MaliA wrote:
Has anyone heard from Hearthly? He's ok, right?
I was going to do a 'one week update' rather than wibble on every day, but I'd say I've driven the car enough already to do a decent early review.
In essence it's exactly what I wanted, which is to say a better version of the ST, as I loved the ST and thought it was a fantastic car.
Things about the N that are a definite step up.
1) The brakes. These were the weakest thing on the ST by far, the N has substantially better brakes that can take much more of a pounding and not fade.
2) The handling and the LSD. In N mode it's very close to what the Type-R was in 'R' mode, but not quite as unremitting. I've not had it at the limits yet but there are several corners over the mountain I've already found I can take faster and with more composure than in the ST, which started to turn into a bit of an understeering mess at similar or even lower speeds. The LSD almost feels like cheating on the way out of a fast corner, TBH.
3) The infotainment, it's a nice swishy style iPad experience as opposed to the single finger 'prodding at things' that the ST's screen utilised.
4) The lights. Superbright LED headlights that light the way much better than the standard lights the ST had.
5) The exhaust. In N mode it's a riot, with pops and crackles ahoy. I do not have car in N mode in an urban setting.
6) The different drive modes. NORMAL and N get it done most of the time, I'm still tweaking my perfect N CUSTOM mode. I'm not finding much use for ECO and SPORT. (Apparently ECO mode is great for long motorway drives, which isn't a thing over here, of course.)
So yes, overall, very happy with it.
TWO YEARS MINIMUM.
Also, TRUE STORY, I put petrol in* when I got back to Ramsey this evening, and when I came out from paying there was a visiting biker looking admiringly at the car's arse.
'Is this your car?'
'Yes it is'
'It's really nice, I haven't seen one before'
And then we had a little chat about it.
* The car said I had 10 miles worth of fuel left when I was in Douglas, so I decided to have a GAMBLE and see if it would get me home over the mountain. About 2/3 of the way over the mountain it decided I had no fuel left and the 'miles left' number changed to a --- and it flashed up LOW FUEL again. A few miles later I was in Ramsey, absolutely brimmed the tank and got just shy of 45 litres into a 50 litre tank. So on what planet did I have ZERO MILES REMAINING? What is even the point of a range indicator if it's going to be so far out?