WHEN MORE IS ENOUGH
I read with some bemusement that CAR gets flamed by some readers, accusing yourselves of overindulgence in exotic machinery. Well, each to his own. But there is a case to be made for dreaming and drooling, and arguably a more compelling case for somewhat recalibrating our focus in automotive tech R&D towards the broader good of the many, not just the few. Especially, given the increasing predicament of our environmental impact, we the petrolheads and automotive manufacturers collective can ill afford the increasing trend of overindulgence in exotic creations for the few. Perhaps, even petrolheads do need to grow up at some point, dreams included.
Which brings me to Terence’s drive report on the Citroën C3 1,2 Puretech. The car makes do with 60 kw and 118 N.m. Or rather, it doesn’t. Neither does the Hyundai Atos 1,1, also featuring among your “sober” assessments to presumably please those who are happy with 100-120 km/h in 8,73 seconds. In other words, the driver who really (hopefully) does not attempt to overtake anything on the open road, but rather prefer suburban pottering about. I mean, one would require a runway to overtake any sizeable vehicle at rural road speeds in any of the above two cars. Not safe. Indeed, as you conclude: more is more. More performance, that is, bringing me to how much is enough.
In the good old days, with far fewer cars when typical light to medium cars sporting 60 to 80 kw (the Golf 1 GTS and GTI nostalgically jump to mind) were enough, these engines would be 1 600 to 1 800 cm³, generating much more torque than today's 1 100 cm³ runabouts, and a useful overtaking performance of around four to five seconds from 100-120 km/h. Because this argument is not about traffic-light bragging rights. It is about safe overtaking on increasingly busy rural roads. Face it; sitting in a queue of 15 vehicles dawdling along at 90-100 km/h is not really safe. Chain accidents happen to convoys. One needs a good bit of open road around oneself. But overtaking is a high-risk manoeuvre and here enough performance is your friend, applied with good common sense plus a reasonable dose of patience.
Too little performance and you spend too much time on the wrong side of the road. Too much power and you risk suffering from delusions of invincibility and end up out of space with too much speed in hand even for your R1 million bling mobile to save your bottom. Many drivers have way more money than driving skills and end up in things way too fast for their own and our good. So, when is enough, enough? In my book, 0-100 km/h in about 8,5 seconds and, crucially, 100-120 km/h in three to four seconds, and 120-140 km/h in four to five seconds define enough in terms of safe, brisk performance for today’s road conditions in South Africa.
We need a refocus in automotive R&D towards cars that deliver enough performance in the most efficient and green way possible. Spend the money on making them fun, well-made, and affordable, rather than developing more insane exotics.
JP BARNARD Stellenbosch