I don't see a single journalist putting a Lada Riva/Niva estate above a Focus in terms of driving pleasure. Not in Autocar, Car, Evo, Top Gear or Auto Express(??) magazines anyway. Nor on any 'net review'!
Anyway, it's all irrelevant really. FWD is cheaper, easier to use and much safer on a day to day basis. It's also just as much fun as a RWD up to 90% without any of the risks, and you will have a large boot and better rear legroom because the drive train isn't in the way.
Although :
Most slower cars are FWD, so you are infact saying they are better? :rolleyes:
correct me if im mistaken but arent both of you too young to have a license? so what would you know about which cars are good fun to drive on back roads?
FYI Alex has a licence as he turned up to Tristans free LFS meet in Southampton a while back (loads of fun! ) and BlueFlamer is old enough as well, at least according to his profile
What?
I drive old pajero. RWD in tarmac, AWD in dirt. RWD is much better in roads than the other cars I tried (FWD), much more pleasure from the driving because it steers with throttle. Its fun to drive (in my mind). Pitty i never had the chance to drive a real rwd sport car.
But i also own a old mini and its a lot o fun with FWD
I care about the driven wheels. It needs diferent driving and i like more the rwd
edit: just to say i crashed once fwd fiesta and never crashed my pajero. I drive the pajero a lot in rwd mode
Autocar rated it as having a much better gearbox than modern hatches, being more involving to drive, turning in with 'reasonable precision'.
'you can get pleasure from driving it. No joke'
Read some of the editorials in a magazine like Autocar, lots of journalists (Chris Harris springs to mind) are constantly harping on about both the lack of driving involvement in modern cars and how they're too fast to be enjoyed on the road.
How is a rear wheel drive car anymore dangerous, a car like the Lada (or any old rear wheel drive saloon) will understeer like there's no tommorrow with standard suspension setup and driving fast is still largely about countering understeer, but the throttle can be used for positive gain, whilst you can get the arse out the average road driver is going to have no issues with it suddenly jumping out on them, a well balanced front wheel drive car is actually potentially more dangerous for an incompetent driver because lift off oversteer will be made worse by a typical driver.
There's a lot less wrong with low power light weight front wheel drive cars, they're less adversely effected by having everything going through one axle. On the road a well setup low power front wheel drive car will also be far more entertaining to drive than a considerably quicker high power front wheel drive car.
Yes, I have noticed this. Namely the lack of driving enjoyment is due to the electric power steering systems which are devoid of feel and weight. But the car that the average Joe can buy (I.E a Focus, small BMW such as a 320 or a 120d, Mondeo or the like) tend to be the better steerers and are, in my opinion, 'slow enough' to be safe. Then again, even a Zonda has a progressive throttle!
95% of road drivers have no clue about understeer, or oversteer. Or steering on the throttle. They just know that a car has 4 wheels and it's what gets them to work and it's what takes their family about in relative safety. MOST FWD cars don't have lift of oversteer, most don't even do anything. Some, such as the Civic Type R (bar the new Spaceship shape one!) do this, as well as the infamous 205GTI, not mentioning many others. But the cars that do tend to be full on Hot Hatchbacks, driven by enthusiasts rather than John trying to get to work.
What's more, most RWD cars have worse lift of than most FWD. Most normal FWD cars just tend to turn in better if you lift off.
Then there you go!
I hope you don't take me on the wrong terms. I just really can't understand why most people (who tend to be members on Car/racing game forums etc) are like "ZOMG FWD IS FOR GAYS AND RWD IS AWESOME", when 98% of said people couldn't even control a drift. Infact, they are exactly the kind of person that's likely to lift off mid corner and crash! :rolleyes:
Many don't even have a driving licence or have driven any sort of machinery besides their Mums Corolla.
They're all too big and heavy, don't have any true feedback in the way that even the Lada manages and a modern 2 litre car is too fast to drive hard on the road unless you want to be approaching 3 figures down a country lane, which is great fun until you meet something.
I can assure you that rightly or wrongly our Focus does oversteer when on the limit, was great fun with the back end out round Luffield and I hold my hands up as an idiotic novice who span through lift off oversteer at the Craner curves, thankfully *only* at 95mph because I was in a slow car
I think the last world sums up the part the argument is about. Driving a "bad" car at slower speed gives more excitement than driving a safe modern car with that same speed.
It's simply because you think you are going to die all the time. Driving a modern and 24 year old Toyota feels completely different. In the old car you got more respect for the car, the steering is heavy and the car is lighter, and not the other way around. You can feel the road. Down a motorway 120 km/h feels absolutely insane, when in a modern car you feel completely numb.
Driving a car fast is never boring irrespective of which wheels are being driven
Here you are simply stating a preference. You like the feel of throttle steering, other people like the feel of getting the entry in to a corner just right so that they don't need it and avoid the inherent understeer of a road car. Cars of either variety, (oh and AWD ones :razz, can give driving pleasure. The driven wheels aren't nearly as relevant as how well the car has been designed and the quality of the steering, feedback, suspension etc.
His point is that RWD cars are more fun and satisfying to drive and that cars with low levels of grip and crap suspensions are even more fun because they are more "lively" and don't have to be driven fast to have "fun" in and also that cars without power steering have better feedback.
To which I say, fine that's his opinion. Mine is different, I get my buzz from making progress, not larking about with a car that is easy to slide and ultimately has poor performance, imagining I'm taking a really fast car to the limit on a race track.
I want a car that's going to get me from point A to point B quickly well within the limitations of the car, the road conditions and the law. I learned a long time ago how dangerous it is to take a vehicle to the limit, (or anywhere near), on a public road. Older cars have a lower safe performance envelope and are more likely to crash at any given speed. That's just a fact. No matter how much you "fun" you think they are to drive.
I get more satisfaction from the actual speed of the drive not how the car feels in my hands. But then I'm an ex motorcyclist and I'm used to real pace and cars just feel slow to me.
Here's where your ideas about driving differ from enthusiasts, driving quickly and fast doesn't tell you anything about the average speed the car is maintaining, or is capable of maintaining over a stretch of road. In order to drive quickly it is pretty universally accepted that the car is being driven with its limits, the tyres are not going to be slipping slightly but not (intentionally) beginning to get to or pass over optimum grip levels. Typically a driver driving quickly (particularly on the public road) will reduce the amount of braking they have to do (both to add a safety margin and to reduce unnecessary wear and tear). A car being driven quickly may still be steered on the throttle or brakes, but well within the drivers comfort zone, and most importantly a car being driven quickly should never ever loose control or have an accident. The point of driving quickly is solely for the enjoyment of pro-actively driving a car, and can be performed on track days and the public road (obviously the environment restricts what kind of pace is safe) and the rate at which the car is traveling is completely irrelevant, if you want to travel fast on the public road use the motorway not back lanes.
Certain cars are unsuitable for driving quickly because of the relative lack of feedback or progression they give meaning they are neither satisfying nor particularly easy to drive near but never quite at the limit, overweight overly power assisted cars that are very dynamically capable spring to mind, as do a lot of racing cars, anything with wings and slicks would be hard to drive reliably at 9/10s cold. These cars simply have not been designed with driving satisfaction in mind.
Driving fast is different altogether, and again does not require a high average speed, driving fast requires the car to be driven on and slightly over its limits for the conditions with a small safety window, you can't drive a car fast bellow its limits. Road rally cars are driven fast, and when in a competitive environment is the only time I have ever driven or would consider driving truly fast on the road, obviously basic safety and a bit of caution has to be taken but the objective is to get the car from A to B as quickly as possible and high power front wheel drive and all wheel drive cars (which are very good at this the fact they're boring to drive) being driven fast struggle to maintain the average speed of 30mph down tight narrow lanes with a typical navigator on a typical 12 car rally. Cars are driven genuinely fast, at and over their limits, on autosolo and autocross events.
It's not up for debate that a car without power assisted steering gives you a direct mechanical linkage with the wheels, a car with any form of power assisted/indirect steering does not give a mechanical linkage and whilst it may not be too bad it will never give as much feedback through the wheel.
You don't need a really fast car to enjoy yourself on a race track, any car can be driven fast and pretty much every type of car has been driven fast on a race track, the 2CVs in the 24 hour race are driven fast, on their limit. They are still going fast and it will still be far more rewarding to drive one fast at that pace than to effortlessly follow driving at a mundane pace in another car (even a Lada!). Driving the Morgan quickly/fast on track is absolutely fantastic fun but I'd far rather drive a Leon quickly than have to follow it in the Morgan
I think by the limit your simply talking about driving fast in a straight line, a vehicle can drive at very high speed well within its design limits without being anywhere near its limits. I agree that driving quickly in a straight line on the public road, whilst tempting, is totally pointless, drive a vehicle once as fast as it can go and the novelty will soon wear off, and whilst not particularly exciting can get you in trouble very quickly both with the law and other obstacles in your path, that's why I much prefer to drive faster at a third of the speed of the typical motorcyclist who seems thrilled with the fact his machine can go forwards (but not stop) very quickly.
Older cars suddenly jump into bushes on their own do they? People have been driving/racing/rallying just about every type of car on the road and none to my knowledge have demonstrated this curious habit. Any car driven to its limit for the conditions (which can only be established by feel) and driven there quite comfortably, of course older cars may have lower limits or curious habits which the driver must respect through feeling the fact he's going over them! A lorry is by your logic far more likely to crash at any given speed because it is a dynamically less capable vehicle, as we all know this is total bollocks and generally the most likely vehicles to have accidents (through going way beyond their limits and the driver failing to save the situation) are relatively modern hatchbacks (popular with young boy racers) and expensive modern sportscars and coupes (owned as a status symbol and driven totally incompetently far too fast).
So in other words you like going fast in a straight line?
Just a quick update...
Had to drive the Coupe up to Wetherby and back on Saturday..200 miles each way approx..(clocked 397 miles for the day, including running about up there!)...and was absolutely gob-smacked when I did the fuel usage calcs...I got about 47 mpg out of it!!!! Considering that I was cruising at a steady 75-80mph most of the time (except for the 18 miles of bloody roadworks on the M1!) and was not too gentle through the gears when I had to (roundabouts, junctions, etc) I must say that I was very surprised at the returns...not bad for a 2.0 ltr PETROL engine!!!
) and BlueFlamer is old enough as well, at least according to his profile 
