Speed

If 'interesting' means the same as in the Chinese curse 'May you live in interesting times', I don't think anyone would want to drive an interesting car. It implies something made by British Leyland in the 1970s.

It's quite interesting to actually compile such statistics yourself. Remember when it was 'BMWs are the only ones using foglights in town'? I decided to take on the very arduous task of sitting outside the pub for several evenings at dusk and log those going by. In an area where BMWs are very common. The most common make by far to be using foglights was Ford.

Tell me a country that has a 209MPH speed limit.

Why. ?

Thats not what you asked.

Why have you picked on Bentley Plenty of cars can travel at 70mph plus.

Why? Do you drive your car at maximum speed ever?

Bentley have demonstrated the extreme ridiculousness of building cars and aiding and abetting grossly dangerous speed. It is high time that cars were fitted with speed limiters and before anyone says it there is no need to lock to 70 MPH when GPS will allow various limits to be set to match legal limits.

I know what you are going to say:

Going as fast as you can, round a roundabout in the 2CV with the roof down ...

Most of the cars made will exceed 70mph. Bentley do no just sell cars that drive on the road.

Why not?

My VW will do 120 or more, that's still very illegal, and in many places, dangerous.

Cars sold in the UK are also driven in other countries where speed limits are higher. The limit on much of the Dutch motorway system, for example, is 130 km/h, which is a tad over 80 mph.

I have driven my last three cars, all capable of a theoretical 120+ mph, at over 100 mph on German autobahns for short periods when there was very little traffic.

Here is a dilemma: Suppose you buy a VW Golf R ~300bhp and 30k. If you then drive sensible and relaxed, as you should do, then he could have bought a Golf 1.2 TSI for ~17k. The driving experience would be about the same as the 30k Golf. Hence the Golf R man almost feel forced to drive faster than he should do in order to justify his purchase.

This is where your argument fails...

Tim

Why would you buy a 300 bhp car if not to experience the performance? And there is a lot more to performance than top speed.

But it could be a novelty effect; the performance also comes at a price: Fuel cost, insurance, increased wear and service costs.

I'd disagree - for any one driver, the A-B time taken might be similar for the 2 cars. The one driver being me ;-)

And to say that the driving experience would be much the same is surely wrong - especially applied to those who bought the faster car in the first place.

Could be, depends on the driver.

Then stick to a shopping trolley. It's your choice.

I like a bit of quiet and comfort. Shopping trolleys don't ride particularly very well. A merc E class would suit me nicely.

It's sometimes instructive to watch the youtube horrible car fails, mostly of russian origin. In many cases you can spot the erratic drivers and you just know that they aren't going to make it. Vodka may have a role to play in this. So keep well away from any crazy drivers, don't try to compete or match their speed.

Other accidents are caused by bloody minded drivers, e.g. flooring a

500 bhp car without knowing if the wheels have equal traction. If one of the wheels is on a banana skin, the car will just go up the next tree or into the row of parked cars. LOL.

After all is said and done, the true definition of an accident is one that just happen without any warning whatsoever.

You could do that quite happily on my '97 BMW. The traction and stability control stopped anything nasty happening. I'd expect more modern and more powerful cars to have the same sort of thing.

I attend drag race meetings where it is relatively common for car to accelerate from the start line and then suddenly veer 90 degrees into the crash barrier. This is not just related to purpose built cars but also unmodified performance road legal cars. This happens in a 'safe' environment where the track is always dry and artificially sticky. Walk the track at the end of a meeting and your shoes are likely to be stuck to the track.