and he's making london more difficult for me

nice

what car

you probably won't actually get any increase from the filter without a pretty heavygoing remap

exhaust is usually the best place to start on upping power, especially if you can get away with a decat

dunno, most modern engines aren't suffocated by induction but at very least run happier with less backpressure. I wouldn't say for sure if good manifolds and decats translate to more hp without a remap as ecus dictate a lot but they certainly lead to better throttle response

can't you just swap a decat pipe out for inspection each year?

I run a 3" from turbo right back, I only put the cat on for the yearly MOT

I mean most performance exhausts have an insert for making them less noisy, I've never used mine because pissing off neighbors is great but it's there if I needed it

also I have a personal dislike toward the entire VW group so I can't comment on any affection for VWs, sorry

haha it's weird for me seeing the chevy logo next to ecotec

https://i.imgur.com/JfZNZQ4.jpg

I got to take an odd shot today after installing a satellite dish

well if I were drunk I would struggle to access my roof

the choice is ladder to the flat garage and across or out the bathroom window

I took the window route

neither are good plans because my ladder sucks

I've been considering modifying my box intake for an extra cold air feed because I don't really want a cone filter sucking in warm engine air

but I'm also super lazy

I think there are heat shields available that somewhat stop warm air intake

here's an example of the lack of heat shielding with a cone filter

http://oi1083.photobucket.com/albums/j396/Michael_Conrad_Mitchell_Mackay/Facebook/The%20cars/11667459_10153505181483969_5931985419770826178_n_zpsbqk4i0qa.jpg

I know box mods are enough for s1 tuning and the shitty sr gearbox isn't really up to more than s1, I don't need more than about 300hp so the box mod is the cheap way to go, but I'm very lazy

I guess if I see a z32 afm with a cone filter I'll grab it and remap

vw and their ownership of other brands has lead to the boring corporate snoozewagons being so prevalent, almost everything being made by the vw umbrella is soulless corporate cash grabs. While lambo might be more reliable now, they're much more boring, the urus is an insult to the brand, most of audis lineup is reskinned vws with awd options, bentley is now the automotive equivalent of designer handbags, porsche are the only ones with any individuality left really and that's because the outright ownership is also the most recent and convoluted

oh and then there are the side companies; seat and skoda which just sell polos, golfs and passats with different shapes

also nobody knows how fast ferraris are because they cheat on all the testing

they put goddamn slicks and road legality breaking ecu tunes on their test cars, it's complete bs

Lamborghini was never a mass market brand, vw have decided to impose that on them

by reskinning a toureg and selling it with a badge tax

I don't blame them for doing it from a financial perspective, but no car enthusiast should be supporting this behaviour

and I doubt it will be a mistake; the majority of people buying supercars these days aren't buying them to drive them, they're either buying investments or buying badge status

the people who bought f40s and f50s and countaches often bought them for driving thrill

not for status or investment

uh

back then buying a rolls royce was buying luxury and reliability

it wasn't to show off to others as much as it was to provide yourself with comfort

and believe me, the classic rolls royces are a world apart from their "competitors" or alternatives

I've driven a 34 SS1 and a 38 wraith

admittedly there's 4 years between them and the wraith was probably in much better condition but the SS1 is ... terrifying in comparison

it wasn't as smooth, it constantly triggers your instinct to try to counter steer, you can literally see the flex in the chassis while you drive just by the door gaps

realistically it wasn't until the late 50s or early 60s that the justification for the price of luxury cars started to waiver and even then it's questionable because the overengineering to produce reliability in rolls and bentley was so extensive

also I don't think anyone bought new cars as investments until probably the last 30 years because historically it wasn't worth it for such considerable periods of time, that trend has only changed very recently

Honestly I think it's mainly down to two factors; the medias portrayal of wealth and frankly the erosion of pleasurable driving vehicles due to technology

technology has made cars faster but also less engaging for a driver, so the "pure driving experience" doesn't really exist in modern cars, the result is the car enthusiast can buy pretty much any of the top line vehicles and it be comfortable and refined, meanwhile the media has a bunch of fucks showing off in lambos and ferraris looking like total cunts which puts a lot of people off buying them because a large amount of wealthy people don't want to draw attention to themselves, the majority I'd say

it's not just technology though, it's also all the safety stuff adding on weight and making cars simply fat

I have a friend who has ludicrous wealth and he buys horribly exorbitant cars, if I had his money I'd be buying 80s and 90s stuff because it's more "fun" to drive

he likes to show off though

I think a lot of people are that way

personally if I had his money I'd buy myself a merc s65 amg for my day to day business and probably an f40 for the fun

well he also doesn't care about the performance, I mean he bought an urus as soon as it was available

because he wants the badge

the gumball drivers would disagree

I think the chiron might dispute that

there are also some tuned jap awd machines that definitely put down some really absurd times

Cheaper than the average executive sedan

the problem with them tends to be clutch weight and turbo lag

though there was a 1500hp supra that had a stupid motorcycle beating 0-60 and was road legal a few years ago

which ran an auto

well turbo lag isn't much of a compromise

I've never driven an evo, I heard some nasty things about the FQ400 though

but that's not really stock

I have driven a few imprezas around 300-450hp

If I was being picky, the clutch was a little heavy on the higher hp ones

but it's not something that would really bother me

450hp is a decent amount in a '99 impreza

they don't weigh much at all, and they do grip like the rubber is wrapped in glue

I've driven a 600hp supra, that would have worked fine as a daily

the brakes on that were utter garbage though, but I think something was genuinely wrong with them

they were worse than my s14s

I've only driven a base v6 charger

I have no reference point beyond that

and that was... 5 years ago

damn

It's been a long time

the thing is, a lot of the modern performance cars are going to be less comfortable than tuned cars

because supercars make compromises as well

my ludicrously wealthy friend has a huracan, it's a great car to look at but the driving position is not perfect, the seats imo are uncomfortable and the interior feels cheap - not because it is but because it's been made for lightness

it's impossible for the majority of people to tell the difference between plastic made to be cheap and plastic made to be light

because they feel nearly identical when you knock them

there are almost no cars out there that make no compromises at all

the chiron and veyron are obviously in that category, I'd argue that most of the luxury sedans are also there if you discount weight as being a compromise

funnily enough, I think some of the most exciting cars being made today are American cars

they're powerful, well priced, comfortable but not too bogged down with technology

and they come with glorious slower manuals

the expensive powerful cars still with manual options from Europe are limited to what, the jag ftype and porsche? I think even aston have pulled their manual options but I could be wrong

Japan don't seem to have anything manual either

all this talk of cars reminded me

I need to check a wheel bearing brb

could there be a leak?

also the automotive industry is kinda fucked in the long run; the rise of electric and driverless cars is gonna render a lot of existing selling points redundant

driverless cars will make performance irrelevant, electric cars will mean once a vehicle has a range of probably 1000 miles and a sufficiently rapid charging capacity, anything else is irrelevant so cars are gonna sell on comfort/ride and pretty much every manufacturer can match one another on that

also I have this horrible theory that the future will be the elimination of private vehicle ownership and basically everyone will just take ubers

probably, but it's developing rapidly

I'm hoping hydrogen wins out over battery storage

no dude, tesla is on life support, other companies are doing it a lot better

look at jaguar and hyundai

volvo are totally withdrawing pure ICE cars and going hybrid/electric only

toyota are pouring money into the mirai

meanwhile Europe is drawing closer and closer to banning ICE