Jim Kenzie's The Driver's Seat

Porsche 911 Turbo Launch Control

I know there's about four thousand videos of the 911 Turbo with launch control on YouTube.

But only one that I shot, at the car's press preview event in Germany a week or so ago.

Well, there's two videos I shot, but I can't find the other one.

In this video (and the others, I must say) it all looks very calm and peaceful from the outside.

You select launch control, left-foot brake, floor the loud pedal, it revs to about 6 grand, you side-step the brake, and off you go on a perfect nearly-three-second 0 - 100 km/h ride.

From inside though, it's pretty intense.

Noisy.

Fearsome.

Huge fun.

Note at the end of this run, the brake lights flash as the car slams to a halt. In case you haven't driven behind a fairly modern German car lately, if the ABS is activated, the brake lights flash, to indicate to the dudes and dudettes behind you that you are stopping.

RIGHT NOW.

With the carbon ceramic brake package that comes with the new 911 Turbo S, there's a way better than even chance its brakes are better than whatever is behind it.

Enjoy here.

A Couple of Money-Making Ideas for You

I was up in Muskoka a couple of weeks ago, and came up with a couple of ways somebody is going to make some money.

Might as well be you - I don't have enough time to make any money...

I was in Gravenhurst, looking for my half-caf one percent latte. I hit 'Points of Interest' on the SatNav in the Volvo S60 I was driving, and spelled out 'Starbucks'.

The nearest one was in Parry Sound, 67 km away!

Really? All those moneyed folks in Muskoka, and they have to drive to Parry Sound to get a 4$??

There is a good coffee shop (Oliver's) in Gravenhurst, but Starbucks never worries about a little competition.

My second money-making idea?

That Volvo needed a wash.

But there is no proper car wash in Gravenhurst!

None in Bracebridge either.

Oh yeah, they have so-called 'Touchless' washes.

But 'Touchless' means 'Cleanless'.

I ended up settling for the hand-held spray wash in Gravenhurst, with one of those grotty foam brushes.

As you can see (above) it didn't do a bad job, but I'm always leery about those things. Who knows who has cleaned what with those foam brushes?

D'ya think I shouldn't be subjecting new cars to those rotating stainless-steel bristle brush (kidding - they're plastic...) car washes at gas stations?

Not sure if it is still like this, but at least some years back, the last step Porsches went through when they came off the assembly line in Zuffenhausen Germany was a rotating plastic bristle brush car wash.

If it's good enough for a Porsche...

Nice Tatas

From the get-go, I figured that Jaguar and Land Rover being bought by the Indian Tata conglomerate would be a perfect marriage. OK, so maybe a three-way.

Not that this was a universally-held opinion (I'm kinda used to that).

Tata is a massive world-wide organization. They even have several thousand employees here in Canada, mostly in IT.

But few who don't actually work for the company have any idea it even exists.

My thought was that if Tata could be successful managing two iconic brands with world-wide renown, it would help put them on the public perception map.

That part of it has worked out far better than anyone dared hope. Tata has helped Jaguar and Land Rover finance the development of brilliant new models (e.g., the Jaguar F-Type and Land Rover Evoque; I'm sure you can tell which photo is which). According to my sources, as long as the two car makers keep "hitting their numbers", Tata management leaves them alone to do what they do best.

Sales of both brands are strong everywhere.

Meanwhile, Tata's share of the automotive market in India has seldom been worse, dipping into single-digit territory. India is largely (you should pardon the expression) a small-car market, and Tata is getting its butt handed to it by Suzuki and Hyundai.

The company's much-touted "Nano" (I'm sure you can pick that one out too...) was supposed to be the cheapest new car in the world. It was intended to do for India and the rest of south-east Asia what the Model T Ford did for North America and the Volkswagen Beetle did for Germany - provide reliable transportation for the masses.

But the car has been a dismal flop. My Indian colleagues tell me the car isn't all that bad, but few new-car buyers, even first-timers, want to be known as having had to settle for "the cheapest car in the world".

Tata has recently upgraded the Nano, trying to turn it into a hip 'urban car' for young people.

But new product is always what moves the car biz, and Tata hasn't had an all-new model since 2010.

You would have to think the company is too big and too smart to allow this to go on. 

Then again, we are only a few years removed from when car companies with a much larger global footprint than Tata almost went under.

Can Tata recover, with or without government assistance?

Time will tell.

 

Porsche 911 Turbo 'Active Aerodynamics'

Porsches have featured deployable rear spoilers for some time.

Here's how the one on the new 911 Turbo looks:

Porsche 911 Turbo rear spoiler deploys

This happens automatically at speed, but you can also deploy it manually as we obviously are doing here!

What's new for the 2014 911 Turbo is a front spoiler that also deploys automatically or manually (ditto):

Porsche 911 Turbo front spoiler deploys

Porsche claims these devices cut a couple seconds off the car's Nurburgring Nordschleife time.

The obvious advantage of the deployable front spoiler is that when retracted, it is much less likely to get whacked when you pull into a gas station.