Hard cars?

[martine]

What's the hardest car you've driven and why?

(I don't mean 'hard' as in blacked-out windows, 4 Litre V8, chrome alloys etc )

[Spike]

Probably a mate's 1960s Land Rover. Cable brakes, crash gearbox and no power steering. Bloody hard work!

If we're talking "normal" cars, I used to have an Austin Maxi. It had a typical British Leyland gearbox of the day, so changing gear was a bit like stirring porridge!

[jcochrane]

It used to be the Porsche Turbo S 964, sheer brute performance and no aids, that is until last Sunday...
.....when I drove a van in East Anglia. Another poster here, who also drove it on Sunday, described it as follows...

"There's something about mid-engine, rear-wheel-drive, no power and van tyres which are made of Kryptonite but have about as much grip as greased weasel faeces on a teflon frying pan, which brings out the real driver in all of us."

The van has a narrow wheel base and is quite tall which adds to its instability. It understeers like you'd never believe. My first attempt to steer the thing resulting in my co diver observing that he had never heard me swear before. Because of the understeer you have to steer slowly and very early with oversteer input from the driver to get it to go where you want it to. Without inputing oversteer you'll never get round a bend. It is a real test of a driver's skill.

It's an absolute hoot to drive and immensely rewarding as well. But above all a real test of skill.

Some on here, members of HPC, might have heard of it as the legendary "pogo stick"

[Gareth]

Said van has the marvellous ability to transform a dour face into the broadest of smiles after just one drive.

I'd have said a certain rear wheel drive Alfa is harder to drive, and its older sibling is harder still.

[TripleS]

What is meant by a narrow wheelbase?

Best wishes all,
Dave.

[jcochrane]

What is meant by a narrow wheelbase?

Best wishes all,
Dave.

Dave,

Sorry did not express this well. The van in question is both short (wheelbase) and narrow (track) but quite tall giving it a high centre of gravity. Easy to roll over as I am told a certain Mr Hammond of Top Gear found. Also it responds rather readily to side winds. Both side windows need winding down to help overcome the problem.

[jcochrane]

I'd have said a certain rear wheel drive Alfa is harder to drive, and its older sibling is harder still.

That brings back happy memories. Got invited many years ago as one of 6 drivers to spend the day at Brands Hatch with 6 pro racers to play with the complete range of Alfas they had at the time, all at their expense. Just had to give them feedback on the cars.

[jcochrane]

Said van has the marvellous ability to transform a dour face into the broadest of smiles after just one drive.

Do I gather you've had a the privilidge to drive it or have you just seen the silly grins on the faces of those who have?

[Gareth]

Do I gather you've had a the privilidge to drive it

Twice, both ages ago. The best face example was Maximum Bob.

[TripleS]

What is meant by a narrow wheelbase?

Best wishes all,
Dave.

Dave,

Sorry did not express this well. The van in question is both short (wheelbase) and narrow (track) but quite tall giving it a high centre of gravity. Easy to roll over as I am told a certain Mr Hammond of Top Gear found. Also it responds rather readily to side winds. Both side windows need winding down to help overcome the problem.

Thanks, John. People often seem to talk about wheelbase when they really mean track. I was just surprised to see you doing that.

My driving lessons in 1957 were mostly in an Austin A35, and I always felt that model was a bit narrow for comfort. Then in the early 1970s I bought an old A35 and ran it for a year or two while I rebuilt the 3.8 Mark 2 Jaguar following a shunt. I suppose that Jaguar might be considered a hard car, would it?

Best wishes all,
Dave.

[jcochrane]

My driving lessons in 1957 were mostly in an Austin A35, and I always felt that model was a bit narrow for comfort. Then in the early 1970s I bought an old A35 and ran it for a year or two while I rebuilt the 3.8 Mark 2 Jaguar following a shunt. I suppose that Jaguar might be considered a hard car, would it?

Best wishes all,
Dave.

I believe that was the uprated A30. Power increased from 28 bhp to 34 bhp.

When I was on a provisional licence I used to drive my father's Wolseley 12. Rather nice with leather upholstery. I think they stopped production around 1948. Had a maximum speed of around 60 mph. I once owned an Austin 12 that could cruise at 40/45 mph.

Such heady performance figures. I think all these cars were harder to drive than those of today. Every car had its own foibles to master. Steering, clutches, brakes, gearboxes all were always a challenge. I'm not sure if manufacturers had learnt much about car handling either.

[TripleS]

My driving lessons in 1957 were mostly in an Austin A35, and I always felt that model was a bit narrow for comfort. Then in the early 1970s I bought an old A35 and ran it for a year or two while I rebuilt the 3.8 Mark 2 Jaguar following a shunt. I suppose that Jaguar might be considered a hard car, would it?

Best wishes all,
Dave.

I believe that was the uprated A30. Power increased from 28 bhp to 34 bhp.

When I was on a provisional licence I used to drive my father's Wolseley 12. Rather nice with leather upholstery. I think they stopped production around 1948. Had a maximum speed of around 60 mph. I once owned an Austin 12 that could cruise at 40/45 mph.

Such heady performance figures. I think all these cars were harder to drive than those of today. Every car had its own foibles to master. Steering, clutches, brakes, gearboxes all were always a challenge. I'm not sure if manufacturers had learnt much about car handling either.

Yes, you're right about the A35 being the successor to the A30, with a rousing 34 bhp available from 948 cc.

TBH I wasn't sure what Martin meant by hard cars, but I would say it is much easier to drive smoothly in modern cars, and they all feel much more stable and sure-footed than the cars of 50 or so years ago. The older cars were more difficult to cope with in those respects, but I was happy with what we had at that time.

When I speculated about the 3.8 Jaguar possibly being regarded as a hard car, I didn't mean in terms of being able to get a smooth result with it: it was pretty good in that respect. I was thinking that it was, by the standards of its day, a very high performance car, at least in a straight line, but it was the sort of car that needed treating with a good deal of respect and restraint, otherwise one could get into a lot of trouble with it all too easily. You may recall that it acquired an unfortunate reputation for being a killer car, after being involved in a number of bad accidents. I had one for above 30 years - 1968 to 2000 - and enjoyed it greatly, but I was always wary of getting too adventurous with it: which is just as well, I suppose.

Best wishes all,
Dave.

[jcochrane]

Great in a straight line...but cornering.

[IVORTHE DRIVER]

Hi,

i have also driven an Austin Maxi, my girlfreind at the time had a 1750HS, Twin SU's if I remember rightly, horrible gear box, near impossible to get 5th gear first time.

Also the first Sherpa vans had no PAS, on or off disc brakes on the front, useless gear ratios, so were heavy, slow and tiring.

Worse ever I think though was an old J4 caravette, heavy steering, no brakes, handling like a pregnant pig and required most lanes on the motoway to keep it going anywhere near a straight line.

My favourite "hard car" however was my own Chrysler 180 (who remembers them) converted by me to a pick-up, with huge 16 inch/8 inch wide rear tyres and a Ford V6 3Litre under the bonnet.
Unless the road was bone dry the lack of rear weight and the ridiculusly wide tyres plus the V6 power meant there was little or no forward momentum in a straight line, then if you did manage to reach a sensible speed (over 50mph) corners were at best interesting....those were the days

Ivor

[TripleS]

Great in a straight line...but cornering.

I didn't think the Mark 2 Jaguar's cornering ability was as bad as some people say , but it certainly wasn't as easy to exploit as the straight line performance; so it needed a pretty experienced and skilled driver to get the best out of it. Unfortunately I never acquired a sufficient level of skill, so I just had to be more restrained with it.

Maybe the mistake we make is in comparing it with cars designed several decades later - and of course that shows it in a bad light.

Best wishes all,
Dave.