Power To Weight Comparison

[Ty]

Tjere's a whole lot more fun to be had, IMHO, driving a smaller lightweight car at 9/10ths than a muscular brute at 6/10ths. Best of all, the cops hardly notice!

There is truth in that!

 

[Jeff Miller]

Tjere's a whole lot more fun to be had, IMHO, driving a smaller lightweight car at 9/10ths than a muscular brute at 6/10ths. Best of all, the cops hardly notice!

First off, I LOVE powerful motors! However with that said I can reference my motorcycle experiences to quantify what Lil4x said.

Over the years my motorcycles grew from small off road bikes to large road bikes. The large road bikes have tons of power and can gobble a ton of asphalt but their weight gets to be a handful when getting into twisty roads.

A few years ago a friend challenged me to resurrect my old 250 Sprint to join him in the Motogiro ride out east. Motogiro is a joyful romp through east coast farmland on bikes no larger than 305 cc and built before 1968. Riding through that setting and enjoying the twisty roads rekindled my spirit for smaller more agile bikes and really helped me understand what I left behind as I thirsted for bigger bikes.

I drive a 1/2 ton truck now mostly because I need it to tow a camper. It has a ton of power that is great for stop light racing but it really isn't very much fun to drive anything other than on big roads. I am really looking forward to the agility that the lightweight elio will provide as well as being able to park easier than I can a huge truck.

 

[Lil4X]

Although I appreciate a machine that sits in oily silence waiting to do my bidding at the tiniest flick of a power-assisted toggle, that machine has no soul. If you define “soul” as I do, a special gut-level connection to the driver, a car that accomplishes all with unruffled grace, whether it’s a .9g corner or an 11 sec. quarter – to me, is an appliance, not possessed of a soul. That requires a beautiful day – an understanding companion beside you who is not just willing to share this kind of automotive adventure, but actually loves it herself – a brisk drive on a winding two-lane country road, splashing in and out of the dappled sunlight with no particular destination firmly in mind. This is an experience to be savored like a fine wine.

The small British sports cars of the late fifties and early sixties exemplified soul. Triumphs, MGs, Healeys, even Sunbeams - and for the horsey set, Jaguars and Morgans were the most popular. They were basic machines – an engine, a transmission, steering wheel, and driver connected through four wheels and hopefully a similar number of brakes, to the road. No creature comforts, a raspy exhaust that made a glance at the tach unnecessary, no roof, no windows, not even a radio (you couldn’t hear it anyway). They had soul – they were usually unreliable, uncomfortable, and more fun than anything with wheels should be allowed. Picture a riding lawnmower at 80 mph. These were direct, to the point fun machines. If a product feature didn’t make you grin, it was removed at the factory.

Italian sports cars – particularly the Alfa Romeos had not just the Italian brio for life, but a rich, well-earned racing pedigree that went back to the most famous names in prewar racing. They were the very definition of soul; lovely lines, incredible sounds of a fine precision four or six cylinder machine whirring amid the mechanical injectors and tappets clattering away beneath the bonnet. On a cool, sun-struck autumn day, there was nothing like a blast through the countryside with the top down to make you feel alive. For the price of a pedestrian Oldsmobile, you could join the ranks of Nuvolari and Ascari driving the Mille Miglia in an open cockpit a thousand miles from Brescia to Rome and back again. That was soul.

They were more seductive than an Italian lover, and as utterly faithless. They were not just unreliable, but prone to fits of temper out on the road that could leave you stranded for hours. They were easy to repair, almost impossible to repair properly. British cars could be put in running condition by your local blacksmith, Italian cars required a watchmaker. British marques dripped oil in the driveway, and were subject to electrical blackouts – usually at night on dark winding roads at speed. Italian sports cars, Alfa, Fiat, and Lancia did their best to coat their rear ends and anyone so unfortunate as to follow behind, with a thin film of oil that had passed through the engine in an attempt to escape. All were impractical in a modern sense, but they never failed to produce a grin.

Sad, in a way, that with the exceptions of the Lotus and the Atom, cars today are primarily appliances. You press the key fob to unlock the door, slide into a leather cocoon, and seal yourself inside. You adjust the climate controls, seats, steering, mirrors – all by pushbuttons . . . you crank up the CD or mp3 and twist the key. The computer-operated engine instantly responds – so quietly you glance at the tach to be sure it’s running before sliding the selector into “drive” (oh, the irony) and joining the bumper-to-bumper crawl to work.

That’s an experience your kids one day may think pretty crude – but it’s a long way from switching on the ignition, waiting for the fuel pump to wind up, then settle to a slow putt-putt before pulling out the choke, punching the throttle a time or two to prime the cylinders, then stepping on the clutch and thumbing the big “start” button on the dash. Somewhere deep under the hood, a whine punctuated by a mechanical shaking and thumping would signal the engine was turning over and (hopefully) the engine would catch. A delicate interplay between choke and throttle would keep the wily beast from either strangling or starving as your scan, pinned to the oil pressure gauge from the instant you pressed the starter, began to shift to other instruments as pressure came up and lube oil was being distributed to dozens of bearings, cams, chains and rockers.

The engine comes to life with a series of snorts and settles down to a stumbling idle as all cylinders seem to wake one by one, smoothing to a nervous stutter. As the temperature comes off the peg, you engage first gear and slowly begin to move, accelerating easily up through the gears until the engine and gearbox are up to operating temperature and have established a friendly relationship with one another. As you leave the Interstate and stretch out on the two-lane blacktop, you go to work, shifting smoothly and quickly to keep the engine in the narrow power band - downshifting heel and toe and braking slightly before you slice the apex and squeeze on the power. The engine note rises and falls from a feline snarl to a raspy howl as gasoline is transformed into adrenalin.

No turbo lag to anticipate, no wheelspin - just a slight 4-wheel drift as you ease to the edge of your lane to remind you what this machine was made to do in the hands of its master. The mechanical chatter of the engine and yowl of the exhaust on the overrun – the distinct smell of castor oil (no additives, thank you) provides you a front-row seat to the most exciting concert in motorsport. Soul music.

 

[Zipper]

Although I appreciate a machine that sits in oily silence waiting to do my bidding at the tiniest flick of a power-assisted toggle, that machine has no soul. If you define “soul” as I do, a special gut-level connection to the driver, a car that accomplishes all with unruffled grace, whether it’s a .9g corner or an 11 sec. quarter – to me, is an appliance, not possessed of a soul. That requires a beautiful day – an understanding companion beside you who is not just willing to share this kind of automotive adventure, but actually loves it herself – a brisk drive on a winding two-lane country road, splashing in and out of the dappled sunlight with no particular destination firmly in mind. This is an experience to be savored like a fine wine.

The small British sports cars of the late fifties and early sixties exemplified soul. Triumphs, MGs, Healeys, even Sunbeams - and for the horsey set, Jaguars and Morgans were the most popular. They were basic machines – an engine, a transmission, steering wheel, and driver connected through four wheels and hopefully a similar number of brakes, to the road. No creature comforts, a raspy exhaust that made a glance at the tach unnecessary, no roof, no windows, not even a radio (you couldn’t hear it anyway). They had soul – they were usually unreliable, uncomfortable, and more fun than anything with wheels should be allowed. Picture a riding lawnmower at 80 mph. These were direct, to the point fun machines. If a product feature didn’t make you grin, it was removed at the factory.

Italian sports cars – particularly the Alfa Romeos had not just the Italian brio for life, but a rich, well-earned racing pedigree that went back to the most famous names in prewar racing. They were the very definition of soul; lovely lines, incredible sounds of a fine precision four or six cylinder machine whirring amid the mechanical injectors and tappets clattering away beneath the bonnet. On a cool, sun-struck autumn day, there was nothing like a blast through the countryside with the top down to make you feel alive. For the price of a pedestrian Oldsmobile, you could join the ranks of Nuvolari and Ascari driving the Mille Miglia in an open cockpit a thousand miles from Brescia to Rome and back again. That was soul.

They were more seductive than an Italian lover, and as utterly faithless. They were not just unreliable, but prone to fits of temper out on the road that could leave you stranded for hours. They were easy to repair, almost impossible to repair properly. British cars could be put in running condition by your local blacksmith, Italian cars required a watchmaker. British marques dripped oil in the driveway, and were subject to electrical blackouts – usually at night on dark winding roads at speed. Italian sports cars, Alfa, Fiat, and Lancia did their best to coat their rear ends and anyone so unfortunate as to follow behind, with a thin film of oil that had passed through the engine in an attempt to escape. All were impractical in a modern sense, but they never failed to produce a grin.

Sad, in a way, that with the exceptions of the Lotus and the Atom, cars today are primarily appliances. You press the key fob to unlock the door, slide into a leather cocoon, and seal yourself inside. You adjust the climate controls, seats, steering, mirrors – all by pushbuttons . . . you crank up the CD or mp3 and twist the key. The computer-operated engine instantly responds – so quietly you glance at the tach to be sure it’s running before sliding the selector into “drive” (oh, the irony) and joining the bumper-to-bumper crawl to work.

That’s an experience your kids one day may think pretty crude – but it’s a long way from switching on the ignition, waiting for the fuel pump to wind up, then settle to a slow putt-putt before pulling out the choke, punching the throttle a time or two to prime the cylinders, then stepping on the clutch and thumbing the big “start” button on the dash. Somewhere deep under the hood, a whine punctuated by a mechanical shaking and thumping would signal the engine was turning over and (hopefully) the engine would catch. A delicate interplay between choke and throttle would keep the wily beast from either strangling or starving as your scan, pinned to the oil pressure gauge from the instant you pressed the starter, began to shift to other instruments as pressure came up and lube oil was being distributed to dozens of bearings, cams, chains and rockers.

The engine comes to life with a series of snorts and settles down to a stumbling idle as all cylinders seem to wake one by one, smoothing to a nervous stutter. As the temperature comes off the peg, you engage first gear and slowly begin to move, accelerating easily up through the gears until the engine and gearbox are up to operating temperature and have established a friendly relationship with one another. As you leave the Interstate and stretch out on the two-lane blacktop, you go to work, shifting smoothly and quickly to keep the engine in the narrow power band - downshifting heel and toe and braking slightly before you slice the apex and squeeze on the power. The engine note rises and falls from a feline snarl to a raspy howl as gasoline is transformed into adrenalin.

No turbo lag to anticipate, no wheelspin - just a slight 4-wheel drift as you ease to the edge of your lane to remind you what this machine was made to do in the hands of its master. The mechanical chatter of the engine and yowl of the exhaust on the overrun – the distinct smell of castor oil (no additives, thank you) provides you a front-row seat to the most exciting concert in motorsport. Soul music.

You have talent. Your post transported me back to the late sixty's and a certain blue '62 Austin Healy 3000 Mk. II. Thank you.

 

[Lil4X]

Thank you! While I put that piece together for another forum some six years ago, it pales before what many consider the finest piece of ad copy ever written - for an automobile that failed some 90 years ago. Written for the Jordan Motor Car Company, it was entitled "Somewhere West of Laramie", it remains a classic.

The art by Fred Cole was a vast departure from the purely illustrative artwork of the day, evoking both speed and imagination as a woman dressed in a cloche hat races a cowboy through swirling clouds - but the key was the copy that still appears in advertising texts as exemplary of what great copy can do for an ad. A little dated now, since its appearance in the Saturday Evening Post in 1923, it is still a magnificent bit of prose that represented a shift to "image" advertising rather than the contemporary recitations of cold specifications that characterized automotive ads of the day.

A second installment showed basically the same scene with even more stylized artwork and pared-down copy to accommodate the larger image on the page allowed by the Post.

Notice that although you don't know how many cylinders it has, or gears in the transmission, you don't care, you want one - whatever it costs. Or would have, particularly if you were a woman of some means in 1923. The Jordan Playboy may have ceased production, but its image will live in American advertising forever.

Sword, meet pen.

 

[rmcelroy]

Lil4x the romance of those cars is undeniable. At one point I had a 69 Triumph Spritfire. Later in life a got a 90 Miata, there are ghosts in those cars you would recognize!
If you look at the Miata Performance book by Norman Garrett, you will see the Miata design team went out of their way to bring many ot those charateristics forward.

Thanks for the read.

 

[Craig]

Although I appreciate a machine that sits in oily silence waiting to do my bidding at the tiniest flick of a power-assisted toggle, that machine has no soul. If you define “soul” as I do, a special gut-level connection to the driver, a car that accomplishes all with unruffled grace, whether it’s a .9g corner or an 11 sec. quarter – to me, is an appliance, not possessed of a soul. That requires a beautiful day – an understanding companion beside you who is not just willing to share this kind of automotive adventure, but actually loves it herself – a brisk drive on a winding two-lane country road, splashing in and out of the dappled sunlight with no particular destination firmly in mind. This is an experience to be savored like a fine wine.

Always had a thing for the older (67-68)Opal GT. A poor mans Vets. Drove one around in Germany for awhile, it was fun on the curvy roads.

 

[Jim H]

Always had a thing for the older (67-68)Opal GT. A poor mans Vets. Drove one around in Germany for awhile, it was fun on the curvy roads.

Thanks for taking me down memory lane because I had totally forgotten about the Opal GT

 

[Lil4X]

I had a much-loved '72 Opel Rallye. I didn't think I could get into the much lower and smaller GT - and it proved difficult in the showroom. A few weeks after I purchased the Rallye and was really enjoying it, one of my engineers bought a GT. He was at least 3" taller than me at 6'7" and I have no idea how he stuffed himself in there, but getting out needed calliope music accompaniment. Formula 1 cars and fighter jets were often described as something you put on rather than got into. I think that Opel GT was more like that as well.

 

[2.ooohhh]

Sad, in a way, that with the exceptions of the Lotus and the Atom, cars today are primarily appliances. You press the key fob to unlock the door, slide into a leather cocoon, and seal yourself inside. You adjust the climate controls, seats, steering, mirrors – all by pushbuttons . . . you crank up the CD or mp3 and twist the key. The computer-operated engine instantly responds – so quietly you glance at the tach to be sure it’s running before sliding the selector into “drive” (oh, the irony) and joining the bumper-to-bumper crawl to work.

The bulk of the current market apparently wants the lifeless "cocoon" and the push buttons but just because that's what's there doesn't mean that's how you have to accept it. I don't own, haven't conceptualized, and certainly haven't built any vehicles without a soul. Some may snarl and snap and try to kill the driver in a life and death struggle at each and every corner, while others cruise along content to accompany the driver as far as they may care to go. (and further if you happen to forget that the parking brake doesn't work) Regardless every single one I assure you, does indeed have a soul.

If you buy it boring and leave it boring you are just as responsible as the designer was for being stuck a drab lifeless vehicle. If you build/modify it to suit you may just find yourself waking up a few hours early to take the long and winding way in to work on nice days.(I know I did this morning! )

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