well i was curious about all the crap from the spec v dudes about how their ride can beat any ra blahblahblah..so i stopped by the dealer and test drove a 2005 spec v to see for myself..alone i might add ( no dealer with me)..i took it way out in the country to some long straight roads to test...bottom line for me is the car is extremely similar to the RA..good acceleration to 60mph..but so is my RA..from 60-100mph, the RA has the spec v beat..period...the spec v felt good and solid but steering seemed a little looser than RA..but all in all a good car too..still, the RA handles better, looks better, and though despite the lower HP rating, seems to have a bit more power when driven hard...I'm satisfied i bought the RA instead of the spec v..but if there were no RA's..i could be happy in a spec V..that's as diplomatic as I can get...anyone else feel the same?

 

untill the engine ate the throttle body plate screws and started sucking back 1L of oil a day

 

heh, ya but sadly it'd still probably be worth more at trade-in time even with those problems than a pristine ralliart

Regarding the first comments, it's a drivers race. I totally agree with you about the spec v being quite a bit uglier.

 

... so true.

Not being built in japan was the major turnoff for me. My ralliart is JDM yO ! Good performing car, just lacks topend compare to the ralliart. It's funny, they have the LSD, yet when ever I encouter one I seem to always out launch them.

 

Motor Trend did a comparison a while back and the RA came out on top:

http://www.technogeeky.com/ralliart/...nd_potenza.jpg

Sport Compact Car also did a comparison where they dynoed both cars, and they both made the same whp/torque.

 

i have that issue somewhere...

look at the RA's purty numbers... espec. under the 0-30 and 0-60 times

 

I would like to read that SCC issue . pse bring me the date of it to see if I can get a back issue

 

I think they are probably very close. I've seen reviews that say basically trash the RA and say the spec-v is so much better because the spec-v has more power and handles better; however, they probably tested the ralliart with the stock tires. The dynorun done in that review shows the ralliart putting out pretty much the exact same amount of power to the wheels as the spec-v; however, it only displayed the peak amount of power to be the same, and we all know the RA has a broader powerband, so what does that tell you?

Incidentely, the i've seen the stock tires in action in videos and the amount of grip is horrible. The tires I have on my RA grip far better than the ones that came on the car and they arn't even high end tires, just lower end V-rated.

 

July of 2004, I'd guess. Here's a LINK to the story.

 

I think that in the article its pretty obvious that the tires on the ralliart were trash. Having bad tires is going to hurt your 0-60, quarter mile times and make it handle like trash too. The skidpad numbers in that indicate to me that the tires on the ralliart were likely the cheap tires that come on the car. They even mentioned that the spec -v had relatively sticky tires and that the ralliart had "cheap rubber" so there you go. Reading the article you can tell the author is bias towards the nissan.

lol in one of the pictures it shows them smoking the front tires like crazy. I hope they waited until after the serious tests to beat the car.

The other somewhat annoying part is the part where they say that they failed every attempt to get the car sideways w/o the use of the e-brake. I havn't even tried to get my RA sideways but i'm pretty sure if i had enough entery speed that you could drift it with the brakes. I would try it but I don't feel like doing the brakes all the time.

 

speaking of tires...my 05 RA came with goodyear eagle rsa's..are those the new stock tires..did they have bridgestone on 04s?..i only have 9k on the car..are the eagles good tires?..they seem to be so far.

 

They'll last for a long time, but they absolutely suck when it comes to performance.

The old Bridgestone Potenzas aren't anything special, but they are much, much better performance tires. The car is half a sec slower on Goodyears than it was on the old Bridgestones.

 

http://www.sportcompactcarweb.com/ro...rs_comparison/



theres the SCC magazine article. I could do without the psuedo intellectual writer trying to be funny. Sometimes just straight up comparisons and results are more effective than saying things, "like If the Spec V is a scalpel, the Lancer Ralliart is a garden hoe."

It's no secret that dave coleman is a HUGE spec V fan, and this junior achievement author is all on hizzz balllzac.

 

Yeah I agree, all the writers comments are stupid considering hes comparing a ralliart with "cheap rubber" against a spec-v with "relatively sticky tires"