whats your virdict on the top gear test where they tunned up the renault people carrier, spent thousands on suspention, brakes, tunning and didnt make a scrap of difference on the time round the track.they where ainimg to knock 10 secs of the standard time but only managed about two. the conclution was, tunning, a complete waste of time.:confused:

Brakes where big and heavy. Wheels too big.

They started off with arguably the worst possible vehicle, wasted money on mods without thinking through their decisions e.g. requiring bigger wheels because of the much bigger brakes and also didn't give themselves a lot of time to make the changes.

Totally badly executed with a ****e choice of car. More money spent than required on the mods which wasted their £10k budget.

Entertaining.

Given that the methods were far from scientific, any conclusions drawn are little more than opinion...but I thought people already knew this about Top Gear? :confused:

Oh, and the Avantime isn't a people carrier!

Rob.

It sounded nice though....

If they had spent £10k on a corsa, I'm sure their results would have been somewhat amazing.

given that they actually didn't increase the power, i didn't think they could say "tuning" was a waste of time/money.....and clarkson, not increasing power??! well i never!

I felt that was a total waste of time and didn't even find it entertaining as they so obviously wasted time and money on pointless mods just to try and create entertainment.

Surely they could have got a turbo and remap for 10K?!

Phil

aye, but at the end of the day top gear is now an entertainment programme.

nothing in life would be entertaining if you looked at it factually, that's what bbc news channel is for, along with bbc parliament,

Top gear isn't what it used to be, fifth gear has filled the shoes when it comes to being informative.

I'll still watch top gear though, it always amuses me as an entertainment show

Top Gear is mainly entertainment but if you think about they knocked a second or 2 here and there proving mods aren't a waste of time. It all depends on your aims and budget.

Look how modded the BTCC cars are? They have budgets, the knowhow and time to tweak every little detail.

Jezza prob deemed it a waste of time as they didnt get the results they set out to achieve.

Was very entertaining though.

I've only got one question...............

WHEN DOES THE NEW SERIES START?...............

Anyone know?...

turbo, mapping, intercooler, nitrous, water/meth, uprated brakes (not stupid big like they did on TG) toyo 888s, serious weight removal, coilovers.... I'm sure it could have ran a lot faster than it did for £10k, but that's Top Gear for you - #1 entertainment then #2 fact

I've only got one question...............

WHEN DOES THE NEW SERIES START?...............

Anyone know?...

End of June

Surely they could have got a turbo and remap for 10K?!

That's what I was thinking throughout the process. Entertaining none the less. All hail King Clarkson.

The Tyres and brakes weren't given a 1000 miles to bed in either, which probably didn't help matters.

They could have just bought a VAG 1.8T for 5k, put a big turbo, remapped and ARB on it?

I rekon with there £10k budget, I could have got that Avantime flying.

They went about it wrong.

Needed a big turbo (+ the usual exhaust, decat etc), coilys and serious rubber.

Dave

was this the one where they make a splitter for the fornt bumper out of wood and it catches fire?

Yup, thats the one, I think it was on Dave over the weekend - at least 73 times.

Countdowns for Top Gear and 5th Gear: http://www.finalgear.com/

It was entertaining and showed how mods needed to be done in the right order and proportional etc, I know we all know, but thinking back to when I was 17 (over 10 years ago) the mods that people did were very inline with what they did on top gear (and for many 17 year olds today still are), it always used to make me chuckle when people put big wide wheels on there 1l cars slowing down acceleration and increasing drag. admittedly in recent years the euro style of smaller alloys has come in over here. (but yeah big cars with big engines still = big wheels naturally)

Hopefully some of the chavs that watched it will now remove their sill huge spoilers now they realize they only serve two purposes:

1. It slows them down.

2. Makes them look the tw@ that they are.

With a 10k budget they could've slapped a turbo on it or even done an engine transplant, and still had a few grand left over for brakes and suspension. but that wouldn't have been as entertaining as sticking on a wooden spoiler and buying brakes too big for the wheels...

I concur: Top Gear is a non-PC entertainment show.

Their attempts @ tuning were a parody of young-uns attempts to make Novas look cool bling speedsters.

Easiest(!?) option would be rear mount turbos running up to say 5 PSI. Moderate power increase possible without chopping stuff around under the bonnet.

Same argument as goes for some of the low boost supercharging or turbocharging as done by Power Engineering and/or Van Aaken.

Low boost = much less heat to deal with = not really any need for an expensive intercooler.

They could get mild steel piping for a rear mount done at most exhaust shops for tuppence.

It was entertaining I recall, but as said, even if they made it a straight line hero, and made it corner like a dog, it still could have gone much quicker.

Edited 28 April, 200917 yr by coursemyhorse

Hmm...I spent a lot less on tuning my diesel Astra, and it went faster and handled better than a VXR.

150hp 1.9CDti remapped to 200hp/310-lb-ft - £200.

Bilstein B12 suspension kit - £490

Whiteline Rear ARB - £120

VXR brakes - £450

0-60 in 6, clocked at 141mph GPS. It did corners too.

jezza dosnt even understand torque