Top gear: 80's hot hatches vs modern

[pooroldcodger]

Just noticed this old thread but it has new meaning for me as Mrs. Beard's 156 has been put into semi-retirement and been replaced by a four year old Giulietta MA with only 23,000 miles on the clock, so it feels like it's just run-in.

With 170 bhp and a turbo, the Giuli feels a lot faster than the 156 if you get your toe in and it hangs on really well through the bends as well. But, it does feel less "organic" than the older car if that makes sense. There's something about the handling that lets you know other forces are at work rather than just inertia, momentum and the natural compliance of rubber.

I'm sure the MA is way more capable and able to cover the ground going cross country faster than the 156, but somehow I think I prefer the older car. At least I will once it's had a few bushes and a pair of suspension arms replaced. Oh, and some of the clag blasted off the bottom and it's been re-sealed.


And er, its windscreen has been replaced.

And a bit of bodywork has been cleaned up.

And some of the interior trim bits and pieces have been replaced and re-fitted

And...........

Thinking about the earlier sections of this thread though, in the '70s and '80s there were a number of cars which you could buy from your local dealer that had the basis of a performance or competition car but none of the luxury bits and pieces, such as the Escort Mexico, Sunbeam Ti and later on there was a Peugeot Rallye which, if my memory serves me correctly was a 106. These came about with the philosophy of it being a bit daft to buy a luxury performance car only to throw most of the kit out in the name of lightness. Some of them also came with the basic flat seats of the cheapest model as you were going to fit rally specific items anyway.

Beard ! Where've you been man?
What you have just said, minus the performance (obviously!) is what attracted me to rusty old Panda ownership. Simplicity, no expensive luxuries, and whatever performance you can squeeze out of it will be reqwarded because it is so light!
I have got rid of my gorgeous old BMW e38 today, so I have mixed feelings, but I could not justify spending a load of money to get it through an mot and then not use it. So all my energies are now going in to the Panda.
Plus fixing the Punto of course.
Plus painting the front of the house
Plus cutting the hedges
Plus decorati.....you get the idea.

 

[The Beard]

"Where've you been man?" You've just taken me back to the mid '70s, a line from a Peter Frampton song and a party in Bramhall. I was leaning against a wall on the landing of a large house at about 2 in the morning when a couple came past en-route to one of the bedrooms.

As they passed he said:

"Don't stand alone, you might turn to stone, man"

I didn't say anything but at that moment there was the sound of a toilet flushing and the toilet door unlocked.

"Oh, cool, right on man."

I never did find out whether he was about to invite me into said bedroom with his girlfriend, probably for the best really.

I've been hanging around in the Panda section but for the last week Mrs. Beard has been terrorising Spain with her boozey mates but she's come back today so I've been meeting up with some old mates who shared my shameful early days.

One of those was the driver of the Corsair GT Estate I once mentioned on another thread in connection with a dodgy Weber carb (you posted a pic of your Firenza on that one) who used to live in a stone shepherd's cottage somewhere off the Marple Bridge to Glossop road. No power, water or sewage. He now runs his own H&S company, lives in a four bedroom detached house in Marple and drives a BMW 5-Series.

Another was the drummer in a band I used to be part of (I was the only one withe a driving licence) who now has a great flat near Whaley Bridge and a home studio and a ridiculous collection of guitars form the likes of Gibson, Fender, Gretch and Rickenbacker. He also lives with his girlfriend who, as well as being really nice, is also 18 years younger than him.

The third was our Best Man who walks Kinder Scout every morning as he lives in Hayfield. He's mad as a box of frogs and runs his own advertising copyright business from home. They're the only people we know who have a 4X4 and really need one. It's a L-R 90 County. The only problem with that is that they live almost at the end of a road that leads up to Kinder and if they can't get down the road it's because of all the X5s, Q7s and MLs that are abandoned because they can't get through the snow because of their low profile tyres.

Think I might have taken a wrong turn somewhere.

I must learn to be more careful when booking holidays on the Internet. Mrs. Beard had a really enjoyable time in Almeria. I'm sure in the destination section I ticked Algeria!

 

[The Beard]

Beard ! Where've you been man?
What you have just said, minus the performance (obviously!) is what attracted me to rusty old Panda ownership. Simplicity, no expensive luxuries, and whatever performance you can squeeze out of it will be reqwarded because it is so light!
I have got rid of my gorgeous old BMW e38 today, so I have mixed feelings, but I could not justify spending a load of money to get it through an mot and then not use it. So all my energies are now going in to the Panda.
Plus fixing the Punto of course.
Plus painting the front of the house
Plus cutting the hedges
Plus decorati.....you get the idea.

Just for you Codge


[ame]https://youtu.be/GMbRn3si_BY[/ame]

Not sure if this has worked

 

[The Beard]

Woo-hoo, it has. I am truly the master of the Intern..............................................................

 

[pooroldcodger]

Just like me in the 1970's, only with half as many cylinders and talent!
I do remember making the classic young lads mistake:
Buy new car
Take it round to show mates
Take mates out for a spin
Go down nearest country lane
Have massive understeer moment on a bend that you didn't think was so tight and end up with the front end in a hedge!
Luckily no harm done other than to pride. We could have been another statistic.
Lesson learned and all that.

 

[The Beard]

In 1974 and with my freshly printed green driving licence in sweaty palm, I managed to persuade my Mum that I should be allowed to borrow her new Viva with 1256cc and 58 bhp (sorry, 58.5bhp - every little helps when you're a teenager) for a drive one Sunday afternoon. After all, the pubs had shut at 2pm. What could possibly go wrong?

I picked up a couple of mates of mine and we sallied forth through Macclesfield in search of adventure. Some time before we got to Leek we were passed by a Mk1 Escort. I let him pass and then set off in hot pursuit with the sole intention of humiliating him. After all, what could his weedy 1098cc possibly do in the face of such overwhelming firepower?

Needless to say, he pulled further and further ahead until he was out of sight round a bend. I pushed harder and then discovered a phenomenon known as understeer.

Right hand bend, steer right. It's still heading for the verge and railings, steer more. No, it's still heading for the verge and railings, so steer more then. So I did. Then more, and more, and more. Until....CLUNK! The wheel would go no further to the right. To the accompanying sound of gravel hitting the sills, it finally managed to get round the bend.

About 20 minutes later, and fully composed (my two travelling companions had got up from the footwells where they'd been hiding) I pulled into a lay-by where, lo and behold, the aforementioned Escort was parked. It seems that although the car had started out as a 1100L, it still had the badges, at some stage it had acquired the engine and 'box from a crashed Mexico along with the manifold and twin Webers from a rally car. It also had the suspension, roll cage and wheels and tyres from that car as well.

A couple of days later my Dad told me off as he was sure, despite my protests, that I'd kerbed the nearside front tyre, dragging it along a pavement. I accepted the verbal lashing as I really didn't want to tell him what had actually happened.

According to the Escort driver who was a mechanic and also worked on privateer saloon racers and rally cars, what had happened was that the N/S/F tyre being a Cross-Ply had actually "crippled" and the last part of the bend was negotiated on the sidewall rather than the tread.

Thanfully, my own first car four years later came with radials as standard!

 

[pooroldcodger]

Being an 1800 my Firenza had the worst of both worlds:
Not as much power as a 2300, but much heavier than a 1256
hence understeer was far more likely than oversteer.
The trouble is understeer never looks or feels as exciting as oversteer does it?
I could never really understand the safety aspects of chassis designers setting road cars up to understeer rather than oversteer. #
Ok so you reverse in to a hedge rather than nose first so I suppose that's a plus!