carreraclubsport

Couldn't agree more. I'm sorry guys but these kind of things could only happen in America. I know that not every (American) here likes the American legal system, for an outsider (European/Norwegian) it's nothing but ridiculous! Sometimes it looks like the USA is 50% lawyers and 50% using lawyers to sue someone. How has it gone so far that grown people do not have to be responsible for their own actions? Why do you always have someone to blame? Doesn't anybody take any blame or criticism themselves?

How is it possible to try to blame Porsche for a tragic accident? Why doesn't people understand themselves that a 600 bhp sportscar will go faster (and be more dangerous) than a 100 bhp VW Golf? I remember an old Top Gear episode with the Chrylser/Dodge Viper where the host said that inside the b-pillar was the text: "This is an open vehicle, please drive carefully" or something like that. Is it really possible that grown people has to be told this fact? Couldn't they figure it out themselves? I find it strange that you allow 16 year olds to get a drivers licence, when people twice their age cannot see the dangers and limits of cars, and their own abilities to drive them.

I really like American thinking when it comes to "The American Dream" and how you like to see people make it on their own, and be successful, but it don't like the shortcuts some try to make, by making a fortune out of suing others. Why don't you use your creative thinking making new business ideas rather than finding new ways to sue (and screw) your big companies?!?


Regards

Christian

Bob Rouleau

Jeff - why do you think it will be "defeatable"? Trying turning off ESP on a Mercedes.. can't be done.

Alex - will you adopt me? I can't afford 4 dedicated track toys, and you can't drive them all at once. As a dowry I bring a GT3 and a 430.

Best,

icon

bob,

that is true!
i do not know and made an assumption!
wishful thinking?

best,
jeff

Les Quam

AS,
Would you consider sharing with us what the 4 dedeciated track cars are and what you like about them and what you don't like about some of the others. That sounds like a pleasurable discussion because this CGT should/shouldn't have driver aids America's legal system sucks is really been beaten to death IMHO.

It would be great to hear an enthusiast talk about some cars and driving those cars on a track for a change and we might all learn a few do's and don'ts about dedicated track cars from Alex's experiences if Alex would consider sharing them with us?

1AS

What an honor!!!!!!!!
In no particular order:
1973 Lotus Super 7, twin cam. About 175 hp, maybe 1350 lbs- the purest simplest car you can imagine. As fast as a Corvette up to about 70 when wind starts to count. Scary at 130 with everything shaking- but that's as fast ias it will go in a mile. Lightly drifts every corner on R Hoosiers Easy to drive using only your wrists, including shifting. Breaks about every 4 hours. Because of wind resistance, you must get it tight behind a car you want to pass, let it pull you up the straight, then pass on corner entry. Brakes suck, as it won't even lock the rears.

1999 Lotus Elise 190 R practice car- about 1500 lbs and 190 +hp with Lotus hop-up. About as fast as the 7, pure driver's car but mostly a "grip" car since on R tires it doesn't like to hold a slide, but needs to be corrected out of them. Around a tight track like Gingerman will keep up with a 360 Ferrari. On street tires, it will go into a complete drift on an off ramp. If you like driving, you would love this car

1953 Kurtis 500S. This is the car Jon Ward built to win the La Carrera, and was tested by every magazine. Now has a (totally illegal) 405 inch all aluminum Chevy with NASCAR Pontiac heads, a Jericho (no clutch) trans, quick change rear with Detroit Locker, etc. etc. 570hp off the engine dyno, and as wild as a car can get. This car cannot be turned without sliding, as it is essentially a sprint car sans wing. Acceleration up to 120 is similar to CGT, timed top speed is 188. Won the La Carrera, because it was the best car there, but a monster to drive. It was legal at the time it won (with a 302), but the engine was swapped out before magazine testing. If you want to learn to drive sideways, this is the car. Driver gets 5 point belt, passenger is stuck with 4 point. Tire life is measured in days. My greatest moment was catching up to Augie Pabst in the Scarab in the BRIC event. I am now detuning it, since I don't anticipate wheel-to-wheel competition in this car, at least for me. Full throttle cannot be used on the street ( yes it is street licensed, plate reads "1Mexico") R Hoosiers on the strees tramline everywhere, but much better when hot on the track. A great car to get mild on Sunday morning. Even my neighbors love it, tho it wakes up the entire town.

1953 "Psuedobaker"- This is a 1990 Winston Cup Monte Carlo, rebodied as a 1953 Stude. It competed in 2 LaCarrera events, but didn't finish. It was legal for the race due to the frame rails of the Stude welded in underneath. Now has a Jericho (then had a Richmond), full floating rear, and all the rest of a road course Cup car. Obviusly full cage. This car really handles, but is haaaard to stop. Now has a 377" chevy, 9.0 pistons, 500 hp, weighs 3600, and is a surprisingly good handler, just doesn't like to stop (2 feet on the brakes at Elkhart Lake). Going thru a revision, currently with Chris Beebe in Madison.

Now sold- Lola T163 updated to 165 specs raced by Gary Wilson in the original Can Am series. I reconfigured it with an all aluminum 405 repalcing the iron 427, which massively improved the handling. An unbelievable car that I had street-plated, written up in Autoweek ("The famed Lola of Munster, Indiana"). Sold when pros started dropping down into vintage- it got too fast for me. A totally unbelievable car with 607 hp, 5 speed Hewland, huge rear wing(mounted low), 17 inch slicks out back. The only Can Am car you could drive to a race and win. Let me say that again. It could be driven to the track and raced. While I did win in it, in truth, I did trailer it to the track. I can't describe driving that car. I geared it short (top speed was 188 at redline), and each gear was like first all over again. 75 mph in first, then evenly spaced up to the top. No-clutch shifting with the Hewland. Totally pasted to the earth with the huge rear wing (over 800 lbs rear downforce). I always drove it in "grip" style, but when Chris drove it at one BRIC, he slid it thru 5 consistently. 600+hp, 1800 lbs in a totally straightforward flat-bottomed car at a great track is an experience every car enthusiast should have. I don't think I ever came close to mastering that car, but I never crashed it, and did win once at the Chicago Historic Races. Just finishing 8 laps (40 miles) was a huge accomplishment. I bought it because I wanted to try one, and nobody lets you drive theirs. I whole-heartedly recommend it.
Hope I didn't bore you. AS

Bob Rouleau

B-R-A-V-O

Nick

AS WOW!

You and Les should put your heads together. He has quite an array of performance cars.

Christian, what are the taxes on cars and income in Norway? Rather than the legal system screwing the people, your government is. I AM sure I know which is worse. Jurors decide in our legal system and politicians decide in yours.

Irishdriver

Bob, don't assume it can be in the Porsche either. In my 986 MY 2000 I can switch it "off" but If it decides I am really in trouble it switches itself back on. You can never disactivate it completly.

I think it was designed with the american market in mind.

Nick - would you ever give over - It's getting boring to hear you repeat your "unshakable faith in the system" beliefs here. we know !!!

I have noticed your style now though, when we say we don't like "Sue, Grabbit and Run Inc." you always change the subject and add something irrelevant to the arguement. This time it is to say the Norwegian tax system is more biased than the US courts - bravo - that is really a relevant comparision.

Could you think of an irrelevant comparision involving the Irish? 'cos we think your system sucks too and have enacted legislation to avoid ever being in the same mess.

AS - cool collection - you've got soul after all

Nick

Irishdriver, maybe we in the US should prevent companies from doing business in Ireland since you have no respect for our legal system. It would fun watching the Irish crawling on hands and knees begging for US business.

BTW, I will not let anyone impugn the integrity of our legal system. It may not be perfect but it does the job. The Norwegian made a gratuitous attack which was not relevant to this thread. He received what he deserved.

Finally, I get tired of the ROW attacking the US in their holier than thou attitude. I do not agree with everything my and many other governments do. I can criticize but do not view it appropriate to maliciously attack them or their system of governing.

carreraclubsport

Thanks for your comments Nick, I'm signing off. Just find it funny how some of you (not everyone) can't take responsibility for their own actions....

Yes, the income taxes, and car taxes in special, is ridiculously high in Norway, but I can't see what that has to do with you running from the consecvenses from your own actions. It's not like I can jump in front of a moving car and then sue the driver, his family and, of course, the manufacturer of the car. If you can't, and won't see, that this is a wrong way of placing the blame of the accident, then I feel it is your problem. It must be easy to live a life where eveybody else can be blamed, even for the things you do wrong yourself.

Yeah, I really meant to be mean and attack all Americans, please just forget all about it.... Calm down! I never said Norway was any better than the US, where did I say, or imply, the holier than thou attitude?

Thanks for your support Irishdriver, any chance I could sue Nick for making me cry, ruining my Saturday evening and crash my car after 15 beers?


Regards

Christian

Nick

Christian all is forgiven. BTW, don't you have to be a millionaire to afford 15 beers in Norway?

1AS

Can't we bash the Italians for a while? Personally, I think that is a place where everyone wants everyone else to take care of them. How about France, where apparantly you can't get fired from your 32 hour a week job. Or the Middle East where they just chain women to the bedpost (figuratively) all in the name of the lord? Let's accept that every place has it's peculiarities, and we all seem to prefer our own.
And, whatever else is wrong with America, we have Nick. And we don't have time to fix our legal system, we have a war to fight. Did Iran get the bomb while we were arguing torts? AS

Les Quam

Iran has the bomb???????????

I thought it was Iraq with the bombs and weapons of mass destruction???

Why are we sending young Americans to die and be maimed in Iraq if it's Iran that has the bomb and has repeatedly threatened to use it on Israel and create a nuclear holocaust because after all Irans president said the first holocaust never actually happened?

Alex,
Fantastic cars really neat!!!! IMHO true car guys all have some old cars in their garages to tinker with that have some form of fluid oozing on the floor from somewhere. I have never heard of a Kurtis do you have some more background? All my old muscle cars were only built to go straight and stop at some uncertain point in the future and each day something new breaks on them even if they haven't been moved but I love them anyway. You can't beat the sounds and smell of an old car they just have a personality the new ones don't have. Thanks for sharing those are some rare and unusual cars. Great stuff.

The rest of you can return to your regularly scheduled program of Nick bashing, lawyer bashing, government mandated driver safety aid bashing and America civil legal system bashing. LOL

1AS

Hey Les,
I love muscle cars too, having started with a '66 Olds 442, then discovering autocross in the days before there was anything written about handling, and certainly no suspension components for sale. That's when I became aware of the gulf between"people driving Porsches", and "Porsche drivers". I won a boxful of trophies in my hunkered-down, souped-up muscle car before moving on to road racing. However, I was at an event in Milwaukee when Mark Donahue showed up with a GT350- used the event for testing before loading the car, took top time of day, and obviously wasn't there to get his trophy.

Fundamentally, I think if you are a car nut, you love them all, but have a special place for the cars of your youth. My interest has always been street-licensed race cars, and for that you are pretty much restricted to vintage. The Kurtis actually preceeds my era, but would have been the Enzo of it's time, if a car with front and rear solid axles can be described that way. It was just the fastest thing you could buy, and since Frank Kurtis briefly manufactured a street car, the Indiana Dept of Transportation lists the 1953 Kurtis as a car that can be licensed ( I declined the police inspection required for a discounted "historic" plate).

The Kurtis 500S is a 2 seat version of the front-engined Indy car that won the 500 every year between 1948 and 1953. Those cars had the engine leaned over to the left, so the drive shaft came thru the right side of the passenger compartment. Kurtis built 18 for road racing, by standing the engine straight up, and having the drive shaft come down the middle. They absolutely stomped everything else in their time, with a variety of V-8's (Ford, Caddy, Buick). Jon Ward is an individualistic master mecahnic/artist who built lots of stuff for Hollywood (the Stealth bomber in the Honda commercial- if you recall that one). He actually created my car at the Kurtis plant, with the original prints, and obtained serial number 19 from the filing cabinet that had the original tags. Technically, my car is a recreation, but in the vein of 'My grandfather's axe" was accepted into the La Carrera and won.

This is the car that proves Colin Chapman was wrong, in a sense. It is brawny, tough and unsophisticated. With a solid front and rear axle and torsion bars, it is a dinosaur. On the other hand, it is reliable and ungodly fast. You sit very exposed in the car, with low-cut doors and no windows (obviously). The driving technique is go like hell down the straight, brake hard and while braking turn in. Count to one-one thousand, and the car takes a set, and adopts a yaw angle of about 15 degrees. Then you get on the throttle and hold it all the way around the corner until you get that momentary pause when it wants to go straight again, and start the process all over. If you trry to drive it like an ordinary car, you are at granny-in-a -parking-lot speeds. When I took it to a Porsche club event, it blew past a boatload of Porsches. And the noise..................By the way, to make it a road racer, I had to rework the panhard bar which made the rear roll center way too high in its initial configuration. That resolved the rear roll that was apparant in all the magazine photos. The car is painted McClaren orange.

But enough about cars, let's bash Nick. He totally sucks.

Regarding the CGT, I think it is the closest we have seen to a street-licensed race car in many years, and likely will never see again from a major manufacturer. I don't really warm to the Radical, despite the fact that one is in the One Lap of America, ostensibly with a street plate, as we post. Obviously, the McClaren F1 is in that genre as well, but built in such smallnumbers that it will always be a rarity-seen in museums but not on the street. That's what pulled my attention to the CGT, and why I looked at it so carefully. It is a fantastic accomplishment.

What's in your collection now? AS

Les Quam

Great story and information about the Kurtis I am a student of automotive history but had never heard of the Kurtis before. It seems to me so few car guys today appreciate the historical significance of these old cars. Most don't even acknowledge that they have any historical significance. It's my observation that today auto enthusiasts can walk into a dealership and buy a low volume "classic" such as an F40, F50 or an Enzo and essentially have a collection without knowing or caring about the Ferrari's that came before them.
I admire the fact that you have studied and love the old stuff as well as the new.
I sent you a PM about where you can see some of the cars in my collection.