Barry

The older European members amongst us will remember the original Alpine A110 And the later Renault Alpine A310 To win European car of the year is a prestigious award and if the new Alpine A110 wins, it will be the first 2 seater sports car to win the award in the last 40 years. Previous winners have included cars such as the Porsche 928 and the Ford Granada, a varied array, but a lot of factors are taken into consideration. For a 4 cylinder sports car that can beat a Porsche Cayman into submission on a track, the new A110 is really something special. The cars the A110 are facing in the final include the Citroen C5 Aircross, Ford Focus, Jaguar I-Pace, Kia Ceed, Mercedes-Benz A-Class and Peugeot 508. Personal opinion, there a lot of special cars with nice features in the final, but the A110 just stands out as extra special. Remember when Dodge brought back the Challenger and Ford went back to retro Mustang styling? This is what that is to European cars.

I feel bad for Syd and what happened to him. I’ve taken a lot of psychedelics in my time and it definitely changed how I view the world, Syd took it to a whole other level and it wasn’t helped by the people around him. I’ve read a story where his flat mates were slipping acid into his tea every morning to keep him on a permanent trip to supposedly increase his creativity. It’s ok getting high and getting inspired, but if you never come down, how can you do anything about it? Roger and David were good to him after he was kicked out, especially David, considering the amount of resentment Syd must have had for David for “taking his place”. They helped him produce his solo material after Pink Floyd. I can only imagine how difficult it must have been for them to work with him considering how he was. They must have had a massive love for him. But there comes a time to realise you can’t help some people and you have to walk away. I had a bandmate like that in the early 2000s. Massively talented and inspired but a massive alcoholic and drug addict and could never keep it together long enough to do anything productive. He would come out with these amazing guitar licks but when you asked him to play it again, what? Who are you? Where am I? I loved the guy but the last straw was when he stood on the table and tried to insert a CD into the lightbulb because he wanted to listen to guns n roses. You can’t work with that.

Thanks @Ren13 much appreciated

I’m looking for a warehouse in the Al Quoz area.

I’ve had a look through YouTube and I couldn’t see anything I’d recommend. You just need to experience it and gain confidence. The best advice I can give is don’t brake, it will upset the handling even more. Plant the accelerator and steer into the slide. It will feel counterintuitive but that’s what you need to do. Implement techniques that you have learned in sand too such as rocking the car on the clutch to get unstuck. I found a lot of stuff I learned in snow can be applied to sand so you can reverse engineer it. You might laugh at this, but get on the Xbox and play some driving sims like PGR or Forza. It will give you an idea of how a car reacts to different inputs. But if you can drift a GT40 at 140 MPH on the TV, don’t assume you can do it in real life. Watch some in car rally videos on YouTube too, see how the drivers react when the car slides around corners. You’ll be doing this in no time

At least twice. Ok, it wasn’t the most impressive sideys with sand flying everywhere but when you stand back and watch a dinky little car like that flying around, there’s no denying it’s impressive for what it is.

Here’s one for you @treks an old song but recorded by David 2 years ago. It must have been such a mind melt when they were recording this originally in the studio and syd walked in and none of them recognised him. I love the band but I think the best music was made after syd left. I appreciate the older experimental stuff, and some real fans might murder me for saying this, but they made their best music after syd.

Just came across this band recently they are a cross between rancid and the distillers. I can’t help but feel that Tim signed them to the hellcat label because Amy interrupter sounds like his ex wife brody. Anyway, nice ska band with a hint of punk. Check them out.

It snows 4-5 months out of the year in my home place. My advice is to stick to the same tyre size. Any brand of winter tyre is ok as long as it’s a winter tyre. Even the cheaper tyres will offer you better grip than standard summer tyres. Change all 4 though. If you only change 2 you are asking for disaster. For driving on ice, you need studded tyres which are hella expensive but if you’re on regular roads with snow, winter tyres are fine. Try to get yourself into an empty car park or open space. Learn how to use the handbrake to slide the car. Learn about countersteering. It will help you loads. Another bit of advice, go the the scrapyard and pick up a set of steel rims, 40-50 dollars and put your winter tyres on them. Even if you have an accident and bend one, your nice wheels are sitting in the garage undamaged waiting for summer. If you don’t damage your winter wheels, they are still waiting for next year along with your tyres.

The jimny is worth every dirham it costs. Sure, it’s not a patrol or even a Parero. And sure you can buy a bigger car for less money. It will take a special type of mentally ill petrolhead to buy a new one but different strokes for different folks. If we all went out and bought the same car, the jimny never would have been invented and the world would be boring as heck. There’s nothing as satisfying as standing back and watching a jimny pull off a huge sidey. It puts a massive smile on your face.

Let’s see the bentayga heading across the empty quarter towards liwa. Then I will be impressed. A Chevy lumina would do the route in that video.

It’s a Bentley but it is a VW engine. It’s basically 2 VW VR6 heads stuck together on a common block with 2 ecus. Real fun thing to drive. You slip into the comfy seats and think it’s a luxobarge but when you put your foot down, it blows your mind. I raced it in a 4.6 Lexus one day, I was in the Lexus (on a private road for legal sake) and the Lexus couldn’t even keep up with it. Lot of fun though, the Bentley went everywhere with its 4wd and the Lexus was sliding on every corner.

I was young and stupid before, now I’m old and stupid. Theres a time and a place to have fun and smoke tyres. SZR isn’t the place, an abandoned desert road is. Once you realise that, it all makes sense.

Why though? I genuinely don’t get it. Why wouldn’t you rather have a fast car with a lower fuel consumption than a slow car that drinks fuel other than the benefit of saying my engine is bigger than yours.

Also to add, Jaguar XJ12. 6.0 litre engine. Only made 158 BHP. Worshipped by everyone but the flagship Ford at the time was making double that with a third of the cylinders. Try to see the bigger package.

I’m the only person I know who has passed 5 driving tests due to licence confiscations. Maybe you’re daring the wrong person? Thats all over now. Maybe. Not saying I’m averse to doing 300kph on a quiet road or drifting a quiet corner. I’ll take you up on your challenge if you pay the fines.

It might be a V12, I have a car with a W16 in the shop at the minute. Numbers don’t impress me. It’s not the number of cylinders or engine capacity, it’s what you do with it that counts. It can easily turn into a willy waving contest, mine is bigger than yours etc, but if you’re not going to pull the handbrake and drift it round the world trade centre like a boss, what’s the point? The smaller cars with better power to weight ratio deserve more respect. What’s the point in having a million horsepower unless you can use it on track?

Grumpy old man stuff aside, there’s no denying the S2000 is impressive for what it is, a small convertible, especially considering it was released in 1999. 250 bhp from a N/A 2.0 4 pot, hits 9k rpm reliably all day long. RWD, 50/50 weight distribution, handles like a dream. Broaden your horizons man. I love a nice burbly V8 as much as the next guy but there’s a whole other world out there.

So what was the problem?

Getting to pick your own parts in a scrapyard is a good thing if you know what you’re doing. Helps to be on good terms with them too. When I was working in the scrapyard we would try to get rid of the old parts first. It wasn’t so much about being an AH, it’s just trying to get rid of stuff that most people don’t want and it’s taking up space. You still have to get the money out of the cars you buy for stripping and unless you sell the parts off it, you aren’t making a profit and nobody goes into business to break even. If someone was to bring you a few cans of beer or an ice cream on a hot day, that’s a game changer. Then they got to pick what they wanted.

I was at bidayer a few months ago and the place was disgusting. Never seen some much garbage in my life. Sometimes I wonder if some of these people shit on the carpet in their own house.

You can do it more reliably and for a lot less money. Honda S2000 hits 9k. Real screamer of an engine but the most interesting thing is that it spins backwards. You can adjust the Rev limiter on ECU equipped cars easily, or remove it completely if you have uprated rods and are feeling brave. One of my first cars had no limiter and it was a lot of fun to drive. You just have to be aware of it, have some self control and watch your gearshifts. I never had an issue with it but the guy who bought it from me blew the engine in less than a mile.

Sorry to be a pedant. Not all aftermarket parts are junk. Cheap pattern aftermarket parts are junk. Some aftermarket parts are higher quality than OEM. You need to do you research before buying. I recently built a mustang, all aftermarket parts, nothing original other than glass, and it runs a quarter mile 4 seconds than standard and hasn’t broken down yet.

Not all American cars are junk. I’ve fixed American cars that were written off because they needed 2 doors and were a cheap fix. Carfax is your friend here. Just remember when you go to sell again, most people do no research and automatically assume all imports are junk so you could loose a chunk of money.