pull yourself out of the corner. Needless to say, once I reached Berowra and dropped back to normal speeds I got over those niggling ergonomic problems. It came real close to convincing me not to insist on RWD when I was looking for a car. Its the kind of car that will shit you to tears Monday to Friday, but put a massive grin on your face on the weekend.

Hey, STFU! My Hello Kitty! seat covers were genuine Sanrio! :)

Anyone who was with me on the way back from the cruise on Sunday knows that I'd be lying if I said I babied my car. But there's a time and a place for everything. In the middle of the street next to some unknown, and possibly idiotic, guy is not the time and place for me. I'll give it a good squirt in the country where I'll only do damage to myself should I f**k up, but in the middle of the metropolitan area I don't feel the need to prove anything.

I mentioned it on the CB after you overtook me. I wasn't entirely sure what your nick was, and I kinda forgot about it by the time I put a nick to a car.

Yeah, I saw the "Motorbike Awareness Week" notices posted on the electronic boards down the F3 too. Maybe someone should address the blind spot that motorcyclists have about the amount of cornering speed their vehicles can carry on rough, potentially debris-covered, roads.

At least you didn't point at the tarp and reply with, "Shame that's not a cop"

Anyway, here are my pics: http://www.au-z.org/gallery/sau_20051023_avoca?page=1 Feel free to use them for non-commercial purposes, as long as you credit me.

I was wondering where you went to. I was off-throttle in 4th down the hill from Gosford, and you were generally with me with that. When I gave it some throttle going up the hill I lost track of you. We caught that big pack of bikes at the Calga Interchange, and by the time we reached Mt White you weren't following anymore. Bloody women. Slows the car down more than hauling a couple of bags of cement in the boot.

Supa lack of braking techonique, des'ka!!!!!!!! ;-) But yeah, it was boiling hot. I kept turning the air con off during the Old Pac, and then turning it back on when we reached the little towns and stuff. Made me kind of glad that I don't have turbos....

Just got home. Was nice to meet a lot of you. Pics to come....when I can.

Nah, its quite easy. Its amazing what kind of gains they get from a "light" tune (full exhaust, CAI, and LS1Edit with the MAF taken off). Of course, getting the damned thing to go around a track fast without running out of brakes, overheating the tyres, or boiling the power steering fluid is something else entirely. But, it just depends on whatever floats your boat......

I'd say it was arguable as to whether a 4WD system on a NA Skyline would be a benefit of a hinderance for track work, unless you're planning on racing in low grip conditions. Does the R33 GTS RWD car make enough power to constantly overwhelm the rear tyres, to offset the negatives of 4WD?

Otherwise call Race Brakes up. Dunno if they do OEM GTS-t rotors, but you can score DBA rotors off.

If you're after a practical luggage-lugger that can also be a bit of a sleeper, people have slotted old air-cooled boxer 6's out of Porsches into VW vans.

In the old Volvo 240 / 740s, its possible to have a 5.0L FI or 5.7L NA engine approved for ADRs. The engine bay is massive, its a FR layout, there's room to put massive tyres front and rear, and nothing says sleeper like a twin turbo Holden 308 in the Swedish brick......

If I had to buy a big sedan, I'd get an XR6T and do my own tweaks to it. But then, if I was buying a sedan my priorities probably wouldn't be to get a very quick car, and I'd take the build quality, interior trim, and fuel efficiency of an Accord Euro or Liberty GT over the superior pace of a Falcon or Commodore.

Yeah, I'm with you on the VX220. I would love one of those things. Its boxy and angular in a non-80's (and therefore ugly) way, and there's plenty of poke in it. It is a little bigger than the Elise, and a little softer, but that will probably make it an even better street car. As a personal preference though, on a car like that I'd run it without turbos to keep that instant and pure throttle response. One thing I like about the Elise is its purity. No power steering, no powered brakes, and NA engines. Just everything the car's doing faithfully transmitted to your limbs. I'd consider a screw-type supercharger, but in a 800kg car (like the Elise) I would much prefer a tweaked version of the K20A out of an Integra Type-R (IMNSHO a better street engine than the Toyota motor they are using) than a tweaked SR20VET that the X-Trail uses. (I picked the X-Trail purely because it makes the most amount of power from the factory of any turbo Nissan 4-pot). The Rover-powered Elise is quick enough in the bends (and I've chased one on the track and out in the country), and I'm all for having more handling than power. Drop a nice Jap engine into it and retrieve some of the factory tolerances, and it'd be fine.

I'd argue that an Elise is a more "complete" car than a Westfield, Caterham or Arial. They do have a bigger R&D budget, and they're also more "sports" and less "racing" than the Lotus 7 copies. Considering windshields and wipers were options on Westfields (not sure about now), it goes to show the difference in philosophy. Those Clubmans should be faster on the track, but as a street car I'd be more likely to purchase an Elise. PRBs are having harder and harder times getting road registered these days, but the Elise will have no issues. While badge and history I agree are intangibles (ones I don't particularly care about, and don't want to pay for) the last one does increase value for money and is worth paying for, if you're throwing your spending power at buying a sports car.

AMG CLK55 Not exactly the best choice for a course as narrow as Targa Tassie, but when you have a love of overweight and soft cruisers and the manufacturer loves what you can bring to their exposure, I suppose it'll do.

Well, he's broken almost every bone in his body while riding on a bike, and the last time he competed in Targa Tasmania he rolled the car.

Is that because you can't see the value in it, or purely because you can't afford it? If its the latter, you're not really comparing the vehicles on their merits, merely on your own constraints. Lets say you had $100K in your pocket purely for car buying; would you buy a brand new Lotus Elise or an about 15 year old R32 GTS-t and try throwing the change into mods? If anything, I'd say throwing even throwing $50K+ at an R32 that's not even a GT-R is a situation where the "$$$ just don't add up". Its not exactly fair to compare a 15 year old car to a brand new one on a total price (including mods) structure, something I alluded to earlier but evidently escaped some people. Nor is it particularly fair to compare cars of such disparate classes. Since we're talking "Japanese cars vs the rest of the world's car", the only thing we should be removing from the comparison is the country of manufacturer and badge cachet. To make it truly fair, the price in its domestic market should be used but I suppose the price in Australia means the most to us here. And the 82kW is more impressive if you think about the fact that the car weighs about half that of a GT-R. A mid to high 14 quarter mile isn't too bad for 82kW, even though the car's really not set up for it. Your peak power number in isolation is only impressive if your only automotive needs is bragging rights while sitting outside the vehicle, or you're only interested in driving in a straight line. A mentality I thought was the domain of "bogans", and I definitely know is not in the interests of a potential Elise buyer. If its paltry power output concerns you that much.....maybe you're not the right demographic to be driving one of the best handling and most rewarding production cars in the world.

For the price point comparison, I was comparing the Z Roadster to the Rover powered Elise.

Its a lot easier to pay for shipping from Japan than it is from Europe (you know, since one is half a world away). Hell, a Commodore or Falcon is cheaper than a landing a brand new G35 Skyline (if we're talking apples to apples by factoring the cost of shipping, compliance to ADRs, and import duty against the local product) so maybe Nissan's a "wanna b" too. As for the cars making "the cut", what are you comparing it with? The Elise is a low volume car, made by a niche manufacturer. In Europe they're cheap enough, and they'd give a Tommy Kaira ZZ-II or ASL Garaiya a good run for its money. You can't expect it to compare with a volume model car. On price point locally delivered, the only "sports car driver" that would choose a 350Z Roadster over an Elise is a hairdresser. Not to say the Z Roadster is necessarily slow, but on a nice country road or on the track the Elise will get pipped in the higher gears down the straights, but take the Z out under brakes and through the bends. The Z's more comfortable and easier to drive, but buying a sports car and a convertible for its practicality at the expense of its performance prowess was, I thought, the definition of wanna b. And what luxury sports coupe does Japan currently offer to truly compete with the M3? A car that is impressively quick, while still having a luxurious interior. The 350Z and RX-8 can't match the M3's interior, although maybe the Infiniti G35 might be on-par. None of them will keep up with an M3 on the track, though. The NSX isn't really an M3 competitor, and even if it was its interior can't match the BMW. Mitsubishi, Subaru and Toyota don't even offer a top-spec coupe (anymore).

How are the M3 and Elise wannabes?

Yeah, when I was looking about 75% of the cars on the market had Tiptronic. In the end, the Tiptronic gearbox is still a torque converter, as opposed to a clutch pedal-less manual. So you still get all the problems in terms of powertrain loss and deadened throttle response. The INVECS II system the Tiptronic has is nicish (it was also added to the slusho in the Lancer MR I got a drive of, which didn't have Tiptronic) but its still not amazing. All it does is modify the shift points depending on how aggressively you're driving. I think its the biggest waste of time for a sports car ever. So imagine that, instead of having a "power" and "economy" switch on your slusho its now running off a delta sensor. So not only do you still get the pain in the arse problems of having the thing short shift if you decide to give it a thrash after commuting for ages....but you have to give it some stick for a little while before it decides to go into the "power" mode. At least with the switch the shift algorithm change is instantaneous, but then I suppose if you wanted instantaneous response from a gearbox you would have bought a real one instead of a little girl's one.