The one that bugs me is when people “get angry” because they think Korean just added an I to Honda.
It’s hyuhn-die. Not Hawn-dai. Not Hawn-die. Not Huhndy. Not Hi-yhoon-die.
Then again, my family has been driving for over 30 years, so maybe I have a bias XD
They’re advertising it as the Qaushqai, so I doubt they’ll be changing it. It’s better than the Rogue Sport and Outlander Sport crap the the US market gets instead of a proper separate name that isn’t based on an unrelated model.
I meant it will likely change around the time they do the facelift.
You say that body is OP and then you show up with the Caterham. I’m going to have to call you out on the bullshit here.
The top is my entry.
The middle is the micro-sized supercar
The last one is the Caterham body (2005 is the earliest year it came in)
All three are with the exact same engine I submitted and 275/315 tires. I should note the Caterham is happy to go up to 375 which is the highest of the three.
Considering the Caterham is by a long way the lowest on production units and material costs, and in the same range on performance I’m not sure what sporting and performance stats per which cost you were referring to? Or how that body is OP if there’s two more sitting right next to it. Not trying to stir up trouble you see, just surprised to hear that being given as advice. 
In the interest of full disclosure I’ll say both the quick tests were a bit more than a second down on the car I submitted around Zolder, but they were also built in 10 minutes each with zero suspension tuning which was not the case for mine.
I suppose I should have been clearer about the rather specific combination of criteria for which the MR body outperforms 
The last time we did a “small but fun track day” round, that same body gave the best bang for buck for cornering and track time, without necessarily breaking your spine or having to push the engine too hard. It also comes with a higher practicality score, something the not-Caterham/Donkervoort loses heavily upon because of the chopped roof, oh, and the somehow ridiculous amount of luggage space the MR body has!
The real part where the MR body does better is that it has a lower drag coefficient and its zones are mapped out that it’s not only lightweight but can fit a decent amount of engine for its small frame, meaning you don’t have to do stupid things to make it go fast. Or you could do stupid things and make it go fast, it’s well capable of going stupid fast too 
In the Caterham/Donkervoort you can put a fairly sizeable engine in there but after a certain point it starts limiting your engineering choices to the point that you would end up picking things that would really hurt the fuel economy. I already didn’t go with DI fuel injection because of engineering time and even with the eco tune I pushed I’m still getting just under 10L/100km. True, I did have some extra comfort in there but I reckon I’m pushing about 10% extra fuel consumption to get similar performance, so that’s where the trade-off went.
Specifically for this challenge, going for the maximum tyre width is actually irrelevant because: 1) Dragawn appears to be quite concerned with tyre costs 2) we’re not attempting to shoehorn 1000bhp into anything here 3) wider tyres seriously destroy comfort, and Dragawn didn’t want a trailer queen.
After all that I should absolutely concede the possibility that I overlooked the Caterham body and assumed it was inferior, because I actually haven’t done a direct comparison between the two across the entire metric. I just remembered that it wiped the floor with most other things (maybe that was phale’s fault ha… but honestly it wasn’t just phale) in challenges like this. Then again the Caterham/Donkervoort body is quite rarely used here, which is specifically why I went and did it.
You know, this could all be me ruminating on wishing I could have taken the CD player out of the car and used fiberglass panels instead, but as my ad said, it had to be somewhat viable as a daily car too am I simply feeling the bitterness of compromise?
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Yeah, I wouldn’t have called practicality score and luggage space sporting and performance stats per se.
The little MR has slightly better aero, the caterham has more engine space and the tires to put it down for a low price and the micro supercar has some hot prestige and good safety which can also be relevant.
I’m going to go ahead and suggest that none of them are OP because they are nice and close to each other, and there may well be others because this is already a long ass time to discuss it and I don’t care enough to check. Maybe the micro supercar needs some more luggage space because it’s there in the body.
And maybe phale wiped the floor because he’s phale and he can make the stats grow big. I’ve been the floor, you’ve been the floor, everybody’s been the floor when it comes to phale and stats and props to him. I’m more about the track time and drivability combo on this one.
CSR39 Reviews part 2 of 3
Note: As I mentioned in the post, the “MOD” spec is suggestive, and I have changed a few things that benefit the competition, like fitting semi-slicks where lacking, but also cuts where it exceeded the budget.
Also, semi-slicks are very legal in Belgium, so often I’ll be swapping these on at free cost since I assume that there’s a good chance tyres would need to be replaced (soon) anyhow.
@Yurimacs : Zast Super Ethos 1996
Price now: 15,610 euros
Holy sh*t you can fit a kitten into each of these exhausts. Wasn’t this the car in that one manga? You know, Wanban Midfight? Anyhow, this car is fast. 400 hp and just 1165 kg. This beast was a true supercar, how is it affordable? Oh, wait, yeah, I remember one lapping Zolder under 1:50, but the next lap it blew its engine, something to do with piston failure at high rpm. Ah, so sad. They’re great cars while they last though, they understeer a fair bit, and the brakes lock up easily, but hell, with 400 hp it’s hard not to have fun, while it lasts. And that sadly is what the dealbreaker is for me with this car, it would be a great contender, if it weren’t for the pistons failing easily. Such a shame.
@HighOctaneLove : Bogliq Slyde H’s 1989
Price now: 9,040 euros
Ahh, a car from the 80’s, one without any rust even. Good ol’ Bogliq quality I assume. Sadly though, this is an oldtimer now, and racing oldtimers can be…costly. Its engine was designed well, but is less reliable than modern counterparts, and the same can be said about of the parts, maintenance won’t be cheap, especially whipping an 80’s car back into shape after purchase, but let’s see if it’s worth it, it leaves plenty still in the piggy with the budget after all. On semi-slicks the Slyde H can lap Zolder in under 1:59, not too fast, but…the car was engineered very well: it has enough power to get its tyres smoking at the start, the handling at low speed is sharp and nible, while at speed it gives plenty of confidence without understeering into oblivion, the front and rear suspension work well together. This, the Bogliq Slyde is a good partner to take to the track. It’s a classy coupe, but if it can keep up with the young’uns is the question. It must’ve been quite the legend back in its day. Good value for the money, and designed very well with a lovely NA inline 6 roar.
@07CobaltGirl : SME Z/54 Trackday Edition 2000
Price now: 16,780 euros
Do you even torque, bro’? 386 hp, and very torque-y ones. Yep, this is a muscle car alright, but, this one handles. Multilink at 2000? Impressive, giving great sharp handling and is good for a 1:51.34 time around Zolder on semi-slicks (and a lot of burnouts with that mean V8). It is expensive though, not just in price, but also in fuel, sadly it being a muscle car it can’t escape from the huge V8’s glutton. It does have good driving comfort to go around and to other tracks though, so asides from the cost it’s an incredible track car. Maybe, maybe, but certainly one of the most appealing muscle cars I’ve had the honor of beholding.
@gridghost : Halo XS 2007
Price now: 14,270 euros
If this car was a girl she’d be 1,5 meter, feisty, and kick you in the nuts when you least expect it, but the next night you’d forgive her because she’s such an animal in bed. Oh and she’d be a fuckin’ loli because of how she little she weighs, 923 kg in 2007 with advanced safety? Damn son. The turbo lags, but the rear tyres have plenty of traction and it’s a track car so who cares? Getting nearly 250 hp with that weight pays off: 1:52.40 to go around Zolder, nicely served with a good engine tune. The engine is a 2L twin turbo V6, pretty small, but sadly does get a tad inefficient at high rpm. Still, a fun engine with plenty of character, bolted to a tiny well tuned chassis, asides from the oversized brakes, but atleast they show nice I guess. It is fun, it lacking power steering only makes it even more fun having great steering feedback.
What a great little car, completely loco, only downside about it are the high barstool seating and the high fuel consumption at the top of its powerband. A force to be reckoned with.
@Mikonp7 : Trackproven 85 EcaMobile Trackbox
Price now: 2,950 euros
Sh*tbox gone mad, hot hatch served spicy, this is one old classic gone fast. Well, relatively, and it’s dirt cheap too. Plenty of money to fix it up and maintain it left. Well, the engine does twist itself in a knot though. Pumping nearly 300 hp out of a 2L inline 4 of ’85 doesn’t have pretty results: the engine often fails if you depress the throttle fully when the turbo does kick in (which isn’t until after 4500 rpm), with being relatively low on traction this does render the car a tricky drive. For its age it’s a great drive and a great rally classic, but on the track it’s a handsfull. Fitting an LSD sure does help though, making the car much more stable, but still just alright fast for its power to weight (291 hp at 1037 kg), going around Zolder in 1:58.
It is a hot hatch, but was at its prime 30 years ago, it is cheap, but I’m afraid there are better options out there.
@stm316 : Inne Yuros 2.8L
Price now: 11,660 euros
Ahhh, a late model sedan of the Yuros, with a rather sweet 2.8L inline 6. The engine may be old, but is holding up great to modern standards, well, the economy is alright what could I expect? But the reliability is top notch. This car should prove to be a great easy fix’erup. Costs a bit, like probably the rest of the budget, but that does make it up to par with the modern competitors! #builtnotboughtyo It isn’t fast around Zolder, at 1:58 around it on the semi slicks, but doing so on rather thin ( 225 mm ones) which are affordable. The handling is sharp, the brakes bite good, maybe a tad too good, but they have a little noticeable fade on the rear. A good ol’ burnout is possible, although the LSD is just a viscous example. The car is fun, yeah, I can see myself slowly growing fonder of this sedan the more time I spend with it, a great job from the engineer of Inne!
@HowlerAutomotive : Howler Pulsar RSF 2002
Price now: 14,530 euros
This…this is a monster, I…good lord… It may not have entertainment as in the sense of a radio, but what it does have is a laptime around Zolder under 1:48 on semi-slicks. And 1.45g’s of raw cornering. F*ck F1, we need a competition with lil beasts like this. You’ll probably die a horrible death if you crash while pulling these forces, but oh what a glorious death it would be. It’s impressive what this little car can do with 270 hp, and is quite economical too. The 2.5L V8 makes all of the right noises too, but, oh the shame, while going to a glorious 9200 rpm, doing so too often may mean its death. Not severely, but the engine will give out doing what it loves most sooner or later. Not an easy one to maintain either with cylinders just a bit bigger than 300 CC putting it into almost motorcycle territory. The tyres are well…does anyone know a manufacturer that does make 325/25r16 tyres? These must be as exotic as unicorns shitting gold. 305/30r18’s do fit aswell and are more available though, but that drops the agility of the car a bit, and makes the ride harsher. Speaking of which, the front does bump hard.
One amazing vehicle, but plagued by a few issues like engine reliability during trackdays and, well, not getting killed crashing it. Great track weapon that does require love, but…damn.
@phale : Misty 2001
Price now: 12,450 euros
My my, aren’t you an elegant one. Just a bit over one tonne with a V6 producing 255 hp and a lot of lovely purrs. An affordable car in every aspect. The remaining budget is enough to whip her back into shape with maybe some change. She lacks power steering, making the steering nice, and with just 380 kg on that axle quite liveable. The handling’s nice too, nothing extreme, but good for what the 245 mms are worth, doing Zolder in 1:55.42. I’m struggling to find much wrong with this little car, she seems like such a sweetheart. One big issue however, is the goddamn too low redline of 7100 rpm. Sacrilege ! SACRILEGE, Misty deserves so much more and has so much more to give. 8500 rpm would be more like it, but even with the best internals the engine seems to get into trouble past 8300 rpm. Oh well, maybe it’s worth a rebuild to 8300 rpm, but those aren’t cheap. Hmmm. (would drop the Zolder time by almost 2 seconds aswell!)
Ah Misty, so seductive, but like usual the girl’s heart does not seem to be doing what the guy wants.
18 reviews done, 9 to go, today was a busy day with university deadline, but tomorrow that should be done so I can focus the evening on getting the last reviews out and a winner decided. I swear, I’ll finish this in time, damnit.
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looks around for a huge V8
It’s not THAT big. I think someone had a V6 that was bigger! 
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Is your engine bigger than 4.2L/4243cc? because if it isn’t,you are probably talking about me 
No, somebody had a 5.7L V6…a red sedan…don’t remember the name.
EDIT: It was Madrias with a monster V6. Not sure what TR8R’s Hellcat had in it…I only remember it was an NA V8…i think it’s in here but I can’t find it right now.
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Well, I couldn’t help myself with trying to make an (almost) 350 cubic inch V6.
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Now go back and make it with OHV hahahahahaha
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Kinda tempting to try that next round…
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Was semi slicks specified in the original post? Sometimes the suspension needs a retune when switching, unless you want a car that doesn’t need that. I get the feeling of you just whack on semi slicks in my car it’s going to develop terminal oversteer and that’s going to be a problem.
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Semi-slicks weren’t mentioned in the original post, I just assumed it common sense, which appears to have been wrong. As most semi-slicks are developed solely for the purpose of being street legal track(day) tyres.
And don’t worry, for each car I verified if it started to oversteer on both graphs when switching to semi’s which never was the case so far as far as I can remember, and otherwise would’ve altered the alignment slightly for it to work. Usually it seems to induce a bit of understeer, or not enough towards oversteer to cause the car to oversteer. I didn’t spend time seeing if you could retune the suspension to corner that .2-.5 seconds faster again, but quite honestly that bit of time is totally neglectable in this competition.
My apologies if I missed something and a car did go a significant bit slower on semis than it would with a slight tweak though.
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Well, I left off semi-slicks because cost! And over here in the US a semi-slick tire is mad expensive and not at all common on the streets.
yeah ok, see, for me, I tune my car to the tyres by about a hair’s breadth, so we’re not talking 0.2-0.5s faster again, we’re talking three seconds lost due to changes required in gearing and suspension (I suspect you’ll agree that this isn’t insignificant). Same with the aero, changing the weight distribution of the car (tyres count) by the least amount can also send the car from being glued to the road to flying off ass-first at high speed.
That being said if I change the tuning my car’s sportiness goes up more than a point which makes the car several hundred dollars more expensive!!!
What would you like me to do, just keep it as is? (which will make me slightly unhappy at the lost potential), or send in a new tune or the new specs (which will make the car slightly too expensive)? I’ll PM you the changes anyway just in case that’s the way you want to go.
Yeah, I should go back and recalculate cost on sport compound for all entries that were close to the 15k price and didn’t, but the vast majority did. I’ll tend to that before choosing a winner and best-in-classes. There won’t be a full ranking as honestly deciding each exact position is tough with how diverse the entries are.
And @strop and anyone who feels like their car wasn’t performing as well on semi-slicks as it should: Feel free to send it tuned to semi-slicks in the MOD trim if possible (As such the change to semi-slicks is “free of charge”), and it will be used for the final decision for a winner, or for the review aswell if yours hasn’t been released yet, the review can be altered if already released and the car gets significantly faster.
But so far I only think Strop’s entry was the only entry meticulously tuned that gets thrown off severely by the change to semi-slicks, I could be wrong though.
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Does it really matter ? I guess you wouldn’t what to go racing on Semi-slicks which were made in 2010 or later.
I didn’t put Semi’s on mine because i though you wouldn’t need them to drive on the normal road.
For me it was logical that you would get some new HOOSIERS FOR THE TRACKDAY um, i mean some new rubber for the track.
Correct me if i am wrong
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I’ll go with @Mikonp7
There’s no need to recalculate anything. Unless you are going for the ultimate laptime/handling/…
But to be honest…the best looking car has been sent to the UnderBarn so we don’t care! 
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