M3_Power

Happy Birthday!!

The owner was over at my place last night, it's actually not that bad just dirty (it lives up in Whangarei so you can imagine the crap he picks up travelling down here) - pretty tidy interior and exterior otherwise. It's the only original owner CSL in the Country actually.

Oooo ... that's harsh ... I dare you to post this over at NZHondas

Sounding optimistic so far at least.

I remember people telling me that it was a wrap - I never bothered asking the owner before, then I saw the car in person and it's definitely now painted.

I wish him a speedy recovery ... although realistically I think that's the end of Kubica's F1 career. Never understood why he would par take in Rallying when he's earning 7 figures driving the fastest thing around ... and he's thrown it all away for a Skoda ... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfmFJeJ31uU

So that was you!! I waved back too, not sure if you saw though.

You sure it's a wrap ... because I was standing about 5cm away from it in Remuera and I swear the whole car was painted orange with painted black roof and a Vorsteiner GT3 front bumper. Let me call the owner and find out ....

One of the trade offs as a result of faster cornering speeds = more downforce = more wings to control air flow. And as rumoured .... Lotus Renault have come up with the first F1 car to have an exhaust system that points towards the front of the car not the rear to create more downforce and better utilise the blown rear diffuser concept. I think they are onto a winner here. By the end of the season teams are going to be scrambling to build front flowing exhaust systems, this will be the F-Duct of 2011. Early days yet ... but results from first day of Valencia testing. Remember some teams are still using last year's car on new Pirellis. 01. Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1:13.769 93 laps 02. Nico Hulkenberg Force India-Mercedes 1:13.938 + 0.169s 71 laps 03. Gary Paffett McLaren-Mercedes 1:14.292 + 0.523s 91 laps 04. Paul di Resta Force India-Mercedes 1:14.461 + 0.692s 28 laps 05. Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1:14.553 + 0.784s 97 laps 06. Kamui Kobayashi Sauber-Ferrari 1:15.621 + 1.852s 68 laps 07. Jerome D'Ambrosio Virgin-Cosworth 1:16.003 + 2.234s 71 laps 08. Vitaly Petrov Renault 1:16.351 + 2.582s 28 laps 09. Michael Schumacher Mercedes 1:16.450 + 2.681s 15 laps 10. Jaime Alguersuari Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1:17.214 + 3.445s 19 laps 11. Rubens Barrichello Williams-Cosworth 1:17.335 + 3.566s 77 laps 12. Narain Karthikeyan HRT-Cosworth 1:18.020 + 4.251s 45 laps 13. Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1:19.930 + 6.161s 9 laps

Ferrari F150 = boring and predictable Ferrari. It's just like last year's car. What a let down for a team that desperately wants and needs to win. Lotus Renault = Engineering master piece with a lot of new innovative engineering and aerodynamic improvements. Can't wait to see where they've routed the exhaust (because rumours are apparently it doesn't blow towards the rear of the car) Mercedes W02 .... Computer generated image doesn't count, but looks like it's making good use of front splitter for clean air aero design and a high angle front nose from the shot. Aggressive front end suspension geometry too it seems. Be interesting to see what rear suspension package they come up with. Cannot wait for the season to start!!!

Instant 50hp like a Type R sticker on a Honda

Click to enlarge

do want.

Newer is always better when it comes to safety (unless it was a China made car : P) Fifth gear tests: Same Model different era Old Volvo vs New Renault http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBDyeWofcLY...feature=related

He was doing mid 14s with passenger yesterday in the racecar and said he's consistent 12s and have hit a high 11 with the car. Not sure if he's going to be around then ... Oh I saw that GTI ... very nice indeed. There were two GTRs there and both looked plenty fast actually. But to be honest the black GT3 RS looked faster and had way shorter braking distance compared to it and it also managed to keep going and going and going, whereas the GTRs you'd see slowly losing braking distance after a couple of laps and had to slow down or come back into pits. I think the White and Cream GTR were a Stillen kitted car ... quite loud for a R35.

More toe-in for stability under braking and toe out for turn-in but less stable in straight line. The CSL is actually best with static zero toe in the rear, but I've messed with the toe setup a bit to get the car to turn in a bit better without running huge toe out in the front (which makes the car really hard to drive but brilliant and was what I had as an old setup, but it got too hard to drive for me) Yeah that warm up lap time was surprising. Mike said at the back end straight the CSL was only about 10km/h slower compared to the E92 M3 race car.

Yes I was there for two hours waiting around - luckily the RMA track day cars entertained me well!! Some very nice cars out there yesterday for sure (the GT3 RS stuck in my mind as the best out there and the R35 GTRs ... christ those things are fast out of corners) Mike's E92 M3 racecar sounds bloody awesome. I was kicking myself for not bringing a video camera with me. Mike says he's down in the 11s now around Hampton!! The car is wickedly fast.

Was out at Hampton Downs yesterday at a photoshoot and for Mike to take the car around the track for a shake down and feedback ... and this is what he said: "I had to keep reminding myself that this is a road car and not a race car, but gosh it drives just like a race car and the brakes are phenomenal, really balanced and great pedal feel ... I wish my race M3 had these brakes .. the car is set up a bit too hard in the rear and little nervous at the limits, might help if you soften it a bit and do the alignment with less toe in the rear. (he did say more, but I won't bored everyone with the technical stuff) Oh and he did a 1:17.1 on his first warm up lap on cold under pressured tyres that are 7 years old with very little tread left ... (he wasn't pushing hard either he said ... just really trying to get a feel for the car)

Right, that's it .... {storms off to sell me BMW} I had a long chat with my friend about this and according to him the $7000 was just a general service with the gearbox oil (which is apparently about $4500 just for the oil) and which you have to have done about every 5000km. If he counted the full costs he said it was about $12,000 just for a track day (which included all brake rotors, pads - the standard car don't have carbon ceramics). Even worse if you blow the gearbox apparently. Honestly I can only think of Ferraris costing more to maintain. But yes, buy a Porsche if you want a track car that's just as fast and no where near as expensive to maintain.

To me the Z3 Coupe looked way better. Hence I've given it the nick name "Fugly Ferrari" - FF Although I am sure these will fly out of Ferrari showrooms just because it's different.

My bad .. haha ... but you never know, it might be in the next software update Greg (I am sure a BMW engineer has already thought about putting it in there)!!

Yeah I was just being sarcastic about the bulb change on the F01

I honestly think that the reason BMW put in all these 'recode' crap for all the mundane stuff is just so the owners (and future owners) have no choice but to take the cars back to an authorised dealership - simple as that. In reality, and those well versed in NCS Expert will know that you can actually turn off virtually every checks and registration functions in the cars and have it almost as analogue as an E30. I will stop buying BMWs the day that a bulb change will require a recode (oh wait, don't they do that already on the new 7 series??) - that's going way too far in my opinion. A battery registration is already hard to swallow (although sometimes understandable on the newer models due to their complex electronics requiring a certain level of battery power). I do feel that at a point protectionism will go too far for car manufacturers. Off topic - the 1 series M coupe uses the Z4 35is motor (exactly the same). It's the first "M" series car that use a production engine rather than a hand built motor exclusively found in a M. So realistically it's not really a M car as some would argue. Ironically it carries a lot of E9X M3 suspension and diff components. So basically a hybrid parts bin special. Oh and if you think high cost of maintenance is an European car exclusivity, go look at the cost of running a R35 GTR. I've got a friend that owns one and he says it costs him about $7000 each time he takes it to the track just on servicing (as you have to service the car including the ridiculously expensive gearbox oil after each track day) - makes maintaining a BMW look like pocket change in comparison.

All good and dandy until the accelerator gets stuck and you can't stop

I agree totally - I was merely illustrating the point that sometimes it's not always a BMW design issue - but a third party supply issue (which BMW is ultimately responsible and liable for). I never said that BMW shouldn't be liable for a faulty 3rd party part which they have commissioned (maybe I came across that way, but wasn't what I was illustrating). Agree with the Lexus comment!!