if you had to pick one: Slow car fast, fast car slow?

Umm... both? 

I own LBCs, so "slow car fast" just comes with the territory.

My R53 JCW, is a nice balance - fast enough to get me out of trouble, but not quite fast enough to get me into trouble if I'm not paying attention.

Then I have my 2017 Grand Caravan GT daily driver, which with 283 HP is surprisingly capable of getting out of its own way, despite its size and heft. Handling is... acceptable.  I tend to limit how much I push it simply because it will wear out the tires for minimal enjoyment - and I usually have the cargo area filled with stuff that I rather not have shifting around.

Some day I'll buy/build a truly "fast" car... 

In reply to captdownshift :

E153 from a Camry, I’m actually the guy making and selling the adapter plates.

I’ve owned all sorts of cars and driven all kinds of things.  I clearly remember one of the design goals for the FD RX-7 was 10hp/lb.  While not perfect it comes really close to being fast enough to enjoy, and slow enough to not be insane.  It’s a power / weight ratio that can be daily driven yet enjoyed at the track or autoX.  All you need is a capable chassis with a good suspension.  It falls right into the wheelhouse of my 00 996 too.  The 00 Boxster S is short about 30hp and you really notice it.  Sure its a great car but the power deficit is glaring.  

I really like my cars to have 300-400 hp.  Anything less merging or maintaining 75 in the mountains, passing on two lane highways....  these kinds of things become real chores.

This is why turbo Miatas are so damn popular and fun or Rotrex ones.  You get to a happier more fun more balanced performance car.  120 hp in a great chassis is not balanced.  Momentum racing 100% of the time isn’t 100% fun.  Being able to make the car rotate using power is part of the fun.  Having so much power you are scared to poke the throttle is also not fun. Sure smokey burnouts are a hoot but overpowered isn’t fun all the time either.

Given a choice, I’d take too much power over too little any day.  It’s easier to control the throttle than it is to add sufficient power in a lot of cases.

My next dream cars are an LS powered ND and an L99 powered 6 speed auto 2nd gen F body.  The Miata will be overpowered.  426hp in an F body will be about right.  It’s getting the suspension up to snuff that will be harder.

I have driven fast cars.. and never enjoyed them. All of my vehicles have been of the "slow car fast" which is much more fun and doable and safe

I chose slow car-fast car, turbo miata

Putting numbers to it, I think the hard line for me is right around 13lb/hp and the happy area is like 11-12.5. My fiesta st is right there at 13, and if it didn't run out of turbo at 5500rpm it'd be about perfect. Can merge easily from fourth or fifth gear in most cases, can floor it through 2-3 gears without going to jail, but only needs about half throttle to drive like an adult. My 986 boxster is somewhere around 14.5 and obviously missing the low end torque of the turbo. Once you get it up to speed it's got decent top end acceleration but getting it going is basically full throttle all the time to not be left in the dust by soccer moms pulling away from a stoplight. Merging usually takes at least third gear to get it into the power band. At least the exhaust note is good, if not for that I'd probably hate driving it. My old M roadster was somewhere south of 9 and it was awesome when I could use it, but it basically required a fully empty road ahead of me which doesn't happen super often. And merging it was fairly easy to accidentally be doing 100. The car I'm looking at for my next summer DD car is somewhere just south of 10, but with gearing about 20% longer so it'll probably feel more like 11~11.5 compared to everything else I've owned.

I've considered it more, and my revised answer is "Fast and well-behaved but comfy car driven spiritedly but not to its limits." The roads around here are rough as heck, and even my Focus is a little bit stiff for some of the bumps. The Probe is way too stiff. The Town Car is too floppy, but at least it can do one-wheel peels.

The Cougar needs about 100 more horsepower and then it would be perfect. It's somewhat firm, but not too firm. It handles good, but not like a race car. And it's comfortable enough to drive on the crappy roads around here. All it needs is to be a little bit better at doing burnouts. (I might even keep the auto transmission, for daily driving...especially if I could figure out a paddle-shift solution for it...then again, I was going to make it a race car...but what if I had one for racing and another for daily driving...ignore me, I'm rambling)

@AnthonyGS, totally agreed on the lacking power when trying to maintain 75 mph when climbing hills. I like my Outback but it could use another 40hp when climbing mountain passes.

Now as for 100% momentum not being 100% fun all the time; on a track yes they are. When I road raced a 125cc GP bike you had to ride them on the verge of crashing everywhere to get anything out of them. Same goes for my Datsun, you have to 4 wheel drift it everywhere. This is great fun.....even if the car is mid-pack. My ego may not always like it but I have to admit it's fun, like doing donuts in a muddy field.

I would further argue 120hp in a great chassis is balanced; with a user friendly chassis you can (for the track anyway) set the car up very edgy, knowing that if the car does get away from you it's easy to bring it back from the brink.

Oddly I see know reason why one would want to use the throttle to rotate the car on the throttle on track but for a street car I could see this being fun (OK it's fun on track too). My F500 is capable of breaking the tires loose at speed but doing this is slower than rotating the car by trailing the brakes and then driving it though.

The 700hp Viper I drove on track many years ago was super cool but it wasn't ever a car I would aspire to own. Now the 911 GT3RS I drove last year was amazing but it was also one of those cars where it was obvious that things would go wrong really fast because the car was so capable of attaining warp speed so easily. Really fast cars aren't necessarily fun............a total rush yes, but not fun, as once you reach a certain level of seriousness the fun diminishes rapidly. I miss driving my old D-sports racer, it was faster than any production car could hope to be but the ownership (maintenance & cost) took the fun out of it. It was also a car one had to take very serious so while it was a total rush it wasn't as "fun" as one would have in a beat old Miata.

At the end of the day each individual's version of fun is going to vary. 

secretariata said:

dean1484 said:

Just because you have the power does not mean you have to use it.

You sir have "no mas pantalones!!!"  Like in the commercial...  :)

I think I should have qualified it with "all the time" .   

After driving the CLS I get in the 07 saab 93 with the 2.0T and I have the thing to the floor all the time.  

A friend owns an NSU Prinz with the 30 bhp two cylinder engine.  He can indulge in racing around the street full bore all day and never risk a ticket. Something about that you have to like....

wspohn said:

A friend owns an NSU Prinz with the 30 bhp two cylinder engine.  He can indulge in racing around the street full bore all day and never risk a ticket. Something about that you have to like....

I had a friend back in college who drove a 1965 Datsun, he said the same thing.

Fast car slow for me.  I own opposites ends of a spectrum....a 62 Beetle with 40hp and an 87 930 with some mods.  Sure I can drive the beetle foot to the floor everywhere,     but the 930 is a hell of a lot more fun to me.

Jordan Rimpela said:

I've owned nothing but slow cars. My 300 SDL is terribly slow, but that didn't stop me from driving it balls to the wall at Daytona. 

This is such an awesome photo. How did it handle the high banks?!?

My dad had an 85 500SE he imported from Germany. It wasnt quite the SEL model but the thing had nearly 300hp and it flew down the highway like a missile. He had some basic work done to it and it had such a nice growl to it. Parts ended up being ridiculously expensive to import so he sold it in 93 and bought a 740iL. Worst mistake ever. He still wishes he could find that 500SE and buy it back.

Oh and im a slow car fast guy. Love my Fiesta ST.

kevinatfms said:

Jordan Rimpela said:

I've owned nothing but slow cars. My 300 SDL is terribly slow, but that didn't stop me from driving it balls to the wall at Daytona. 

This is such an awesome photo. How did it handle the high banks?!?

My dad had an 85 500SE he imported from Germany. It wasnt quite the SEL model but the thing had nearly 300hp and it flew down the highway like a missile. He had some basic work done to it and it had such a nice growl to it. Parts ended up being ridiculously expensive to import so he sold it in 93 and bought a 740iL. Worst mistake ever. He still wishes he could find that 500SE and buy it back.

Honestly, it handled the entire track really well. The only thing it didn't like was on the first lap, someone in an E39 M5 entered the banking at... 45. Driving that slow on the banking is terrifying. But at speeds approaching 100, the Mercedes just went with it. It's amazing just how well a car with loads of R&D performs. 

Jordan Rimpela said:

kevinatfms said:

Jordan Rimpela said:

I've owned nothing but slow cars. My 300 SDL is terribly slow, but that didn't stop me from driving it balls to the wall at Daytona. 

This is such an awesome photo. How did it handle the high banks?!?

My dad had an 85 500SE he imported from Germany. It wasnt quite the SEL model but the thing had nearly 300hp and it flew down the highway like a missile. He had some basic work done to it and it had such a nice growl to it. Parts ended up being ridiculously expensive to import so he sold it in 93 and bought a 740iL. Worst mistake ever. He still wishes he could find that 500SE and buy it back.

Honestly, it handled the entire track really well. The only thing it didn't like was on the first lap, someone in an E39 M5 entered the banking at... 45. Driving that slow on the banking is terrifying. But at speeds approaching 100, the Mercedes just went with it. It's amazing just how well a car with loads of R&D performs. 

Mercedes sure does seem to spend a ton on R&D for suspension... at least on the older stuff.  I never could comprehend why my W210 could handle as flat as it did but still ride like a marshmallow.

Slow car fast for me, although I'd love to try fast car fast. Just E36 M3ty where I live that even an NA miata can get into "give us your license and go to jail" territory by the end of second gear on 90% of the roads around my house, seems like there's no point having 500hp and nothing to do with it. 

Even in what I'd consider a "medium" car, like a P71 (heavy but "powerful"), it was too easy to be doing double the speed limit without even trying, or noticing.  

I still disagree 100% momentum is fun.  It is not fun.  For example in a medium corner with a slow entry speed in a momentum car (looking at you Miata), you can have the throttle buried to the floor and scrub off speed.....  that ain’t fun to me.  It’s irritating.  Being able to rotate the rear of the car isn’t always faster, but it can be an awful lot of fun, which is why drifting is a thing.  It’s a hoot and sometimes its even faster.  I like having multiple ways to negotiate turns.  In a momentum car you are severely limited by inadequate power.  

We seem to have lost the original question. Y'all are talking about driving a fast car, not about driving it slowly. 

Time has come in the favor of making fast cars easier to drive slowly. My friend's 697whp mustang sucks to drive slowly. It's loud inside, has crappy stiff clutch feel and gets crappy fuel economy.  And that's only 15 years old. Now we have factory cars with that much power and quiet comfort and warranties.