Well its now been a full week since buying my 197FF. Absolutely loving it so far, done around 320 miles, majority round town to/from work and the rest have been out blasting on country roads and A roads. Averaged 22mpg and I reset the trip before going for a blast the other night and saw this drop to 17.5 mpg - But like I say i've been basically driving everywhere with a lead foot.
Heres are a few things i've noticed about the car and just wondered if other owners have similar thoughts. Sorry if this is a long and pointless post, but thought i'd share anyway.
Grip - Overall the car is fantastic in the twisties, grip in the dry is just immense, I don't feel like i've got near the limits of grip and doubt I will on the road without purposely throwing the car sharply into a corner too quickly. The grip in the wet is similarly impressive, infact i'm blown away by it - I'm completely sold on the Conti sport contact 5's that my cars got all round - But we'll see how these go with wear rates. The car feels softer than I expected for a sporty car, but can get a bit bouncy at motorway speeds and above and generally the setup feels quite progressive with no surprises.
Steering - Well weighted, reasonable feedback for an electric system and quite quick too. Can't complain really.
TC - I've found the traction control rarely steps in, i've had it flash up on the dash a few times but that was leaving a roundabout with my foot planted in 2nd gear and with a bumpy exit to a roundabout. It also flashed up a couple of times on the lanes before, again putting power down out of a corner on a rough surface. Either way I feel that the TC helps rather than holds the car back so I think it'll be staying on unless i'm on a track.
Brakes - The brakes feel good, easy to modulate with good feedback. Mine squeal a bit at low speed but are fine under harder braking, they have more pedal travel than I thought they would, but this might just be an illusion because the first third or so of travel applies a very small about of brake. When driving the car hard they definitely require a good amount of pedal pressure to get good power out of them and when braking from high speeds the car can feel quite twitchy and unstable (pretty normal for a small hatch I think) After a hard drive on some A roads near me which consist of long straights with lots of roundabouts I found the brakes get pretty well punished and actually being to fade slightly. Again i'm not too fussed about this as they are getting used really hard but on a track I imagine you'd be coming in every few laps to let them cool - I'd definitely upgrade the pads at least before tracking the car and may do anyway.
Gearbox - Slickish and easy to use at lower speed, but i've found that the gearbox doesn't really like lazy gearshifts. It really needs a positive, firm action to get the best from it. When I first got the car I actually struggled when revving the car hard and shifting across the gate i.e. 2nd to 3rd and 4th to 5th but i've got this sussed now. Like I say, i've found if i'm just trying to lazily shift with a couple of fingers when driving hard the gearbox won't really respond well to this and it works much better with the full weight of your hand and a firmer action when slipping between gears at high speed. I may change the gearbox oil as a precaution as my cars done nearly 80k and I doubt its ever been done - Looks dead easy to do from what i've read here.
Engine - Responsive, free revving and works well with the close ratio gearing of the car. It really does need revving though - Below 3k rpm there's not much power, between 3k and 5k it pulls well and then above 5k it really opens up (VVT I guess) and it rips up to 7k with eas. I've not noticed a flat spot at 2k though which everyone seems to suffer from, but then again I don't really understand this anyway - Unless i'm sat in 6th gear at about 35mph, 2k rpm isn't really used much and i've not noticed it when pulling away normally. If i'm launching the car off the line i'll probably be dropping the clutch above 2k rpm too so can't see how much of a problem it would be.
Heres are a few things i've noticed about the car and just wondered if other owners have similar thoughts. Sorry if this is a long and pointless post, but thought i'd share anyway.
Grip - Overall the car is fantastic in the twisties, grip in the dry is just immense, I don't feel like i've got near the limits of grip and doubt I will on the road without purposely throwing the car sharply into a corner too quickly. The grip in the wet is similarly impressive, infact i'm blown away by it - I'm completely sold on the Conti sport contact 5's that my cars got all round - But we'll see how these go with wear rates. The car feels softer than I expected for a sporty car, but can get a bit bouncy at motorway speeds and above and generally the setup feels quite progressive with no surprises.
Steering - Well weighted, reasonable feedback for an electric system and quite quick too. Can't complain really.
TC - I've found the traction control rarely steps in, i've had it flash up on the dash a few times but that was leaving a roundabout with my foot planted in 2nd gear and with a bumpy exit to a roundabout. It also flashed up a couple of times on the lanes before, again putting power down out of a corner on a rough surface. Either way I feel that the TC helps rather than holds the car back so I think it'll be staying on unless i'm on a track.
Brakes - The brakes feel good, easy to modulate with good feedback. Mine squeal a bit at low speed but are fine under harder braking, they have more pedal travel than I thought they would, but this might just be an illusion because the first third or so of travel applies a very small about of brake. When driving the car hard they definitely require a good amount of pedal pressure to get good power out of them and when braking from high speeds the car can feel quite twitchy and unstable (pretty normal for a small hatch I think) After a hard drive on some A roads near me which consist of long straights with lots of roundabouts I found the brakes get pretty well punished and actually being to fade slightly. Again i'm not too fussed about this as they are getting used really hard but on a track I imagine you'd be coming in every few laps to let them cool - I'd definitely upgrade the pads at least before tracking the car and may do anyway.
Gearbox - Slickish and easy to use at lower speed, but i've found that the gearbox doesn't really like lazy gearshifts. It really needs a positive, firm action to get the best from it. When I first got the car I actually struggled when revving the car hard and shifting across the gate i.e. 2nd to 3rd and 4th to 5th but i've got this sussed now. Like I say, i've found if i'm just trying to lazily shift with a couple of fingers when driving hard the gearbox won't really respond well to this and it works much better with the full weight of your hand and a firmer action when slipping between gears at high speed. I may change the gearbox oil as a precaution as my cars done nearly 80k and I doubt its ever been done - Looks dead easy to do from what i've read here.
Engine - Responsive, free revving and works well with the close ratio gearing of the car. It really does need revving though - Below 3k rpm there's not much power, between 3k and 5k it pulls well and then above 5k it really opens up (VVT I guess) and it rips up to 7k with eas. I've not noticed a flat spot at 2k though which everyone seems to suffer from, but then again I don't really understand this anyway - Unless i'm sat in 6th gear at about 35mph, 2k rpm isn't really used much and i've not noticed it when pulling away normally. If i'm launching the car off the line i'll probably be dropping the clutch above 2k rpm too so can't see how much of a problem it would be.
