The "I just drove a..." Thread

[Gt1Street]

what did you think of the new Aveo, I like the look of it, waiting to pass my test before taking a 1.4 for a test drive at the dealer 0.2mi from the college gates

For starters, the styling is alot better and more pleasing to the eye. I especially like the new front.
The interior is well equipped, and the build quality was higher then I expected but its still all plastics and will eventually start wearing and tearing and will surley develop rattling noises.
I drove the 1.4 Auto version, the engine is quite responsive and has a nice note to it, the biggest issue I noticed was lack of support on the sides of the chairs, which is noticeable when taking slightly hard turns. Other then that I did like it and its a huge improvment over the previous gen

[Waugh-terfall]

Are you thinking of swapping the Yaris for one?

[Gt1Street]

Are you thinking of swapping the Yaris for one?

Well, No for two reasons:

First, There's nothing wrong with the Yaris that might make me think of swapping it for something else. On the contrary, I'm doing quite a bit of driving latley and the fuel consumption on the Yaris is amazing, better then some hybrids even. which saves me money and it's size saves me time and money when parking in the big cities. And besides I love it, it has a nice little engine that can deliver a kick (unlike the Smart I drove a couple of nights ago that was simply garbage with its Robotic gearbox and it's tiny Turbo lagish engine)

Second, I haven't found anything that catches my eye and is affordable at the moment (car prices are horrible here, something like 100% over the same price as in the US) And with me wanting to move out soon I think I should save my money for more important things to come.

[F1_Master]

So, this is my first taste at horsepower.

And boy did I enjoy it, even if I didn't floor it.

You don't know what you're really missing, then.

[dydzi]

so couple of days ago i drove '87 daimler double six. absolutely stunning car, too bad V12 power is hampered by automatic gearbox. the car is so long, so sleek and so low, it may cause some problems in tight situations but fortunately i wasn't to occur any i'll be driving the car more as it belongs to my dad's friend. i'll be also writing two articles about it. oh as to jaguars, i'll be writing an article about e-type and driving one during this summer

[dydzi]

ok, next post from me. i test drove a carver yesterday.



the car is not of greatest quality itself, but you forget about it when you turn engine on. well, maybe not, as the engine is not that astonishing (apart from the fact that it likes revving), but cornering is... like nothing you can experience. i absolutely love cornering with it, no matter if you corner at straights just for the fun of it, or take long corner or tight ones if i were to pick one type, those would be long ones - bending 45 degrees at 80 - 100 km/h is so fun that it's almost scary in fact, i even scratched it on one side. hell of a fun to drive!

[Gt1Street]

Holy cow, you should really give us a more comprehensive report on it. I'd love to hear the details.

[NSXType-R]

You don't know what you're really missing, then.

Haha, yeah, I know what you mean.

Power's always addictive.

[Kitdy]

I just drove my friend's dad's E46 323Ci. It was a manual and I have not driven a manual for over 2 years and was never terrible proficient at it so sometimes my gearshifts were sometimes clunky. The clutch pedal was a bit stiff and had too much travel which was annoying.

In terms of speed, the Bimmer was easily faster than my normal car - the City Golf - but certainly not as fleet of foot as our TL. I only drove briefly and had a passenger and the radio on and was concentrating hard on shifting so I can't tell you too much about the car to be honest. I found because it was a coupe, the seatbelts were frustratingly far back and reaching for them was a pain. There was a kinda cool analogue fuel economy meter just below the speedo (I think).

I still had trouble in stalling in first a few times - less than 5 I'd say but had it down by the end of my 15 or so minute drive. I just need more practice to get used to it and when to shift and how to make it smoother.

Anyways, for me, driving manual in the near rush hour traffic was a bit of the pain as I am not an expert in it but I would like to take the car out by myself when traffic is light and turn off all distractions to get some good practice and evaluate it better. I will try to do so and give a better report later.

EDIT: Maybe a mod could merge this thread to this one.

[Ferrer]

How about the handling, comfort? Was it any good?

[Kitdy]

How about the handling, comfort? Was it any good?

The ride was good but as I said, I was not too focused on it and more preoccupied and anxious about other things. The seats I recall to be pretty hard like most these days - they were cloth not leather.

I didn't drive in at speed or in anger enough or around big enough corners to really get a great feel for handling - I couldn't really even tell it was a RWD car at the speeds we were going. It was between 40 km/h and 60 km/h that we were going anyways so not so fast.

I am not a great writer and don't have a great memory but I'll try to report more later.

EDIT: The whole care felt old and kinda clunky. The engine did not really rev freely and the odometer had nearly 140k km on it and this car is only winter driven. It didn't feel in the best of shape and was not much to look at due to the winter dirt everywhere. When driving, I changed into second once and the gear knob fell off. Quality German engineering there. The outdoor temperature also said that it was -40 outside for some reason. I feel as though if I drove a brand new one (this one was a 2000) it'd be better.

[cmcpokey]

I just drove my friend's dad's E46 323Ci. It was a manual and I have not driven a manual for over 2 years and was never terrible proficient at it so sometimes my gearshifts were sometimes clunky. The clutch pedal was a bit stiff and had too much travel which was annoying.

In terms of speed, the Bimmer was easily faster than my normal car - the City Golf - but certainly not as fleet of foot as our TL. I only drove briefly and had a passenger and the radio on and was concentrating hard on shifting so I can't tell you too much about the car to be honest. I found because it was a coupe, the seatbelts were frustratingly far back and reaching for them was a pain. There was a kinda cool analogue fuel economy meter just below the speedo (I think).

its going to not be too quick, since its a 323. but it also should be a good amount of power to get comfortable driving a stick. enough so that you dont have to give much gas when starting, but not too much to make it too touchy. and the mpg thing is something bmw has been doing for ages. fun to see how long you can keep it pegged at either 99 or 0.

I still had trouble in stalling in first a few times - less than 5 I'd say but had it down by the end of my 15 or so minute drive. I just need more practice to get used to it and when to shift and how to make it smoother.

Anyways, for me, driving manual in the near rush hour traffic was a bit of the pain as I am not an expert in it but I would like to take the car out by myself when traffic is light and turn off all distractions to get some good practice and evaluate it better. I will try to do so and give a better report later.

practice makes perfect.

EDIT: The whole care felt old and kinda clunky. The engine did not really rev freely and the odometer had nearly 140k km on it and this car is only winter driven. It didn't feel in the best of shape and was not much to look at due to the winter dirt everywhere. When driving, I changed into second once and the gear knob fell off. Quality German engineering there. The outdoor temperature also said that it was -40 outside for some reason. I feel as though if I drove a brand new one (this one was a 2000) it'd be better.

my '87 325 had its original gear shift break off. just the rubber handle part, not the steel linkage, but still required replacement (with a nice ergonomic M version). and when the car was still my mother's she managed to rip the front air dam off on a parking curb. that happened to be where the temp sensor was, so from then on, despite it being repaired, it always said it was -22 outside.

[Ferrer]

practice makes perfect.

Indeed. And tih time it becomes second nature. Even at the point where you start searching for the clutch pedal in an auto...

By the way, I found this past weekend that automatic in a twisty country road are truly uselessand annoying. Becuase they always find a way to change gear in the middle of the corner. Even in S mode, it happens less often, but it does happen sometimes.

[LeonOfTheDead]

Indeed. And tih time it becomes second nature. Even at the point where you start searching for the clutch pedal in an auto...

jumping on the brakes

[Ferrer]

jumping on the brakes

Thankfully no one was behind...