Grand touring in a veloce style...

Waiting waiting waiting...

2009-04-07T05:24:00.001Z

Can't say I'd actually spend this much on a car, any car - even an Alfa. But it's small. And I like small. And it's feisty.

Boasting pearlescent white paintwork with a contrasting bodykit complete with a front splitter, mesh air intakes, plastic side skirts and a power bulge on the bonnet, it really looks the part. Power comes from an all-new 1,750cc four-cylinder turbo engine with 237bhp - all of which is sent to the front wheels. Expect a 0-60mph time of around six seconds and a top speed of 150mph. The newcomer is set to have a price tag of around £18,000, and UK sales will start in early 2010.

But I'm actually happy with my '82 GTV, thanks.

Alpine Classic Ride Report 2009

2009-03-09T04:58:00.001Z

Golf Mk1 rally car circa '79

2008-11-25T04:57:00.001Z

Golf Mk1 rally car CT 1979_582
Originally uploaded by gtveloce

Pretty sure this was the roof-top car park of the Bankstown Square shopping centre - if I'm wrong then it's Roselands!

Point is, if I must make this point, I can't imagine a shopping centre in Sydney opening up its car park to the start of a car rally these days... first, the traffic issue. Second, the inconvenience to shoppers. Third, where would the rally cars go next? Onto a neutral, untimed stage until they leave the Sydney basin?

Top Gear Ford Focus ST - and it comes in blue

2008-10-12T22:12:00.001Z

I don't always agree with the damn-the-torpedoes pro-auto bravado but it's always well filmed, articulate and funny...

Catalina Park - western side

2008-07-21T06:48:00.001Z

Catalina Park_0056
Originally uploaded by gtveloce

This would be sooo fast... and so demanding to drive on at speed...

Catalina Park repairs?

2008-07-21T06:37:00.001Z

Catalina Park repairs_0047
Originally uploaded by gtveloce

Recent repairs suggest some plans are afoot... but a report to council in 2005 suggested otherwise, including dismantling the wooden race fencing.

Catalina Park Katoomba

2008-07-21T06:36:00.001Z

Catalina Park lake_0045
Originally uploaded by gtveloce

Would you believe this was originallly a privately-funded amusement park with an ornamental (and actual bathing) lake? Later to include a Catalina flying boat (in the centre of the lake, hence the name) that was presumably trucked in?

Later still (around 1950) a motor racing circuit was built around the edge of what was known as "the Gully", north and west of this shot, to the dismay of residents, many indigenous. Thousands of years of aboriginal Australian culture was disturbed or destroyed in the process of creating a track for car racing.

A shale and coal railway line also passed on the western edge of the park, providing a link from the main railway down to the mines in the valley..

Alfa Giulietta 2 Oran Pk 82

2008-06-14T04:27:00.001Z

Alfa Giulietta 2 Oran Pk 82
Originally uploaded by gtveloce

My 2nd-most popular image on Flickr. Probably because it's a car on a race track, and a race track that has been closed for redevelopment as housing. It's also an Alfa Romeo, an iconic car brand if ever there was one. And a Giulietta, possibly the nicest of the Alfetta line, outside of the GTV.

FWIW it's me in my Giulietta at Oran Park, NSW, Australia in 1982. Nice understeer... It's an Alfa Romeo Owners' Club event, probably a lap dash. If you don't know BP corner then you haven't lived. Basically you come hurtling out of some fast bends, go down into a ditch, come up and go hard left into a long straight. So you've picked up some speed, bottomed and released the suspension and then chucked it left into understeer territory. You can see how the rear wheels remain planted square to the road by the deDion tube and the fronts are trying v. hard to get the car around the bend... and not into the wall.

Mini magic

2008-06-07T08:58:00.001Z

Can't beat a short wheelbase, FWD and a handbrake...

On VW Golfs, windscreens and cables

2008-06-04T02:55:00.001Z

Golf no windscreen 80
Originally uploaded by gtveloce

Not an Alfa, but a VW Golf. I like the Series 1, I had 2 of 'em myself, but this one is not one of those. It's seen here somewhere outside of Lithgow, NSW, Australia. Without a windscreen - it wasn't as laminated as we thought. The moral of this story is 'be careful what you wish for'... we (my then girlfriend and I back in 1980 - she owned and was driving the car) were behind a truck on a good road. I said to her something along the lines of 'maybe we shouldn't be so close, it could kick up a stone' just moments before exactly that happened. Ooops. And yes, Golf windscreens were quite difficult to find in 1980, especially in country NSW, but we found one after a bit of a search.

As a postscript, a few months later the Golf broke a throttle cable (it was simply a wire to the carby that passed through a rubber grommet in the firewall and eventually wore down to the metal). Not dramatic, the car just failed to accelerate as desired. (OTOH there's also a throttle return spring that broke on a separate occasion, resulting in the sudden application of full throttle.) Anyway, as the car sat in a driveway I wondered aloud how long clutch cables lasted, given that throttle cables break after a couple of years. Sure enough, the clutch cable broke the next time it was used. So be careful what you say aloud, it may actually happen...

Alfa Romeo Giulia GTA Junior Gr.5 Racing

2008-05-31T08:32:00.001Z

It starts slow but ends up fast and well done. Shame about the exhaust gases and all but oh well...

BMEP or Weight Transfer, anyone?

2008-04-23T03:51:00.004Z

I've just put my Brake Mean Effective Pressure calculator online at Google Docs... http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pJDQWs1Qj-Gq7HgSBoeH3Rg

It includes my Weight Transfer calculator as well, but here it is on its own:
http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pJDQWs1Qj-GqNBA_KCIsydg

Plus I have a Simple Diesel vs Petrol calculator, so you can make sense of why diesel will take you further: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pJDQWs1Qj-GqOX1xloHwzPw

My Energy Mustknows... collected from all over, these energy facts are as correct as I can make them and are as objective as we can be in comparing different energy sources. Attributed where I can, please let me know if you see better figures. The conclusions you draw are of course your own... http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pJDQWs1Qj-GraqesgS5tfTQ

And of course my 'Energy to make a car' calculation, back-calculated from the retail price in Australia: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pJDQWs1Qj-GofPn1flSH-bA

Please use with caution, these are not guaranteed to be 100% correct in every way, nor have they been tested by teams of chimps. Anything incorrect or plain silly, let me know...!

Is this the Top Gear test track?

2008-04-18T07:46:00.002Z

Well, reputedly so. It looks like a classic WWII triangled runway layout to me. Check it out.

Alfa Mi.To: are you ready to play?

2008-04-04T06:23:00.001Z

The Mi.To - it moves!

Accidents happen

2008-04-02T02:01:00.001Z

Shame to lose someone who has seemingly had a positive influence lately.. but there you go: Frank Stephenson, 49, the multicultural American who has guided Alfa Romeo's styling department to the triumphs of the 8C Competizione and the Mi.To hatchback, has parted ways with the company.

Top Gear Alfa 147 GTA vs Golf R32 vs Focus RS

2008-03-28T05:20:00.001Z

Well it's a bit of fun, isn't it?

Interesting look at Notes 8

2008-03-28T01:10:00.001Z

8 Reasons You'll Love Using IBM Lotus Notes 8

From: elsua, 7 months ago

| View | Upload your own

This is a presentation that details some of the new features from the latest release of Lotus Notes, Notes 8, and which clearly details that it is so much more than just another e-mail client.

SlideShare Link

Probably not the Alfa 159 GTA

2008-03-28T00:19:00.001Z

But a nice getaway anyway...

Alfa Romeo MI.To

2008-03-19T11:08:00.001Z

It's small, it's got Italian styling, it's got the Alfa badge. I want one, but please change the "me-too" name!

Alfa 33 vs Alfasud at Pukekohe, NZ

2008-01-24T07:12:00.001Z

Sud attack in NZ! Close and furious...

RACING ALFA Romeo VELOCE IN CAR.!!! HILL CLIMB RITSONA 2007

2008-01-24T07:05:00.001Z

What a fine car for a hillclimb...

VW Golf GTI W12-650

2007-08-09T22:58:00.001Z

Yes, yes, utter waste of resources, time and money. Does nothing to help global warming. Still, kooky fun to watch. It's certainly not new or innovative in concept, either, although the engineer explaining how journalists rather than customers or simple logic could help it into production is a trifle revealing...

1o. Alfa Romeo Road Trip - GTV Autodelta

2007-04-27T08:48:00.001Z

Yep, that's an engine...

Alfa Romeo 8c Competizione Promo Video

2007-04-27T08:42:00.001Z

Can't resist... a bit of style, some history... sure, it's an advert (and I'm not even in the market!) and it's a global resource-hogger, but it's also art on wheels. I'm torn between supporting classic design and a strong feeling of environmental doom. Not good.

New word formations from evo mag

2007-04-02T04:25:00.000Z

OK, I've had enough. Firstly it's "organic" grip vs "mechanical" grip.... huh? Now it's (from evo mag) The new Clio would feel more involving if it had some of the old car’s organic mechanical weighting.

OK, I think when a car mag says "organic" anything they mean "we really don't know what the heck it is but we believe it's different somehow". So despite the fact that tyres sit squarely (or not) upon the road purely by mechanical means, and derive grip by mechanical action between rubber and road, they mean to say that somehow something else is going on that they can't figure out. That somehow the tyres are better than the car's suspension and are providing extra grip that the suspension alone couldn't provide. Of course a suspension in isolation produces no grip at all, as it only does so through the tyres... yet somehow they need to say that some of this grip is being delivered generously by the tyres alone, despite the car's best intentions. So they call this magical mystical extra quality "organic". The car's crap, but the tyres are great. Why don't they say that instead?

And now evo has evolved "organic mechanical weighting". Hmmm. So what, I ask, could "in-organic" mechanical weighting be?? Why not just "weighting" or steering feel?