Riding home from work in my stock W208 CLK 55 AMG on I95. I start to hear what sounds like an F1 type of sound coming from behind me. Glance back, HIDs low to the ground, drop top Ferrari flies by and slows to a crawl in front of me. I put down the cigarette I was about to light and
*Click* - S mode
*Flip* - ESP/TCS off
*Slap* - downshift 3rd
We clear a little traffic, by now he's in the right lane, me 2 lanes over, 1 car between us, and I see the open road ahead of the vehicle between. As anticipated dude in the Ferrari hits it, I hear the revs from his car, he jumps to the middle lane, I jump right behind him and we're off. As I squeeze the throttle I wonder if I even stand a chance...Oh well!? I hear his exhaust screaming higher and higher pitch as I slap 4th then D and reel in the a$$ end of this bright red poser mobile. Took me a few seconds, but I run up on his back bumper to the point where I can almost read the stamp on his muffler tips. I slide over to the next lane to pass him at about 130-140mph and of course he lets off. I let off too, pull up on the side of him and his tints are like negative 82 percent...can't see scheisse! I'm smiling of course as I'm sure he saw my face clearly. We slow to a cruise, he swurves into the far right lane flies by all traffic and gets off at the next exit.

Nobody believes this story since it was AN ALMIGHTY FERRARI. I looked it up the next day and I think it was probably a few years older something like a 360 or somethin like that 3.6L V8 convertible. I'm not into those high end cars, so I'm not very knowledgeable, but I know he got his a$$ handed to him by an ancient AMG!

http://images.google.com/images?um=1..._rfai=&start=0

 

Good kill, but unfortunately, Ferrari's are that not fast, especially not the 360's. They only make around 400hp to the crank.

 

my paper racing lol:

360 Spider: 400 hp, 275 tq, 3197 lb,...7.99 lb/hp; either a 6 spd manual or 6 spdauto, co-efficient of drag: 0.36, stock 1/4mile trap speeds ranging from 109 - 115 and running mid to high 12s....some with low 12s

CLK55: 342 hp, 376 tq, 3450 lb,..10.09 lb/hp; 5spd auto; coefficient of drag: 0.32; stock 1/4mile trap speeds ranging from 106 to 109.....running low to mid 13s....

with the torque advantage, i would not be shocked by any means to see a CLK55 pulling a 360 spider down low below 100. up top though, with the gearing and the lb/hp difference, i would say 9 times out of 10 a stock CLK55 doesn't pull on a stock 360 Modena Spider. its tough to believe, though with the tq difference and coefficient of drag difference, i'm sure its possible. additionally, if it was a 6spd manual, driver may have not been good.....nice kill either way! nothing like the element of surprise!

and for the record, the 360 modena coupes are about 100 less lbs, have a higher top speed of about 9 mph faster (189-190), have a drag coefficient of 0.32, and trap north of 117-118.

 

400hp at the crank can be a lot when the car ways just a smidge above 3000 lbs.

how do you think a lotus gets by with such a small motor? its light weight. its all about that lb/hp ratio and other miscellaneous factors (COD, gearing/final drive, tq). its not all about the hp.

 

This is the truth. I was just making generalizations at the point. In this day and age, 360s, as beautiful as they are, are considered dated in terms of performance.

It is not all about HP, I concur and I know this very well. In fact, it's more about weight/whp. A 360 Spider will weigh in (curb weight) around 3200 and dyno around 325rwhp. Equally roughly 9.84:1.

Now I don't know much about 01 CLK55 AMGs, but I will assume they dyno around 300rwhp on a good day and make boatloads more torque but probably curb weigh in around 3450. So that is 11.5:1.

With that said, I believe in a legitimate race, the CLK55 would've lost to the 360. However, I believe that in this case, the OP probably took the 360 because the 360 may have been in an inappropriate gear for the speeds he was traveling (most likely one gear too high).

 

well put. as far as what clk55s dyno, i think they are in the 260-280 range, depending on dyno (i've seen 260 from a dyno dynamics and some in the 275 ranges on a dynojet)

 

nice story

 

nice run.... i had a similar story when i had my 01 clk55.... (vs a 360) very close race.... i won. but we backed off by 120......

 

Nice kill! Having had a couple of Ferraris I can tell you that some are REALLY not that fast and some are blindingly fast. You may not have the same results with a 288 GTO and above! Again, nice kill!

 

I didn't hear him change gears at all, his exhaust just kept screaming higher and higher pitch like a bike.

 

I don't doubt it happened. But if 360s were REALLY that slow (driver mod) then it wouldn't have been a front runner (and winner) in SCCA T1 against LS2 C6s, C5Zs and restricted SRT10 Vipers...

 

NICE NICE =d

 

I think u meant to say if CLKs were really that fast

 

I will be looking for some 360's so i can surprise them with my " Milf Mobile" as my friends call it =D

 

if you've never driven one you should. Pretty sure you'll want one within 5 minutes. If you're fortunate to drive a 360 CS, you'll offer up a kidney on the spot.

 

Almost forgot - tailgating at triple digits is really effin' stupid...

 

Nice run ! I always wanted a 360, its not about HP and speed.
Its all about the sound and the beauty ! Its a classic F car.
I am waiting for F430 which is much faster than 360 and much better in reliability.

 

It was probably an F355, not a 360. They look very much alike, but the 360 is much faster. F355 ragtop vs a CLK55 would be a closer matchup:
http://www.motortrend.com/roadtests/...per_specs.html

F360 convertibles trap at 113+ (here's a road test of a Modena convertible that trapped at 113.5, and here's another that ran a 12.2 @ 115), only way you'd reel one of those in in a 208 is if it had a loose nut behind the wheel with a few screws loose who doesn't quite understand the concept of gearing.

The hardtop is even faster; Motorweek ran a 12.3 @ 119 in this one, and plenty of others were in the same range.

 

Motorweek, due to testing procedures, is notoriously high in trap speeds by 3-4 mph sometimes. Beyond what is achievable by a stock car.

The 360 isn't remotely close to a 119mph trap speed. Are there any other examples in that range?

 

That may be true in some cases (as w/all mags), but on the whole in my experience they're not running consistently faster than other publications; in fact I've seen multiple examples on there that trapped lower than other tests, or the same. Examples:

2006 Charger SRT8: 104 mph (others have gotten 3-5 mph faster):
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2529a.shtml

2001 Z06: 113 trap:
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2002.shtml

2007 Z06/Viper/Gt500: 121/120/113 traps respectively:
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2625a.shtml

2009 Camaro SS: 109 trap:
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2906a.shtml

2004 E55: 114 trap (most US mags got 115-116 in it):
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2247.shtml

2005 M5: 117 mph:
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2625a.shtml

2005 M6: 115 mph (slower than other publications):
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2551a.shtml

2007 335i: 103 mph (several other mags have gotten 2-3 mph faster)
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2624b.shtml

2005 CL65 AMG: trap of 115 mph (other publications got this in a CL600, far less hp, and owners have trapped 120-ish in them as I recall):
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2453.shtml

I could go on, but as you can see there are plenty of examples of them trapping the same, and slower, than other mags got. I know that in the 208 they trapped 107, right in there with what C&D/R&T/MT got...so while their F360 trap was definitely on the high side, I don't see it as fitting any pattern on their part, nor does a collective review of their tests indicate any pattern of excessive deviation on the high side from others' traps.

Perhaps here they had a factory freak (or a ringer), or maybe they just got a fantastic DA that day (not sure whether they correct or not).

Based upon its weight and hp, I calculate that it should run 115-116, so 119 is definitely on the high side, but 30 or so hp would get it there, not impossible for a handbuilt motor; further, one of the convertibles I linked to trapped at 115, and it's 150 pounds heavier than the coupe...their traps, though, seem to vary wildly based upon the different tests I've seen, so perhaps the QC isn't what it should be...

Anyway, even at the rated hp it should trap 115-116, which is still 8-10 mph faster than a 208 should run, so at those speeds it should pull a 208 pretty hard.

I'll have to look through some old mags when I get home, as there seems to be a dearth of tests for that thing online, at least using google....road & track got a far lower trap, 112.5, which is 3mph below what it should hit (but R&T doesn't correct their numbers and have trapped much lower than others in multiple cars as a result), but I know that other pubs got better than that, will have to look when I get home tonight.

 

I was expecting that much sooner

I doubt it, I'd much rather take the car in your sig or a Supra. I'm not into Ferrari, Lambo, super high end stuff. Give me that old school Porsche or Supra w/ mods and I'll go hunting for the 100k + cars

 

Haha, this is what happens to Supras in my 100k + cars.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-AN7EmO38WE

Even with the 1 car jump, fully spooled 460whp, and me with an extra passenger, I pull him in by 120.

Exotics are fast when driven properly, 90% of the videos you see on YouTube are of fat bald guys driving beyond their skill level. I don't drive my cars like the 360 you raced.

 

That's good data, thanks. I do know of some examples that were simply impossible such as the G8 GXP, 112mph iirc, Honda Del Sol from years back. A friend wrote to them complaining about a BMW or Porsche test too. They have some huge swings, that's for sure.

I was thinking - if they don't calculate the average speed in the last 60ft, and a shift is needed, would that throw it off much?


Did you happen to notice any differences between manual and paddle shift cars?

I thought R&T did correct their numbers, no?

 

They do, which leads me to believe that they don't correct, which would explain some cars testing faster, others testing slower, though that wouldn't explain a GXP hitting 112 (but Pontiac has a history of providing ringers; once in the 60's they gave the mags a GTO with a full race motor in place of the stocker)...

Well, there are two methods, one as is done at true drag strips where the avg is calculated, the other where the actual terminal velocity is calculated; the latter will normally give faster traps, unless maybe someone was a horrendous shifter and as a result slowed down somehow at the very end.

Afaik the mags generally use the averaging method, even when they use the GPS-based test systems.

Didn't get the chance to check. I know that both of the MW cars were sequential manuals, and I believe that the MT car was a manual, let me check...yup, it was. Maybe the sequentials trap a bit better, dunno, not enough data points unfortunately....hold up, let me check the European site...OK, they've got two tests, both manuals, both hit 0-200 km/h in 16.1 / 16.4, in the same range as the C5 Z06 and C6 6M, both of which were in the mid-16 range, so I'd figure that a 6M 360 should probably be pretty comparable in terms of acceleration to those...but they don't have any sequentials (other than the Challenge Stradale, which did it in 15.5 but a) has 25 more hp, and b) is about 80 kg lighter), so can't tell for certain if that is what makes the difference.

Nope, that's Car & Driver:
http://www.caranddriver.com/features/08q3/how_does_c_d_test_cars_-info.
Road & Track, otoh, doesn't correct:
http://www.roadandtrack.com/tests/car/how_we_test

 

Very interesting. I looked at some of the Motorweek times and sure enough, they were within the bell curve. Thanks for all the info.