coldel

Hey from Richmond Surrey

Have to say wish I had gone this route, I thought the gearbox on my Zed was pretty un-sporty and clunky. Especially now having experienced the manuals in the VX and GT4 which are much sharper, shorter and tight, didnt have the play in them like the Zed.

I guess there are more people that don't make claims each year than do - so the more people you have taking out a particular type of insurance means I would think means more positive outcomes which means you can be more price competitive. Imagine for example flipping it, only 1 person taking out 3rd party only insurance in the UK, if you don't charge them £10k theres a small to reasonable chance you could be in for a big loss on that type of insurance product with it hedged against just one person. There is also the fact that the insurance business runs on such old calculation models and has so many quirks in it that half the time they don't care if it all comes up odd as long as at the end of the day their business makes a profit.

If there is no profit, then a private company would not want to run it so it would become a government operation under the DVLA type thing?

See quite a few in Richmond - grey 370z in the mornings going past the station, blue 350z roadster with DAN or something on the number plate, two black 350z's parked a couple of streets away

What a simply BRILLIANT car for the money - a few people on here looking at the moment, they should take the time to go see this it looks a stunner.

Above. Pics required! Welcome!

I completely steer clear of mainstream insurers now - they are just idiots pressing buttons with no idea what they are talking about. The specialists at least try to engage with customers, understand 'our business which we are paying them for' and speak to you with the intention of trying to win your business rather than seeing you as just another number in a long line of numbers.

Well done mate, feel free to buy every contributor on the thread a beer

Nothing is perfect and can always be improved

Thats your opinion, others won't agree...doesn't make them (or yourself wrong) - the ratings though do not make the people that think its tired wrong either, it just means lots of people want to watch TG for what it is, I am sure if you ran a survey of all viewers you would not get 100% of them saying that the show is 100% correct and in fact might find a majority would replace at least one element of the show. For the record, I really didn't have an issue with JC, I thought he deserved not to continue for being an utter idiot by getting drunk and punching a work colleague and in most jobs you would be dismissed for gross misconduct, but I thought he was a reasonably good presenter and clearly better than the other two.

You are assuming what you find entertaining is what everyone else should find entertaining though...you might bellow and laugh out loud and feel great about watching three guys do something daft whilst someone else might find it just stupid and a waste of time. I think what Dan means is that the reviews of cars on TG tend to be silly camera angles, prewritten funny lines and analogies and very little detail on the car itself - TG focus on making it a visual spectacle and some people are ok with not actually learning anything of any detail about the car and just enjoy the videography. I don't think Dan means to turn TG into a 60 minute documentary but to improve the reviews...although correct me if I am wrong.

You could be right, but it was too late, I had gotten into the habit of not bothering to switch it on and only the change of presenter has made me consider otherwise. I guess I wanted to see car based entertainment and when they spent over half of a show doing stuff like getting army equipment to smash up a building it really was getting to the point where it felt like they couldn't take the show any further forwards, lost the point of the show and my loyalty started to wane.

I keep repeating JP I am not against specials not sure why you keep saying that? I cited an example that I am bored of the special with a 'car racing public transport' idea which got trotted out series after series, I want to see something else - I want to be entertained by a special that is innovative, new and exciting. It really felt like the old presenters were never going to deliver that so I lapsed out the programme. There is tonnes of 'motoring' material out there untapped - is it up to me to say what I want to see, not really, because then it would be predictable for me - I want to be entertained, surprised, delighted and that wont be material I could possibly think up. I was not getting that in the old format as it was predictable and eventually got dull and I had better things to do for an hour. I guess some people like to watch the same format over and over but personally I don't. But that's just my opinion.

I didnt say take away the specials? Not sure where you got that from. They tend to turn out a few of these train races each series and its just my opinion but I tend to switch off as its all too predictable. My point was to remove the dead wood - as I say the bits that feel like they have run their course and replace with something else - what could that be? Well thats the trick and I would suspect it will be a mix of ideas Clarkson had before he left that probably havent had the chance to implement, ideas CE will bring and also with new staff behind the scenes some other ideas. What are they, well if I could answer that right now I wouldn't be sat here at my desk I would be starting up my own TV show... ...at the end of the day, you only have to look at shows like Dr Who, Match of the Day etc which over the years cut out the crap parts that were tired and worn and beefed up with something new and exciting. TG in its current format was a revamp of a revamp of a revamp, so I find it quite bizarre that current TG viewers seem to think doing a revamp now is a bad thing.

Again its conjecture that CE will just sit in the studio and not do drive outs, I appreciate you would not like to see him not driving, but you are assuming that will be the case, we will have to wait and see what happens with his other commitments which he hasn't yet said he will definitely carry on with i.e. radio. Its a good question though, what do we want it to be? CE seems to have indicated he will stay true to the ethos of the show and evolve rather than make any drastic changes - for me I would be looking at the weaker areas (what do you fast forward through when watching it on playback/netflix?) and then seeing what you could fit in there that is different but dovetails with the stronger areas that remain. Things like the news are pointless in my opinion, often not very funny and take up a lot of time and to report 'news' which by the time it hits our screens has been debated on here and by various online news sites well before TG hits our screens. I also felt that the car reviews by May and Hammond when doing them solo were really poor, they had little screen presence and their voices just carried no weight. I would certainly like this area improved as I felt as a threesome they were great, but May and Hammond going solo were pretty awful. I also want something more than 'who can get there fastest me in my car or you two on the train' it was really getting tired (although having not watching the last series they may have evolved this). Its always going to be a difficult one, the first series sans the terrible threesome, so expect some backlash from the die hards, the people that would defend Clarkson punching staff in the face etc who even if they watched an amazing next series would moan anyway. We will see lapsed viewers coming back to see what the new show might bring. Then there is the big majority in the middle who need to get that fix of 'car entertainment' so lets see - the real test will be to see after three years where TG sits.

I would imagine pounding along the motorway the cold air rushing into the engine bay negates a lot of the engine heat, I would think though sitting in traffic will have a detrimental effect (although if you are in traffic loads more power makes no difference!)

There were also some 'funnels' available on here some time back which fitted the standard box to make the airflow more efficient. Not sure if anyone is still doing them?

I think if you are basing your opinions on Chris Evans of the last 5 years then you are missing the point really - as Dan said DFYT etc were TV defining shows, and he did it more than once on more than one media type, no mean feat. In terms of the right man for the job he has all the credentials and I just cannot agree that he isn't the right guy in terms of being a petrol head or capable of producing a great entertainment show - thats pretty baseless looking at the evidence. It could fail because GTi man doesn't want to watch it, but that's also an assumption based on someone car collection from what I am reading above and nothing more, you dont even know what the content is yet. As reading in the press today, he has already put out a tweet for ideas and someone suggested putting Clarkson, May and Hammond in the reasonably priced car which he has said yes to. I just cannot even consider the argument that he is going to arrive and turn it into 60 minutes of looking at cars in a garage and talking about the spec. It will still have entertainment value, anyone that has made hundreds of millions I would expect can see that.

Debating, bickering, all friendly banter! Chris Evans does have money, he wont not have money, he has lots of cars he is fanatical about - I appreciate the theoretical scenario Graham but that isn't what is reality right now and the person we are debating - reality is he is a bloke passionate about his cars on an obsessive scale, which by definition makes him a petrol head. Yeah yeah its not how you stand by your car I don't drive fast as I am too scared of damaging my car because I am not a great driver!

I cannot for one second think that he would spend ages looking at a car on top gear talking about it sat in a garage and that would be that, just because he might have before it doesn't mean in any way that's his only presentation style. You said that 'driving fast doesnt interest him...' as if that was relevant and making a point of your view that he wasn't a petrolhead, so yes I agree you didn't specifically say but you included it as to imply it backed up your point. A petrol head as far as I am concerned is simply someone who is fanatical about cars, which Chris Evans is, I cannot see how its even open to debate as to whether Chris Evans is a petrol head as clearly by definition, he is. In terms of entertainment shows, I think if anything CE is more qualified looking at his CV than either Hammond or May (whose other shows scattered around on freeview are quite frankly rubbish) to make an entertainment show, its what he has made his millions from, irreverent entertainment. He might well fail for other reasons and the possibility is really there and we shall see, but I don't think it will be because of the reasons cited so far i.e. that he isn't a petrol head or that he can't produce an entertainment show.

Why would fast driving define a petrolhead? I don't like track driving, I am not a fast driver out on the roads, but I spend untolds amount of my life looking after my cars, making them look immaculate, then enjoy driving them - am I therefore not a petrolhead? All my friends say unequivocally that I am? If you lookup the definition of petrolhead there is actually one that simply says 'a car fanatic' it doesn't say anything about driving fast. Even looking up the word fanatic as a definition it means someone who has an 'obsession with zeal' which from what I can see Chris Evans has. I think people are mixing the word petrolhead with some other definition of what they want in the next top gear presenter...just my opinion of course.

Yes the three mates having a laugh worked really well and it wont be the same, but it shouldn't be and it needs to take its own path with the presenters they have. All you will get if you try and replicate it are people complaining 'its not the same' etc. I am rather neutral about Chris Evans but happy to watch the show and see how it goes, admittedly I got bored of the old format and had stopped bothering to watch it. But is Chris Evans a petrol head, who knows, its all conjecture and interpretation based on the limited info you read in the media. I certainly saw as many petrolheads as I did posers at Goodwood (I was there with the guys off this forum actually who are all petrolheads!).

Welcome I think with the direct debit scheme in place for VED the extra is a bit easier to absorb as you can manage the cost - so really it shouldnt really be a consideration when purchasing a car, as you say get the right one for you!

When I have seen him interviewed by top gear guys and on other occasions (like when he was at Goodwood the other year and I was stood a yard away as he spoke with a few guests) he displays in general good intimate knowledge of cars, events, history - he doesnt strike me as a rich guy sticking cars into a lock up never to be seen again but someone who has that passion and knows his stuff.