Replies

And I’ve seen a girl get into my last truck with 485 on the dyno HP and damn near rear end a car because she was used to driving with less power and stepped ‘normally’ on the gas.

Being a car buy you KNOW that 400 isn’t trifling. Put 500 on an icy road with traction control and no experience with it and watch the computer be useless. They can only do so much.

"... Put 500 on an icy road with traction control and no experience with it and watch the computer be useless. They can only do so much."

Indeed. There's a TRD supercharger for the iForce 5.7l V8 in the Toyota Tundra that bumps the power from 375 (stock) to 505hp and the same number of torque.

I know a supercharged Tundra 4x4 owner who will not drive his here in the winter when the ice covers the roads: The computer-controlled Vehicle Stability Control (VSC) and traction control does absolutely nothing. You can't even creep off the line in that monster giving *any* gas on the pedal without starting to go sideways in 4x4 locked. And this is on snowflake-sidewalled DuraTrac tires which are one of the best snow/ice hybrid tires you can buy. Just ridiculous. A bone stock Subaru Legacy wagon could easily whoop him in a drag race in snowy conditions; just leave him sitting still.

There's other guys in town with 700hp Ford turbo-diesels that are as nervous as first-time drivers when the flakes come down.

You CAN have too much power.

Being a car buy you KNOW that 400 isn’t trifling. Put 500 on an icy road with traction control and no experience with it and watch the computer be useless. They can only do so much.

I had a Caddy front wheel drive STS back in the /90s; had to drive on the Jersey Turnpike and Parkway a lot.

The road surface coming out of toll booths was always slicked up quite well as it was so well worn with vehicles starting out from a stop. In the hot summer months you get warm asphalt and tire rubber deposits making a nice smooth surface.

No matter how gently I tickled it when pulling out of a toll booth, it would chirp the driving front tires.

What was really "fun" was about a 2 mile long steep uphill grade highway with 3 lanes, and an on-ramp halfway up the hill that I frequently used getting on the highway. Heavy traffic, so you need to get moving in a hurry.

Nothing like having 300 horse in a front wheel drive 1995 or so STS, and you really need to step on it. It was the very definition of squirrely. Really nasty, had to really make a point of watching that rear view for oncoming speeding traffic and actively keeping it going in the direction you want it to go. And this is on a clear day, dry road.

The opposite handling - I found in the MB S-class from the '90s. It goes in the direction you point it, period. No problem at all in that same situation - you could drive those cars and be half asleep and still have no trouble handling the car - even in bad weather. It's all about rear-wheel drive and BALANCE and suspension design, of course.