GUM Clinic

Dorothy’s Bitch

Any sane human can see that mixing cars, guns and booze makes as much sense as mixing children, superglue and a dog’s eyelids. The kids will have an enormous amount of fun, but the dog will be blind… then probably dead. Overfinch’s new ‘Holland and Holland’ Range Rover must therefore be designed for childless, staggeringly minted insane people that like dead dogs.

For a start, children couldn’t possibly be left in the back. The materials are stunning; leather usually reserved for private jets, hand crafted woodwork and natty metal plaques with room for bespoke engraving – but they’re all waiting for a biro drawing of a plane. And the posh materials are just the start. In place of a middle rear seat is the cocktail cabinet of Shane McGowan’s secret aristocratic brother – there’s a fridge for three bottles, a bureau for some whisky tumblers and a cupboard to hide away the really hard stuff. Leaving a child in the back of the Holland and Holland would be like leaving Alf Garnett in the back of a Mosque.

Staggeringly minted only goes some way to describe the wealth of anyone who can afford the £140,000 needed to buy the 500bhp Supercharged V8 – £60,000 more than a standard Range Rover. Overfinch seem to have realised it’s a hefty wedge to ask for a cocktail cabinet so they’ve added something a bit extra; in the first year of owning the car, they’ll refill the champage, whisky and vodka included with the car… getting pissed softens the blow I suppose.

They must be insane, because it’s not actually very good. Despite the materials, the levels of craftmanship and attention to detail completely fail to titillate the pedant in you. Exposed hinges, bare screwheads and inconsistent touchpoints aren’t really what a thoroughly well-to-do pheasant killer wants, but that’s what they’ll get. Despite treating the prototype version we tested like the top of a baby’s head, we still managed to accidentally crack a glass as we shut a drawer. Out on the road, the sound of glasses clinking and bottles sloshing hinders your ability to patronise the peasants below – at least their cars don’t make you feel like you’ve robbed an off license.

The final straw? This is the really good bit… you can’t even fit a dog in the boot because it’s filled with cupboards. There’s a lockable section to store a couple of shotguns, a drawer for gunning gubbins and a place to stash more booze and glasses. It’s an impressive thing to behold – a cross between a hearse and a Mayfair lounge, but like the cabin, the execution isn’t as polished as you’d expect. Even MFI can manage a soft-close drawer.

So, if you’re a childless, staggeringly minted insane person that likes dead dogs, guns and alcohol you’ve just discovered your perfect car – just don’t expect it to be half as good as you hope.

Predictable news broke today, confirming that the Government’s ‘warmly received’ scrappage scheme is being extended. Apparently, the £3million put aside to help poor people buy slightly less shameful cars was going to run out next week. Luckily, Mr Mandelson stepped in with a further £1 million – enough for another 100,000 people to chop in their Rover 111i Knightsbridge for a Hyundai i10.

But, he didn’t stop there. Because of his floral persuasion he dressed up the deal with the help of everyone’s favourite previously fat celebrity bully Gok Wan. Mr Wan, who rose to fame after consistently referring to breasts as ‘bangers’ on TV shows featuring fat women, was asked by Mr Mandelson to tell the public just how satisfying it is to get your bangers out.

Mr Mandeslon said ‘despite mine and Gok’s common bedroom traits, we’re passionate about bangers. Cynics will say that old cars and gravity struck breasts are very different things, but I beg to differ – it’s good to get them out for personal gain.’ Mr Wan, standing very close to Mr Mandelson, echoed his sentiments. ‘ohh, look at you, don’t hide your banger… oh yes, oohhmmmmm, that’s better. Come on girls, show me your bangers. Ohhmmmm’.

Mr Wan expects the £1 million of new Government money to be spent before Christmas as the country ‘gets them out’. Mr Mandelson was unable to comment on this point. When asked why Mr Wan was in fact promoting the murder of useless old bangers instead of dressing them up like sausagemeat in clingfilm, he also refused to comment.

Rental Abomination

Protein Shake

Guilded Tissues

Rhythm Method

McLaren’s MP4-12C has already generated enough spit-speckled excitement to drown the hopes of every rival in the world. The sea of choppy hyperbole was instant. When the 12C first appeared, it replaced reality – an 80kg one-piece carbon fibre chassis born from the minds behind the iconic McLaren F1. It was an instant benchmark.

But when you drag reality back from behind the headlines, it’s got some work to do. Ron Dennis’ alchemists may have the tidiest desks and clearest minds in automotive design, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they’ve got the best grasp of what makes a car scintillating, addictive and organic. A £150k super-machine needs more than a clinical approach to speed; if the most efficient route is always the best, we’d drink ethanol in place of ale.

So, instead of sucking up the hype and proclaiming the 12C as ‘the best car since the F1’, let’s remind ourselves of two very important factors in its success: the Ferrari 458 Italia and Mercedes SLS AMG. Give or take some intangible margin of error, they’re just as fast, expensive and hyperbolic as the McLaren. They all cost around £150k, all approach 600bhp and will all yelp past 60mph in less than 4 seconds. Against these two, the British new boy isn’t really a benchmark at all – it’s an underdog.

With the McLaren not actually built yet, finding out how it fares is obviously slightly awkward. So let’s take the approach of the people that supercars really appeal to – schoolboys. A particularly lusty game of top trumps is an excellent starting point… and for the well-heeled pub bragger, could actually prove decisive.

Annoyingly, McLaren are yet to announce the 0-62mph figure that will define their car in schoolboy’s minds – so we’ll have to do some approximation. Scribbled on the back of a text-book, the Mercedes starts off well with the biggest engine, at 6.2 litres, and greatest torque figure at 479lb ft – but after that, it loses its way. The SLS AMG is by far the heaviest; so without any power advantage (563bhp) it’s 3.8 second sprint to 62mph will be the slowest. And because schoolboys don’t care about value for money, the fact it’s the cheapest is totally irrelevant.

Which leaves the Ferrari and McLaren to battle it out. Ferrari claim the 562bhp developed by their 4.5 litre V8 is more per litre than any naturally aspirated engine. McLaren claim their 3.8 litre twin turbo V8 has more power per CO2 than any car ever made. Both records are worthy of merit for different reasons, but neither are useful in top trumps. The 12C has 600bhp – 38 more than the Ferrari. It’s got 440lb ft of torque – 42 more than the Ferrari. While exact weights aren’t available for the McLaren, we know it has a dry weight of 1300kg – so expect a kerb weight almost identical to the 458’s 1380kg. Unless it suffers from off-the-line turbo lag, it should beat the Italia’s 3.4 second sprint to 62mph. McLaren beats Ferrari. Probably.

Modern schoolboys are also a sophisticated bunch. They understand the nuances of design, can appreciate poise, stance and proportion and will lecture their science teachers at length about the effect of drag coefficient on a car’s performance, stability and fuel economy. They also like to draw cars at the back of geography lessons – so which best fits the bill?

In this test, the Mercedes isn’t knocked out quite as easily. Snapped on film it can look gawky and awkwardly retro, but in the flesh it’s neither. The Ferrari pulls off the opposite trick – somehow it’s not quite as striking in the flesh. From certain angles such as the front three quarter view, it’s still stunning, but walking around it doesn’t make your pants tickle like the pictures do. If the kids were feeling unkind, they’d say the side architecture was borrowed from a Seat Ibiza and the bonnet’s leading edge was from a Scirocco.

Which leaves the McLaren, supposedly the antidote to all modern supercars. It’s well documented that designer Frank Stephenson penned the McLaren so that it ages gracefully; basically like the F1. It shares so much of the F1’s basic shape – cab forward, four-square stance and prominent front wheel arches – that he’s probably right.

But schoolboys don’t have foresight or understand subtlety – they want it flash and fast, with just a nod to science. Despite the Mensa convention going on beneath the surface, the McLaren has to go first. To adults it looks honed, classy and taut but to kids it looks bland. Its saving grace is the playground chat generated by its pop-up air brake, but not even that’s cool enough to save it. Also, there aren’t any pictures of it with bright red paint… so, despite it’s flaws, the Ferrari is a goer.

The Ferrari and Mercedes both look more cartoon sketchable and can match the 12C’s Top Trump physical technology. The Ferrari wades in with deformable front winglets mounted in the bonnet, whereas the Mercedes has what could be the pinnacle of textbook scribble cool – gullwing doors. The argument over which is best could have someone’s eye out so we’ll solve it with an easily recitable piece of GCSE science; who’s got the most exhaust pipes. Ferrari has three, Mercedes only two – Ferrari wins. Handily, for the science geek kids, this victory is reinforced by the fact that the Ferrari has a drag coefficient of an incredibly low 0.32, which the Mercedes will almost certainly not beat.

You might think this is all pointless – the proof is in the driving after all. Yes and no. While human adults like to think they’d make a rational decision when buying something as expensive as a supercar, they’re tricking themselves. Supercar buying men, just like schoolboys, fall into two categories – geeks and wankers.

The geeks want something that they can prove is fast and the wankers want something that they think is fast. In this case, the geeks will quite rightly choose the McLaren as it has the most power from the smallest capacity in the most efficiently packaged body. The wankers will choose the Ferrari because it looks the most like you’d expect a supercar to look and has three exhaust pipes. Which leaves the Mercedes SLS AMG. But it needn’t worry. There’s a whole new group of cool kids at the school who want one – the teachers. They still haven’t recovered from their childhood desire to own a car with gullwing doors.

If you don’t want to buy an old Audi A4 Avant because you don’t want people to think you can’t afford a new Audi A4 Avant, then Seat have whittled a wagon that shares your illogicalness! It’s an old Audi A4 Avant that’s brand new! Meet the Seat Exeo ST – a chunky flamenco abacus-buster! Audi do that then?

Like a slurpy bucket of poisoned paella, the Audi from Aldi is glued together with misfits! But instead of fish guts and poison plonk, the ingredients smell like German VAG! Freshly dropped into this seafood cauldron are the innards of an old A4 cabrio, the skeleton of a nearly new A4 Avant and the lungs of the VAG fish!

If you think all the aging VAG makes it feel old then you’re not that wrong! The Exeo ST dances the rumba with wooden legs! Darting round towns with pointy toes offers all the relaxation of a pilled up Balearic cheek chewer! Leave urbanity and the Spaniard’s more sultry voice can be heard above the diesel’s castanets – but only on motorways do the wooden legs turn into snake hips!

And talking of legs, there’s no room for a big pair in the back! While pint sized continental shouting bastards might be able to sit behind a standard human, a normal six-foot person will need flat pack limbs to fit! And the boot of this old new Audi A4 Avant is 50 litres smaller than the boot of a new new Audi A4 Avant!

It might have the room and zoom of a Spanish static caravan, but at least the interior isn’t made of straw donkeys! Slap rape tape on the S-shaped badges and it will trick you into being Bavarian! It’s got more sophisticated nobs than Eaton! Four rings here!

So, how much to pay for old technology dressed up new? The plainest of Spain requires a fiscal unloading of £19k to dance with – that’s only £2k more cheap than the most cheap of Audi Audis! If you’re thinking about teasing your purse out for that, then you’re too easy! Put your purse away or it will get chafed!

Seat must have been distracted by nylon strung guitars and ladies with loose bras! Think about this now please! You can buy an Audi badged Audi with the Exeo’s metal gubbins for £7K! The Seat is a £2k saving on a new car, but in realness it’s a £12k overspend on an identical used one! And the old Audi wagon won’t drop pounds like Fern Britton!

Let’s get back to the quandary! If you don’t want to buy an old Audi A4 Avant because you don’t want people to think you can’t afford a new Audi A4 Avant, then the Seat is not the answer! You’ll look like you shop in Lidl even though you’ve paid a near-Waitrose price! The answer is simple! Buy an old Audi and spend the change on a private plate to mask your shame!

Green is still only cool in theory

It’s getting boring really. For approximately basically ages, manufacturers have been promising to build the insane hybrid concept cars they bandy around at motorshows. We’re teased with teardrop shapes, smooth glasshouses and mpg figures in the hundreds – and then consistently disappointed.

VW were showing off their 1L concept car – it looks like a drop of mercury, has a 0.8 litre diesel engine with electric motor and will do about 180mpg. They bragged about producing the diesel engine by basically chopping a current 1.6 litre diesel in half, and told us it was definitely ready to build. That’s great. But the only actual green car they had to offer was the new Polo Bluemotion – 70-odd mpg, no electric engine and a bit of a dull face.

or this…

The same was true at BMW – they teased us with their Efficient Dynamics Vision concept which, thanks to a combination of diesel and electricity, has the speed of an M3 but CO2 emissions of just 99g/km. But the latest green car we can actually drive? A 320d that does 57.4 mpg and definitely isn’t as fast as an M3. Hilarious.

or this…

It’s about time concept car one-upmanship was actually put into practice; we’ve been teased for too long.

British rivals were born

The Bentley Mulsanne and Rolls Royce Ghost were unleashed onto each other. The Bentley is unforgivably ugly, but has the pedigree of being an all-new design:

The Rolls looks awesome, but is basically a BMW 7 Series talking in a posh English accent. Bentley pedigree versus Rolls Royce style… we’d take the Rolls – it’s got a V12 over the Bentley’s V8.

GM left a nasty taste

The new Vauxhall Astra and Saab 9-5 were revealed – both GM designs that have now been left to their new respective owners Magna and Koenigsegg. Unfortunately, both cars are perfect examples of what GM do best… the bare minimum.

The Astra, which will be UK built, fares marginally better with a tidy Insignia-aping interior and bland solidity outside, but the Saab looked very sorry indeed. Again, the interior fares better with the usual Saaby ergonomics and materials, but outside is more of a facelift than re-style. Both cars go on sale in the middle of 2010 and will hopefully be profitable enough to put their new owners in better financial health than GM – in the case of the Astra, some Northerner’s jobs are relying on it.

The battle of the 21^st Century is coming

Days before the show, McLaren announced their new MP4-12C supercar. It’s a bespoke McLaren design, features a one-piece carbon fibre chassis and every single component (3.8 litre twin turbo V8 engine included), will be built by McLaren themselves. It’ll crack 0-62mph in under 4 secs, has 600bhp and will top 200mph – all for £150k when it goes on sale in 2011.

Despite not even being at Frankfurt, it made Ferrari and Mercedes look silly.

Ferrari unveiled their actually quite nice looking 458 Italia, and Mercedes their power-snouted SLS AMG – both the same price, performance and power as the McLaren, but too flash looking in comparison. Frank Stephenson’s 12C design is deliberately low-key – predicting that the age of the noisy, shouty supercar is over as well all get swallowed up by eco-modesty.

Looking at all three, it’s hard not too agree – while the McLaren isn’t as immediate as the other two it already looks timeless and classy. It’s like the SLS and 458 already trying too hard to beat it. The Merc and the Ferrari go on sale next year – our money would be not to buy either until the McLaren is released, unless you’ve got a chestwig.

The Jaguar XJ still has a squiffy rear quarter

It’s a British Ian Callum design, so we’re all expecting it to be a grower not a shower, but it’s taking its time. The front looks mean, sleek and powerful. But that back… well, it looks like a Hyundai. For the time being. Hopefully, Callum’s designed in so much ‘acquaintance time’ that the day it goes on sale (in December 2009) will be the first day it actually looks good.

The future does exist

Despite every car maker selling wildly reduced numbers of cars, think half the quantity of two years ago for some, clever financial men have made sure their companies can still afford to make cars. Quite how they’ve done it is anyone’s guess, but after speaking to various industry types, there was a feeling of optimism that was missing from the last Geneva show just six months ago. Back then, there was panic – when would the customers come back? What will we do with the cars we’ve already built and can’t sell? How will we afford our ludicrous research and development costs? When will sales pick back up to where they were in 2007?

The optimism hasn’t come from a pick-up in sales, or a change in fortune – it’s come from accepting the grim reality that things will never be as they were. Sales will probably never reach the dizzy pre-crisis heights. Now that manufacturers have come to terms with that, the panic has subsided and they can settle into just working with the funds and sales they have. With forecasts adjusted to reality instead of crystal ball optimism, and with the dead-wood sold off or downsized, car makers can focus on looking forward and working instead of looking back and worrying.

With the previous Z4 never matching the dynamics of a Porsche Boxster, BMW’s engineers must have been itching to unleash their sport spanners and make amends with its replacement. It comes as a surprise then, that BMW are moving the Z4 away from unkind Porsche comparisons, and pitching it against the more luxurious Mercedes SLK.

The old car’s soft-top has been replaced with a folding hard top, and alongside the six-speed manual there are two different automatic gearboxes; a six speed traditional automatic and a seven-speed ‘DCT’ automated manual. The top spec sDrive35i is over 250kg heavier than the car it replaces – Z4 mark two is clearly not a lightweight driver’s tool.

With a whiff of defeat surrounding BMW’s framing of the new car, the Z4’s outright pace actually comes as quite a surprise. The most powerful 302bhp twin turbo 3.0 litre motor is far gutsier than the previous car’s naturally aspirated unit, and what it lacks in top end wail is more than made up for by a bassy rasp and a 0-62mph time of 5.1 seconds – quicker than both the SLK350 and Boxster S.

Despite performance figures to be proud of, the new Z4 has a certain modesty on the road. In fully automatic mode the DCT gearbox favours using the ample 295lb ft of torque (from 1,300rpm), with slightly slurred changes occurring as far before the 6,800 rpm limiter as possible. Switching the Dynamic Drive Control from ‘Normal’ to ‘Sport +’ does provide a greater sense of urgency, but the overall impression is of a car that prefers to lope, not sprint.

There’s an oily, well-weighted resistance to the steering in place of any intricately detailed feedback. On the motorway, this softer approach (and a slower steering rack than the last car) irons out any tendency towards twitchiness, which is helped by an excellent ride even on the largest 19-inch wheels.

This cruising ability is symptomatic of the strengths of the Z4 – it’s a smarter, more mature overall package. The materials and ergonomics of the interior are a vast improvement, and the novelty of turning the Z4 from hardtop coupe to open top roadster in just 20 seconds will never wear. Even small improvements such as a 50-litre increase in boot size and better visibility soften the blow of the muted drive.

Perhaps the biggest problem for the Z4 is its price. While a 2.5 litre version with no frills costs less than £30,000, a twin turbo version with the DCT gearbox and a couple of toys will be the wrong side of £40,000 – which, rather awkwardly, is Boxtser S money.

Despite the new model’s occasional tendency to feel more like a bland tourer than a real driver’s car, BMW has developed the personality of the Z4 incredibly well – it’s a meaty, luxurious and satisfying proposition that will delight more often than it frustrates. While perhaps not the ‘ultimate driving machine’ you’d expect, the Z4 is certainly a very easy car to sell in a tough climate.

Numbly Fraudulent

Time has a funny effect on whether or not a car is seen as being any good. Motors that were scintillating at launch often turn out to be forgettable, while truly terrible cars can take on an iconic rubbishness that quickly evolves into affection. This moment in time marks a turning point for a car that, by most accounts, was at least a little bit terrible – the Calibra.

When it loped onto British shores in 1989, first impressions were positive. The Calibra looked better than a Ford Probe, was better built than a Rover 200 Coupe and cost about as much as a Cavalier. Sadly, those first impressions were shattered when you sat in it. The Calibra was like Dr Who’s tardis, but backwards; not because it was tiny on the inside and massive on the outside, but because the swoopy showy exterior was so at odds with the low-tech Cav-shaped dash and interior.

The chassis was basically untouched from its family car roots too. While a mk3 Cavalier drove well for a dad car, it clearly didn’t have the verve of a coupe. So, sadly, nor did the Calibra – it seemed a bit of a fraud. We’ll never forget seeing one parked up at that massive hyper-marche near Le Mans, proudly showing off its green-painted rear brake drums from behind 18” wheels. Wrong.

But now it doesn’t matter. The mk3 Cavalier dash has matured well (compare it to a Sierra), it drives as well as you’d expect any mid 90s car to, and somehow its looks, always the Calibra’s main selling point, seem sharper than ever. Time has healed the pain.

At the money Calibras are currently selling for, it would be rude not to have a flutter. On the Sidewalls spent a week cruising the country in a tidy SE9 – the run-out model which, tellingly, was still on sale after the Cavalier had been replaced by the Vectra. Leather seats, air con, electric sunroof, trip computer, CD player, some airbags and a smooth 2.5 V6 all for £1500. With 80k on the clock, a decent raft of service stamps and golden oil it’s a bargain.

The original criticisms of Cavalier interior and dynamics are less obvious too – cars of this vintage feel like different animals altogether, having developed a patina of their own. There’s never any urge to abuse the Calibra – it prefers a torquey, lazier approach to flying along, making it easy to settle into the car’s mature rhythm. The fact that anyone with a Halfords socket set and a pair of hands can fix it only adds to the pleasure. Don’t forget to look out for that other effect of time on a Calibra; rusty sills.

So, now is the time to hunt down a nice standard Vauxhall Calibra – preferably with a V6, leather seats and standard wheels. Pay around a grand, wait for everyone else to realise what a cracking car it is, then sell it on for profit just in time to buy the next car that time will save. Meriva VXR perhaps?