OT: Just received this in the mail

The details

I think the escalating power wars are verging on ridiculous. Mainly because chassis technology cannot keep up. I would say for the most part, cars with over 500BHP (and similar torque) cannot employ this power on the street. It can only be exploited on a racetrack.

It's hard for me to believe, for example, the Hennessey car can post those numbers on street tires, even on a dragstrip. That car almost certainly had to have racing slicks. Even all wheel drive is not going to tame those kind of massive power numbers.

If it weren't for automatic traction and throttle control, tons of these super-powered Mercedes and other mega-cars would be planted sideways every day. Sans those controls, when your average owner planted the throttle in a modest fit of road rage, those tires would break loose in a heartbeat and those supercars would become super-expensive scrap metal.

At levels like 600-700 BHP, the numbers are just about image and bragging rights IMHO, with little functional value, even in performance terms, to recommend them. (Unless you are racing or going for sustained top speed runs of course.)



DLY