Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2019 i BBC Top Gear Magazine

@TopGearEditor editor@bbctopgearmagazine.com “Simplify, then add lightness.” Colin Chapman’s most iconic quote, and the ethos on which the Lotus brand was built, could not be more relevant in the current climate. As electrification takes hold and the average weight and size of cars increases, I often wonder what Chapman would make of it all. Moreover, I wonder if he wouldn’t have come up with a better solution, especially given that another one of his credos was “Rules are for the obedience of fools and interpretations of smart men”. As the electric revolution moves from the early-adopter phase to mass-market consideration, I worry we might have got it all wrong. To remove a major barrier to purchase created by range anxiety, manufacturers are developing EVs capable of going 300 miles in one…

13 Minutes to The Moon podcast Amazing insights of how NASA got Apollo 11 to the Moon. It really is sooo much more than Stretch Armstrong and his mate Buzz Lightyear. Listen on BBC Sounds Happy place Stay calm. Look at dogs Stanley Kubrick Take a trip to the Design Museum in London with your droogs. The exhibition is great. Note: there is no vellocet at the bar. On until September Stranger Things: Season It’s here! The kids are back, older and wiser but, Eleven is still…well, Eleven? Office playlist – yacht rock The Doobie Brothers top our smooth-sailing, soft-rock playlist. Some open front floral print shirts and boat shoes will be worn…

01 VANILLA ICE ICE NISSAN, TOO COLD! Normally we’d delete stunts like this faster than you can say “double 99 with monkey’s blood”, but given the UK is in the grip of a sweltering 25ºC heatwave, you can only admire Nissan’s timing 02 VALKYRIE TO RACE LE MANS Aston wants an outright Le Mans win in 2021 – when new rules replace the LMP1 protos with recognisable hypercars. Enter the Valkyrie, designed by some bloke called Adrian 03 BMW VISION DC ROADSTER Can an electric bike continue BMW’s rich tradition for sticky-out engines? Yep, when cooling ribs and fans for the cells pop out just like the cylinder heads on its boxer twin. Bad. Ass 04 KODIAQ vRS JAM SANDWICH Days of the plod pottering around in old Vauxhall Astras…

Cars reflect us. They’re a distillation and caricature of the way we organise ourselves as a society. In this time when both the automobile and democracy seem to be facing a tumultuous future, it’s worth asking if one might teach us about the other. In normal times, the first job of government (after defence of the realm) is held to be economic growth. Recent history says that’s unhelpful. In 2012 we were in recession, with memories of the ’08/09 crash. But we also had the Olympics. And we had faith in democracy, as shown by the respectful Scottish referendum campaign. The worst that could be said of the media was that there was phone hacking – not great, but look what followed. That summer, the country felt united and heck,…

↑ FOR The first truly silent Bentley. Hybrid integration is well done, it’ll appeal to a new audience ↓ AGAINST V6 is coarse when roused, regeneration and range are both limited “PRESS THE START BUTTON AND YOU GET EVEN LESS SENSATION THAN IN A V8 OR W12” 6/10 Bentley turns 100 this month, which makes it just about old enough to have had a crack at an electric car a century ago. But no, this is the first. And, Bentley claims, the world’s first luxury hybrid. What about Lexus, Porsche and others, you’re wondering? Premium brands apparently, not luxury. The tech that underpins it is similar to other premium hybrids in the VW Group. There’s a single electric motor sandwiched in the gap between the engine and gearbox. That delivers…

↑ FOR Looks fab, sounds naughty, goes like stink, looks after your hairdo ↓ AGAINST Fiddly dashboard. Dare we say it, a smidge too much power for its own good… “IT’S RAPID ENOUGH TO RUN WITH 488s AND HURACÁNS” 8/10 Unless someone drives their Valkyrie under a really, really low bridge, the new Aston DBS Volante will remain for some time Aston Martin’s ultimate open-top car. It’s the only way to get an al fresco Aston V12 experience – the DB11 Volante is AMG V8 only. And what a V12. 5.2 litres, two turbos, 715bhp and 664lb ft of torque with a power band to make a diesel weep into its ULEZ receipt. Sometimes, it’s too much. Mostly, the DBS puts its power down with traction alchemy, but more than…

↑ FOR Smooth hybrid handover, build quality, surprisingly agile and comfy… ↓ AGAINST …if you don’t pick the heavier hybrid. Dad-bod image 6/10 Hope you enjoyed the rest of this month’s mag. It’s OK, a VW Passat Estate facelift review is not something you stick a thumb in to read first. But in a landscape dominated by niche SUVs clashing, the Passat wagon is quietly wonderful. One of these – a new plug-in hybrid GTE model – has just become the 30 millionth Passat built. It’s improved to capitalise on that diesel hullabaloo someone caused a few years ago. The Passat GTE will now go 34 miles on e-power alone, apparently enough to complete most Passat owners’ daily commutes without waking the 1.4-litre, 154bhp petrol engine. Really? Don’t most fleet…

REPORT 2 DACIA DUSTER Happy little car, this. The 130bhp engine is powerful enough for the chassis’ modest-but-reliable talents, and I’ve been enjoying the lack of pretension much more than expected. Small things to flag up: the seats really are flat and basic – a back-tweaking hassle after more than a couple of hours – and the place you rest your elbow on the door trim is uncomfortable. Minor but important. TF REPORT 5 CUPRA ATECA The Spanish super-SUV has excelled itself in the wettest week in June history, remaining sure-footed even when I’m leaping out of junctions on north London’s greasiest roads. Not a hint of wheelspin. I’m becoming quite smitten with it, now I’m ignoring the badge. Although one of my boys feels queasy every time he even…

Like anyone who has lived through the transition from paper to online media, there isn’t much that shocks me these days. Fanboys, trolls, faceless keyboard warriors – they’re all the same. The only way the internet can occasionally prove to be genuinely surprising is if it self-regulates and isn’t mental. With the exception of the Tesla army. The Tesla army is a total enigma to me. Last month, on the back of driving the new Model 3 and being both impressed and curious, I tweeted that I was going to buy one. Previously, I was an object of mild ridicule to the T-army, but instantly my status changed from fossil-addicted Flat Earther to new Messiah. “They change their minds rather quickly,” I thought. I attempted to follow and understand the…

↑ FOR Engaging, upmarket interior with big-car optional gadgets. If you spec it correctly ↓ AGAINST Not a huge revolution in terms of styling, not the most exciting car to drive “IT’S ALL VERY CLEAN AND CRISP, WITHOUT BEING PARTICULARLY SCARY OR REVOLUTIONARY” 6/10 If it sounds simple, it’s probably less simple than it sounds. So when the corporate communication that said ‘Do the same, but… y’know… better’ came through to the development team of the new Renault Clio, the significance of the job probably didn’t register. The trouble is that this new MkV version of Renault’s small hatch (v1.0 hit the streets in 1990), is following on not from waning sales, but a car that has stayed solidly popular – Europe’s best-selling B-segment supermini since 2013, no less. Which…

↑ FOR An interesting and rather beguiling take on a luxury GT ↓ AGAINST LHD-only, £139,000, sensitive brakes “IT’S THE COMFORT/CONTROL BANDWIDTH THE CAR HAS THAT’S DOWNRIGHT AMAZING” 8/10 This is Polestar’s first car, and it seems Volvo’s future-tech/luxury offshoot is keen to do things differently. It’s a super GT – that much is obvious. Given its price (£139,000), power (600bhp), weight (2,350kg) and exclusivity (only 1,500 will be sold globally, across only nine countries), you might be thinking Conti GT or S-Class Coupe as rivals. But then you dig a bit further. And grow more puzzled. No air suspension nor adaptive dampers, but instead manually adjustable dampers with twiddly knobs on top? Carbon body panels, brakes by Akebono (the same people who did the McLaren P1’s stoppers), a turbocharger,…

MUST TRY HARDER? MUST TRY LESS HARD, MORE like. The Golf GTI TCR is what happens when engineers and marketing types have a dash too much time on their hands and Just Can’t Leave Things Alone. Look, the MkVII Golf is done. We’ve had GTIs, Rs and even the superb Clubsport S. We’ve had every flavour of hot Golf, and they’ve been brilliant. What we want now is the next one, not a run-out model purportedly named after the World Touring Car series. Enough, VW; put the MkVII Golf down – you’re spoiling its legacy with this, confusing the brand strategy and identity. So what if it has more power and torque and a mechanical LSD to help get that to the tarmac through the front wheels alone? I don’t care…

MG TF Avoid the older hydragas-suspended F. More conventional TF’s are a sweeter drive – £2,000 will buy you a good one Bentley Continental GT Peerless engineering, build quality and craftsmanship now yours for under £30,000. Just mind the running costs Lotus Evora Early, low-mileage Evoras are now down to £30k. That’s a lot of handling for hot-hatch money. And four seats, too Mini Cooper S S’charged British? Maybe not, but original supercharged Cooper S was a belter. Now available for around £3,000…

If the regular Tuatara is a little too understated for your liking, you plan to spend the majority of time worrying your local race circuit and you really like g-force, then SSC has you covered with this High Downforce Track Pack. Available as a, cough, $250k option, the road-legal Track Pack increases downforce from 250kg to 600kg at 180mph and adds more than a little stance. In addition to the revised carbon-fibre splitter, sills, wing and diffuser, you get track-optimised suspension, wheels, airjacks, and a plumbed-in extinguisher system for the full track-hero experience. Production will start with 50 coupes in standard or Track Pack specification followed by 35 spider versions (complete with industrial strength toupée tape) and more focused and extreme versions thereafter. The first production car will be delivered…

Paul Horrell: A simpler car for simpler times. Its fizzy engine wanted to be caned, and its steering and handling were wonderfully knockabout. It was terrific value at £9,995 – including Bluetooth (an option on a BMW M3 at the time). It did 35mpg, which wasn’t so good, but there was only one way to drive it. Its upright narrowness made it super-handy in London. Only issue was the firm ride, but it never rattled, and it never went wrong.…

Esther Neve: Are we talking about us or the cars? Because if we’re talking about us personally… you lose. Jason Barlow: As with so many things, it’s in the definition. Part of my stylishness is in not rising to your taunts. And the 508 has some of that, too. At last, a French car company has channelled some of the national cool into une automobile. EN: Come on, the French have nothing on the Italians. Two words: Alfa and Romeo. JB: To which I might add two of my own: warranty and claim. I like the Giulia – I’m just not sure I’d go there with my own money. EN: Bof. JB: Peugeot is on a roll. Design, tech, injecting the mainstream with some savoir faire. EN: Fine. Though the…

The Cayman isn’t the only mid-engined coupe that’s had its Weetabix. This is the Alpine A110S, which receives a boost from 248bhp to 288bhp, by dint of a beefifier turbo. Zero to 62mph takes 4.4 seconds – a tenth of a second quicker than standard. But it’s not all about outright speed. There are new springs and hollow anti-roll bars, which are 50 per cent and 100 per cent stiffer respectively, plus tuned dampers. The ride height is down by 4mm, and it rolls on wider Michelin tyres with a stickier compound. The ESC, which can be fully deactivated, has been retuned too, and you get bigger Brembo brakes as standard. Jean-Pascal Dauce, Alpine’s chief engineer, stresses this is still a car that “can be enjoyed by drivers with any…

“SPORTS CARS ARE RACING CARS FOR THE ROAD, AREN’T THEY?” I was born in a petrol station in Denmark that my father was running. He was a racing driver too, both on gravel and tarmac, but my interest was always in karting. I started when I was seven or eight years old but I wasn’t allowed to race until I was 10. I had to wait until I was 18 to learn to drive on the road too. I think I got my driving licence not necessarily on my birthday, but certainly very soon after. I actually took the test for trucks, though – because of the karting and the need to travel with all of our stuff. I think I only drove with the examiner in a truck for…

SHOULD I CARE? Oh, yes. Continental and Leia are daring to dream of a world where warning symbols, nav directions and feeds from various cameras all float around in front of your face while you drive. That won’t be distracting at all. SHOULD I BE SCARED? No harmful lasers are used to create the 3D effect. Instead, “light conductors with diffraction grating and nanostructures create a precise diffraction of light under the display panel,” says the press release. Simple really. SHOULD I TELL MY FRIENDS? Immediately. In fact, impressing your mates might be the only benefit of this tech. SHOULD I SPEND MY MONEY? You won’t have to. The plan is to flog the tech to major OEMs, who can combine the Natural 3D Lightfield Instrument Cluster with their existing…

You. You, in your Nissan Qashqai, trundling down the middle lane of the M4 in rush-hour traffic, absently brushing Ginsters crumbs off your knees, one ear on the Five Live phone-in, the other on your partner’s analysis of supermarket own-brand sandwiches. Yes, you. You are extraordinary. You are a miracle. Because driving, even the most mundane driving (in fact, especially the most mundane driving), is one of the most mind-bogglingly complex activities known to man. As your Qashqai bumbles past Reading, your Ginsters-fuelled brain is busy all-but-unconsciously mapping the real-time positions of – what? – a couple of dozen cars around you, assessing their position, relative speeds, the likely mood of their drivers. And all at the same time as wondering if you turned the thermostat down this morning. We…

1/10 1 Run. Hide. Get as far away from this car as humanly possible 2 Like a common cold. Not actively lethal, but it’ll still ruin your weekend 3 Too forgettable and dreary to actually be terrible. Which is worse 4 Below-par. AKA “meh”. There’s too much good competition these days 5 Perfectly, exactly average. Does the job asked of it, nothing more 6 A decent car, but not a great one. We’d recommend it, except… 7 …you can do better. Why settle for mid-table? Good cars start here 8 An eight means great. Well-priced, good to drive: a fab package 9 Top of the class. The sort of car we’d auction off organs to drive again 10 A flawless, perfect car. Shouldn’t really exist, but there’s always hope…

Ford Fiesta Perky, happy little Fiesta that drives better than it should and isn’t as nice inside as the new Clio. Still gets the nod for a B-road Volkswagen Polo Sober-suited, safe, Teutonic, the charisma of the robots that build it. Polo is good – it’s just subjectively hard to get excited about Vauxhall Corsa All-new Corsa revamp due next year, and it looks pretty good. Expect competitive pricing and full-on EV, as well as slick(ish) looks Dacia Duster The enemy from within. The Duster may be made from ‘old’ Clio bits and be less plush than the all-new Clio, but it is cheap, big and honest…

1) The Öhlins dampers have 22 separate positions, allowing you to really cock up the car’s dynamics. Volvo recommends three different settings to try out. 2) But while the front adjusters are under the bonnet, to get to the rears you either need pipecleaner arms to reach around the back of the wheels, or a trolley jack. 3) Joachim Rydholm, the 1’s chief development engineer, reckons he’s tested around 80 separate front damper tunes and 115 rear ones over the past two years. 4) They prove you don’t need air suspension or adaptive damping to ride well. The 1 is not only composed and smooth, but does a great job of disguising its weight.…

The Fan “We have a 400mm fan that’s both active and interactive. It interacts with the top surface of the car, with the air brake which is the only flap on the upper body. We can control downforce or shed it and reduce drag, so we have a top-speed, low-drag mode and a high-downforce mode for corners. It controls the centre of pressure for braking, which means we can have fixed aerodynamics at the front axle. The fan cleans up the flow over the diffuser, so we can have a more aggressive design and also have moving flaps inside the tunnel. It’s just amazing, and it’s not powered by the engine, but by a 48V electrical system.” The F1 “I don’t think anybody’s done an F1 since the F1. It’s…

I guess this must be purgatory… for no other reason than I don’t know if I’m standing at the rusty, padlocked gates of automotive heaven or hell. Behind them, over 400 ‘R31’ Nissan Skylines – all forlorn, disembowelled and methodically stacked on top of each other like some ghoulish game of Tetris. It’s a properly macabre scene – one juxtaposed by rolling mountains, lush rice paddy fields and a sprinkling of fantastically unremarkable industrial buildings. Stranger still, this pile of JDM junkers belongs to one man. A man who has failed to turn up. That actually might be the weirdest thing. Punctuality is taken verrrry seriously in Japan, so much so that last year a Japanese rail company was forced to apologise after a train left a station 25 seconds…

BECAUSE THEY DON’T MAKE’EM LIKE THEY USED TO PLUS Honest Harris’ bargain rally replicas 1. GETTING TO THE PAD ASTRONAUT TRANSFER VAN It’s a journey of 238,855 miles to the Moon from the Kennedy Space Center on Florida’s sun-bleached east coast. Nine miles more if you count the bit from the crew quarters along a lonely causeway to Launch Pad 39A itself, upon which – exactly 50 years ago this month – sat a gleaming Saturn V rocket, like a white spire against the pastel-blue sky. That’s a hell of a commute, and one which – for the crew of Apollo 11 – started at 4am on 16 July, 1969. Roused by astronaut chief Deke Sleyton, they showered, shaved, slipped into their space suits and waddled out into the warm…

1894 FIRST AUTOMOTIVE USE OF A STEERING WHEEL Alfred Vacheron replaces the tiller system on his Panhard for the Paris to Rouen race 1926 FIRST POWER STEERING SYSTEMS INTRODUCED Francis W. Davis inadvertently invents power steering for cars while working on heavy steering in trucks 1955 CITROEN SINGLE-SPOKE STEERING WHEEL The DS gets a lovely single-spoke wheel for safety reasons. Binned when airbags become necessary 1966 FIRST STEERING WHEELMOUNTED BUTTONS The Ford Thunderbird is introduced with cruise control buttons on the steering wheel spokes 1997 FIRST GEARSHIFT PADDLES Ferrari brings its F1 paddle shifter to the F355, meaning more time for hands on the’wheel 2016 MERCEDES TOUCH PADS Merc introduces the divisive, smartphone-style touch pads on the E-Class to declutter its’wheel…

SUBARU IMPREZA RB5 (1999) Price now £8,990 Harris says The Impreza should need no introduction; nor should the RB5, a special edition that celebrates Brit rally hero Richard Burns. Good ones are increasingly hard to find, so snap this up TOYOTA CELICA GT-FOUR (1998) Price now £16,495 Harris says Weren’t expecting this, were you? The Celica homologation road car possessed a dizzyingly nerdy spec sheet, while the rally car was involved in one of the most fascinating motorsport cheats. AUDI QUATTRO (1984) Price now £25,995 Harris says Audi makes five-cylinder cars now, but none have been slung through forests by a man called Walter Röhrl. Good luck buying a decent Delta Integrale for this sort of money. Honest Harris' Bargain Corner…

Where? Wales. Fraithwen Cottages in Adfa is a great place to stay as there’s access to lots of trails for all abilities and car capabilities Be prepared Make sure you have appropriate tyres, plenty of fuel and someone who knows what they’re doing. NEVER TRAVEL ALONE. Learn where you can drive Do your research – you can’t just drive anywhere. Bone up on by-way laws and consult the Green Lane Association if unsure.…

Esther Neve We all know that keyless entry and keyless start go together like rama lama lama ka dinga da dinga dong. So, I find myself asking on a daily basis, “Why does the Giulia have keyless start, but not keyless entry?” Who in their right mind only offers half of a well-known, tried-and-tested formula? Why design a system where you need to take the key out to blip (so wireless anyway…) the car open, but then put it away again and use the starter button to get the car going? Honestly? The thinking behind it is totally beyond me. Frankly, I think Alfa should either offer the whole package or none of it, not some weird mix.…

WHO: ANDY FRANKLIN WHERE: TG TOWERS, UK The head of the crayons department hard at work tracing around Gordon Murray’s T50. Car design: not as hard as you’d imagine WHAT: HISTORY WHERE: MODENA, ITALY What was a pretty spectacular day at the office for us has been immortalised at Pagani HQ. Brave pants all around WH0: WILSON HENNESSY WHERE: BANBURY, UK Half photographer, half skateboard pro, Wilson manages to combine his two passions on the Mini Electric shoot. Rad WHO: OLLIE MARRIAGE WHERE: GOODWOOD, UK Another British ‘classic’ moment. The TVR needed a ratchet strap to keep the door shut. As the saying goes: buyer beware WHO: JONNY FLEETWOOD WHERE: GOODWOOD, UK Turns out Ollie Marriage’s pride and joy does not have a working reverse gear. Unless he takes Jonny…