i mentioned to a friend that id love to know the real top speed of my xj diesel jaguar and he says his BiL works in a USA airbase in Lincolnshire and every Sunday they use the runway downtime to race a few cars along it as a fair few GI's bring in the muscle cars from home.
I duly met up with the group of car nutters (after a very thorough search of me and my car even xray my pills and take one apart to test it)
They were so great when i arrived. they had a few cars set out so if the jag broke or i was scared of breaking it i could use another car.
this runway i was told is 6ish miles long so enough time to get to top speed we hoped.
the timing was done by a black box type gps device i think.
jagaur xj diesel clocked 152.9 mph. i was thrilled with this and was just going to get an early morning burger from one of the crew and someone asked how fast ive driven before and my reply was about 150ish.
he shows me a chevrolet corvette lookalike with just a plastic body and fixed windows. i knew it was fast as was told it had 800hp but we were clocked at 205.6 and was told it can do a bit more. tried again and did 212.5mph. i then drove the corvette thing and managed 192mph before i chickened out
we saw some more cars go through the speed test
Lincoln town-car 98 mph
Ferrari testrossa 151mph
insignia elite 200ps auto 141mph
specialist fire engine 125mph
1983 Granada 2.8i ghiaX 130mph
and finally me on the back as pillion on a ducatti motorbike at 179mph
Last edited by: nyx2k on Mon 13 Aug 12 at 15:00
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>> and finally me on the back as pillion on a ducatti motorbike at 179mph
Finally, because I presume no-one wanted to use the track after that ;-)
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it was very nearly a brown trouser moment.
great day out and all were american servicemen and one woman and all were very nice hosts.
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I read the whole post nyx2k and although I was happy for you enjoying it, I didn't envy you...until I read the last sentence!
I would have loved to have done that:)
Pat
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i get tired out easily now and had to leave from Chichester to get to Lincolnshire for 7.am so i was expecting to be allowed to run the jag and have a bbq burger for breakfast and be sent home but a lot of cars turned up and its weird seeing 25ish yank tanks and the airbase is like a home from home for the americans.
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With a top speed (via GPS) of 151, you must have been bouncing off the limiter, which I seem to recall is set at 155?
Was it noticeable?
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to answer some questions.
the jag was doing about 5k revs i think so at its top end.
the runway is huge and when i lived around there they housed some uk awacs aswell.
im sure he said 6miles but i may have been wrong. i was akesd not to say which base it was but was a lovely place
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Probably not 6 miles but it sounds fun all the same. I am not sure I'd have gone on that bike but I can understand why you went for it! :-)
I could imagine it has an exclusion zone around it from the sound of it.
EDIT: If it really was 6 miles you'd expect more land-speed attempts there rather than Pendine Sands for starters.
Last edited by: rtj70 on Mon 13 Aug 12 at 23:12
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Pat
Perhaps Mr Brett will lend you one of his lorries?
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Sounds like a brilliant day. Jealous! :-)
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He's promised me a drive in his new car but I'm not really bothered...
It's a S65 AMG and it does sound nice but I'd rather have two wheels or 18:)
Pat
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>> this runway i was told is 6ish miles long
Great post but I've been trying to find that runway without success; any (more) clues?
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...Great post but I've been trying to find that runway without success; any (more) clues?...
You should know better than to ask that.
"Somewhere in the south of England" is all you need to know.
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>> "Somewhere in the south of England" is all you need to know.
>>
Or even Lincolnshire.
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I don't think there is a 6m runway in the UK. Perhaps it includes some kind of perimeter roads or similar.
Last edited by: No FM2R on Mon 13 Aug 12 at 16:14
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>> I don't think there is a 6m runway in the UK.
That's what made me curious, 6 miles is a heck of a distance in a straight line. I wanted to see it on Google Earth.
Looks like 3k, or just under 2 miles, is about the straight-line limit for the uk:
forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?t=59798
EDIT: sorry 3.7k, Heathrow
EDIT2: ok 3.9
Last edited by: Focus on Mon 13 Aug 12 at 16:24
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wouldn't get me to ride pilion on a motorbike at 30mph never mind 179 !!!
Not a hope in hell!!!
Incidentally, when a guy carries another guy pillion, is it not a bit, you know, close, I mean does the front of the bike have the same wee blue lights system that the lorry drivers use ? :)
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Very shrewd Bobby. Better safe than sorry.
I think you should make clear what it is you are really wimpish about though: going at 30 mph on a motor bike or being mistaken for a bum bandit by the pedestrian throng?
:o}
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Mon 13 Aug 12 at 16:38
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Bet you wouldn't complain if it was a woman on the front!
Location or length of runway arn't important, a good day out was had and that's what matters.
Pat
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>>a good day out was had and that's what matters.
Too true. Sounds like a great day. And isn't it nice when people are nice. Well done to the hosts.
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Great post Nick, thanks for sharing the experience. I'm lucky that my job allows me to drive exotic cars like these every week but only at walking pace on and off transporters - I'd love to see and hear all those hundreds of horsepower given free rein!
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>>and finally me on the back as pillion on a ducatti motorbike at 179mph
Strewth! rather you than me, Nick. 40 mph on the back of a mates BSA Bantam a few decades ago was frightening enough for me.
Sounds like you had a thoroughly good day.
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I am trying not to become envious of those who have had a blast, however short, in the upper reaches of snorting monster performance envelopes. If it happens one day, it happens. I'm not as all-fired keen as I would have been thirty or forty years ago.
Coming back from getting the tracking done today I overtook a Ferrari Daytona on the A24 dual carriageway out of Worthing. It was a slightly bloomed, slightly tatty red example whose front suspension looked a bit high to me. Perhaps a museum exhibit rather than someone's very expensive fun steed. It was doing about 60.
It followed me nearly all the way to where I was going, and I kept it in sight in the rv mirror nearly all the way either by mimsing a bit, or more often being held up by mimsers. It didn't do what the old Bugattis do and blast past when it could. It may have been heading for Goodwood because it went that way when we parted.
I never heard it at all. Doubtless the V12 burble was sublime for the driver, but it never growled audibly or did a 400 yard effortless sprint. A bit sad really.
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it took some nerve to get on the bike but i felt safe with them and after a herbal cigarette i felt a bit braver. that bike was just fierce acceleration all the way to top speed.
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What does a Moto Guzzi Le Mans do flat out? Because that's the fastest I've ever been on a bike as a pillion. Scared beyond belief and desperately trying to appear cool like I did it every day.
And that was on the A33 dual carriageway between Reading and Basingstoke, never straight or flat at the best of times.
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and it had a *very* small seat and not much to hang on to. Coming out in cold sweats thinking about it.
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I like to drive cars fast where it's possible to do so. I also like to ride motorbikes fast ( in countries where they don't seem to mind that I don't have a bike licence ), but never, ever again will I ever get on a fast bike as a pillion passenger.
It's a bloke thing I suppose. For a start, no matter how good the rider is, you just know he's not as good as he thinks he is and what's more you also know, that having got you on the back, although he'll pretend not to be doing so, he will do everything in his power to scare the living fertiliser out of you. And he will succeed...
I actually quite seriously wanted to torture and kill a previously very good friend after he gave me a lift from the West End of London to Heathrow on the back of his Yamahonduki1000totalnutter a few years ago...
Last edited by: Humph D'Bout on Mon 13 Aug 12 at 21:58
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>> What does a Moto Guzzi Le Mans do flat out?
A quick search suggests a good 130-140mph. Plenty windy enough ta, a mate has recently bought a Westfield and 90-100mph is more than enough for me with nowt on my head.
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Hitting a wet cattlegrid on a cresting bend in a Westfield at 100 mph is a bit of a sphincter tightener. I'm told...
:-)
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>> Hitting a wet cattlegrid on a cresting bend in a Westfield at 100 mph
I really didn't want to raise the subject Humph, but after a few rides in the thing I can see why you liked yours so much :)
A sample conversation from the other day after attacking a 50mph bend at a good 85: "I felt the back end starting to go there!" "I think I felt *my* back end starting to go there!!"
Last edited by: Dave_TDCi on Mon 13 Aug 12 at 23:13
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Seen 110mph on the pillion of a Norton Commando 850 in Iver Bucks and 90 solo on the same Machine at Blackbushe one afternoon. Only sixteen y.o. at the time. Happy happy days when my steed then was an FS1E!!
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>>Happy happy days when my steed then was an FS1E!!
Do you remember many years ago, I think it was in Motorcycle Magazine, about some bloke who was travelling the world on an FS1E? It was the MkI and a sort of maroon colour (I think), whereas mine was the yellow with black hatching MkII.
Anyway, I'm sure I remember this guy getting up into the Artic circle somewhere. I might try and google it up if I have time later, but in those days I was dead impressed by him.
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Let's have the details Matey. Mine was Yellow too. UGP 642M (I think)
Last edited by: Martin Devon on Mon 13 Aug 12 at 22:05
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I seem to recall mine was one of the earlier of the MKIIs and was 1975, I think. And I believe it was called a DX because it had a front disc brake - which I also think coincided with the introduction of the yellow tank.
All very vague in my memory. And no chance of remembering the licence plate.
Look at www.fs1eoc.co.uk/ (although none of the FS1E riders I knew looked like that!!
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I remember driving with my uncle in his Ford Consul in about 1956 on the Great North Road, when he said, "let's see how fast this will go".
The needle was swinging about a lot but could just about be said to have touched 100.
Probably about 75 mph, almost.
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real top speeds for some cars - Lygonos
