Motoring News

A 37 year old Swedish man has been dished out the biggest speeding ticket in the world after being caught driving at 180mph (290km/h).

The man, who has not been named, was driving through Switzerland in his brand new Mercedes SLS AMG when he was stopped for travelling over 105mph over the speed limit. Under Swiss law, the level of fine is determined by the wealth of the driver and the speed recorded, meaning that the unnamed man has been fined a huge SFr1,080m ($1m or £656,000). As well as being given the speeding fine itself the mans car has been impounded and he is being forced to pay a daily fine of SFr3,600 for 300 days.

Local police spokesman Benoit Dumas said of the latest case that “nothing can justify a speed of 290km/h”. “It is not controllable. It must have taken 500m to stop,”.

I’m surprised the Swiss Police could catch him at 180mhp, they must have some very fast police vans. I wonder why he was in such a rush?

Mercedes SLS AMG

I have taken these facts from a forum that I visit. I am not the original writer but I cannot find who wrote the facts to give credit.

• One Top Fuel dragster 500 cubic inch Hemi engine makes more horsepower than the first 4 rows at the Daytona 500. They have over half again as much horsepower in one cylinder as a Dodge Viper has in all ten. No one has ever successfully run one long enough on a dyno to get a horsepower reading. Current estimates are right around 6,000 horsepower.

• Under full throttle, a dragster engine consumes 1-1/2 gallons of nitro methane per second; a fully loaded 747 consumes jet fuel at the same rate with 25% less energy being produced.

• A stock Dodge Hemi V8 engine cannot produce enough power to drive the dragster supercharger. The fuel pump alone requires more horsepower to turn than the average street car produces.

• With 3000 CFM of air being rammed in by the supercharger on overdrive, the fuel mixture is compressed into a near-solid form before ignition. Cylinders run on the verge of hydraulic lock at full throttle.

• The 1.7:1 air/fuel mixture for nitro methane produces a flame front temperature measures 7050 degrees F.

• Nitro methane burns yellow. The spectacular white flame seen above the stacks at night is raw burning hydrogen, disassociated from atmospheric water vapour by the searing exhaust gases.

• Dual magnetos supply 44 amps to each spark plug. This is the output of an arc welder in each cylinder.

• Spark plug electrodes are totally consumed during a pass. After the run, the engine is dieseling from compression plus the glow of exhaust valves at 1400 degrees F. The engine can only be shut down by running the car out of fuel. There is no way to cut off the fuel; the engine stops only when it blows or the tank runs dry.

• If spark momentarily fails early in the run, unburned nitro builds up in the affected cylinders and then explodes with sufficient force to blow cylinder heads off the block in pieces or split the block in half.

• In order to exceed 300 mph in 4.5 seconds dragsters must accelerate an average of over 4G’s. In order to reach 200 mph well before half-track, the launch acceleration approaches 8G’s. To put this in perspective; a top fuel dragster, parked next to a Super Hornet on the steam catapult on the deck of an aircraft carrier, would be in the water and sinking before the Super Hornet was halfway down the deck.

• Dragsters reach over 300 miles per hour before you have completed reading this sentence.

• Top Fuel Engines only turn approximately 540 revolutions from light to light!

• Including the burnout, the engine must only survive 900 revolutions under load. They only survive about 80% of the time.

• Redline at 9500 rpm.

• Assuming all the equipment is paid off, the crew worked for free, and for once NOTHING BLOWS UP, each run costs an estimated $1,000.00 per second.

• The engine is entirely rebuilt every run, or every 900 revolutions. New pistons and rings, new rods, new rod bearings. Sometimes a new crank. The crew does this in about two hours between rounds.

• The current Top Fuel dragster elapsed time record is 4.441 seconds for the quarter mile. The top speed record is 333.00 mph (533 km/h) as measured over the last 66′ of the run.

• Putting all of this into perspective: You are driving the average $140,000 Lingenfelter “twin-turbo” powered Corvette Z06. Over a mile up the road, a Top Fuel dragster is staged and ready to launch down a quarter mile strip as you pass. You have the advantage of a flying start. You run the Vette hard up through the gears and blast across the starting line and past the dragster at an honest 200 mph. The ‘tree’ goes green for both of you at that moment. The dragster launches and starts after you. You keep your foot down hard, but you hear an incredibly brutal whine that sears your eardrums and within 3 seconds the dragster catches and passes you. He beats you to the finish line, a quarter mile away from where you just passed him. Think about it, from a standing start, the dragster had spotted you 200 mph and not only caught, but nearly blasted you off the road when he passed you within a mere 1320 foot long race course.

What amazing machines.

After not posting a car of the week for around a month i have decided to do something a little different this week and post a car that is within most peoples price range, instead of being one of those cars we all wish we could afford (but probably never will).

This week i have found a very nice example of a Series 1 106 Rallye for sale on a forum called retro rides. Retro rides is usually a great place to look for retro projects and older cars needing a bit of love, but this Rallye is far from a work in progress and looks as fresh as it did when it can out of the factory.

The S1 106 Rallye was originally built to  compete in international rallying in the 1400cc class. The car was then homologated into international group N and A rallying class meaning that Peugeot had to produce a certain number of the cars for road use to qualify. 1000 S1 Rallye’s were planned to be imported into the UK but the demand for the little hothatch meant that the number increased to meet demand.

The S1 106 Rallye has a 1.4 XSI engine that produces 100bhp, which is pretty good for a car that weighs 810kg (F1 cars weigh 600kg). The S1 Rallye also benefits from bigger anti-roll-bars for better handling and 247mm ventilated front discs for better braking.

The Pug 106 Rallye in question is a 1994 model with 134k on the clock. there has been some choice work been done on the car in that 134k including a head rebuild in 2010 at a 106 specialists, the fitting of a kent cam, 206 front brakes, lowered suspension and a re-undersealing of the whole car. The car has extensive service history and looks as good as it sounds. The price is £1700, which is pretty good from where i’m sitting.

Someone needs to snap this car up fast, as Peugeot’s of this quality are hard to find, let alone something as rare as an S1 Rallye.

Peugeot 106 rallye S1

Peugeot 106 rallye S1 quarter

Peugeot 106 rallye S1 rear

After yesterdays post about the amazing Audi Quattro for sale on classiccars.com I have been looking through a load of old group B rally videos on youtube. Group B was just mad and certainly dangerous, but I love it. The videos make me want to go out to Spain or France for next years world rally championship to get some real rally action (I’ve been to the Wales rally before and it too is great), but i fear this year is going to be expensive for me, though that’s another story.

Here is a great video of the legendary Stig Blomqvist showing what the old Audi’s can really do. Enjoy!