Cheating VS "Optimizing" Manufacture Test Data — The Carmudgeon Show w/ Cammisa & DTS — Ep 213

Derek, that was quite the yawn.

Did you not realize the cameras are rolling?

I do now.

OK, welcome to another episode of the Car Margin Show,

driven by Hagerty.

You are Jason Camisa.

You are asleep.

I can tell you, you're in a post-bunch food coma.

Yes, as we often are.

Our specialty.

I'm Derek Tam Haifetz-Scott.

In this episode of the Car Margin Show,

we talk about optimizing.

Optimizing, which is the Italian word for...

Cheating?

Yeah.

You can say it, I can't.

For optimizing test vehicles for performance.

There is some evidence that I have in my pocket.

Well, technically it's on the floor.

I'll pick it up in a second that maybe some car companies

have not always been 100% honest about the cars

that they give us to test.

Like Volkswagen, shockingly, I didn't say it.

It cost them a few billion dollars.

Anyway, we're talking about performance testing,

not emissions testing to be clear.

But if you're going to optimize,

you might as well optimize everywhere, right?

That's right.

Can we have an optimal...

By the way, that was two so far in a row

that have been really good claps.

So the pressure...

Okay, B plus, he's getting better.

Thank you.

He's getting better folks, he's getting better.

All right, on to the jingle.

This episode of the Car Margin Show is sponsored

by none other than...

Fredstein Tires.

Yes, they are back.

Welcome back.

And front.

You know what I'm about to do next week?

But did you do the spare?

What are your thoughts on replacing the spare tire?

Oh, you know, that's really strange to bring that up

because just yesterday last night,

I was airing up the, of course,

Fredstein Sprint Plus tires on my Mercedes Cosworth.

And we didn't talk about that the last episode, did we?

Huh, I was supposed to talk about that last episode.

I replaced the steering box on that car

and it's magical.

We did talk about this.

That was the episode before last.

That's why I don't remember it.

It's two whole weeks ago.

Yes, I had a box here and the whole thing.

Just ignore me.

Anyway, I was, I smell toast.

Grandma?

I like toast.

Do you smell it or am I having a stroke?

No, I was airing up the tires that I have on the car

and I went to go air up the spare

and I realized that I still have the original spare

on that car that's never been driven on.

It's a Pirelli P6000, I think.

It might be just a P6.

It might be a P6.

It's cool trend.

I looked at it and I'm like, I really should.

I mean, I paid to have that tire taken off of the spare wheel,

had the spare wheel refinished

because it scratches on it and put back on.

And I think probably I should have that somewhere

for safekeeping and then buy another wheel

and mount an actual usable spare

because it's now 40 years old.

Yeah, I don't know what to do.

I do like looking in trunks of vintage cars

and finding vintage tires

that have been extremely in LA for a long time.

Not because I ever want to use them,

but just because, you know.

My wagon has its original spare also.

The Scirocco's original spare exploded,

literally exploded in the trunk of the car.

I got in the car and I'm like, what's that smell?

You know, like I've been in the car

at the time probably 25 years.

And I'm like, you know the smell.

And I'm like, what's in here?

Did I leave a sandwich or something?

It was this weird smell.

And I looked around, looked around

and I looked under the trunk mat

and there was a tire with a blowout right in the sidewall

and a mark like on the paint.

Like what is going on?

Impressive.

Yeah.

Actually sent it to a tire rack.

They asked for it.

Like, can we evaluate this?

And it turns out someone in the first 10 years

of the car's life before I owned it

drove it on it, drove on it under inflated

and it had weakened the sidewalls,

which only just goes to show you never know

what horrors befell your tires before you.

Well, it's a good idea, especially before a long trip

to check the tire pressures.

I mean, I've definitely like put a gauge

on a tire pressure on the spare and had zero.

It's more often than not been zero when I buy a car.

And I do, I have on my whiteboard in the garage

I have the recommended tire or my preferred tire pressure

for every one of the cars and then a date next to it.

And so I probably average once, I aim for once a quarter,

probably average once every four, five, six months

that you air up.

And I'll do it times four or times five as a reminder

of like, have I done the spare or not?

Cause sometimes a spare, you got to pull it out

cause it's mounted upside down.

It's very important to make sure your tires

are properly inflated.

Regardless of brand.

I mean, yeah, this is not a Fretnestine thing,

Fretnestine just came in and sponsored this episode

and they know that like we have

how many sets of those tires?

11 D3, something, dozen.

But what I did start to say is that

I'm about to do an autocross in the e-golf.

On the all track pros.

And I don't think they have quite the grip

that the PS4S's did, but I really, really quite like them.

And I think I'm going to send Randy Popes.

Randy Popes can be there.

I think we're going to send Randy Popes out

in the e-golf cause I'll probably have the e-golf

and be a Trist My Ship Box E30,

which is on Fretnestine Sprint Pluses there.

And I want to see if the e-golf is faster

around an autocross course than the E30 is.

The ability to carefully meter out power

that an electric car has is, and the instant torque.

In rally cross, certainly electric cars

are have especially front wheel drive or four wheel drive,

but they're usually front wheel drive in that context

are really, really impressive performers.

It's probably because of the sophistication

of the traction control in that context.

I took the dirt car on a back road on snow tires

and it was incredibly low grip.

That'd be incredibly fun though.

It's very fun, but it's like very slow, very low limits.

Well, Randy cut his teeth racing Volkswagen GTIs.

So I'm thinking front wheel drive, like a front wheel drive car

and Randy got to cut his teeth racing.

So racing autocrosses.

So, you know, I just want him to autocross the e-golf

and set like the fastest time of day

and just be like, some motherfuckers.

Like, so against some person

in a very heavily prepared, more sporting car.

I don't know if it'll be that fast,

but those tires are grippy AF.

And we are unfortunately approaching that time of year

where I'll probably switch to my winter tires and wheels,

which are the original wheels for the car,

but 16s and 205s instead of 18s and 225s.

So I get some of my range back.

You're running the Ecopia.

No, you're not running.

No, the car came with Ecopias.

And I didn't want to put another set on them

because I did not love really anything about them grip wise.

Yeah, I thought they were fairly low grip.

I definitely remember having exciting moments

in my e-golf.

0.86, according to car and driver,

there's not terrible,

but I mean, on 1.16G on the Pilot Sport 4Ss,

I haven't done the first time Ultra Pro,

but I'm guessing it's 1.09.

I mean, it's stupid amounts of grip.

And then now I have Quattrac Pros for the winter on the 16s

and they definitely outgrip the Ecopias,

but they're also not as efficient.

And so my winter range was about 130 miles between 120 and 130,

and it's now like 110, so.

Well, it's not a tire for that mission,

which is what the Ecopias were,

hence the ECO and whatever the PIA is, pain in the ass.

Wow, that's, I mean.

That's what Ecopias was,

I mean, Fred Astan is going to be happy

that you're shitting on Bridgestone's naming like that.

Maybe they're not, maybe they're friends.

No, it's just transparent marketing of what the tire is,

you know.

Is meant to do, is being pain in the ass.

But economically.

Anyway, here's our not Bridgestone sponsor.

So I did something embarrassing the other day,

and I went to Wednesday Night Drags at Sonoma Raceway,

which part was embarrassing?

I was like, I don't know what to do.

Which part was embarrassing?

The part where I showed up in a red Volkswagen Cabrio.

Yeah.

I did it two points slow.

It was.

You drag race the two points slow.

I did.

And I asked if I could please run with the top down

because I just wanted to have four people in the car

playing like Katy Perry or California girls

or something really embarrassing and they told me no.

But then the horrible resulting time

wouldn't have been quite so embarrassing

if there were four people in the car.

Was the time embarrassing even with one person?

Okay.

Asterisk first, not scientific test.

Sonoma Dragway tends to be slightly uphill

and it is slightly uphill

and it tends to be into a headwind.

So the times I've seen at Sonoma

tend to not be the fastest.

Also the car should have 195 section tires on it

as 185s because I currently am running

my Mark I spare wheels.

So it doesn't have as much grip as it should

especially given the wheels and tires that I have on it

are my rollers that I use.

And the massive torque and power

that the engine produces.

No, it doesn't do either of those

but their general Altimax RT 43s.

And if you know anything about those tires

you know that they are non-performance tires.

It's not that they're not performance tires.

They are actively against performance.

They are negatory performance.

But I thought, all right, on VHT

maybe it'll even out the 185s versus 195s, whatever.

So how did it hook up?

Holy shit, it did not.

So the first couple runs, it was like a 1500 RPM

soft clutch launch-ish and just monumental wheel spin.

Did you try putting people on the front bumper?

I did for the third run because I didn't care.

I put a person in the front seat

and it improved dramatically.

And I think it was just the fact

that these tires have never really been driven.

They're on my spare wheels and I have those wheels and tires

just to roll a car around

if the other wheels are out getting mounted

and balanced or something.

They barely ever drove these tires.

They eventually wound up warming up and hooking up.

And I got, I'm so proud of myself

because you know that drag racing

at a drag race event is not really about your fastest time.

It's about consistency.

I did three runs that were within 0.071 seconds

and 0.45 of a mile an hour.

So they were unfortunately all 18.3 seconds at 75 miles an hour.

Thus making me embarrassingly the absolute slowest car

out of the entire crowd of people drag racing.

I got by Prius, by about Prius, yeah.

Video of the Prius.

Generation of Prius.

I don't know, 2008-ish something like that.

So that's second or third generation,

second or third?

Third probably.

Third.

Fairly modern.

So it would have been third, yeah.

Yeah, embarrassing.

Quite embarrassing, except that I really,

I was laughing the whole time anyway.

Tell me more about who's drag racing a Prius.

I didn't talk to that degenerate.

Why would you speak to someone who drag race?

To know why.

Why the fuck was I there in a cabrio?

Cause you're in hinge.

We know that.

We have the answer to that.

Maybe the Prius driver was also on hinge.

That's what I wanted to know.

If you had confirmed that they were on hinge or not.

No, listen, drag racing, it's bracket drag,

so it's all about consistency.

It doesn't really matter.

So a friend of mine who was there was saying that there was,

there was someone who used to show up in a minivan.

I think she said she was a minivan.

It was an old lady that showed up in the minivan

and won every week.

Cause she was just more consistent than everyone else

and she was running 18s or 19s.

And I'm like, don't fucking slow shame 18s.

But it really doesn't matter because you dial in a time,

you, half of this is strategy,

but you dial in a time

and the other person dials in a time

and whoever gets closer to their time

without beating it wins.

That's it.

Have you done drag racing?

Oh, okay.

So let's say you dial in a 10 second run,

meaning you expect to make a 10 second run

and I dial in a 18 second run.

I will leave eight seconds before you do.

My light goes.

And if I beat my 18, if I run a 17 nine,

I do what's called breaking out.

I'm not a drag race expert.

So like if I use terminology and correctly,

everyone can yell at me.

If I beat my run, I've broken out

or if I jumped the light, if I read light

and I've then you automatically win.

But the idea is I have to get as close to my time

as possible without going over,

meaning going under, meaning beating that time.

And so do you.

So you will leave, it's 18 and 10,

eight seconds after I do.

And ideally, it's whoever crosses the line first wins.

There's a little caveat there is

because whoever crosses the line,

you're not just looking at elapsed time and speed.

You're looking at reaction time also.

So technically, you could be closer to your time

than I am, but I had a shorter reaction time

and therefore I crossed the line first.

It's all this weird crazy shit.

But more than anything else, consistency matters.

And so you can race a 10 second car

against an 18 second car and still a good race.

You're still looking at the finish line.

Okay.

So consistency is 71 thousandths of a second.

I'm not that consistent of a driver.

Like when I test cars, that are manuals

it's for instrumental testing.

I'll often see a variation of two or three tenths

just between runs and part of that's the car,

part of that's me.

You know, maybe I'm just not as fast shifting

but I think this confirms I'm pretty,

a lot more or at least it's,

there's a possibility that I'm a lot more consistent

than thing 0.071 of a second.

All of this has got me thinking though,

in addition to being embarrassed

about being in a big red strawberry flying down the track

is why the fuck was I so far off

of car and driver's number from back in the day?

What was car and driver's number?

176 at 77 miles an hour.

And you were 18 what?

183 at 75.

So you were two miles an hour slow.

And 0.6 to 0.3, so four and three,

seven tenths of a second off.

It's an eternity.

And you've dined on the car and confirmed,

maybe it's your tires.

So for those three runs, it hooked up perfectly.

It hooked up right at around 3,500 RPM.

That's where the wheel spin stopped

which is right at the torque peak.

Kind of that's what I'd want testing.

I think I could have done a 6,000 RPM side step

and maybe gotten another 10th,

but you risk just over spinning the tires

and I don't think it was worth it.

I got what I would consider.

If I were testing this car for the magazines,

I would have said, yep, this is consistently 18 threes.

That's what the car runs.

I was also running with an almost fully empty tank

of gas, so I'm 70 something,

probably pounds lighter than it should have been.

I expected, and there was no wind

and no weather correction

because the magazine numbers are weather corrected.

The only thing is that car's got a broken shift linkage

so I can't really slam first to second

as hard as I would or as quickly as I would,

but that's not seven tenths.

That was maybe one or two tenths of a difference.

So I just started thinking like, what's going on here?

I've dined on the car.

It makes more power than most do.

In fact, it was sort of a shock

to the dyno operator who does these cars all the time.

One more horsepower than it should.

And there's nothing otherwise special about this car.

It's not like it's got a lot of equipment.

There's no real special equipment,

which this all brought me back to another Volkswagen.

Go figure, which is my Scirocco.

Back in the day, when I first got the car in 1997,

one of the first things I did was dyno it

and it put, if I remember correctly,

109.6 horsepower to the wheels

on a 123 horsepower rating.

This was a 16 valve dyno day that somebody had organized.

It was all 16 valve Volkswagen.

So it was Scirocco's and Jetta's and GTI's.

No one else crossed the 100 horsepower mark.

They were all 97 to 99 and I put 109.6.

And a totally stock car.

28,000 miles.

28,000 miles, by that point 30 or 31.

And so, I had the healthiest car

so I know I have a very or had a very healthy 1.8.

And I took one of these devices that was called a GTEC Pro.

Do you ever hear of this?

Oh my God, it was the coolest thing.

Looked like a radar detector,

but you put it on the windshield and it measured G forces

and it would spit out 0 to 60 quarter mile

and then also lateral Gs and braking distances

if you wanted.

And I was-

And it would do this entirely with an accelerometer?

I mean, everything you need to know

other than if the thing swung

and then smashed the windshield, it would get a bad rating.

But yeah, this is at all accelerometer.

I don't know how accurate they really were,

but should have been pretty accurate.

I tried like the Dickens

and the fastest runs I got was with that stock engine,

4,200 RPM.

I have notes from this from June 3rd of 2000.

I was in visiting Mexico

and the fastest I could get was an 8.7 to 60.

The magazines all got between 7.7 and 8.1.

So I was a second off to 60,

which is like, okay, maybe you can blame

like I wasn't good at launching,

but I had really, really sticky tires on it.

If we fast forward to whatever, 2000 something,

Sonoma Raceway, there was a headwind that day,

but I went from 109 wheel horsepower to 148,

I think that motor had at the time.

So you put in a different motor to be clear.

I went from a 1.8 liter to a 2 liter with an intake,

with cams, with an exhaust,

with all these other tricks done,

shaved head for extra compression,

and almost a 50% of horsepower bump.

I got a 15.9 at 87,

which is exactly the same number that car and driver got.

With a 123 horsepower.

So a car with 50 fewer horsepower.

It's over the years when I've looked

at pictures of those original road tests.

I noticed something maybe a little suspicious.

Okay, not suspicious, completely and fully damning.

Volkswagen fucking absolutely cheated on those tests.

And I know this because the US engine

used 40 millimeter intake runners

and the Euro version of the cars without cats,

which were not 123 horsepower or 139 BS,

so 136 horsepower US,

used 50 millimeter intake runners.

Very different design,

clearest day when you look at them.

One are skinny and the same length,

the whole way the fatties have to tuck in at the spark plugs

and then go back out.

So clearly Volkswagen had put Euro non-cat motors

on the US test cars.

So no US car was doing 7, 7 to 60,

which is why I couldn't get within a second either.

And they would always talk about this lack of low end torque

in the engine.

Like all the magazine reports talked about this

and my car didn't have that.

None of the US cars had a lack of low end torque.

Yes, because they traded low end torque

for high end breathing in order to make more power

than 50 mill runners did exactly that.

And the Euro cams did have far less low end torque.

And they would say pulled right to 7,200,

like it wanted to rip the needle off the scale.

Well, I did one of those tests

and I forgot to write down number.

It was a, my car did an 11 second zero to 60

if I shifted it at 7,200.

It had no power over 6,000.

And so it is confirmed.

As far as I'm concerned,

Volkswagen 100% put cheater motors in these cars

because not only were the numbers

not even close to attainable,

but the impressions were just didn't match every other one.

And I now wonder if Volkswagen put a bit

of a cheater motor in that Cabrio.

Who would do that at a two point slow though?

What's the incentive for that car?

I get it with the Scirocco

because it's meant to be like a performance car, but.

Well, that motor was also using a GTI that time.

I mean, you buy a GTI

and that wretched two points low in it.

Okay. Not wretched.

Uninspiring.

Uninspired.

Absolutely unacceptable engine for a GTI.

I'm going to say it's unacceptable for a Cabrio.

I mean, it's just a single cam, two valve versus a, come on.

That engine dated back to the 70s

and this is in the late 90s, so.

Okay. So Volkswagen shockingly cheated.

That's a big headline there.

A couple of times.

Okay.

So no one has ever heard or seen a Volkswagen

cheating ever before in testing of their vehicles.

No, they certainly read about it

on those diesel gate emissions, real world emissions tests.

So that brings me to a company that's also known to cheat.

Jason's making friends.

No. Okay.

So unrelated to any of this,

having nothing to do with cheating at all.

I also drag race the Ferrari a couple of weeks ago,

which is pretty amazing to do

because people lost their minds at the idiocy of me

showing up in a 50 year old Ferrari at a drag race.

Meanwhile, everyone's there in a 50 year old GM product.

Look, what's the difference?

The difference is of course.

Four times the camshafts.

That, probably a lot more money to build the engine.

Although some of these cars,

these guys have to spend crazy money in these cars

because they're big, low P crazy V8s that are.

Yeah, but I still bet that crazy money

for one of those motors is like 10 grand

instead of four grand.

I don't want to know what a,

what a rebuild of that Ferrari engine would cost me.

And also-

I hope you never have to find out.

Thank you.

Me too.

I also know that the way that engine is constructed,

the crankcase is also the transmission.

The casting.

Yes.

That whole casting is one piece.

And so I thought, all right,

you have a transverse transaxle design,

which means instead of the engine torque

stressing everything out,

it's axle torque stressing out,

which means 12 or 15 times engine torque in first gear.

So you dump a clutch in a rear wheel drive mid-engine.

You're not from a perspective of motor mounts and such?

Motor mounts and all the forces on the different turnals

and everything in that one unit.

I don't dump clutches in transverse rear wheel drive cars.

That's just insane

unless I'm doing it for testing purposes.

So I showed up at this thing going,

this car will bankrupt me

if I do a 7,700 RPM side step launch.

So I will go super gentle on this car.

And I beat all the magazine numbers without a launch.

So Ferrari was not cheating.

Yes.

So very quickly,

because we'll get to the part where Ferrari is cheating.

I ran a 15 to 92 miles an hour.

All of the US magazine, the 1975 model year cars

were 15,4 and 16,1 at 91 and 86 miles an hour.

I was significantly faster without a launch

and at Sonomo, which is never fast.

For the record, the later cars,

which dropped from 240 horsepower down to 205

also did 16,0 at 89 and then 15,8 at 87.

So they really did significantly slow down

as the cars aged.

They also got 300 pounds heavier, strangely.

Allegedly.

No, no, no, these are actually magazines.

They actually weighed them.

Magazines always weigh something.

But I've always had the feeling

when I read the road tests of the original Eurospec cars

which are rated at 255 in horsepower.

Your car was light.

My car is light.

Somebody removed the US bumpers.

But when you read the road tests,

they talk about this ferocity of top end stuff

on the Euro cars and they don't on the US cars.

And so you own this car before I do.

Every, you've agreed that it's a healthy one

that pulls harder.

Every other one I've driven has felt slow to me.

All the US cars, not the Euro cars.

And so if I look at the one instrumented test

done by US standards, which means rollout is extracted

and weather correction, all that other shit,

was Rodentrack tested a Euro car,

exactly same spec as mine, but without air conditioning.

And it weighs a hundred pounds less than my car.

It did a 14.6 at 91.5.

So same exact speed that my car did,

but six tenths faster,

which tells me if I had launched my car,

it probably would have done about the same.

Therefore, I was right.

The early US cars without catalytic converters

are in fact, probably as performant as the Euro cars.

It depends how they're tuned.

I think in period in the US,

they might have been tuned differently

in order to be a little bit less stinky,

a little bit less pollutiony,

but now that this car has surely been tuned

in a way that's performance oriented

rather than emissions oriented.

I didn't do anything to it.

I'm in stock.

Yeah, but anyone who's ever touching the carburetors

on that car in any number of times

since it has ever had to be smogged.

I'm sure it's going to say,

well, we don't need to worry about smog anymore.

Let's make these things happy.

That is also true.

I mean, we live in now in the world of fuel injection

and you can't do anything, I guess,

with carbs and mechanical fuel injectors you can

and somebody could have certainly done advanced curving.

But I don't know, that made me very happy

that Ferrari actually outperformed its expectations.

In the, with the production customer car.

Yes.

Once upon a time.

In this one example, which brings me

to Chris Harris's complaint about Ferrari

and the 360 Modena and car and drivers complaint

about the 599.

You know about these?

Didn't Chris Harris be prevented

from testing Ferraris ever again

or for like 10 or 15 years as a result of this?

Well, and here's the thing.

Ferrari is incredibly sensitive about its brand

and it's obviously wants to look performance oriented.

Sporty, if you would use the German term.

Ferrari's not going to lose.

Ferrari's not going to make sure

they put their best foot forward.

Everyone I've spoken to at Ferrari has said

they like everyone else optimize, right?

They're going to choose the most powerful engine.

You know, they dine all the engines.

They're going to put the most powerful one in the car.

You know this. In the press car.

In the press car.

You know this because of Mercedes.

Uh-oh.

Do you not remember your,

did you not buy a weird silver E-class wagon

of blue tinted windows once?

Oh yes.

Yeah. And what did you find in it?

It was blue with blue windows and a blue interior.

I'm color blind.

Yeah. It had a get proofed motor in it.

Yes. So you found us.

It had notes of the factory build sheets

had notes in them which specified

that it was going to be a press car

and to put in a motor whose power output

had been verified.

Yes.

It's the direct quote of the term.

Verify that this is the most powerful motor

we've ever built.

Yeah.

Did they ever,

did you, you've driven other ones?

Is that car feeling different?

That's the only one I've ever driven.

Okay. That'd be interesting.

We did, so we had, when I was at automobile,

we got a Jaguar XK8.

That was a long, XK, sorry, XK,

which was a long term.

And when it arrived,

I went down into the parking garage

and we're all excited about it

because we had spec the car

and it was like, you know, delivery day.

And there was a piece of the footwell

that sort of above the footwell on the driver's side

was hanging down

and the center console hadn't been snapped together.

I mean, the build quality was just atrocious.

I got myself in a little bit of hot water on this

because I wrote in the notebook

that I would have burned a $10,000 Daihatsu

for interior quality like this

and our managing editor printed that

in the long-term wrap up.

The reason that I did that

could you even buy a Daihatsu at that time?

Probably not, no.

I don't even know.

Okay, anyway.

It would have been a Laganza.

No, Daiwu, maybe it was a Daiwu I said, I don't know, whatever.

The point was that the reason that I was so hard on it

is while I was in there fixing

all of the things that were broken

because I'm not gonna bring it back

to a dealership for this shit.

I found a sheet in there that said,

caution, this is a press car.

And they had names of people

who went through the whole thing to make it perfect.

And I thought if this is the best case

what are real customers winding up with?

I have no problem making that sort of comment.

So obviously car companies do note.

How was the performance?

I don't know, who knows?

I mean, probably, you know.

Fast enough to get you to the more gap.

Did that break?

Probably broke, I don't remember.

It was lovely, it was very pretty.

Don't like shit, but pretty.

So obviously car companies are gonna optimize

and they're gonna put their best foot forward.

That's just kind of the way it is.

Chris's observation was they tested a 360 Modena

that was two seconds faster from zero to 100

than a customer car was.

So they tested a customer car and a press car.

And he noted, and this does happen

that you are often when dealing with the Italians

you were given cars to drive and cars to test.

And so car and driver had this same thing happen

at Lamborghini when the Aventador came out.

They gave a car to Aaron Robinson,

who now I think works with us at Agri.

And I wanna say the car was like 4,064 pounds.

He went and drove the car and tested the car.

He was not allowed to drive.

And it was 4064, which is like insanely heavy.

And the test car was like 46 or 47,

36 or 3700 pounds.

So four or 500 pounds less.

I think it was three or four.

But some enormous number difference

that you're not gonna get from seats and equipment level.

That car had a different tub.

I mean, there's just no way

you were getting that kind of way savings.

But he did to his credit went out and snuck a test

with the Aventador who was not allowed to test.

And it still was just as fast.

So we were all like, what are you doing?

Like who cares?

Like just be fucking authentic and real and honest.

When the Ferrari 599 came out,

car and driver got a 3, 3 to 60 and then.

Regular 599.

Not a GTO.

No, what was the 599?

GTB?

GTB, yes.

Because then there was the HGTE Furano.

And then there was eventually the GTO, which was.

Their 599 did 3, 3 to 60 and 11, 2 at 131

through the quarter mile.

Spicy.

Very spicy.

Especially for a front engine rear wheel drive car.

And the problem was,

the 11, 2 is the same number they got out of an Enzo

which weighed 691 pounds less

and had more horsepower, 650 versus 612.

There is no Ferrari came back and said,

it's shift time difference.

Okay.

The Enzo shifted in 150 milliseconds.

The 599 shifted in 100 milliseconds.

You're talking about 0.05 of a second per shift.

That is not gonna give you the advantage

enough of an accelerative advantage

to counter 691 pounds of extra mass.

They put an Enzo motor plus in that 599

was the only conclusion that I could come to

at the time.

Was there any other like proof to this engine thing?

No one I ever saw.

I don't know if anyone ever pulled it apart.

I mean, you're, so they were at Furano

when they tested this car.

So you're on Ferrari's test track.

It was slightly downhill when they tested Enzo.

Still the 599 matched its time.

Like that's the joke.

So yeah, we, I don't think this happens anymore.

Let me say that in defense of my ability

to get cars from these car companies.

Not that they give me them anyway.

But they, in the turbo era,

I don't think you have to cheat.

I think all these cars make so much fucking power.

It doesn't actually matter.

So they just give this much to the customers.

Yeah, I think they-

Good luck.

Yeah, good luck.

Here's 710 horsepower in your Pista.

Hope you have good insurance.

But, you know, so I always,

but I've read this from the outside

and I don't like the idea of cheating.

I don't like the idea that they cheated on the Characo.

I don't like the idea that they,

that I couldn't get close to the,

to their numbers on the Cabrio.

I don't like the 360 Modena story.

And I don't like the 599 story.

But here's the story I've never told.

I tested a Forfa V8 Spacciale

and it didn't feel fast.

So I was asked not to test the car by Ferrari.

This was a test car back in the day.

And I got out of it

and I drove a privately owned Forfa V8 Italia.

And it was-

Sorry, you had a Spacciale test car.

I had a Spacciale test car.

And I swapped, I brought it,

I was at a race track

and somebody just gave me the keys

to their Forfa V8 Italia

and said, tell me the difference.

The Italia was so slow

that I was like, wait a second,

something is really wrong here.

Cause the cars were, I think, 30 horsepower apart.

If I remember correctly, I think I wrote that down.

I think there was something like 30 horsepower apart

and it just didn't make sense to me

how fucking slow this guy's car was.

And so I just had a sneaking suspicion

and I slapped some test gear.

I don't have the horsepower numbers.

I thought I, yeah, 35 horsepower

between Forfa V8 and Spacciale.

And this guy's car was like so slow that I'm like,

I would have never given this a good review

like when it came out.

Like I would have just been like makes all the noise,

no power.

So I snuck a run or 10 in a little place,

a little dead end road that I had found

that's at sea level, great conditions.

And I brought all my actual testing equipment

and I ran the car both directions to win.

I did the full battery of acceleration tests.

This is the customer car.

No, I went back in the Spacciale

and tested the Ferrari press car.

And the Ferrari Spacciale was 1.7 seconds slower

from 60 to 120 than the Italia press car.

Base car.

The base car.

It should have been way faster.

It was 35 pounds.

It was a hundred and something pounds lighter

and 35 more horsepower with more aggressive everything.

Way more aggressive tires.

You know, when I look at zero to 60,

that the base Italia got was three seconds flat

that all the magazines got and I got three five.

And that's three five weather corrected

doing the same regimen that I would have done on an Italia.

And so I'm like, why is this so much slower?

A half a second to 60 is slow.

It's a big difference.

Why is it so much slower than the base car?

And then why was that customer car like pathetically slow?

And it just the only conclusion

that I could come to was on that one was like,

oh, maybe it's launched.

That's why I had a press car.

Then why was it slow?

It was, well, because I had a press car

that I was told not to test.

And that's the backside of the ability to cheat.

I shouldn't say the ability to optimize,

which is the word that Italians use.

But yeah, I mean,

if you take the launch out of the equation,

which is why I did 6,800.

So I have here a chart of zero to every speed

and you can see the differences between the two cars.

And it's just night and day.

Without question, the speciale that I tested

was way, way, way slower than the base Italia was.

And it shouldn't have been the case.

And so there you have one additional data point

from many years ago about-

More than a decade ago.

Past the statute of limitations.

Is it?

Well, I was in Mexico, so it doesn't really matter.

Right.

It was a dead end I found in Mexico.

Uh-huh.

No, it was a test track.

I mean, it was a little test track that I found

and that I used in is no longer available

for public consumption because I was caught on camera

and they put a boulder at the end of the road.

So you can't do that anymore.

But it was a flat section of road.

So anyway, there is some validity

to car companies cheating, which is upsetting.

I mean, I'm not surprised.

But I also out of the box, that car is hairy enough.

Like, I don't know.

Spiccialli?

Yeah.

Did you find it underwhelming?

I loved it.

I adored it.

It wasn't, I wish it was as fast as,

oh, I don't think anyone's ever tested a Spiccialli.

Really?

No.

I don't know if any magazines were ever allowed to test it

and that's why they would have had to build

a cheater, optimized car.

To do it.

Well, they did it for the Italia,

why not for the Spiccialli?

Well, because the Italia was all new

and the Spiccialli was probably all sold by the time.

I find it upsetting.

I mean, the narrative here is,

let me be very clear.

Ferrari stands on this should, is and should be publicly,

numbers don't matter.

Like, you are not buying a car.

It doesn't matter that that's the Italia.

Yeah, but Lamborghini says that

and then they give you optimized cars also.

Well, now they don't give me any cars at all.

Lamborghini feels very strongly

that their customers don't care about straight line speed.

That is literally what they told me.

I mean, I've seen a lot of standup comedy

and none of which was as funny as that.

Here's the question, should numbers matter?

I mean, they're all, they're all cheating

because of these numbers.

I mean, when you reach a certain threshold,

it kind of doesn't matter to me personally,

but that threshold is, you know, I don't know what it is.

Three and a half, four seconds, six seconds.

I don't know.

Whatever it is.

I mean, what's your fastest car?

I don't even know.

That's probably my 911.

Really?

The 964.

Faster than your like big Mercedes automatic.

Yeah, definitely.

The 911 is probably for nine or four, eight to 60.

Road and track tested, well, road and track.

Here we go again, was it optimized?

I'm sorry.

The factory quoted a five, seven.

And road and track's car was four, nine.

So the factory also is quoting the German conventions,

including roll out and the road and track test

presumably didn't.

There are a bunch of ways.

So the factory typically doesn't do zero to 60,

and German car companies,

they'll typically do zero to 62, so zero to 100.

And that does make a difference.

Often there's a, not often.

Occasionally there's a shift in there,

which will really screw everything up.

The US magazines ignore the first foot of roll out,

or in the case of car driver back then,

I don't know what road and track did.

They didn't do a foot of roll out,

they did three tenths of a second flat.

And also the car companies won't necessarily do the shit

that magazines do to get the numbers, right?

I mean, we do, did, do, I guess,

car drivers still test cars,

and I really appreciate that,

because it is a validation

of what the car companies claim.

God, the things that we do to cars.

I mean, and a 9-11 has a huge amount of rear traction.

So to launch your car, I would do,

what's the red line, 64?

Yeah.

I would probably do, I doubt you could spin the tires

on modern tires anyway.

Even then, I kind of doubt you can get much wheel spin.

So it would be a full red line, full throttle clutch slip,

aiming for the clutch to hook up right at about,

right before the power peak.

So 5,000, 5,200 somewhere in there.

I don't know where power peak goes in your car,

maybe 6,000, maybe even higher than that.

It would be horribly abusive.

And it's something you would do three times

on your own car, and then probably wanna replace

your clutch and flywheel.

It's horrible.

So yeah, of course they'll get a 4-9 out of it,

and you know, when Porsche's probably could get 5-2,

cause everyone who's doing that

is worried about losing their job.

For the magazine, we're like, oh, we blew it up,

take it back, give us another one.

Yeah. Anyway, that's my fastest car.

That's quick.

But I wonder what it is.

Quickest.

5-60, so car drivers 5-60 street start test

is actually the most brilliant test out there.

Cause what it is is you're rolling at five miles an hour.

They put a trigger on the gas pedal,

like a pressure trigger on the gas pedal.

And you have to be within,

I don't remember if it's 4-8 to 5-2

or 4-6 to 5-4 miles an hour.

And the trigger activates

when you slam your pedal on the gas.

So you're measuring the engine's reaction time also.

You're not just looking for the car to start accelerating.

And then there's a piece of software that they use

that normalizes that to 5.0 miles an hour.

And you do it a couple of times,

you average it and it's just that number.

And that takes the abuse of horrible launch out of it.

And some drivers are more abusive

and some are more sympathetic.

And I bet your car, if your car could pull a 4-9,

I bet it's actually a 6-1 or 6-2 car.

I remember when I would compare those numbers as a kid,

I'd be like huge difference,

not understanding what the difference was,

but knowing that there was a substantial difference.

We just, we're just doing research on the Mustang GTD,

which is an automatic, it's 8-speed automatic dual clutch

and eight or seven, I think it's eight.

Either way, dual clutch automatic with launch control

and all kinds of other shit on it.

And car and driver got a two eight out of it,

which I do believe is the fastest front engine rear drive

zero to 60 ever, certainly over there.

But that's not crazy.

What's crazy is the street start on that car is two nine.

Wow.

Two nine, that has to be the fastest accelerating.

Yeah, the smallest gap between the-

It's certainly the smallest gap.

I don't, oh, well, yeah.

Cause even Hellcats are two, three, four tenths of a second.

And they'd be the other one that's just wheel spin on demand.

So you can, you don't get that initial weight transfer.

So you lose a little bit of grip maybe,

but I don't think I've ever seen anything

internal combustion get under three and a half seconds

street start, nothing.

So that's clearly in the real world,

one of the fastest accelerating cars off the line,

two-wheel drive cars, or period.

I mean, two eight, two nine, I mean, you're getting,

you're looking at plaid is the only way you're being that.

No Ferrari would touch that, not even V12 stuff.

I wonder how they do it.

815 horsepower, short gearing,

that crazy push rod suspension, none of you've seen that.

So this GTD is a Mustang, but it's also as a track with

I think that is four inches wider than the regular one.

So the entire body is they start with a,

it's also $370,000.

Let me say 400 with options,

but they use a regular Mustang, EcoBoost,

like rental car, body and white,

chop it completely up and do an all new carbon fiber body

on it that's way wider.

They replace the front strut suspension

with double wishbone, short long arm.

They replace the entire rear multi-link

with a push rod, bell crank,

insane, multi-mattox, bull valve,

active, everything rear suspension

that's just takes up the whole backseat

and basically have to trunk too.

And the car adds gains 400 pounds over the,

so it's 4,400 pound car.

But then they put the old GT500s supercharged 5.2 in there,

5.2, in there, boosted to 815 horsepower.

And so you do that.

Oh, oh, oh, sorry.

And then take the transmission, throw it out

and put a trans-axle in the back,

but not even just like, just move the transmission back.

They do a real trans-axle

where most of the transmission is behind the rear wheels.

So the car gets almost 50, 50 weight distribution.

So you have great- How's it boosted?

Supercharged. Supercharged.

Instant response, huge displacement,

massive torque, massive power,

short gearing, automatic- Massive traction.

Great traction, nuts.

I can't wait to drive one of these things.

It's happening shortly.

But yeah, 2.9 on a street start.

From a rear-wheel drive car now, unless it's really impressive.

I mean, and part,

one of the other benefits of that push-rod suspension

is they no longer have to fit in the suspension,

like the shocks and whatever else.

And so they can put 345 rear tires on the thing.

So it's got steam rollers on the back.

That's pretty wild.

Yeah, it's F40 sized.

Maybe F40s 335.

God, were they that big?

Yeah, in 1987.

Holy shit.

What was the Lamborghini LMO 2?

275s?

No, it was 3-something.

I want to say there were 355s.

3525s?

I don't know.

And were until recently,

and still, they were until recently,

the biggest tires ever put in any production car ever.

Is that OD or is that outer diameter or width?

No, I'm talking width.

And I think they were 355s.

Whatever.

I mean, when we had an LM in the studio,

we wanted to put it on Gojax to turn it around.

And I bought the extra large Gojax when we built the studio

because I knew at one point we'd have an LM in here.

Still doesn't fit.

We had to drive it around, drive it outside,

turn it around and bring it back in.

Enormous.

What do you mean, ugh, it's a V12.

You get to do it.

You know, you want to drive an LM.

Yeah, but just the reality of using it.

Yeah, I didn't mind that.

I did the reality of having to air this place out

from the fumes was something different.

But yeah, anyway, I find the whole optimizing issue upsetting.

Yeah, I mean, things are not as they seem.

Yeah.

What else is new?

I mean, do you think one of your customers would be upset

for to find out that their Spiccialli

was actually slower than a test to Italia?

Or do they just not care?

It varies person to person.

Some people would be annoyed.

Other people would be like,

it doesn't matter, I'm not going to edit.

Most of them don't really cane the car in that way anyway.

They're too worried about how that would adversely

affect the value.

Really?

I can't imagine buying,

I mean, not necessarily launch control,

but I can't imagine buying a Ferrari

and not runlining it.

It seems like a-

It's scary.

It's under warranty.

No, no.

Like the Spicciall sensation is scary.

Oh.

Fast, rear wheel drive, scary.

Don't they all drive clads every day?

Yeah, I don't know.

Do you find that supercar buyers are like driving EVs

every day for a speed thrills or no?

It varies.

It's really, really variable.

Mm-hmm.

Like some people are, you know,

it really depends how much money

and how big their collection is.

But yeah, yeah, I mean,

some are be like, I'm driving a truck

or a Rivian or a Pladlesso.

Now, I'm sure.

Yeah, they have a sensible thing to drive around in daily.

They don't need the really insane daily.

I mean, anytime I've talked to Jay Leno,

he's like, you can't show up anywhere.

He's got a Spectre.

It's like, you can't show up anywhere in Rolls Royce.

I'm like, why not your Jay fucking Leno?

Like, what do you mean?

He's like, no, it's just obnoxious.

His daily's a Plad.

And then there's a guy around here locally

who had a Chiron and his daily was a smart ED.

And I just like an electric drive smart,

which I thought was hilarious.

And he was like, yeah, well, you know,

parking spots are small and I just.

Yeah, they're pragmatic about their daily vehicle choices.

I just love that.

Can you imagine somebody being like, you know,

this guy's like 87 years old.

Imagine like you fucking old, old man and your shit smart.

Get out of my way and then realize

he's just on his way to go pick up the Chiron

from the oil change.

Mm-hmm.

I love that.

Yep, it's definitely a thing.

I really like to be inconspicuous.

Nice to, you know, nice to take off your outfit

and Superman clothes and put on Clark Kent.

Disappear.

Do I have a gray golf?

That's not why I have a gray golf.

We know.

I tried to get in a good color, it didn't work.

Yeah, it didn't work.

Okay, well, cheating is a thing.

I'm sorry, optimizing is a thing.

Yes.

No, except Volkswagen.

Volkswagen, Volkswagen definitely cheated on the Chiraco

and I'm here to say that I am embarrassed

by my own performance in my horribly slow bitch basket.

Well, that's why you're gonna do motor swap.

Is there a period road test for that also?

With the VR6s?

Yes.

Swaps into?

Well, that's, here's the thing.

In Europe, they made a 2.9 liter VR6 in the Corrado.

So what's to say that the test cars weren't 2.9s

instead of the 2.8?

There was no exterior external differences,

I don't think.

Well, you need that.

You need a 2.9.

Damn you.

Yeah, good luck.

I can't do that.

No, I can't.

I'm not, I'm not.

I can buy a US car and punch it out to 3.1 though.

Oh, there you go.

And then, red line rebuild.

That'll blow his mind.

Everyone in Hagar, if you're listening to this.

You'll look at that cylinder head

and be like, what the fuck is this thing?

Well, actually that's one of the cars on the list

that we've talked about with red line.

Just because, while VR6s look so nuts,

when you open them up.

Yeah, it'll certainly blow your mind

if you're used to looking at cars

and then you get in there and you're like,

what are they doing?

What are they doing?

It's wild, yeah.

But yeah, no, I don't think,

I think once the Rover is back from the red line rebuild

to him, they probably will never want to hear from me again.

Well, hopefully the motor sticks together.

I thought you were going to take the advantage

and be like, most people don't want to hear from you again.

Like our listeners won't.

After you've sat here in vomited numbers

and quarter mile stuff,

you're coming drag racing with me next time?

Nope.

Why?

I think I'd rather go to dinner.

This episode of We Hate Everything, including cars,

is brought to you by Derek Tamp-Scott.

I'm going to have.

You're welcome.

See you next week.

On The Karma Dunge Show.

Cheating VS "Optimizing" Manufacture Test Data — The Carmudgeon Show w/ Cammisa & DTS — Ep 213

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