Pat McCrotch's VR6

[CazzaVR 0]

So, mechanically better, but no soul? Exactly how I've felt with the Hondas I've owned. Brilliant cars, just lack the feel/soul/looks of a Corrado. That said, an I'd have an Accord Type-R as a daily for sure 8)

[wy906 0]

I like it very much; a lot of car for the money!

[nlau1 0]

I think the Type-R Honda's have been unfairly grouped with the rest of the range as being soul-less. They have cracking high revving engines and super quick and sharp gearchanges. I had an EP3 before the VR and if anything I'd say the EP3 was more alive and had a bit more character than the VR, more of a little livewire terrier if you like!

[Kevin Bacon 5]

So, mechanically better, but no soul? Exactly how I've felt with the Hondas I've owned. Brilliant cars, just lack the feel/soul/looks of a Corrado. That said, an I'd have an Accord Type-R as a daily for sure 8)

 

I wouldn't say soulless, but it was entertaining for sure! Where the Corrado takes time to master, the Honda immediately feels comfortable into the turns and every control is so much sharper and more effective than the Corrado's, almost to the point of making the Corrado's feel leaden.

 

Considering how harsh and lumpy the CTR feels, the ATR is a paragon of ride quality by comparison!

 

I would say the Corrado's steering feel is better than the Honda's though, a lot better. The feel you get through the Rado's steering is hard to beat imo. The Rhonda's steering isn't horrible, far from it, it's direct and light but it lacks the granular detail you get from other cars in it's class. If you like cornering precision, feedback from the steering is vital, otherwise you're not sure what the car's going to do.

 

Neil's at the point of offering some information starts to push wide and you get aural feedback instead :lol:

[Pat_McCrotch 0]

I love the Accord as a daily and because it's not a show queen. Although if i'd poured £3000+ into a mint example i'm not sure I would be saying the same. The steering feel is sublime and I would personally say is better than the Corrado...but as Kev says what isn't better is what you get back from the wheels.

 

And if you think Corrado's are expensive to run then these are in a different league. Some of the prices from Honda are absurd (£100 for a bit of plastic that surrounds the centre rear brake light, £120 each for handbrake cables), service every 9,000 miles, valve clearance checks every 20,000, cambelt/auto tensioner every 50,000 miles....

 

But meh, Recaros, HID's, Momo steering wheel and four doors for a £1070. I could've done allot worse.

 

This bit really suprised me though;

 

Using the calculator here on 1 full tank brimmed to vapours. Also used Wurth Octane booster on this tank which (so they say...) should take it up to 100RON;

 

http://www.torquecar...-calculator.php

 

Distance covered:- 422 miles

 

Litres of fuel used :- 54.70 litres @ cost per litre 140 (pence)

 

 

 

Your fuel consumption

( 35.07 MPG) ( 12.41 Km per litre)( 8.0580 litre per 100Km)

Averaging 18.5 pence per mile

(40+ mpg for petrol is good under 23 is bad)

So 12000 * miles would cost £2,178.00

 

 

35.07mpg. Thats bloody brilliant!

 

 

 

 

 

As for the Corrado. As some of you know it made an appearance at Stonor Park last week and will be making another appearance at Stonham Barns in Suffolk on Sunday :)

Edited June 10, 2011 by Pat_McCrotch

[Pat_McCrotch 0]

Nothing amazing to report really. Rear ARB came off a few weeks back as the rear was just too stiff with standard suspension. Was fun to try it out though :)

 

As i'm currently signed off work I thought I would phone the Brother-In-Law and see if he could help with my stereo wiring issue. Using the information provided by Yan he was able to work out which wires needed to go where. Was a little unerving watching someone else work on my dash trims (!!) but I now have a period Gamma radio which I now no longer need to input the code every time I start it up and also lights up with the headlight switch. Still have the problem of the rubbish heater control lighting though!

 

Sometimes its the little things that makes the difference. It's so much nicer to sit in a Corrado interior without a bright flashing aftermarket stereo in your face :)

 

The future? Braided hoses and a 90mil splitter will be going on this month before a trip to the South of France. I MAY get the new front suspension on before then but who knows...

[Pat_McCrotch 0]

Oh, and hopefuly if my old man is better a partial respray. If that happens then I might see if the Corrado Club would be kind enough to let me on the Classic Car stand at the NEC ;)

[Pat_McCrotch 0]

Well, leading a pretty depressing existence at the moment thanks to the problems with my leg. Neither of my cars have been cleaned in 6 weeks and unable to do any real work on them. Thankfully it seems I am over the worst of it...until next time :(

 

Another one of the downsides of this illness is that you have allot of time to look at eBay so I have opened the purse strings a little. My "new" (refurbished) steering wheel arrived today from Germany and seeing as all that was required was to sit in the car and undo 1 nut I thought why not :D Didn't ask for the red stitching but to be honest just happy to have a non-sticky/worn steering wheel.

 

I've also ordered a Cassette box holder for the Centre console, planning to modify it into an iPhone Holder if possible but if not then it will add to the OEM'ness of the car :)

 

Oh, and the bottle of beer; my prescriptions had all run out so I thought I would sneak a quick one until I got some more :D

Edited August 12, 2011 by Pat_McCrotch

[Jon_vr6 1]

Same as mine buddy i'm planning on putting it on at the weekend its been sat in my cupboard too long

[Jim Bowen 1]

i think the steering wheel looks good, liking the perforated bits and the red doesn't look too out of place

[Danny B 0]

The red sort of matches the red dials.....like it a lot.

 

Got a link ?

[Pat_McCrotch 0]

Here you go :)

 

Bare in mind you pay a 100 euro deposit on top on this price until you return your old one.

 

http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140535782747&ssPageName=ADME:L:EOISSA:DE:1123

[Danny B 0]

Here you go :)

 

Bare in mind you pay a 100 euro deposit on top on this price until you return your old one.

 

http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140535782747&ssPageName=ADME:L:EOISSA:DE:1123

 

:thumbleft:

[Supercharged 2]

Nice mate - I spoke to the bloke a while ago and he said he'd do one with plain stitching for me... you happy with the quality?

 

Beer - is that a St Peters bottle I see?

[Pat_McCrotch 0]

Quality seems to be spot on. Not sure how it will last but considering the awful quality of the OEM leather it can't be much worse.

 

Yeah, St Peters beer. Cheap and nicely sized bottle.

[Pat_McCrotch 0]

Been thinking about the Cassette holder and how I can bring it into the 21st Century.

 

One of the things I miss about the R32 is the factory navigation and I will need one for the South Of France next month. But if there's one thing I detest it's a GPS device hanging off the screen. So my thinking was that I could cut away the gubbins of the cassette mechanism, find a navigation device that fits near perfect into the hole thats left and hardwire the navigation in. Should look fairly OEM, modernizes the dash a little without ruining valuable OEM dash bits and is totally removable :)

 

Problems I can see;

 

1. Navigation voice may be blocked as the microphone may be blocked. But these things can go pretty loud.

2. The GPS signal may be poor being that low down in the dash, but you can by an GPS ariel that sticks into the windscreen.

 

 

What i'm trying to aim for;

 

[Pat_McCrotch 0]

Another thing I did late last night that i've been meaning to get around to for ages was to paint the accelerator pedal. Another sign of age.

 

Painted with 2 coats of Hammerite Smooth then finished off with a spray of Hammerite Smooth with a tin. It's a little bit shinier than I was expecting but still looks a million times better and will no doubt dull with some foot wear. I know people use the Scirocco auto pad but I found it stopped the pedal hitting the stop and ruined my gearchanges as it's quite a chunky thing. Yes, the paint will eventually wear through again but not exactly a hard job :)

 

It's all in the detail ;)

[Portent 0]

Funny you should look at the old cassette holders for a satnav frame. I've been thinking along similar lines. Unfortunately most newer satnav don't have an audio out so thurs speakers are an issue. Some older models do have audio out but I am not sure on map support for them. Also been looking at larger Android phones or some of the smaller tablets that may fit in there which would offer more than just satnav.

[fla 9]

i've been thinking about the satnav mod for a while - as mentioned, the speaker will need to be connected to the externals somewhow. I have a Parrot in mine, so muting the sound through the speakers when a call comes would need consideration, unless you run an external speaker. Power - would it be conitnually connected to the battery? I think the ciggy socket is permanent live? Interested in your thoughts though

[Jim 2]

Had also been thinking about Nav or something else (carputer?!) in that little binnacle for a while.. be interested to see what folks come up with.

[KADVR6 0]

like the steering wheel lots, but i will not be putting a tom tom in that hole as will loose my handy fag packet holder lol

[KipVR 1]

Nice steering wheel you have there.

 

I like the idea of a tomtom, but what is the Tomtom app on the Iphone like? Just thinking that it might be a better solution for integration with the car, as you can then get it to mute when your phone rings, the directions talk over your music etc. Just a thought.

[Rob_B 0]

The problem I can see with having sat nav down there is it's not exactly easy or safe to look at. When it's on the screen it's much easier to glance at while driving

[Jim Bowen 1]

tomtom isn't very oem, i certainly wouldn't use the oem excuse to justify that headunit and then fit a tomtom :lol:

[Pat_McCrotch 0]

tomtom isn't very oem, i certainly wouldn't use the oem excuse to justify that headunit and then fit a tomtom :lol:

 

Yeah you're probably right. I'll probably just fit the Cassette holder as it is for scene points ;) haha