Woot! SP23 Test Drive

[MrShadow]

Took one for a spin today. Man, they rock! :D :D :D Road noise is non-existant, acceleration is exceptional. Seats comfy as, stereo is quite good for a stock setup. Prior to this, we'd only driven the Maxx Sport.

And, we got the news yesterday, our SP23 is due last week of April.

[Asterix]

Interesting you say no road noise. One of the guys said the opposite in this forum last week. I think it was Aaron?

[MrShadow]

I can't remeber who posted it, but having driven the cars I have, the SP23 is as silent as a submarine when it comes to road noise. My main comparison has been Dad's BJ and my BA Hardtop, both of which have terrible road noise. Compared to these two (and the other cars I've driven in), road noise does not factor when looking at the SP23.

I do agree with some of the other things mentioned in that post though. The main one being the indicator is not really loud. Normally, you can hear it going but not in the SP23, unless you listen really hard. Then again, you can't hear it mine either, but I think that has more to do with the stereo... :roll:

I suppose it all comes down to personal preference for things like this, what I call quiet, another person might call bloody noisy. :)

[WASP20]

Yeah it was me who said there was a lot of road noise in the SP23 I drove, however I can now retract that statement as the tosser at the dealership who delivered the car failed to check the tyre pressures and it was running 55psi all round...!!!

Dropped them down to a sane and normal road pressure and it is a very much quieter car now!

[platypus]

BJ? noisy? he has the same car as me?!!! (1.6 etc)

shoulda shelled out for underbody protection... whisper quiet... only wind noise to deal with

[MrShadow]

Yeah, 2000 BJ Sedan, 1.6L.


the tosser at the dealership who delivered the car failed to check the tyre pressures and it was running 55psi all round

:shock: :shock: Damn, no wonder you had road noise!

[whchan]

I test drove a SP23 last weekend too, here is my comments:

Generally a good car, an improvement from the previous model (which I own).

Pros:

- As weight increases by nearly 100kg the car feels much more solid. It's very quiet and sits like an European car.
- The interior is very good looking, with the red LEDs everywhere. The seats are very comfy too.
- Big improvement inside with a much larger interior.
- Better handling from the previous model (by far). The suspension setting is a vast improvement from the previous car with minimal body roll (I was informed that anti-sway bar front & rear is standard). Cornering capabilities is much higher now but I suspect a lot of it comes from the tyre, which are 4 205/50R17 Potenza RE040s. On full throttle you can still experience torque steer on dry surface (typical for FF) but it comes at a much later stage than my 2yr old Protege.

Cons:
- They claim it's a 2.3l engine with 115kw. To me it's more like 2.0 rather than 2.3. Maybe that's because of the weight increase. It certainly doesn't feel fast either. The previous model "feels" so much faster on full throttle, altho I'd say in actual speeds the new one would've be faster.
- No pulling power under 3000rpm. I tried 5th gear, 1500rpm on 60km/h... the engine have no torque whatsoever. took me >5secs to get to 70km/h (with full throttle). bad one.
- The steering hasn't improve from the previous model. Altho communicative to a certain extent (for a Jap car) its not pin-point accruate. I can always feel this gap in steering when attacking corners, definately not one of the better steerings I have encountered in other cars.

Conclusion:

An improved version of the old Mazda 323 but nothing revolutionary (maybe with the exception of the suspension). Disregarding the steering this will be the better car than the Alfa 147, especially when it's ~$10k cheaper. A nice compromise between a small family car with plenty of space and a fun sports car. Between the group of small Japanese cars (Corolla, Pulsar, Lancer, Civic) it's probably the sportiest with the best handling capabilities out there but nothing like those little Euro hatches, e.g. Mini Cooper, 206, Clio etc...

[Aaron]

Definately wasn't me.....

[P'cisT]

How come all the other expert reviewers in newspapers and magazines are saying there is a lot of road noise, whereas you guys say the opposite. Does not compute.

[MrShadow]

Because these reviewers are probably comparing it to a BMW 5/7 series style of luxury car. :) For a small family sedan/semi sports car, it's quiet. Also, we are comparing it in relation to previous 323's.

[Aaron]

Journalists are the kind of clowns that hear from a Ford designer - "we benchmarked a BMW 5 series for handling and performance/comfort tradeoffs" and then think that Ford can develop and build a BMW M5 and sell it for $35K-$60K instead of the $150K BMW asks for the same.....

A.

[mrpayner]

Found this article on the www.Drive.com.au (http://www.drive.com.au/news/article.asp?article=http://drive.fairfax.com.au/content-new/news/general/2004/03/26/FFXGLXY39SD.html) website of the Mazda3...

AP

[platypus]

doesn't ford own BMW or something??

[P'cisT]

Hah, as if! They own Jaguar though.

[Cosmo Dude]

Ford own Ford, Lincon, Mercury, Mazda, Jaguar, Aston Martin, Volvo and Land Rover.

From memory BMW owned Rover for a time but sold it for a pound due to it's liabilities.

[Rupewrecht]

a mate got a 24 hour test drive of a SP23 last friday. black, manual hatch, too

i had a bit of a fang in it.

handles very well, not much body roll for a standard car.

has lots of lowdown torque but desperately desperately needs to breath top-end - was running out of puff qiuite noticeably.

discovered they do pretty good burnouts, too! i was impressed. ;)


but as he was on his way home that night, a taxi took him out in the left rear quarter. about $5k damage to the rear and the wheel was split as if a corkscrew was used on it. interestingly the airbags didnt go off. but he was fine apart from a sore shoulder.

[platypus]

maybe it was rover, that made the connection for me... or maybe they bid on one another (can't remember...all ready stopped caring)

but interesting note, the SP23 is made on the same chassis, as some ford, and some volvo car... jsut can't remember what.. still not caring