Soldato
Thought I'd report back on how I'm getting on with my Monaro VXR
So far the costs are
Fuel -£1325 over 3500 miles based on 15mpg and a cost of 125.9ppl
Tyres - £968 for MICHELIN PS2's
Servicing - £700 including every single fluid changed, diff, gearbox, brake ect..
Insurance- £970
MOT- £50
Road Fund Licence £460
Bumper Repair - £600
Exhaust - £1200
Misc Repairs - £500, Gearbox output shaft seal and an Aux Belt
The running costs are a fair bit higher than they were with my Stage 3 Astra VXR but I knew all this before buying the car so no major supprises here. Fuel consumption is very sensitive to the kind of driving I do, driving around Dudley in heavy traffic will see around 10mpg but on a run I can get around 26mpg but I'm averaging around 15mpg at the moment.
Interior
Compared to my Astra VXR and my current Mini Cooper the build quality is indeed much better. Yes there are some cheap plastics that creak when pushed hard but the majority of the dash in soft touch and rattle free even when going over rough roads. Lots of storage in there too.
The size of the interior is what a lot of people comment on first when getting in, it's a fair bit wider than my other cars and the room in the back is suprising for a coupé. Plenty of headroom in both the front and rear.
The seats are in my opionion, perfect. I've been in a lot of cars including my old mans S500. They are big and squishy yet supportive. They even hold my tiny 5'5" frame in place when cornering a bit too brisk. They are fully electric and have a 3 memory functions. The rear seats and pretty epic too, I've never actually been in another car with rear seats as comfy as these.
There was no options list for the Monaro so it has pretty much everything as standard bar SatNav.
-Auto Lights
-Auto Dimming Mirror
-Dual Zone Climate
-6 CD Changer with 10 speakers and two subs
-Full electric seats with memory
-Mood Lighting
-Cruise Control
-Extra Gagues
-Electic Pedal Adjust
- and a few others.
My Astra was pretty spartan inside with Manual A/C and Electric Windows, that was about it. So this is a big step up and the Auto Climate Control is an awesome bit of kit. Set it to 21oC and forget about it. Auto lights are very sensitive and if i'm going down a country lane then they are on and off a bit when going under tree's and bridges. Still nice feature to have. The CD changer is awesome to have as I've loaded in 6 CD's full of MP3's so thats hours upon hours of music and the audio quality when the Amps have been tweaked is superb, much better than the Astra and Mini. It also helps that there is very very little road/wind noise when driving, even less so with my new tyres. The mood lighting gives the interior a green hue at night which makes my girlfriends legs look like a witch.
Astra VXR Interior
Ride and Handling
First off I'll talk about the Astra VXR. It was on standard suspension with 19" wheels on a 35 profile tyre and the ride was very firm. As were the seats so overall the ride was uncomfortable. The Monaro is quite strange in my experiance in that is has large low profile tyres and yes the ride is firm in that you can feel whats going on but its also soft and absorbant at the same time. I quite like it, a nice balance. The seats definatly play a big part in this. Being so quiet and comfortable with all the luxurys it makes a very plesent wafter.
The car is long, 15.6ft long and weighs nigh on 1700kg and to some extent this shows. It does learn a lot in the corners and the steering is quite slow but there is plenty of feedback and you know exactly when the back end will start to step out giving you time to sort it out. The long wheel base and 245 tyres on the rear means that the backend breaking traction happens more than I'd like but its still very easy to bring under control. Saying that there is plenty of grip and the almost slow motion of the backend kicking out makes it fun and manageable.
The brakes very good and stop very well however they fade quickly but this can be sorted with any of the numerous brake packs for the Monaro VXR. There is plenty of feel with the brakes and they don't just suddernly bite like the over servo'd brakes on my Mini.
There are plenty of handleing packs for the Monaro VXR which can turn it into an excellent handleing car.
Performance
Right a 6.0l LS2 V8 out of the Corvette gives 400bhp and 390lb/ft of torque. 0-60 is 5.0s and a top speed of a smidge over 180mph. Pretty quick but its the big lazy nature of this engine I love, it'll pull from 1000rpm in 3rd right upto 120mph with no effort at all. 3rd gear is pretty all I need around town
Same with the other gears, the in gear accelertion is pretty intense and hides the weight of the car very well. Much faster than my Astra in that regards. The tuning nature of the engine is very very good for example with a Full Exhaust, OTRCAI, Magic Cam and Remap will see a healthy 500bhp for around £2000 fitted or you can supercharge for around £6000 and see a nice 600bhp before the internals need to be forged.
Furture Plans for the Car are:
Here are a few more pic's from the RR day and some Videos that Kosta took. Hope you guys don't mind me using them.
So far the costs are
Fuel -£1325 over 3500 miles based on 15mpg and a cost of 125.9ppl
Tyres - £968 for MICHELIN PS2's
Servicing - £700 including every single fluid changed, diff, gearbox, brake ect..
Insurance- £970
MOT- £50
Road Fund Licence £460
Bumper Repair - £600
Exhaust - £1200
Misc Repairs - £500, Gearbox output shaft seal and an Aux Belt
The running costs are a fair bit higher than they were with my Stage 3 Astra VXR but I knew all this before buying the car so no major supprises here. Fuel consumption is very sensitive to the kind of driving I do, driving around Dudley in heavy traffic will see around 10mpg but on a run I can get around 26mpg but I'm averaging around 15mpg at the moment.
Interior
Compared to my Astra VXR and my current Mini Cooper the build quality is indeed much better. Yes there are some cheap plastics that creak when pushed hard but the majority of the dash in soft touch and rattle free even when going over rough roads. Lots of storage in there too.
The size of the interior is what a lot of people comment on first when getting in, it's a fair bit wider than my other cars and the room in the back is suprising for a coupé. Plenty of headroom in both the front and rear.
The seats are in my opionion, perfect. I've been in a lot of cars including my old mans S500. They are big and squishy yet supportive. They even hold my tiny 5'5" frame in place when cornering a bit too brisk. They are fully electric and have a 3 memory functions. The rear seats and pretty epic too, I've never actually been in another car with rear seats as comfy as these.
There was no options list for the Monaro so it has pretty much everything as standard bar SatNav.
-Auto Lights
-Auto Dimming Mirror
-Dual Zone Climate
-6 CD Changer with 10 speakers and two subs
-Full electric seats with memory
-Mood Lighting
-Cruise Control
-Extra Gagues
-Electic Pedal Adjust
- and a few others.
My Astra was pretty spartan inside with Manual A/C and Electric Windows, that was about it. So this is a big step up and the Auto Climate Control is an awesome bit of kit. Set it to 21oC and forget about it. Auto lights are very sensitive and if i'm going down a country lane then they are on and off a bit when going under tree's and bridges. Still nice feature to have. The CD changer is awesome to have as I've loaded in 6 CD's full of MP3's so thats hours upon hours of music and the audio quality when the Amps have been tweaked is superb, much better than the Astra and Mini. It also helps that there is very very little road/wind noise when driving, even less so with my new tyres. The mood lighting gives the interior a green hue at night which makes my girlfriends legs look like a witch.
Astra VXR Interior
Ride and Handling
First off I'll talk about the Astra VXR. It was on standard suspension with 19" wheels on a 35 profile tyre and the ride was very firm. As were the seats so overall the ride was uncomfortable. The Monaro is quite strange in my experiance in that is has large low profile tyres and yes the ride is firm in that you can feel whats going on but its also soft and absorbant at the same time. I quite like it, a nice balance. The seats definatly play a big part in this. Being so quiet and comfortable with all the luxurys it makes a very plesent wafter.
The car is long, 15.6ft long and weighs nigh on 1700kg and to some extent this shows. It does learn a lot in the corners and the steering is quite slow but there is plenty of feedback and you know exactly when the back end will start to step out giving you time to sort it out. The long wheel base and 245 tyres on the rear means that the backend breaking traction happens more than I'd like but its still very easy to bring under control. Saying that there is plenty of grip and the almost slow motion of the backend kicking out makes it fun and manageable.
The brakes very good and stop very well however they fade quickly but this can be sorted with any of the numerous brake packs for the Monaro VXR. There is plenty of feel with the brakes and they don't just suddernly bite like the over servo'd brakes on my Mini.
There are plenty of handleing packs for the Monaro VXR which can turn it into an excellent handleing car.
Performance
Right a 6.0l LS2 V8 out of the Corvette gives 400bhp and 390lb/ft of torque. 0-60 is 5.0s and a top speed of a smidge over 180mph. Pretty quick but its the big lazy nature of this engine I love, it'll pull from 1000rpm in 3rd right upto 120mph with no effort at all. 3rd gear is pretty all I need around town
Same with the other gears, the in gear accelertion is pretty intense and hides the weight of the car very well. Much faster than my Astra in that regards. The tuning nature of the engine is very very good for example with a Full Exhaust, OTRCAI, Magic Cam and Remap will see a healthy 500bhp for around £2000 fitted or you can supercharge for around £6000 and see a nice 600bhp before the internals need to be forged.
Furture Plans for the Car are:
- Short Shifter to sort out the sloppy gear changes
- Quick Rack Pack to quicken up the streeting
- Road Reponse Pack to tidy up the handling
- Long Tube headers to extra noise and power
- Sports Cats for extra Power
- TVS 1200 superchager coupled with the Cats and Headers should see a nice 550bhp.
- VXR on the seats outlined with white and red stitching
- HSV braning instead of the Vauxhall Badging
Here are a few more pic's from the RR day and some Videos that Kosta took. Hope you guys don't mind me using them.
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