What Could Possibly Go Wrong. . . (40 page)

Over the millennia, man has been consumed by a need for speed. In the Stone Age the fastest runners would catch the best food, and that made them the kings of the hill. Then came the horse, and it was the same story here. Genghis Khan was successful because his cavalry soldiers wore silk armour, and that made them faster.

In the days of steam, engine drivers would compete to see who could wrest the best times out of their locomotives, and at sea, liners would stage races across the Atlantic. Then, in the Cold War, whoever had the fastest jets was deemed to be winning.

When I started driving, it was all my friends and I talked about. Which one of us had the fastest car? I would spend hours scouring the auto-porn magazines for evidence that my Volkswagen Scirocco GLi was faster than Andy Scott’s Vauxhall Chevette HS. And when we were out and about he would do everything in his power to demonstrate that it was not.

But now something strange has happened. Speed no longer seems to matter. Concorde has been replaced by the fuel-efficient Boeing 787 Dreamliner. HS2 is being questioned because of the cost and the impact it will have on ‘communities’. And on the roads everything possible is being done to slow us down. Not that long ago Frank Beard, the drummer with ZZ Top, said he had a Ferrari because that way ‘I can leave for the party later, get there first, stay longer and still be in bed with someone before anyone else’.

Today, though, I listen to teenage boys discussing their first
cars, and all they ever seem to talk about is fuel consumption. My son is extremely proud of his Fiat Punto TwinAir, not because of the snazzy wheels or the turbocharger, but because it can do more than 60 mpg. Which means he gets to the party after everyone else but has more money to spend on beer. Which means he can’t drive home afterwards and has to sleep on the floor.

These, then, are strange times, which brings us to a strange car. The new Lexus IS 300h F Sport. It looks extremely aggressive. There are fat alloys, sharp daytime running lights, a lean-forward stance and a grille so big I’m surprised it doesn’t have its own moon. This is a car that trumpets a very clear message to the rear-view mirror of drivers in front: ‘Get out of my way.’

It’s the same story on the inside. The dash is a direct copy of the cockpit in the brilliant Lexus LFA supercar. You have dials that move about, information you didn’t know you needed, a mouse to operate the command and control system and a device that coughs discreetly, like a butler, when you are approaching a speed camera. You can turn this off. Not sure why you’d want to, though. The seats are body-hugging and superb. There is space for many, and you get a large, sensible boot into which you can put things.

So, what we have here appears to be an interesting alternative to the BMW 3-series. A front-engined, rear-wheel-drive sports saloon car with the added benefit of Japanese electronics and Lexus quality. However … it takes about four seconds for you to realize that this is not a sports saloon at all. Instead it is a car tailored for today and our new-found desire to save money. This is a car built for one thing: economy. This is a hybrid.

The four-cylinder petrol engine is designed not to produce as much power as possible but as little friction. Then you have the electric motor, which cuts in and out seamlessly. And then there’s the electronic gearbox …

It simply doesn’t feel or sound like any car you’ve driven. The
revs rise and fall instantly. There are no gear changes as such. And because the noise it makes has nothing to do with the speed you’re going, you do tend to arrive at corners either far too quickly or nowhere near fast enough.

Meanwhile, on the dash you get read-outs telling you all sorts of things that you don’t really understand. You can learn, for instance, which motor is driving the wheels at any given moment and when momentum is being used to make electricity. Drive lightly and you are told you are being economical. Mash your foot into the carpet and you are told you are using energy. I know that already. My foot’s halfway through the bloody firewall.

They say it will get from standstill to 62 mph in 8.4 seconds, which is respectable enough, but at no time does it feel even remotely sprightly. You put your foot down on the motorway and it’s as though something is broken. There’s more noise but no more speed. Not until you’re going past Penrith, at least.

You can put it in Sport S+ mode, if you like, which brings up a rev counter but precious little else. So although the front end is barking orders at the car ahead, you’d better hope it doesn’t pull over, because you sure as hell aren’t going past. The IS 300h feels like a car. It looks like a car. But it doesn’t behave like one, and I’m afraid I just found it annoying.

But I’m being a dinosaur, aren’t I? I’m judging the baby Lexus on speed, which these days is bit like judging a dog on its ability to write poetry. I care about speed. Frank Beard cares about it. But everyone else? No. Not really.

Which brings us on to the important news. If you go for the non-F Sport model on skinny tyres you get an output of just 99 carbon dioxides. A meaningless figure to the likes of me, but if you’re a higher-rate-tax-paying company-car driver, that low, low figure is going to save you a fair amount.

Then there’s the question of fuel consumption. Well, officially, you’re going to get about 60 mpg, which sounds almost unbelievable. And that’s because in the real world it is. In town, where the hybrid system really works for a living, the Lexus will
be massively more economical than all its rivals. But on the motorway or the open road you will have to work that throttle hard to keep up, and that will bring the economy figures way down.

Which raises a question. Why did Lexus not do what every other car maker does and fit a diesel? Why go to all the bother of fitting two motors? Why have all that extra weight? Why make it all feel so different? Simple answer, apparently. Lexus doesn’t do diesels. Doesn’t know how.

I make no bones about this at all. If I were in the market for a mid-size executive saloon car and I had one eye on the fuel bills, I’d buy a BMW 3-series with a diesel engine. It would be torquey, fast, cheap to run, smooth and conventional.

The Lexus is the future: of that we can be fairly sure. But I’m not sure we’re ready for it yet, because the dinosaurs have their petrol engines and the new youth have their diesels. Which means hybrids are catering for a market that doesn’t yet exist.

29 September 2013

At present your car’s annual tax bill is based on how much carbon dioxide is emitted from its rear. And not since William III’s window tax have we seen anything quite so stupid. You might as well levy people on how many armpit hairs they have.

My problem with taxing a gas is that to cut down emissions of it, cars are being ruined. Hopeless electric power steering is now replacing the ‘feelsome’ hydraulic systems of old because it is less of a drain on the engine. Double-clutch gearboxes are replacing smooth slushmatics because without a torque converter the economy is better. Which means less CO2.

It’s probable that fairly soon the last V8 will roll off a production line somewhere in the world. I like V8s. They are inherently unbalanced, which is what makes them sound all gruff and rumbly. But each cylinder has to be fed with fuel and why feed eight when technology means you can now get as much power from feeding six?

This means the turbocharger is back with a vengeance. And while many of these blown engines are incredibly good, and remarkably free of noticeable lag, you know as you sit there that the throttle response has to be dulled. Which is the same as giving a connoisseur of fine food a plate of Smash. It’s nearly mashed potato, and yet it just isn’t.

And it’s all going to get worse. Because every year the madmen in charge insist on less and less carbon dioxide, and the only way to achieve that is for cars to burn less and less fuel. Which, to start with, will mean more hybrids, and then as the lunatics keep on going, cars that are purely electric.

I have nothing against electric power at all, except for the total impracticality and the fact the emissions are simply being made at power stations rather than under the bonnet, but I do suspect that when we are all humming around the place in near silence we shall miss the good old days of crackling exhausts and instant responses and limitless range.

And that’s why I’ve been thinking: is there another way of taxing cars that keeps both the ecomentalists and the petrolheads happy? And I believe there is – tax weight instead.

Weight is the enemy of everyone except for the gun-toting, attack-dog enthusiast in a few Southern states of pick-up-truck America. But despite this, cars keep on getting heavier and heavier. It’s our fault. We demand more space on the inside, more luxury equipment and more rigid safety cells, all of which makes a car fatter.

But if engineers can make an engine produce 130 bhp per litre of capacity – and Mercedes has done just that – then surely they can build a safe, big, well-equipped car that needs mooring ropes to stop it floating away at the lights.

Dragging extra pounds around means spending more pounds at the pumps. And that means more emissions, which is bad news – if you believe that sort of thing – for Johnny Polar Bear. So tax it. I certainly won’t complain because weight also blunts a car’s performance – not just its acceleration but its ability to go round corners. A heavy car will never be as much fun to drive as a light car.

I am particularly keen to have a go in the new Alfa Romeo 4C, which on the face of it sounds a bit hopeless. It costs around £45,000 yet it only comes with a four-cylinder 1742 cc engine. That’s white-collar money for blue-collar power. And yet this is a car that tips the scales at just 895 kg – about half what the vehicle on your drive weighs.

It therefore doesn’t need a big engine: 237 bhp – the stuff of hatchbacks – will give it a power-to-weight ratio of 268 bhp per tonne. And that’s the stuff of full-blooded supercars. Along with
more than 40 mpg, which you’re lucky to get from a Toyota Prius. Frankly, if I were in charge, the 4C would be tax-free.

To get the weight this far down, Alfa Romeo has gone the extra mile and then it’s gone round the corner and kept right on going. The wiring, for instance, is made as thin as possible. And the chassis is a carbon-fibre tub that weighs about the same as a loaf of bread. It’s going to be good, this car. I can feel it in my bones.

And now I’m going to unpick every single thing I’ve just said by reviewing a car I have driven. The Mercedes SLS AMG Black Series. A lightweight car that isn’t quite as good as its heavier brother.

To recap. AMG-badged cars are semi-lunatic versions of ordinary Mercs. Black Series cars are semi-lunatic versions of the AMGs. I have one, a CLK. It’s bonkers.

But bonkers in a good way. Because it’s not really built to go round a track as fast as the laws of physics will allow. It’s not a Porsche or a Ferrari. Yes, it’s lighter and more powerful than the standard AMG car, but these modifications have only been made to increase my smiles per hour. It’s built to be a laugh.

It’s much the same story with the standard SLS AMG. Oh, sure, it has a carbon-fibre prop shaft that weighs only 4 kg and an engine that can read Latin. But you try going round a corner quickly. The tail will swing wide and pretty soon you’ll be making more smoke than a second world war destroyer. You’ll also be giggling like an infant.

With the Black Series, though, Mercedes has put its sense of humour back in the box and gone all sensible. Odd that. It is normally so carefree. But whatever, the SLS AMG Black Series now has a Ferrari-style electronic differential that tames the rear end. It also uses exactly the same gearbox that Ferrari puts in the F12berlinetta. Though in the Mercedes it’s tuned to last.

Oh, and try this for size. While the 6.2-litre V8 develops more horsepower than the standard unit, it delivers 11 fewer torques. That means less fire and brimstone when you put your foot
down. And then, finally, various bits and bobs are now made from carbon fibre, which means less weight …

It should be good. And on a track it is. Very good indeed. Way faster than the standard SLS. But if you’re going on a track, why use a pantomime horse that’s been converted? Why not get a car that was built to be quick in the first place? A much cheaper Porsche 911 GT3, for example.

And on the road? Well, it still has all the creature comforts and the ride’s not bad, so it feels quite similar to its heavier, slower brother. But it now comes with lots of showy spoilers and flaps. Imagine Kenneth Williams pretending to be the Terminator and you’re sort of there.

I still love the standard SLS. I like the shape, and the noise and the hysterical muscle-car handling. It’s one of my favourite cars. It makes me happy just thinking about it.

The Black Series doesn’t. It’s trying to be something it’s not. If I wanted a serious car I’d wait to try the new featherweight Alfa 4C. I’m doing just that tomorrow. And that makes me happy as well.

6 October 2013

My coffee machine is a complete and utter pain in the backside. It’s a wall-mounted Gaggia and I cannot recall a single occasion when, after pushing the button, I have taken delivery of a cup of actual coffee.

It always wants water, and after you’ve filled up its bowl, it says, ‘Empty trays.’ So you empty them, and then it says they aren’t emptied properly. So you empty them again and then again, and then you scrub them until they shine like a furnace worker’s face. And then you put them back and it says, ‘Trays missing.’ So you put them in again more firmly, several times, until it says, ‘Empty trays.’

Eventually, of course, you resort to extreme brute force, whereupon it becomes Italian and changes tack. ‘Add beans,’ it says. So you open another tin of £900 Illy coffee beans and, being careful not to upset the trays in any way, you pour them into – as I write, I can hear it doing things in the kitchen, but I don’t know what – the bean drawer. And then it says, ‘Clean unit.’ So you have to go against every male instinct and find the instruction book, which tells you to hold clamp A while squeezing nozzle B for about a couple of hours, and then when you put it all back together it says it wants decalcifying.

Usually I don’t get my morning coffee until it’s time for afternoon tea. But, of course, it’s worth persevering, because when the moment finally arrives the result tastes a whole lot nicer than the instant alternative.

It’s the same story with your choice of pet. A dog requires almost constant attention. It raids your bin, gets the bones it’s
nicked stuck in its throat, bites the postman, eats the milk lady, poos on the carpet, wants a walk when it’s raining, barks in the night for no reason and gets ill on Christmas Day, when the vet is too drunk to come over. But despite all this it’s so much more satisfying than a feed-and-forget cat.

Which naturally brings me on to Alfa Romeo, an experience that’s subtly different. I had one once, a GTV6, and it was like a coffee machine – that had been designed by a dog. At night it would let all the air escape from its tyres, its clutch would weld itself to the flywheel and once it dropped its gear linkage onto the prop shaft, causing an extremely loud noise to happen, followed by the rear wheels locking up. It was a constant nightmare.

But here’s the thing: even when it was a sunny day, and it wasn’t being premenstrual, it was a pretty horrible car to drive. The steering was too heavy, the driving position was tailored for an ape, second gear was impossible to find and it handled as though it was running on heroin.

It’s not alone, either. At present, the Giulietta is ho-hum and the MiTo is ghastly. And if we plunge into the pages of recent history, we find the 8C, which wasn’t quite as good as it looked, and the SZ, which was the other way round. But only because it looked as if it had been designed by a madman. The 33, the 75, the 156, the 159 and the 164? There’s not a great car there. Just many puddles of oil on your garage floor.

And yet Alfa Romeo is still my favourite car maker. I still believe you can’t really call yourself a petrolhead until you’ve owned one. So why is this?

It’s no good going back to the Sixties and saying, ‘It’s because of the GTA.’ Yes, it was fabulous, but it was one car in a torrent of rubbish. Judging Alfa on this one achievement would be the same as ignoring all of Mussolini’s crimes simply because he once bought his mother some flowers.

I’ve had a good, long think and reckon that in all its history Alfa has made only four or five really good cars. Memorable cars. And that in the past thirty years it hasn’t made one.

Yet the love remains, and I think it’s because we all sort of know what Alfa could and should be making. We have in our minds a mini Ferrari. A supercar on a shoestring. Pretty as hell, lithe as a greyhound, cheap as chips and built for fun. We have in our minds the 4C. It is utterly gorgeous. Spoilt, some say, by the headlamps. Yes, maybe, in the way Cindy Crawford is spoilt by her mole – that is, not spoilt at all.

But it’s not the looks that impress most with the 4C. It’s how it’s made. Before this, if you wanted a car with an all-carbon-fibre tub, you had a choice: you bought a machine such as a McLaren MP4-12C or you bought a Formula One racer. It’s expensive to make a car this way, but that’s what Alfa has done.

The benefit is lightness, and that’s a theme it has continued throughout. So, if you’re after luxury and soundproofing and lots of standard equipment, forget it. There’s no satellite navigation. You don’t even get power steering.

The result is a car that tips the scales, fat with fluids, at well under a ton. Which means it doesn’t need a big engine. Instead, mounted in the middle of the car, is a 1742 cc turbo unit that itself is made to be so light it has to be bolted in place to stop it floating away.

Disappointed that it only has the four-cylinder engine from a motorized pencil sharpener? Well, don’t be. Because, thanks to the lightness, you can get to 62 mph in 4.5 seconds and onwards past 160 mph. Way past, I found. Oh, and 40 mpg-plus is on the cards as well.

I shall make no bones about it. I loved this car. It’s like being at the controls of a housefly. You can brake later than you think possible into corners, knowing that there’s barely any weight to transfer. And it has so much grip. Then there’s the noise. Or rather noises. It makes thousands. All loud. All mad.

Yes, the interior trim is shocking, but if you want that lightness, it’s the price you pay. And you do want it. Because lightness is coming. It has to. It makes both the polar bear and the petrolhead happy. And in the Alfa it made me very happy indeed. I
drove the car round Lake Como on a sunny evening and there was almost a tear in my eye. I kept thinking that life didn’t really get any better.

Now the boring stuff. I fitted easily. The boot is big. The dash readout is clever and clear so you don’t need spectacles to see how fast you’re going. And you can choose how you want your car to feel. Really. Just put it in Dynamic mode. And leave it there.

There are only a couple of drawbacks. The gearbox is a bit dim-witted and the steering isn’t quite as sharp as I had been expecting. Also, it’s wider than a Mercedes SLS AMG, which means it’s wider than Utah. And it costs around £45,000. That, for a carbon fibre-tubbed mini-supercar, is not bad at all. But it does put it in the same price bracket as a Porsche Cayman.

Of course, the Cayman is more in tune with where we are now. It feels sturdy, and well made and luxurious. But that sort of thing will have to stop. We will have to go down Alfa’s route, which means, in fact, the 4C feels like the future.

It also feels like the Alfa that the company made only in your dreams. It feels wonderful. I’m sure, naturally, that it will be like my coffee machine to own. But, unlike with any other Alfa in living memory, the rewards will make all the effort worth it.

13 October 2013