Lets talk about cars/motorsports

Just checked the receipt. Clutch, pressure plate centre and bearing were all replaced.

I'll still call. Thanks for the advice.

@ hybrid sports car discussion: It's not in the same tier as those three, but I really like the BMW i8.

edited 8th Mar '15 11:15:39 AM by pagad

Porsche 918. I don't particularly like McLaren and while the Ferarri is amusing and slightly prettier, the Porsche is more technologically impressive. Just in any other colour than that bloody silver you always see the thing in.

BMW i8 is also pretty cool, looking like it just escaped from a car show and able to worry a 911.

I'll go with the 918 as well. Just look at that Martini livery! Yes, that is actually an option with the Weissach package.

No ootini package?◊

I'll show myself out...

I never liked Porsche's. Among the Germans I would be more favorable towards BMW. It's La Ferrari, i8, P1, and 918, in that order (from most preferred to least among them), for me. But then again the i8 might edge it a bit because Ferrari are pussies.

edited 8th Mar '15 9:16:54 PM by entropy13

I don't particularly like the look of La Ferrari, I have to say. The wing mirrors make it look like a bug.

They're not great. Not as bad as the Pagani Huayra's but still.

Mirrors tend to look like an afterthought on cars like that, an annoying real-world constraint that pops up after you've done the fancy styling and amazing aerodynamics. I'm kind of surprised no one's made a hypercar with cameras instead of actual mirrors yet.

As long as you're fine having to pay for the TV license.

@hybrid supercars:

while i have no badge preference among the hybrid supercars, i have heard that the Porsche is faster around the track, so that is my pick.

my brother would definitely pick the La Ferrari

But Ferraris are red. Red un's go fasta.

Not all Ferraris are red. Anyway, red Ferraris are boring.

Red or a bright yellow are the only acceptable Ferrari colors in my mind.

I know they mostly appear in silver, but for some reason I associate Porsches with dark green. It's the colour I think they look best in, anyway.

Greens are for British cars.

They are, rather. The 918 at least doesn't come in green anyway, but there's a dark blue that looks spiffing.

Now silver, that's the most boring colour you can put on a car. Whatever the vehicle, paint it silver and it looks unimaginative and generic. It's acceptable and cool on precisely two cars, a Mercedes-Benz 300SL or an Aston Martin DB5.

They're just such a massive, massive cliché. I agree yellow's good, and LaFerrari looks great in black.

Re: rear view cameras: The Porsche 918 concepts actually had rear view cameras instead of mirrors, but apparently the cameras were not road legal everywhere, so they wound up sticking with mirrors.

A white Ferrari 458 occasionally appears at the top of the multi-storey car park at work. Definitely looks good in that colour.

Buggered if I can work out how it gets up and down the steep ramps, though.

Witchcraft.

Now time for something a little older and different — videos of the 1955-56 Oxford and Cambridge Far Eastern Expedition.

It's a route that cannot be re-created, as The Other Wiki explains:

The 1955 route as a whole is now deemed largely impassable, not least because of the wars in Iraq^note  Ed — The route went from Damascus to Baghdad along the former pipeline and Afghanistan, but also on account of the fact that the Indian border with Burma was closed in 1958 due to an insurgency along that frontier and in the province of Assam against the Government of India. The Oxford and Cambridge Far Eastern Expedition was the last recorded vehicular journey along the Ledo Road route from India into Burma. At present, the northern border of what is now Myanmar is open to local trade, but to this day it remains totally closed to foreigners, and the whole border is closed to any non-locals in vehicles.

Part I

edited 14th Mar '15 4:55:09 AM by Greenmantle

Part II:

What is also notable is that this film was only made due to the involvement of David Attenborough at The BBC, and of course Land Rover, who supplied the 86" Station Wagons involved.

Spotted an (obviously imported) Lincoln Towncar n traffic today and thought of Le Garcon. Never seen one in the flesh before. American landbarges really do look a little out of place here

Imported? Do they not sell land yachts over there in Europe? If they don't that's a shame. They're lovely.

You'd have a horrendous time with a land yacht in Copenhagen.

European city centre design isn't that well suited to land yachts. That and local pride in their own car industries.

Can't be too bad. I have a hard time driving around in town because my car is literally wider than the lanes but I manage. Mostly.

Plus you get to win every car accident you take part in, it's great.