Plan B Forum

The original (1970s) Cannonball was run with the backing of Car & Driver Magazine in protest of the ridiculous NATIONAL 55 MPH speed limit, (1974 TO 1995) and to show off the safety of the interstate system. Now C&D has come out against it. MAYBE 55 MPH made some sense east of the Hudson, president Drumpf's favorite river, but it was despised, and often disregarded, in most of the rest of the country.

https://www.hemmings.com/stories/2020/0 ... 2020-08-23

https://www.hemmings.com/stories/2020/0 ... and-stupid

https://carbuzz.com/news/a-fake-cop-car ... all-record

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... virus.html

I had a V-8 Audi A6 a while back. Talk about a German hotrod... A true bahn stormer. I never drove it over 80.

Objecting to a 55MPH speed limit is one thing. Characterizing driving over 100MPH on public roadways as anything but reckless and irresponsible is something else again.

https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-cultur ... ock-yates/

The late Brock Yates, and his Cannonball Run car...

-"BB"-

IIRC, the only time Brock Yates actually won the Cannonball Run was with Dan Gurney in a Ferrari Daytona.

Scooter wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 24, 2020 1:45 am

Objecting to a 55MPH speed limit is one thing. Characterizing driving over 100MPH on public roadways as anything but reckless and irresponsible is something else again.

The Germans seem to manage ok....

Gob wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 24, 2020 6:50 am

Scooter wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 24, 2020 1:45 am

Objecting to a 55MPH speed limit is one thing. Characterizing driving over 100MPH on public roadways as anything but reckless and irresponsible is something else again.

The Germans seem to manage ok....

That's because the Germans — and for the most part, Europeans in general — take driving seriously.  They're not like Americans who read essays like "How to Drive Fast on Drugs While Getting Your Wing-Wang Squeezed and Not Spill Your Drink":

When it comes to taking chances, some people like to play poker or shoot dice; other people prefer to parachute jump, go rhino hunting, or climb ice floes, while still others engage in crime or marriage.  But I like to get drunk and drive like a fool.  Name me, if you can, a better feeling than the one you get when you’re half a bottle of Chivas in the bag with a gram of coke up your nose and a teenage lovely pulling off her tube top in the next seat over while you’re going a hundred miles an hour down a suburban side street.  You’d have to watch the entire Iranian air force crash-land in a liquid petroleum gas storage facility to match this kind of thrill.  If you ever have much more fun than that, you’ll die of pure sensory overload, I’m here to tell you.

and take that as a 'how-to-do-it' text instead of the satire it was intended to be.
(and yes; that is the actual title of the essay — the quoted excerpt is the opening paragraph — which was written and published by P.J. O'Rourke back in 1978; even today you can find links to it from sites such as NPR.org and Jalopnik.com)

-"BB"-

Gob wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 24, 2020 6:50 am

Scooter wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 24, 2020 1:45 am

Objecting to a 55MPH speed limit is one thing. Characterizing driving over 100MPH on public roadways as anything but reckless and irresponsible is something else again.

The Germans seem to manage ok....

This is well beyond your typical German bahn-burner: the current "Cannonball" record is over 2,800 mi (4,500 km) on public roads across an entire continent in 25 hours, 39 minutes—an average speed of 110 mph (177 km/hr) and a top speed of 175 mph (281 km/hr)...

in a modified 2016 Audi S6 disguised to look like a Ford Taurus police interceptor. Police-evasion modifications included brake light kill-switches, radar detectors, laser diffusers, CB-radio, and a roof-mounted thermal camera. Performance modifications included a trunk-mounted 67-gallon auxiliary fuel cell sourced from the car used in Toman and Tabbutt's 2019 cannonball run, modified turbochargers, an upgraded heat-exchanger, and custom ECU tuning that allowed for engine-mapping to be changed on-demand to suit either 91 or 93-octane fuel; allowing the car to generate an estimated 600 horsepower.

Googling around for random information (as one does...) I discovered that the land speed record by car from Land's End to John O'Groats seems to be 9 hours, 36 minutes—an overall average of 86.7 mph. ( Having driven on some of those roads [between Inverness and Penzance] I am suitably impressed!)

If that thing is ever involved in an accident I hope that every mechanic who worked on it to make those modifications is put away for a long time. Disabling safety equipment (brake lights) is a violation of 49 U.S.C. § 30122. Making safety devices and elements inoperative.

And I'd love to know how around 400 pounds of fuel in the trunk (boot) affects the handling of an Audi A6 at 175 mph. I'm guessing 10 mpg = 670 miles per fill = at least 4 pit stops.

Scooter, you need to do a bit of reading about how the Cannonball runs have been accomplished lately. I think it is probably safer than the Los Angeles freeway, driven at 55mph. In addition to the modifications to the car, it is also a team effort with advance scout cars and airplanes in relay.

snailgate

If I ever get back to the UK again I'd like to try that Land's End to John O'Groats run—not trying for a record but just for the hell of it.

ex-khobar Andy wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 24, 2020 12:36 pm

If that thing is ever involved in an accident I hope that every mechanic who worked on it to make those modifications is put away for a long time. Disabling safety equipment (brake lights) is a violation of 49 U.S.C. § 30122. Making safety devices and elements inoperative.

And I'd love to know how around 400 pounds of fuel in the trunk (boot) affects the handling of an Audi A6 at 175 mph. I'm guessing 10 mpg = 670 miles per fill = at least 4 pit stops.

Probably not much. It's no heavier than 2 people in the back seat and a full trunk.

I have seen several trucks (and driven one) with switches to disable brake lights.

2 of my trucks have switches to disable the lights. ALL the lights, including the brake lights.

Factory equipment.

Mind you, they're both ex US Army trucks (my M35A2 6X6 and my M1028 CUCV)

A "dark mode" switch is nothing unusual on a repo tow truck.

Which would be illegal to use on a public road, no?

Probably, but it is common when doing repos...a shutoff for the backup alarm and dome lights, too. When doing repos, the typical setup was dome light disabled, painter's tape over the DOT numbers, company name removed (magnetic signs, usually on the doors), and when close to the car, truck in dark mode. It was set up as a "stealth" truck...gas engine (Ford V10), dark mode switch, no company graphics, "ghosted" (white on light gray) DOT numbers.

Scooter wrote: ↑

Wed Aug 26, 2020 8:47 am

Which would be illegal to use on a public road, no?

Sure, but then he goes and gets sushi and doesn't pay.

Plate o' shrimp.

Burning Petard wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 25, 2020 12:29 am

Scooter, you need to do a bit of reading about how the Cannonball runs have been accomplished lately.

Are the roads they are using as race tracks closed to all other traffic? No? Then those racing on them in this fashion are a menace.

Scooter wrote: ↑

Fri Aug 28, 2020 11:42 pm

Burning Petard wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 25, 2020 12:29 am

Scooter, you need to do a bit of reading about how the Cannonball runs have been accomplished lately.

Are the roads they are using as race tracks closed to all other traffic? No? Then those racing on them in this fashion are a menace.

The Cannonball record is a major $$$$ undertaking with spotter planes, advance vehicles etc looking for radar traps, traffic, accidents, roadworks etc which might hamper a driver setting out to break the C2C record. If the average speed is 110 mph including fuel stops and inevitable traffic - this is total elapsed time so it's not all done at 2 AM and there is no time of day including weekends (I assume they don't do this in a weekday where there would be no way to avoid two rush hours) when there is zero traffic - then there has to be a lot of time at 130 mph or better.

If you need the spotter car to be no more than 10 minutes ahead of you (seems reasonable) and if he is doing 70 mph and you are doing 130 mph the closing speed is 60 mph. So the maximum distance from the race car to the spotter car is 10 miles. So on a 2800 mile journey you need 280 spotter cars (actually 279 because the first 10 miles is 'free' - the spotter car is moving while the race car is still stationary) - more $$$$.

If I'm on the interstate and someone goes by me at 130 I am calling 911. If someone is ever injured by this kind of insanely stupid activity, it's not an accident and I hope that the drivers, the mechanics, the pilots and everyone involved is sued to the point of impoverishment.

On the subject of Germans: the autobahns were built for speed and everyone expects it. Most people drive at speeds which are not unusual in the UK or US. But I've been behind the wheel of a rental Opel of some sort (don't recall - maybe an Omega) overtaking slower traffic when a Porsche 911 appears from nowhere in the mirror (200 kph comes at you very very fast) and the seriously pissed driver is honking and flashing me. In the old DDR (Dresden - Leipzig - Chemnitz triangle) where I was there were still Trabbies on the road and the airport rental agencies were very clear about warning foreigners about German traffic laws and practices.

Looking on Mr Google for stealth repo finds lots of stuff about the danger repo truck drivers face from customers who are less than enthusiastic about their beloved vehicle going back to the lender. I understand how the towing mechanism can be under the bed of a F250 or whatever so as not to attract attention from people to whom all pickup trucks look alike. I understand how the repo truck may not want to have his brights on while he is in someone's driveway (legal in some states) while hooking up a vehicle a few months overdue on the note. But taping over the DOT numbers? Killing the brake lights or the backup lights? That has to be illegal and I could find no reference to it in maybe 20 minutes searching.