15/04/2010

With a baby on the way later this year, my Chimaera is rapidly becoming more and more impractical. I do have the option of keeping the car as a play thing as my wife gas a Honda Civic which will be the family car. However, I fear the Chimaera will get very little use this way. So once again I've been considering replacing it with something more family orientated yet still special. Top of my list so far is the BMW 135i. Whilst being a compact 4 seat coupe, it share the same engine as that found in its big brother, the 335i. The 3 litre, twin turbo, 300bhp power plant has won numerous awards and provides the 135i with performance greater than that of my Chimaera. The car has M Sport spec suspension as standard and has extremely powerful brakes with 6 pot calipers up front. This car ticks all the right boxes for me. With a free flow exhaust and a remap, a reliable 350-370bhp can be achieved and 400 is possible with improvements to the cooling. The car definately has a lot of potential and i feel it is a better package than the 335i. I have consodered the BMW M5 E39 with its 400bhp V8 but almost all of the cars for sale have covered at least 50,000 miles. Whilst the engine is reportedly good for well over 100k, it's all the other components, such as shocks, bushes, electrics etc that may not be as hard wearing. I would ideally prefer a newer car. The Mercedes E55 AMG also took my fancy - with 476bhp and 516lbs ft from its 5.4 litre supercharged V8, what is not to like! However, this was an �80k car only 5 or so years ago - there is a reason why they are now below �20k now. Having researched the reliability of the E55, I feel there could be some huge running costs when parts fail. Common problems seem to be brake pump, power steering and air suspension pump, and supercharger clutch. Fixing worn out parts doesn't necessarily concern me, but these are expensive items and I ideally don't want a car that costs too much to maintain.

Could one of these be my next car?

11/12/2009

I have my shortlist for a possible Chimaera replacement. I do seem to have strayed away from the criteria I set out in my last post. If I had a budget of £55k, this would be an easy task. I would have a Nissan GTR in a flash. Unfortunately my budget does not quite stretch that far yet, so here are my possible next cars.

Nissan 370Z
Ive always loved the 350Z partly as it is a sportscar in the same sense as the TVR - big, powerful engine up front and rear wheel drive. However, it has 500kg more weight that my Chimaera which makes it a slower car despite the extra power.

The new 370Z is more powerful and faster and even better looking with its wide wheel arches. At a motorshow in the London Docklands this Summer, I had a chance to get close to the car. When I sat in the driver seat I immediately felt at home - it felt exactly like the Chimaera. However, being a brand new car, it would be right at the top of my budget.

Lotus Elise
The Lightweight and minimalist nature of the Elise appeals to me. Town and country road driving would be fun regardless of speed due to the great handling and feedback from the steering. I'm pretty certain motorway and A roads would be less fun given the lack of power and more importantly torque.

There are a number of aftermarket supercharger options which boost the performance considerably. I've not heard any exhaust however that makes a sound I would call pleasing to the ear. I'm still not sure I could put up with a 4 cylinder engine after the V8.

Porsche 996 Carrera 4
In Turbo form, the 996 model 911 is an extremely fast supercar with great reliability from its 993 and race derived engine. At present, early cars are about £30k - a little more than I am prepared to spend.

The regular 996 has dropped to below £20k for early, often high mileage, cars. I've always liked the 911 though do find them a bit plain compared to TVR's. The Carrera 4 with its sophisticated 4WD system appeals to the geek in me. However, The rest of the 996 range uses a different engine to the Turbo, new for this model range, and has many issues in terms of reliability. A warranty would definitely be requirred if I were to buy a 911.

Focus RS
This could be the car. I love everything about it. The rally car styling is great especially in White or green The 5 cylinder engine together with its turbo and dump valve sounds amazing and performance is on par with the Chimaera, and actually faster in gear.

Already, there are a few tuners that have developed kits for the car taking power up to 385bhp. Road tests I have read have said the handling is extremely good and is one of the faster cars in the real world. But could I really part with £25k on a Ford Focus?

Three very different cars, with the Focus RS being my favourite. Truth be told, I have also been looking at newer TVR's. Prices of Cerbera's have really dropped with many available for around £8k. At this price, the chassis will most likely need work and the cost of running a Cerbera is considerably higher than the Chimaera. Tamora's are also looking attractive at around £15k though I do wonder about the reliability of Speed Six engine and the potential costs involved.

New Photos Added

23/10/2009

It has been a while since i have added any pictures to my site. So i have just uploaded a selection of my favourite recent photos. They show off the 18 inch alloys in all their glory. View the album now

Considering replacing my car

15/09/2009

I have to admit. My eyes have been wandering and I have been having thoughts about others. After almost 6 years together, I am considering ending it. Yes, I am thinking about replacing my TVR.

I've discovered that it is not an easy task finding a replacement. To make it easier, I've considered all the aspects of the Chimaera that I enjoy - my next car will have to meet as many of these criteria as possible. These are;

Engine
I really enjoy the lazy, muscular nature of a V8. The high torque from low revs makes for a very relaxing drive at low speeds. I don't think I'll be comfortable with a small high revving 4 cylinder engine therefore I can rule out a Honda S2000 and Lotus Elise 111R. They are both great, fast cars, but they just don't meet the mark

Performance
Many of todays hot hatches have more powerful engines than my Rover V8. However, they are also considerably heavier and as such performance of the TVR is hard to beat. Boxsters, Z4s, 350Zs all develop more power but they aren't actually any quicker. So long as my next car is at least on par with my Chimaera I will be happy. I have thought about a Lotus Elise S. It is a bit slower to 60mph and a few seconds slower to 100. This is probably the base point I'll need to meet or exceed.

Noise
There are very few cars that sound as good as a Chimaera. The Rover V8 makes a superb sound and is also very loud even with the standard exhaust. All 4 cylinder cars are crossed off my list as they just don't sound good. The only exception would be the Impreza with its boxxer 4, but I could never buy that instead of an Evo.

Rarity
With the TVR, I love the way everyone stops to look as I drive past and takes an interest in the car. It is a real head-turner. I don't like to follow the crowd and so my next car will also have to be a bit special. A Porsche Boxster just won't do as they are far too common.

Looks
Following on from the previous point, the car will need to be good looking. The Chimaera is a beautiful design and I'll struggle to find anything to better it this side of a supercar. However, I do consider cars like an Evo or GTR good looking due to their aggressive and functional nature.

Practicality
Due to my changing lifestyle, two seats really aren't enoungh anymore. I could really use a 4 seater. The Chimaera has a deceptively large boot so no omplaints on that front.

Tunability
The Rover V8 is a difficult and expensive engine to extract more power out of. The larger 4.5 and 5.0 capacity engines are a little easier, but still expensive. There is a supercharger conversion that produces supercar levels of performance, but it is not available for my 'pre serpentine' engine configuration. I would like my next car to have more options for tuning. Something turbocharged would be ideal.

Factors that dont matter:

Soft top
A convertible is great on a hot summer day, but as we don't have many of those (in England), most of the time I have the roof up. As such, a convertible is not on my list of essentials - just a nice to have feature.

Reliability
Despite TVR's reputation, my car has been fairly reliable. It is an old car - 15 years old now - and a lot of parts have worn out and needed replacing. A lot of the work I carried out myself, learning about the mechanics of cars in the process.

Fuel economy
Since I have only managed an average of 16mpg during my ownership of my TVR, i am not bothered if my next car is not very fuel efficient.

In my next post, i'll list some of the cars ive been thinking about and how i rate them against the Chimaera

Is a 4 litre Chimaera slow?...No!

08/07/2009

There has been a lot of discussion recently on the PistonHeads forum whether the 4 litre Chimaera is too slow. I find this amusing. The 400 is slower compared to other TVRs, but it is in no way a slow car.

My 15 year old 400 with no engine mods puts out 183 bhp @ wheels, approx 220bhp @ fly. Torque is 230 lbs ft and is very flat. Power peaks at 5500 rpm, but even up to 6200 rpm, the power barely drops off at all (I've seen other dyno graphs where power disappears significantly past 5500 rpm).

With these figures, i believe my car is one of the quicker 400s. I've managed 5.3s to 60mph and a quarter mile in just over 14s. With a better driver, i reckon Autocar's test figures of 5.2s and 13.8s are achievable.

Some of my highlights include:

Just out accelerating a E46 M3

Matching a 996 C4 in acceleration, until we got to a corner - i had to back off, he didn't!!

Easily beating Evo's/Impreza's in traffic light GPs (their turbo lag probably doesn't help)

On a CarLimits day with one other driver in a Mk1 Elise 118, out-accelerating (not hard against the 118), out-braking in the wet (surprising), and out-cornering (very surprising) the Elise

On the same CarLimits day, my car was 12s quicker on a time circuit which only took 1min 6sec to complete. Passengering in each others cars, it was clear mine was much more difficult to drive/control however.

My car feels very quick in every gear apart from 5th, but i only ever use that for motorway cruising. The Chimaera is a car with plenty of grip, but is it a very hard car to drive at the limit. Anyone can seemingly drive a modern hot hatch fast, but you need to be a very skilled driver to do the same in a Chimaera. I'm not one of them unfortunately!

There are quicker cars, there are cars that corner faster, but for me my 400 has everything i need in a road car.