BMW - The Ultimate Driving Delusion?

Joe_Horner

James_B. wrote: »

The OP makes no sense. A Toyota IQ is far more forgiving of errors than an Elise S1, but most would agree that the Elise is the far superior "driver's" car.

Not at sensible road speeds.

To put an Elise anywhere near its handling limits on a public road takes extreme stupidity, such as entering corners at speeds that you haven't got a hope in hell of avoiding anything lurking round it no matter what you're driving.

Go to the track and it's a different matter, but on a track your corners won't have hedges, or sheep on the road, or someone coming the other way a little wide, and you can be pretty sure there won't be someone pulled over on their mobile phone half way round either.

Within that context of day to day driving the IQ can be far more fun precisely because you can get to the hairy point where your own skill is what counts.


eta: to other comments, I happen to totally agree that BMWs (and similar) are great to drive, but because they're so good they're also (boringly) easy unless you just plant it with no thought for everyday hazards - which have nothing to do with the driver or the car but are the usual limiting factor on public roads.

Prothet_of_Doom

Some years ago I coined the phrase, "Any numpty can drive fast in a fast car, but it takes real skill, a lack of mechanical sympathy, and bravery to drive fast in a slow car"


And "Nobody crashes on the straights"


and "It's not what you drive, but how you drive it"


The answer is "MX5"

DominicH

I do laugh when car reviewers say things like "for motorway driving, you may want to consider the more powerful model", when the truth is that the humblest car you can buy today is easily capable of realistic motorway speeds. Take something like a Skoda Citigo - about the slowest car you can get, right? But still as fast as some repmobiles of the 1980s, and motorways haven't changed much in that time, except to get slower. The speed limit was the same then.

darkmatter101

TrickyWicky wrote: »

BMW? well apart from the badge, what really is there to them?

I know a french model that is better than many of them - i should know, i had a beemer driver in one once and he was utterly gutted at how rubbish his babe magnet was compared to it.

you have got to be kidding right? You're comparing a French car (might have been useful to say which one it was?) to a BMW? Drive a proper big engined BMW and then come back and tell me there is nothing much to them pass the badge.

darkmatter101

DominicH wrote: »

I do laugh when car reviewers say things like "for motorway driving, you may want to consider the more powerful model", when the truth is that the humblest car you can buy today is easily capable of realistic motorway speeds. Take something like a Skoda Citigo - about the slowest car you can get, right? But still as fast as some repmobiles of the 1980s, and motorways haven't changed much in that time, except to get slower. The speed limit was the same then.

Aygo, VW Up etc can of course be driven on the motorway but would I want to drive one of them on a motorway on a regular basis? No!

High revs will be noisy at higher speeds and every time a larger vehicle passes by you will get swung left and right as they are such light cars. Most importantly I would rather be in a bigger, heavier car if I ever had an accident rather than a flimsy Skoda City

TrickyWicky

darkmatter101 wrote: »

you have got to be kidding right? You're comparing a French car (might have been useful to say which one it was?) to a BMW? Drive a proper big engined BMW and then come back and tell me there is nothing much to them pass the badge.

Not everything is about engine size and 0-60 times. You sound like a typical lad who doesn't really care about anything other than BMW simply because it's BMW.

If you can't even consider for one moment that there may be other more impressive cars out there then I feel sorry for you.

I won't name the model, I don't want to be linked to other forums etc however all i will say is a colleague of mine paid £5k for his beemer a few years back that was apparently getting him laid every week. We went to lunch one day in my frog mobile.. he was nearly sick with envy and wouldn't shut up about how much better it was than his. All i kept hearing was "i love this car.. my bmw isn't a patch on it"

darkmatter101

TrickyWicky wrote: »

Not everything is about engine size and 0-60 times. You sound like a typical lad who doesn't really care about anything other than BMW simply because it's BMW.

No it isn't all about engine size and 0-60. Go drive even an entry level BMW 1 series and I can guarantee its suspension setup and rear wheel drive layout will feel 10 times better than any French car around some bends.

TrickyWicky

around SOME bends LOL!

Joe_Horner

TrickyWicky wrote: »

around SOME bends LOL!

Yep, generally the ones where you're

Joe_Horner wrote: »

[...] entering corners at speeds that you haven't got a hope in hell of avoiding anything lurking round it no matter what you're driving.

:beer:

agrinnall

UsernameAlreadyExists wrote: »

LOL!
Post #4

What the hell???
Don't post then? What are you even responding to?

I'm responding to it being posted in the wrong place, got a problem with that?