MrLizard Posted July 26, 2009 Share Posted July 26, 2009 Evening, just thought i would share some views on the above 2, On Saturday i took an RS out for a spin around mallory park, and today took a 370z out from polesworth nissan in tamworth. RS Focus RS is a weapon and no mistake, the steering felt good, excellent feedback through the seat and steering wheel, the power was immense, you could feel when it was on the verge of loosing grip and even when it did you could pull it back, i had a few moments of controlable oversteer in a front wheel drive car, wtf is that about?? I was in amongt single seater formula ford type vehicles (dont ask why) and i was flying around the corners quicker than most of them, and was matching them on the straights, went round the outside of one particually annoyed person at gerrards which is a 180 deg gentle bend thats a 1/3 of a mile long, bit nascar ring esque, brakes to start with were abismal, im used to braking in a lightened zed with AP racing brakes all round, so i was braking late anyway (my own fault), took a while to get used to and longer than i would expect to heat up, but when they eventually heated up they reacted well, not as much feel as im used to, but strong enough to give you confidence in the corner braking from 120 - 40 ish.. Onto the negatives for this one, bare in mind i have no kids and im on the track whenever i can get there... I think i dont really 'get' fast fords, ok i can see why it works for a rally car, but lets be honest nowadays its just a shell. I saw a 750bhp new focus RS at cadwell a few weeks back and heard people saying, "ah yes the new RS i might get one like that", the simple answer is you wont, the more complicated answer is, why would you do that to something with 4 seats thats shaped like a flying breeze block. I understand the standard family focus design, the shape, the price, thats great, but for me, from a track/race car perspective i couldnt spend my money on it. This revo knuckle thing sounds, and by my account felt fantastic, but surely they are trying to compensate for a chassis that was ill designed for track and better suited as a daily/kid carrying hack? bah, it was impressive from a technical point of view but stopped impressing me at that point, its quick but there are other things just as quick, to summarise, good car but not for me zed The 370z, been looking forward to this all week, turned up this morning and was greeted by a shining black gt pack 370z, looks better in the flesh/metal but i didnt feel like a kid again, which i did when i saw the 350z. I took this for about 40 minutes through some nice country roads, all privately owned of course... Sat in the car, looked left and i saw it was an auto, noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo Still, no choice but to see if it was any good, i used to own a DSG audi turbo, which was a good laugh, but in the back of my head i could see all the forum comments about how poor the auto 350 is (sorry auto fans). Keyless entry and engine start is a nice touch, there is a plastic hole to put the key which i used though im not sure why... the interior is good, far better than the 350, it feels more like a new tt, very enclosed, your surrounded by nice looking bells and whistles, though i dont really care about interior either so.... basically it passed as an audi in my mrs' eyes so it must be nice. Set off out to the country, let it warm up a bit, realised at this point that my head was bouncing of the ceiling and was wondering if there was a way of altering that, got fed up looking and carried on driving. Seats as in the focus are good, they are like buckets, maybe not quite as hardcore as the RS seats but very comfy and gripy round corners. The first thing i loved when i took the 350 out was the way it let you get the tail out just a bit before slapping you back into place, so i promptly set off for a T junction with nothing coming, put it in semi auto flappy paddle mode and gave it beans, tbh not much happened, other than some noise/grip/power/ then i was halfway down the road i had chosen, the rear end of the car feels so different to a stock zed, it feels planted, like if you lost grip it would eat you, but i was finding it difficult to lose grip, tried to get used to the car for a while before hooning it to much, played with the gears tested brakes etc, all excellent, the extra torq makes a nice difference, no loss of traction when you go from 4th to 2nd and plant it, where as the 350 would squeel and then shoot off (not sure which i prefer mind...). After everything was heated and the mrs suitably warned that brown was a good choice of skirt colour i started really going for it, the car took everything i through at it, had a moment on an off camber right hander but the TCS pulled me back and felt more like it wanted me to keep going than make me stop, if anyone has driven a proka 4s the feeling is similar, it seems to know you want to go quicker and somehow feels as though it just sorts it out for you, over took a few things both in semi auto and Drive mode, felt ok. Negatives for this for me would be the price, the one i took was 33k and that had a 1400 semi auto box + gt pack and sat nav, a lot of money for what you get. A decent 350 is 12-14k i suspect a 2nd hand caymen is less... Also the Auto box, in semi auto it was excellent but as with most of these boxes in drive it just cant quite work out what you want to do.. you plant it and its flicking up and down gears all over the place, in fully auto mode id say my old audi was better, but in paddle shift mode the zed was better, nice feel and shape to the blades as well Great engine, felt like a proper sports car with a decent chassis and suspension that gave you confidence, i assumed it was on bridgestones and they felt far better on this that on the 350. I hope to own one at some point but i wont be buying it new. Fair play to polesworth nissan, they looked after me and told me which roads were best If anyone has any questions about either let me know, im useless at writing reviews Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Husky Posted July 26, 2009 Share Posted July 26, 2009 im useless at writing reviews i dissagree that was really good interesting stuff, i was looking at the RS before going for the Z (+putting money away for house ) glad i didnt, i had got bored of the family hatchback style with the st. that felt like the chassis was giing it its all anyway so i didnt see how the RS would cope. didnt test drive it as i didnt want to like it and therefor spend the money cheers for the review, was very informative Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pimm Posted July 26, 2009 Share Posted July 26, 2009 Good write up and some interesting points. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sarnie Posted July 26, 2009 Share Posted July 26, 2009 Steve, Did they let you take the 370z out on your own I take it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roast350z Posted July 26, 2009 Share Posted July 26, 2009 A great review bud Just to add, revo knuckle style suspension set up was copied from the quicker renault R26 which doesnt understeer off the track Great view of the zed but i bet i does feel alot different to ur stripped out beasty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MITZ@CougarStore Posted July 26, 2009 Share Posted July 26, 2009 Nice write-up, Steve... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrLizard Posted July 27, 2009 Author Share Posted July 27, 2009 Steve, Did they let you take the 370z out on your own I take it? Yep, gave me the keys and even told me to have fun, directed me towards the errmmm private roads etc, liam if your thinking about test driving one (even tho its an auto) id strongly suggest that place, not too far from you thanks for the comments re the review, ill try and upload some pics for some reason my phone camera isnt working properly, doesnt like scaling the images up and its supposed to be 5uberpixels or whatever Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M13KYF Posted July 27, 2009 Share Posted July 27, 2009 moved Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
H5 Posted July 27, 2009 Share Posted July 27, 2009 Sounds like two cars that could end up on the drive in the next 18 months! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted July 27, 2009 Share Posted July 27, 2009 must admit i had one of the new civics and although it was great and had lots of power i ended up only having it 9 months before selling it through boredom and getting the Zed. i'm getting worried about the day i have to sell up to get something else as i have no idea what i would replace the Zed with if it had to go, either for a general upgrade or for something with 4 seats. (4 seats scare me, as for mr it means old and boring) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tarmac@TarmacSportz Posted July 27, 2009 Share Posted July 27, 2009 Very nice review bud - cheers I like the new 370z despite what Clarkson had to say last night Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
S1 HNK Posted July 27, 2009 Share Posted July 27, 2009 saw an RS this morning in that crazy green colour, have to admit it did look very good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jerry3167 Posted July 28, 2009 Share Posted July 28, 2009 At the end of the day its just a £24K Focus, albeit a quick one. Nice review!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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