Cant read all those posts without adding my two penneth !
I have a WRX RA 555 limited edition but not an STi. It has a few mods ie scooby sport exhaust 'de catted' etc but the suspension is still origional. It gives a fairly good ride but it is a real bugger in the wet, and loads of fun watching the back end overtake the front !!!!
I have had a few 'goes' with a couple of friends P1's and have completly done them every time over county lanes etc, but on the motorway they start to leave me behind.
That said, I still think the P1 is a fantastically ballanced car and gives plenty of driver feedback and enjoyment, a bit pricy but doesnt that just add to the elitism ? I personally prefere the RA (with the exception of the toy 2 pots) because of the amount of personal customizing that is possible without having to take off all the expensive bits the P1 comes with. As everything..a question of taste ?

John,

"The quatro is a very reasuring drive, because it has a natural tendency to understeer, that makes it easy for joe public to cope with. Its far from fast though."

I won't belabor the point beyond this, I will just state that after speaking with John Barker after he had taken the UrQ and Impreza back to back on wet wales roads, reaching all the way into triple digit speeds, he said they were pretty much inseparable on the real roads and that while the Q lacked the Impreza's adjustability, he said its stability and wet grip was superior. I tend to trust this testers views as he is a very accomplished driver with a very consistent and specific vocabulary over the years. I am not inclined to doubt the opinion of Barker. And remember his opinion on this topic does not reguard the ultimate handling of these cars, just B-road ability.

Maybe it could be that the Impreza is most certainly the superior race car and can be driven on and past the limit at a faster rate, but that on real roads which are narrow and filled with blind curves etc. the Impreza never was able to delve into its deeper ability because to adjust a car on the public road might prove dangerous. And further for these reasons of wanting to stay within the confines of narrow roads with the most safty other drivetrain configurations could work well? Thanks.

The question with these back to back tests is this. What tyres were they using? Back to back tests rarely give a real comparison. You stick a quatro on SO2's and an Impreza On RE010's and the quatro will easily handle what an impreza can do. Swap them round and your going to see a Quatro disapear in your mirrors. I never take any writers comments as gospel, i dont care who they are, there are too many vaiables involved to be able to say A or B is a better car in these kind of magazine articles.

You cant get round fundemental physics of car designs, as a design the quatro is not that brilliant. It is certainly a well developed package, but so are many other cars out there. Fundementally, the Impreza is a better package and i am not saying that because i am a fan of the cars, i am saying that because thats the truth purely from a physics and mechanics perspective.

John,
I agree with you, there are too many variables, such as tyres, wheels, geometry etc. But in additon to your points I think it is worth mentioning that some of Barkers ideas (ideas I believe that were mostly begun from writers like Mark Hales in Fast Lane) are worth discusion.

Yes we all know that proper chassis, designed towards the best physics is paramount, but what of concepts such as, predicability, progressive breakaway, ability to regain control, feel of the road. Don't these play a large and separate role in addition to genral handling ability? What good is a car for the road if its superior handling suddenly digress's into unpredicable slides or once sliding becomes so hard to catch that prayer seems the only way to safety?

wrx sti type r owner here! light blue 17" gold alloys 1998 bought it 6months ago for £15500 14000miles mint condition.
i could not aford a P1 this i could afford and have money to mod!!
For £50k a P1 is going to have refinements over mine but i'll live with them happerly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
yo to HOL....... TYPE R POWER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well i know its off the orignal topic, butt have to agree with john!
i feel in a position to comment as i did 89,000 miles in a quattro 20v 1990 with torsen diff.

and ive now accomplished 50,250 miles in my MY00 uk turbo.

Ive run both cars on all sorts of tyres, the plouugh on understeer of the quattro is phemnomenol! there is hardly any adjustability in the quattro.
you turn in and it understeers, the backend of the car is dead!
it just follows, nice and safe but you just dont get any feed back at all.

and the quattro's biggest downfall is the steering, no feel what so ever, yes after 89,000 miiles you do start to trust it, bit by no mens is it anywhere near a impreza.

With the subaru i find the feed back through the wheel is ten fold of the quattro, and when your pushing into a corner you can feel the back end start to come alive, mines not entirely standard and the quattro was, but i had all the suspension replaced coz it felt so nose heavy, but out of the box the scoob would pi55 it hands down!

And thats what conclusion i came to on so said wet welsh roads after doing a average of 5000 miles on them following network Q for 5 years in ther quattro.

back to the issue of the p1 i havet been in one in the wet, i was impressed with its abiiity to ground cover but it didnt feel any better than my UK with Eibachs, geometry and solid drop links IMHO and i know my set up isnt fab and far from it on a dry track but its a lovely compromise for a wet track where it feels very predictable.

all IMHO so flame me if you like!:)

John,

So, by your comments above we can take all you've said with a pinch of salt then !!

What is it with this kind of thread that ends up being a slagging match between Scoob owners on the various merits of what car they drive. you'll never agree.

To answer the original question - Fast is relative. My P1 isn't much faster than my old MY97 uk that was std in the engine dep't. Is it worth the money - I think so, some don't, thats fine as long as i'm happy - Isn't it ??

Steve.

sure, i agree with you 100% that the other factors matter enormously. Given the same good chassis tuning charicteristics though, the fundemantally better design will win out. This is where companies like prodrive should earn there money on cars like the P1 for example. They were given a fundemetaly good design and were tasked at improving that, but you cant make it the best in all conditions, if you make it more compliant, it wont be as good at knife edge smooth high speed running. I think thats the fundemental flaw in all the marketing bull**** we read, there is no such thing as the ultimate Impreza or car for that matter, in some respects it will be superior, in others it wont.

Interesting you mention Mark Hales, i have a lot of time for him. Mark actually drove the Esprit GT car i built with my friend, he wrote an article for CCC magazine on it, he was mightily impressed with it and actually broke the lap record for the class on his 5th lap in the car. :D The article was to do back to back tests of 4 fundematally diferent race cars, i organised this test at Oulton Park. We tested the esprit GT (5 litre mid engined), Calibra Pilbeam (6.7 litre front engine), Lotus Elan (2 litre front engine lightweight), Skoda Coupe (580BHP 2 litre turbo mid engined). you can have a read of it at http://www.espritv8.net/id35.htm

feel for the road in a quattro? there is none! very competent and safe but feeling is zilch.

i mean all credit to audi as the fist quattro was a LHD in 1979 thren over here in 1980 so the design is getting on abit! i think the only mod they made was the torsen in 1987.

i know suabarus AWD is quite basic but the balance of weight and the chassis just cant go unmentioned.

I had a A4 2.8 quattro 30v for a weekends trial and thats gone even worse.

Dont get me wrong i love audis for a safe car but they just arent drivers cars. and im not even going to mention the gear change!:D

take it how you want steve. :D;) I think i am talking sense, but i would, wouldnt i. :D

Lee,

Thanks very much for the informed/experienced comparison. Just one question though reguarding the Audi..Was it not more reassuring in that its front heavy design at least promoted more stability than an Impreza? Wasn't that ever an asset for the Audi on challenging/unpredicable roads?

jeremy.

It felt sure footed on the twisties in a safe way, mind you i gave it some stick mind, it was like my right arm!:D

but i feel i can push the impreza harder as it changes direction better and the grip builds confidence.

on a flat out run with 150mph on the clock give me the audi anyday! it felt like it stuck like glue at top speed in a straight line where mmy imprezas wiper blades start to move and the bonnet scoop was bobbing abit whih was a little unerving.

i kept the car until i found a true replacement which is where the scoob came in:)

But i tried various cars until then and none matched the quattro.
i had a A3T sport for 10 months and 25,000 miles and when i got back in the old quattro the A3 wasnt a patch on it.

the subaru just feels its taken that step further in driver satisfaction.

lee

Thanks Lee.

Here is a link to a handling test that very briefly covers aspects of handling...http://www.users.totalise.co.uk/~scoobydoo/imprezaweb/reviews/handling.htm

Lee,

Have you yet tried the new generation Impreza's? Will you be switching soon?

Jeremy i feel guilty now for being so hard on the car as it was a bloody good car!

I do prefer the audi in the snow to the scoob as you could use diff locks under 15 mph to get you going and turn he abs off manually which is a help in the snow!

Bearing in mind its not fair to compare a 12 year old car to my 20 month old impreza!

The quattro is dead now,:( sold cheap to my mate who said he woud look after it and he wrote it off within 6 weeks!:eek:

Id had fitted:

wheel bearings
gearbox rebuild with genuine bearings
clutch
cambelt
drive shaft boots
dampers/ springs/ top mounts
back box
rear diff mounting

then the barsteward stuffed it!

p.s sorry for hijacking thread! :(

Lee,

Have you yet tried the new generation Impreza's? Will you be switching anytime soon?

Jeremy!
Yes i have tried the new age imreza and i wont be switching im afraid!
The chassis did feel stiffer but the steering is to light for my tastes.
My scoob is like my old audi now, its like my right arm and ive spent abit on already whch i wont recoup.:(
so im going to keep it! i look after them well and im not going to palm it off to someone to wreck!
so it will rot in a corner for all i care in twenty years or summat!:D
until a true replacement comes along thats value for money i wont bother, i just keep getting bits an bobs for it and got some long term plans for it!:)
Lee
p.s what do you drive?

[Edited by LEE P - 7/25/2002 1:13:59 AM]

Lee,

Thanks. Sorry to hear about your Quattro. I had one too (an 89 20v), (I also had an Impreza 2.5RS) which I bought over from the UK. I figured out a way to bring it to America (it wasn't easy)I agree with you about its sort of numb quality, but all around it was great. I had to sell it when my company Abstract Learning required development money. Too bad. Some rich real-estate developer now has it somewhere in San Francisco I think.

I agree with you about the new Impreza's having light steering, surly there must be something that someone could do to give some feel to it? Maybe John would know what to do?

Thanks again.

Don't tell me john...

You could beat a P1 in your SPORT in reverse...?

Ps Is it Scalextric's..

no problem in the right conditions. :D

Well, I think that about sums it up.

and draws it to a close, I hope.........

Probably been said already - but close.....couldn't help myself.

As for P1 having more power than STis due to 100RON fuel not being available......nah - the ECU and maps between P1 and Sti are the same - the only difference is that the P1 has greater knock sensitivity and so will retard/lower boost earlier than an STi. Therefore having slighlty less potential peak power than an STI - albeit possibly a little safer.

As for the chap who chopped in an STi for a P1 at a cost of £11,500 - wow - for that money a superb, very fast and brilliant handling STi could have been put together with very great assurance and no warranty needed! ;)

Trout :D:D

sidetacked the question here you guys

Trout in my position I needed a car for EVERYDAY use. I also plan to keep the car, so in buying new P1 and having a potential 5 year worth of subaru warranty is a real bonus to me, aside from the handlng issues i raised. Also at the time there was much press about sti5 engines popping, coupled with the big blow up about a number of jap cars coming in were stolen I made a choice to get my first "official" impreza.

I have tried to make claims before on insurance backed warranties i took out on previous imprezas only to be fobbed off and left with in one case a substantial bill. In other words i never want to buy a car again with a warranty which is expensive and totally worthless, or have my car worked on by a famous "specialist" garage and been charged treble the going rate and wait a month for my car for 2 syncros being changed in the gear box.(plus the fact the famous garage track tested my car to locate the fault even after i specifically told them what the problem was, no they didnt ask permission[img]images/smilies/mad.gif[/img])

Needless to say i dont want a repeat experience. So I think got a good bargain paying £11500 plus my old sti5R ;)

Scooby,

cool - the great thing about Scoobynet is its diversity ;)

I went the other route - warranty would not have been needed in 45,000 of heavily tuned hard driving and many track days!

:D

Trout :D:D

?

'Chelle,

You missed one ;)

http://mmstn03.sac2.fastsearch.net/t...param=13049587

Do you really want this one? ;)

lol - very true :D