Cars that didn't live up to expectations

Sporky

On the "not a nutter" front, I should point out that the instructor at Mercedes Benz world did put up the rollbar in the SL500 I played with on the skid pan. He looked a bit concerned that whenever it spun out (lack of talent on my part) I'd see if I could turn it into a full 360 and keep going.

I don't do that sort of thing on the road though. In public I am strongly in favour of the car facing the direction of travel.

Haych

Mazda RX7 - a very pretty car but a horrible ride and slow.  If you ran over a penny in the road you could tell if it was heads or tails side up!  For a car that was designed to be a sports car it was dismally slow too, it wasn't the turbo version and just about anything could keep pace with it.

The rotary engine would also have a nasty habit of misfiring at the most inopportune time too, and would lose power.  Normally it would clear itself with an almighty bang after a few good revs but very disconcerting all the same.

The Wankle engine made a nice noise, though, and it has an audible warning when it was over-revved - they never had a rev limited AFAIK.

It got replaced with a MKIII Supra Turbo in the end and the Surpa is by far the better car.  Still looks good, fabulous suspension, comfortable, fast and just an amazing car to drive.

Funnily enough, the Mazda blew up the week after the arrival of the Supra.  Good timing!

fields5069

W-reg Metro. None of the adverts really went into any great depth regarding the stink of petrol in the cabin or the near-impossibility of putting it into gear.

HAL9000

First time I drove a Porsche I have to admit I was expecting great things and also have to admit to being somewhat underwhelmed. It was the 911 Carrera S4 with an autobox and all the electronic stability gubbins. Very little feedback to the driver and felt like lots of other modern cars, but a bit better. Although a very nice capable car it really was just that - a nice capable car.

However... The second 911 (no idea which variant) I drove was a twenty-year old manual with no stability electrickery, and you really did need to keep your wits about you to drive it. But so much feel, and so much driver involvement. Absolutely brilliant. Now I know what all the fuss is about, and if I suddenly stumbled across a very large pile of cash that I didn't previously realise I had, then I could easily be tempted.

Nunogilberto

fields5069 said:

W-reg Metro. None of the adverts really went into any great depth regarding the stink of petrol in the cabin or the near-impossibility of putting it into gear.

Funnily enough, my aunt and uncle had a blue W reg Metro that absolutely reeked of petrol at the best of times. Turned out to be a split in the fuel line. It must have been like that for ages though...