Tere

Just west of San Antonio we have what's called the "Texas Hill Country" that has some incredibly fun (and challenging) driving roads. Y'all can probably relate to very narrow roads with no shoulders -- add 6-8 very tight turns per mile and incredible elevation changes and you're on a hill country road. We have one 95-mile loop called the "Three Sisters" -- three twisty ranch roads. Folks come from all over to ride the Three Sisters. Google: texas three sisters

Any time any of y'all happen to visit the provincials across the pond and are passing through San Antonio, just let me know and we'll take some cars out for a cruise!

Thanks y'all. It is a totally unrefined beast with absolutely no road manners. It's so completely different to drive than the 350 -- aside from 4 wheels, the two cars have nothing in common.

I don't think I've ever posted a photo of my oldest son's 350. 35th Anniversary '05 350Z -- they only made a couple hundred in Ultra Yellow.

That and some new rubber on the back -- he's almost got the rear tires worn out doing power slides. The thing goes 5 mph in high gear so he comes downhill and throws the wheel to the stop flipping the back end around with the pedal still to the floor. Yesterday, he spotted a red SRT-10 on his way over to the house, and told his dad that that was his "snake car." Uh oh...

It gets about the same as my '03 350Z when I'm putting the pedal to the metal. Freeway cruising is interesting -- in 6th gear at 70 mph it's practically at idle rpm. At 100 mph in 6th, she's only turning 1,800 rpm. So, sedate highway cruising isn't too bad in the fuel department. The Viper only has an 18 gallon tank, which you can suck dry pretty quickly with the pedal to the floor. Lol, and that 2003 of yours ain't no slouch. Is it. So is the ASP getting lots of road time at the moment Tere? LOL... I took old Black Cherry out for a spin yesterday. The FLYIN Z never disappoints -- she's very quick and nimble. I'm almost tempted to take the 350 on the next Viper hill country cruise to show the Viper folks a real "bad asp" in the twisties. I had to laugh yesterday. My oldest son was over with his 350 -- the Viper was totally surrounded by 350s (and the 300). LOL... 5 cars and only 10 seats. My oldest grandson also had his Viper at the house, so that evened the score a little....

LOL... Yep, if you jab the throttle in any gear on the Viper with the front wheels slightly turned, it will turn around and bite you in the asp. Throttle technique has to be smooth to bring the torque on evenly to the wheels. The Quaife LSD improves even torque distribution to the wheels. Suspension tuning and proper alignment are also factors. Unlike a lot of cars, the Viper is one that takes 100% of your attention on the road. The second you don't pay attention, it will rear up and show its fangs. The 350 is incredibly stable at over 150, so much so that it's boring. The Viper is not as stable -- it will go over 200 mph, but at that speed, it's a big handful of car even for seasoned drivers. The reason the ACR has that big wing is the car needs incredible rear downforce -- the wing generates up to 1,200 pounds of downforce to give it stability. The coupe has a different aero design on the rear than the roadster, so the roadster is the least stable of the three Viper models at high speeds. Fourth gear in the Viper is 1:1 (the gear you use for your dyno numbers) -- 5th and 6th gears are "overdrives". If you're into shredding tires, one of the top drift drivers in the world has won championships driving Vipers -- they go sideways so well.

The '03 350 is still my car of choice for the track -- it's far more precise in cornering (of course it's purposefully set up for the track). On the typical track, all the Viper's torque doesn't get you much since it's not quite as good in the corners. Even with some suspension tuning, I doubt that it will corner as good as the 350. We'll see what happens -- we might do the ACR suspension on it. The ACR T6060 tranny would also be a little improvement. Most of the Gen 4 Viper stuff bolts right up to a Gen 3 Viper.

And for you speed junkies, here's a clip of an R8, GT3, and SRT-10 (vert) fooling around on the Autobahn... http://videos.streetfire.net/video/GT3R ... 207577.htm

And in case you missed the Viper ACR doing 7:22 on the Ring last August, here it is. Notice how driver centric the car is -- it's about 3" from the steering wheel to the shifter (a very tight shift pattern too). You can buy the ACR for around $111K -- but be warned, you're buying a barely street legal race car. http://videos.streetfire.net/video/Dodg ... 181435.htm

Here's the V-10 -- it doesn't look as big as it really is in this photo. The intake "plumbing" is all of 8" long. The hood scoop is functional and gives a ram air effect at high speed (free boost!).

Here's the view most folks get to see -- my asp... Check out the 345/30R19 rubber -- the back end is all freaking wall to wall tire. And the rear aero set-up -- diffuser and four aero strakes. The bottom is all aero panels. I love the center brake light!

Ask and ye shall receive... The exhaust popping on decel is kind of the Viper exhaust "signature" -- all Vipers do it. http://videos.streetfire.net/video/Vipe ... 207879.htm

Yep, it is a ridiculously crazy car. Now is the time to pick one up here in the States. No serious, halfway decent offer is refused. This one was barely broken in. They didn't make '07 model year Vipers, but ran the '06 model production for two years -- this one was made at the end of the '06 production run in '07, just before the '08 production started up. So, I got a practically new Viper for $38,000 under its original sticker. A steal deal, particularly since it's a rare 1 of only 6 made. The paint is interesting since it goes from black to dark blue-gray, to midnight blue, to silver-blue in different lighting. The pearl has three different colors in it.