The curious combination of rural road trip, open-lapping weekend, time trial, vo-tech auto shop class, drunken bender, hotel-room makeout session, and forced march known as “PCOTY” has finally shambled to its conclusion. I can confirm that the winner has at least two seats, 384 horsepower, and six forward gears. I can also confirm that the event was in no way free of mechanical and technical difficulties.
If you’re fascinated by the PCOTY process — and why wouldn’t you be, I asked innocently? — then you’ll be able to read about the individual cars, and some interesting sidebar features, on the Road&Track site in the weeks to come. Not just from me, mind you; brother Bark and his Boss 302 also stopped by to help out with the testing.
For obvious reasons, I haven’t published much this week… but let’s roll tape on what’s out there, shall we?
We have nothing from Bark this week. Go follow him on Instagram or Twitter (BarkM302) to see what he’s been doing, I think it will be a click well spent.
The first of my PCOTY articles, done on the fly between driving stints, is Flat Out. Yes, I know who wrecked the car, but I have some sympathy because the pace was remarkably high, the road was unknown to him, and nobody was hurt.
Over at TTAC we have Sir, Put Down The Burrito. The comments on this are remarkable; people respond to the idea that texting-and-driving is not the only, or even the most serious, cause of accidents out there with the unbridled hysteria that earlier cultures saved for the Black Death.
Finally, there’s the catchily-named Return Of The Max, a think piece about FWD luxury. One commenter offered the idea of instead taking the M37 and demoting it to Nissan duty. I think that’s a good idea, too. Call it the 810 Marauder or something.
One last thing. I don’t plan to write about the VW diesel situation. It’s being written to death around the globe and every half-baked wanna-be “analyst” with zero job experience outside of blogging and living off their parents has already sounded off on the topic. I am going to write about the coffee-shop owner who slept with fifty Asheville women in two years and rated them all mercilessly, because that is a semiotic goldmine with veins two miles deep. Come back tomorrow.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to sleep the sleep of the just, or the damned, either way. Well, first I have to go to work. But then: sleep, perchance to dream of three girls out on the town with no wedding rings and no inhibitions. And it was just a dream, because Larry Webster yelled at me to leave the gas station and get the Ferrari over to the NCM garages IMMEDIATELY. Like the man said,
It don’t pay to think too much
On things you leave behind
As much as I enjoy your writing, and as much as I am genuinely fascinated by the VW scandal and it’s fallout, thank you for not weighing in on the matter. More than enough has been written, often by individuals pushing one ideological agenda or another. It’s gotten a tad bombastic out there. For now at least, I’m not sure there is anything more to be said on the topic.
Now that I’m old , I wonder if it would have been a cool thing to stay home and live off my Parents…..
They’re both dead and I left early on but it sounds interesting in a twisted sort of way .
For now , I’m off to read your linked articles .
-Nate
I just reread the comments on your burrito piece and I don’t see a single one that is “hysterical.” The only one that is even “mildly upset” is this one:
“Ugh. Is this site still claiming texting is not all that bad? This snarky post seems to point that way. I hope it’s not going down that libertarian “I can speed and text and not use blinkers because I’m such a great driver” road it did in the past.”
Most of the comments appear to support your view.
yeah, some people just can’t help but go right past the excluded middle fallacy all the way to cuckoo-land. “You think there are things worse than texting while driving? Why are you OK with texting while driving?!?” Kind of like Lewis Black ranting about the 2nd Gulf War; “Just because you’re against going to war doesn’t mean you support the other side!!!”
ever since I got on the road on two wheels (and now just got my “real” bike”) I’ve been numerous levels of pissed at distracted driving. I don’t care whether you’re texting, or looking at your friends in the back seat while chatting, or trying to pull your cat from under the gas pedal, or shoving a burrito down your gullet. Simple fact is you are not paying attention to what you’re supposed to.
and I’ve just about worn out my bird fingers on people who don’t know why I’m flipping them off.
Picture me rollin in a 488…
I was wondering what Monica Lewinski was up to.
re. coffee shop dudes…..CH will be a tough act to follow, but still looking forward to it.
Yeah I want to hear this too. I’m not a Pua but I have to applaud the genius of these guys owning a coffee shop. Who is CH?
Chateau Heartiste, look out, it’s an interesting rabbit hole to go down
Shell helps. And oh, by the way, I’ll take the brunette on the left.
@Derek, Picture Me Rollin’ indeed — Jack, please tell me All Eyez on Me was thumping on the Ferrari’s stereo when that shot was taken.
Not at that precise time, but within the hour, how’s that?
To be honest with you, the whole VW fiasco has me bored. The MSM is histerical and making a lot of hay out of not much, as per its common practise.
In the US, 500K cars is not even 1% of the total vehicle fleet, so its enviromental impact is f@#$% all. Seriously.
Now, in Europe and other markets with higher diesel difussion, this is certainly an issue. We are now talking about millions of cars.
I’m not saying that what VW did is correct, or siding with them, just putting things a bit in perspective. And I could put money that VW is not the only one doing it… they’re just the ones that got caught.
Also, from what I have read, the “defeat device” is just a different calibration, that is activated under certain conditions and, very importantly, the car is complaint. That alone tells me VW cars HAVE the emission control systems needed to comply. The question would be, why use an alternate calibration? What is the real issue here: long term durability? drivability? warranty? performance? fuel economy?
Nothing I have read so far has juicy/interesting data. The internal VW chair game / drama is certainly entertaining, to a degree, but everithing else is the usual histeria/garbage.
With diesel’s, and especially aftertreatment, it’s usually a direct tradeoff between NOx emissions and both fuel economy and performance. Urea injection is one way around this, the Lean NOx traps most of those vehicles used far less so. So what they, in effect did, is showed the EPA the cal in which their cars would pass emissions, and then said “fuck that, we’ve got this sweet engine, we’re not going to neuter it, we’ll cheat”. It gets more interesting with the newer, SCR cars, since there’s some other way less obvious reason they cheated on those cars. Best guess I’ve heard is to avoid having some other emissions component or whatever suffer from a premature failure that they’d have to deal with under warranty.
As far as everyone saying “VW just got caught, everyone else must be doing this”, I think it’s a load of shit. There’s some leeway on fuel economy testing, which coupled with the fact that the EPA test cycles are not really representative of real world driving conditions means you can get away with more or less legally cert-ing your vehicle at a certain fuel economy and getting sued because nobody else can match it (ford, hyundai, etc). Emissions is way more strict than that, and people generally don’t fuck around at all with emissions certification.
What VW has done has effectively thrown that whole honor system into doubt, and likely crapped on a lot of product plans that involve bringing out more US market diesels to meet CAFE. It’s a big deal not because it’s a fuckup, which it is, but because it involves some deliberate criminal decision making (like the pinto gas tank thing).
On the bright side, with a new engine lead at porsche, we might get some decent engines from them finally?
“The question would be, why use an alternate calibration? What is the real issue here: long term durability? drivability? warranty? performance? fuel economy?”
for the ones w/o SCR and only a lean NOx trap, I’m fairly sure they did this because they knew the LNT wouldn’t be able to do the job without tons of EGR, and tons of EGR can rob performance and economy. And it’s not like they wouldn’t have known that going in; Navistar nearly went tits-up because they went all in on heavy EGR+no SCR, and even Cummins and Dodge tried to hold out but eventually had to go with SCR. Mazda too; the SkyActiv-D was supposed to be here without needing SCR. Where is it?
I haven’t checked the spec on the cars involved TBH. I have the idea that they had SCR, otherwise why use the “Bluemotion” badge as is done down here.
From what I remember, EGR is good up to Euro IV, SCR would be needed to meet Euro V. The US requirement (Bin-whatevs) was tougher than Euro V and nearly Euro VI. The equipment to achieve Euro VI is much more involved and $$$, and I have said in the past in some places that the cost to meet E6 is what will kill diesel.
US regulations (especially those spearheaded by California) have been extremely tough on trace pollutants like NOx, HC, and CO. It’s borne from southern California’s fairly unique geography; it’s basically a smog trap.
Europe, on the other hand, has charged ahead with clamping down on CO2 and more or less “winking at” trace pollutants, but now with e.g. England and France bitching about smog their tune has changed.
as far as I can tell, Euro VI is still not harmonized with EPA Tier 2 Bin 5, but the two standards are “close enough” where it should be possible to develop a calibration to satisfy both.
“and I have said in the past in some places that the cost to meet E6 is what will kill diesel.”
it costs, but even with these emissions controls diesel engines are still more economical. less so in the face of hybrids, but passive hardware like an NOx catalyst and DPF can’t cost as much as an electrified drivetrain and gigantic battery.
diesel still has a place in the world.
Thar air compressor is neat. And tyres NEED a high pressure “blow” to bead correctly. Once they pop, they get cycled to 60-70 psi, to make sure the bead goes against the wheel correctly and then they get deflated to their working pressure. Lucky you guys didn’t stuff the wheel or bent a suspension arm.
Did the Cadillac ATS-V make it through testing without disintegrating like a cheap, Chinese knock-off of I’ll repute?
seriously, are you autistic?
Are you a stalker?
jz78 - My penis is huge, but I’m straight.
The ladies seem to prefer a bit of a curve. YMMV.
Science claims girth is more important than length (my nearly 9 inches is wasted, if true), a little upward curvature (normal) is good (helps with targeting), and that women really aren’t visually stimulated by appearance of sexual organs in the same, basic manner that men are (are subconscious minds associate large breasts and wide hips with healthy child-bearers).
Rhetorical question. I have yet to see a non-hipster-rant on the ATS’s failings from the guy.
X2 with Ronnie on ladies liking the curve
DW - tell me, what are we going to write on your tombstone? Because whenever I open the dictionary to DOGMATIC I keep seeing your avatar.
Herein Rests DeadWeight: Never lived to see General Motors run in even a roughly competent manner.
You’ll have to excuse my naïveté here but:
1: what is PCOTY? Even the linked article doesn’t explain (“Pissed Car Operator Turing Year”?)
2: what, in fact, IS the area code rule?
1. Performance Car Of The Year, as seen in last year’s test: http://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/features/a6422/2015-road-and-track-performance-car-of-the-year/
2. That if you’re in another area code besides your home AC, it isn’t cheating.
Is this the reason Ludacris maintains hoes in different area codes?
Wilt Chamberlain screwed 20,000 different women.
Think about that. Really think about it.
A’Wilt Chamberlain’s 20,000 Women Banged Finally To Be Honored by NBA”
http://sportsmansdaily.com/thescrum/?p=2113
Nice t-shirt!
I am very much in favor of Nissan assigning the Maxima to Infiniti duty. (Then again, I drive an I30, so I know it can work.)