Quote:
Originally Posted by dcb
Varying paths to safety should be a personal choice, and Jeremy Clarkson is an idiot.
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I really enjoy topgear and Clarkson is quite funny. I'll agree he is an idiot when it comes to diesel, the whole lot of them are down on diesels cause all they care about is raw blistering performance and speed. Well then I suggest we introduce them to Gale Banks. He believes that hot rods can be green as well as powerful. He took a Dodge Dakota and put in a Cummins 6cyl turbo diesel and then pumped it up to 750 hp and 1300 ft/lbs of torque. Then took it to Bonneville and went 222mph. Oh yea, all the 200mph cars that go to Bonneville get towed on a trailer, the Sidewinder towed a trailer there. Now for the Good part.
"The fuel economy test configuration of the Sidewinder was almost identical to when it arrived at the Bonneville Salt Flats for its Land Speed Record runs in October. The only changes included raising the ride height slightly for additional ground clearance, replacing the racing air-to-water intercoolers with the street air-to-air intercooler, and installation of a new 3.33:1 ring-and-pinion gear set in the quick-change rearend, with 1:1 spur gears. Everything else was just as the Sidewinder arrived at Bonneville, except we didn’t pull a trailer for the mileage test.
The test loop was just over 119 miles in length, beginning at the Banks Engineering campus in Azusa, California. The route included a couple of miles on surface streets to the Interstate highway. The rest of the loop was all highway driving on I-210, I-30, and I-15, going north up the Cajon pass (about a 6 percent grade), and then back again for a total of 119.6 miles. All highway driving was done at the posted speed limits of 65 and 70 MPH in sixth gear, which is .73:1 for a final drive ratio of 2.43:l. That’s 1800 to 1900 RPM. The powerful Cummins diesel was just loafing, even up the grade. The total fuel consumed was 5.63 gallons, for an average of 21.24 MPG. Not too shabby for a truck with over 700 HP and 1300 lb.-ft. of torque on tap!"
I wonder what they could do if they put one of Bondo's Aerocaps on it.
). Its size would alleviate a lot of city/metro type congestion issues since you can park 3 to a spot (physically anyway), and it wouldn't release its emissions in the heart of a population center. It is a very practical example of a city vehicle, that gets put down for completely irrelevant concerns like "I think it is ugly". Like the video says, 30 years later it is still ahead of its time 
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