M5

It sounds like the M5 is giving you a degree of fun before the safety kicks in....

I have used sport+ loads this week to dispatch slow campervan in the Highlands. The roads have generally been deserted and great fun, I wish I was in the 911 or Elan. Have you plans to bring the M5 up.

Weather is pants, raining non stop all week and it is 25C plus back in Derby!

Does Sport knock the drivers aids down over the standard setting?

I guess its easily forgotten given the advancement of tyre tech but the only thing keeping near 600hp from spitting you into the weeds is the black contact patches on each corner.

What tyres does the car run on?

Yes, 4WD Sport will be the main reason it moved around initially.  Having 2 x Individual settings is good, you could have one for the dry and the other for wet (normal 4WD).  I've got 2 x Individual settings, but one of them is for Eco Pro mode so I don't use it....  Having the suspension and steering in Sport and engine/gearbox in Comfort is how I've got Sport Individual set, which is perfect for A/B roads if you're pressing on a bit.  Sport suspension is a long way from being too firm and it locks down the active anti roll bars so it covers ground really nicely.

As in further North than Glasgow, not really I'm afraid Bryan. I might get to Helensburgh later this week but hardly up north. We were getting weather warnings for Glasgow but they changed them this morning to say the heavy rain would be further north - it hasn't rained at all today. I think you need to come south a bit to Perth or go over to the likes of Crinan on the west or across to the east and St Andrews: the weather looks much better than the north.

PS4Ss are epic in the wet, and the dry. You won't regret a change in due course.

Another vote for PS4S tyres.

My M3 only has one M button setting and I have it in Comfort for suspension (softest of 3 options), Normal for steering (only 2 choices, Normal and Sport), Sport Plus for the throttle (sharpest of 3 options) and M Dynamic Mode for the stability control (the half-way-house setting between locked down and fully off).

This setup makes an appreciable difference to the liveliness of the car without buggering up its usability.

Mine has so many variables and you can mix and match in any way you want.

The throttle/TC/Stability control has Efficient, Sport, Sport Plus and 2WD with no nanny
The steering has Efficient, Sport and Sport Plus. I can deal with either Efficient or Sport but Sport Plus just makes you think the power steering has broken at anything less than about 50mph.
The suspension has Comfort, Sport and Sport Plus. Comfort is great for 95% of all journeys, Sport firms things up a bit but still very reasonable once the speed is above 40mph and Sport Plus has you steering round changes in tarmac colour.

I can set any combination of those up in the M buttons together with choosing the speed of the gear change and how long it holds a gear.

All of these things can also be selected on their own through buttons on the central consul, so if I was driving in the gentlest of all settings and wanted to firm up the suspension I can move to Sport with one push of the button and Sport Plus with 2 pushes so it is massively adjustable. The gear change speed can be changed between one and 3, on its own, from buttons on top of the gear lever and I tend to keep it in the lowest setting - my rapid bursts of acceleration tend to be in overtaking so once I am past, I just want it to change into the next gear as I lift off. However in setting 2 and definitely in 3, the car doesn't want to change gear and holds on to the gear for ages meaning that when you lift off and pull back in, there is way too much engine braking and it's difficult to keep things smooth. One the road, the only 2 gears you can legally redline are first and second!! (the rev limiter is very smooth and just tails the power away)

I don’t have as many options as the M5 in either car but I like being able to set up an individual mode. In the Golf, comfort is selected most of the time and a pull back on the shift lever gives you sport auto when you want to accelerate more quickly. My settings in Individual are suspension in normal, steering/throttle/ACC/lights in Race and engine (the fake sound) in Eco. I don’t use the other settings or change individual, so I’ve only got two options, one for comfort and the other for fun.

The BMW sits in Adaptive the vast majority of the time as it uses voodoo magic to ensure its in the optimum settings.

I think now I have the settings I like the most, I will not change them. However the ability to change each setting independently and then set up default programs is great. I now have basically 3 settings: it defaults to comfort and normal settings from start up. The M1 button adds the Sport setting for the throttle and the M2 button gives me the full beans.

I tried using the paddles all the time but it became tiring with 8 gears. The car will cruise along in 6th at 30mph and 8th from about 40mph but if you want a quick overtake on an A road you have to drop at least 4 gears and that becomes a bit difficult to keep up with when you go from cruise mode to full bore. It is so much easier to leave it in auto but for maximum driving involvement I can understand why some of you prefer a proper manual box.

JoG has never been much of anything. First time I visited in 1987 the 'hotel' (Cough) was a spit and sawdust pub with five visitors and a pool table with no white ball. Five days from London to Kirkwall using nothing but public transport and a bicycle. Even though they built it up a bit it failed to attract the visitor number it needed. Just looked on satellite view and the ?hotel? is a boarded up "Are we there yet" establishment that suggests it has a long way to go before it 'gets' anywhere.

Sounds just like lands end! Some of the west coast is def6on the list.

Must be better than the A9 north of Inverness although when I was last there it was riddled with road works. More speed traps than visitors and the traffic was pretty horrendous.....