Holden or Ford

[A185F]

post num 100. FORD ! aweome choice ther gavin

[Naki]

QUOTE (victor_alpha_charlie @ Jun 17 2008, 08:15 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Didn't just mean Euros! There are (gasp!) some good Jap cars out now- Try the new Mazda 6 or Mondeo.

Good to see Falcons/Commodores are catching up. Nothing beats the sound of a Falcon V8!

You are preaching to the converted - Mazda 6 - fantastic car! Mondeo - Japanese? They are built in Belguim

[Gavin Conroy]

QUOTE (victor_alpha_charlie @ Jun 21 2008, 08:15 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Didn't just mean Euros! There are (gasp!) some good Jap cars out now- Try the new Mazda 6 or Mondeo.

Good to see Falcons/Commodores are catching up. Nothing beats the sound of a Falcon V8!

mm interesting, I test drove a Mondeo a few weeks back and it had a Ford badge on it he he
Might look Jap but its not a jap brand.

The Mazda 6 MPS is a good car but the later model Falcons like the BF and now FG Falcon handle very well as does the VE Commodore.
But.............. Some Euro cars have an advantage with set up including the adjustable ride hieght settings but that comes at a high price and if Holden and Ford fitted that gear they would be too expensive.

As for fuel the car above cruises at 1600 rpm at 100kmh and uses 11.0 litres per 100kms which is good but it will drink a bit if you nail it.
Some other smaller engines run at 3000 rpm plus which uses more fuel but smaller engines definately are more economical around town.

[victor_alpha_charlie]

QUOTE (Naki @ Jun 17 2008, 11:58 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

You are preaching to the converted - Mazda 6 - fantastic car! Mondeo - Japanese? They are built in Belguim

Opps. Typo?
Mondeos for our market are actually built in South Africa I think, just like the Ford Focus.

QUOTE (Gavin Conroy @ Jun 18 2008, 07:36 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

As for fuel the car above cruises at 1600 rpm at 100kmh and uses 11.0 litres per 100kms which is good but it will drink a bit if you nail it.
Some other smaller engines run at 3000 rpm plus which uses more fuel but smaller engines definately are more economical around town.

Not necessarily

Mum's Skoda (Yes I know you've all heard a lot about it ) has a 2.0L Turbo Diesel. It ticks over at about 1800rpm at 105km/h in 6th. The fuel consumption isn't that low for around town, but then when it is driven hard the fuel consumption hardly changes (This is from the car's trip computer). Even after a fast trip over the Rimutakas you're looking at about 7.5L/100Km, at a faster pace than a Commodore/Falcon (even the new ones) could cope with. It does about 650km on a 50L tank.

[Gavin Conroy]

Was more aiming at similar peformance cars it is nearly impossible to compare a diesel Turbo to a 315 kw GT Falcon
A friend of time has a Subaru WRX which cruises at hi revs and the turbo is spinning as well so its quite hard on fuel.
Dont really want to fire up a fuel economy debate as there will always be fuel misers but my only point is that some of the bigger cars arent that bad on fuel especially on the open road.

[victor_alpha_charlie]

QUOTE (Gavin Conroy @ Jun 19 2008, 08:37 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Dont really want to fire up a fuel economy debate as there will always be fuel misers but my only point is that some of the bigger cars arent that bad on fuel especially on the open road.

You've got a point there. Also your new FPV might not be the absolute fastest around the twisties (Although still plenty quick enough!) but it'll be an extremely comfortable cruiser for the odd trip to Christchurch or Auckland.

QUOTE (Gavin Conroy @ Jun 19 2008, 08:37 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Was more aiming at similar peformance cars it is nearly impossible to compare a diesel Turbo to a 315 kw GT Falcon

All I'm going to say is you'd be surprised

[Timmo]

QUOTE (Gavin Conroy @ Jun 19 2008, 08:37 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

A friend of time has a Subaru WRX which cruises at hi revs and the turbo is spinning as well so its quite hard on fuel.

Turbo boost (which is related to mass airflow and therefore fuel needed to achieve combustion) is related to load not revs so it more depends on the load on the engine at 100km/h rather than the revs outright. In that regard, a turbo is efficient as it is responsive both to revs and throttle position (or again, more correctly, to load which is the result of revs and throttle position factors- You can have high revs but low load = low boost or low revs and high load = low boost or high revs and high load = high boost etc etc).

When cruising in my car at 100km/h im still pulling around 3000 rpm but the turbo isnt generating any boost (i.e. the intake is still in a vacum state similar to a naturally aspirated car)

Subarus being hard on fuel has a lot to do with their permanant AWD

Im not saying that isnt what you were implying but just clarifying


Anyway. the reason I dislike the Ford and Holden V8 sedans is because they dont do enough to use the 'potential' they have in their capacity- Their ethos seems to be 'hmm our car isnt very fast...how can we make it faster?....I know, lets through a bigger engine in it!' without looking at the root causes of why their car isnt fast (or which power to weight ratio is only one factor)

A maker like Subaru takes a slightly different approach: 'Hmm our car isnt very fast....how can we make it faster?....well, there is no use having a large mass so far forward so lets make a small compact unit and mount it low and rear.....hmm this limits our engine capacity so lets add turbocharging to overcome this. Hmm... now we are making the same P2W ratio lets maximise the percentage of time the driver can actually use ALL that power {rather than just turn the excess into tyre smoke}- Lets add a dynamic AWD system etc etc. Furthermore lets place this all in a compact sedan, whose low mass means that everything else works better: Tyres, brakes, engine etc etc.

I prefer that approach as it gives more evidence of the engineers/designers thinking through the concept of a fast car....not just putting a big engine in one. (And by 'preferring this approach' I dont necesarily mean the turbo AWD approach, I mean clever approaches to the age old challenge of making a human go fast)

[Gavin Conroy]

Yip that all sounds pretty good.
Only point I was making is that the bigger cars do not always have bad fuel ecomomy. The old ones sure did, no question but as technology marches on, fuel economy will get even better.
Some one posted in this threa and wished me well when it comes to paying for fuel for the new car I have coming later this year and I just wanted to point out that they are not that bad.
As far as the WRX goes, my friend told me how much fuel he used and I was a bit surprised so perhaps he has a lead foot.

On the engine front, I dont think they just throw bigger engines in all of the time, Holden seems to be doing a bit of that of late but the 5.4 engine that powers the Ford Falcon has been around for a few years and has been improved each time round and I think with the new GT they have finally got it right

The new F6 turbo that is being launched as part of the new Falcon range will do 0-100 in just under 5 seconds by the sounds of it which isnt to bad for an 1800kg car, not sure how long it will last though. It is a 310kw turbo and sounds frightening in ways.