VANAGON archives -- September 2003, week 4 (#279)

Date:         Tue, 23 Sep 2003 20:01:21 -0700
Reply-To:     Shawn Wright <swright@ZUIKO.SLS.BC.CA>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Shawn Wright <swright@ZUIKO.SLS.BC.CA>
Subject:      Re: [Vwdiesel] top speed 82 Rabbit 1.6 NA
In-Reply-To:  <4784141.1064365854259.JavaMail.laplante@mac.com>
Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII

I learned to drive on my parents' '81 Diesel Rabbit LS, 5sp with 175/70R14
tires. It would easily do an indicated 140km/h on a long flat straight. I soon
discovered that it did not handle gravel corners whilst decelerating from
that speed, leading to my first (and hopefully last) self induced accident...
(I spun it several times in the gravel, then just as I thought I was in the
clear, I nudged a pole with the front fender. :-(

On 23 Sep 2003 at 20:10, Mark Laplante <laplante@mac.com> wrote:

> I am sure this has come up before -- I looked through the archives for 2003 and
> didn't find anything recent other than a snail-like Rabbit and some discussions
> of top speeds with a turbo.
>
> I just put on some new tires (175/70/13) and now I can go over 65 mph without
> vibration. I top out at 72 mph indicated on level ground. The only smoke I ever
> see is a little bit of white smoke at startup. No black smoke visible in the
> rearview at full throttle. Letting off the throttle a hair didn't seem to cause
> an immediate slow down -- maybe I am just wasting fuel holding it to the floor?
> I get somewhere in the mid to upper 40s for mileage. Transmission is 4-speed
> manual (3+E) -- don't know the code.
>
> Should I be able to get much faster than 72 mph on flatland? (On short downhills
> I can get to 75 mph). I plan to get out my handheld GPS to see if it differs
> much from the speedo (after converting knots to mph).
>
> Test runs conducted with driver's window all the way down. Top speed did not
> seem to be affected by adding an adult and child passengers.
>
> Funny thing is I still have trouble with SUVs and cell-phone occupied drivers
> not accelerating fast enough for me.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Mark
> _______________________________________________
> vwdiesel mailing list
> vwdiesel@vwfans.com
> http://www.audifans.com/mailman/listinfo/vwdiesel
>

--
Shawn Wright
http://Zuiko.sls.bc.ca/swright
'88 Westy 375k
'85 Jetta D 263k
'85 Jetta TD 482k (retired)
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