270 mph. World's fastest production car (w/a bit of controversy) is American.

General General Discussion
1

I know there are fellow car nuts out there. On Valentine’s day a Hennessey cracked the 270 mph mark and overtook the Veyron for world’s fastest production car. Pretty impressive considering they have no where near the R&D capacity as Volkswagen and the Bugatti has a W16 and the Venom has a V8. On the whole as a technical achievement, the Bugatti is more impressive to me but that it not a knock against the Venom. Thought the location of JFK Space Center was appropriate and (for all fellow UK Top Gear fans) see if you can spot the cool Stig tribute in the video. Some say…that the Stig ‘started’ this entire record breaking run. :wink:

-Jax

Heck of a nice pic for screensaver:

http://www.foxnews.com/leisure/2014/02/24/hennessey-venom-gt-claims-top-speed-record-for-usa-at-270-mph/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWAavCjVQvM&feature=youtube_gdata_player

2

I watched a show on the production and development of that Veyron. It was very impressive.

3

Saw that too. The detail is incredible. Not sure if it is still happening but when Bugatti initially launched that car VW lost money on every single one sold. It was done simply as a technical exercise. Lexus I have read loses money on every LFA they build for the same reason.

-Jax

4

If I’d have won that damn Powerball last week, I’d have one already on order. I’d even let you two take it for a spin.

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5

0.7G of acceleration. In a car. Lol

6

The Venom is a straight line stallion. The Veyron is a more complete package, but at an obscene price.

To be honest, what I want is a Hennessey Exige (with stock block), or a Hennessey BRZ - since the VelociRaptors and CTS-V upgrade kits put those vehicles in six digit prices for a car.

7

I’ll take anything Hennesy builds or touches. There’s a Velociraptor around town. 550hp ford raptor that’s pretty slick.

8

I’d be interested to see what a stripped Veyron SS could do. I bet they could gut 500lbs from that beast.

And any word yet on the top speed of the new McLearan P1?

9

P1 is probably gonna be around the 235 maybe 245 mark I would guess.

-Jax

10

I dislike the name of the company, but everything they touch is straight sex.

I’m happy that we’re finally sticking it to the anal retentive Germans and snobby Italians where it hurts most for them…cars that are only affordable to a few thousand people on each continent.

11

Still would rather have numerous other cars. Speed isn’t everything. The complete package is, since 99% of the time I’d be driving around in normal traffic, anyways. Still a good technological feat.

12

I read it doesnt “officially” qualify as the worlds fastest.

13

That’s an impressive Lotus Exige.

The P1 is a different kind of fast, top speed isn’t it’s goal. Conquering “The Ring” and other racetracks is what that car is all about.

14

I have the luxury of driving by their shop on the reg and there are many times a CTS V or other GM car pulls out and goes WOT, it is a great sight. Doesn’t hurt that they have their own test track.

15

I’d think it would be the reverse, considering getting 270mph out of an V8 is a greater technical achievement than a V16 I’d guess. What tech about the Bugatti do you find it’s most impressive achievements? Pretty damn amazing regardless to be sure.

16

Correct.

It is not a true production car so it does not actually qualify. Impressive non the less and an awesome achievement.

17

I think the reason is because it has to make two passes then the average speed of the two passes is used to determine the record. This was one pass, that’s all NASA would allow.

18

Here is the thing, it the Veyron you actually have a W16 to keep the overall package smaller, and 4 turbos. I don’t know how much boost it is running, but I would imagine it is somewhere around 1 bar (14.5psi) or less. In a turbo’d engine, you roughly double the naturally aspirated HP with 1 bar of boost. This means that the LS7 in the Hennessey is running anywhere from 1.5 to 2 bar. Can you build an LS7 to hold 2 bar reliably? The most I have seen that hold for is maybe 50 or 75 1/4 mile passes at the track before you begin to have leak down and may need a rebuild of some sort, at least re-ringing it. Not to mention the cars that I have personally seen run 25psi or boost or more on an LS-anything have to change their spark plugs on an extreme basis. We would take a customer car off the trailer, warm up the engine on a set of plugs, and change them out for a new set before the car would run down the track. That means you can be in full boost for what, 10minutes? The LS7 was never designed for boost, the heads require a lot of work, you need inconel exhaust valves, not to mention expensive valve train upgrades to keep the springs stable at high revs and high boost. I don’t run boost and my rockers are $2K and are not designed for street use, meaning prolonged running as in driving from NJ to Florida. I would imagine the LS7 in the Hennessey has a similar set of Jessels in it, they are not designed to last a lot of miles. I can go on and on.

Point is, the Hennessey is impressive, but being a modified car, it will not be as reliable as a factory offering. Then again for the $600K price tag of the Venom you can buy 3 of them for the price of one Veyron lol.

19

That too. But it is not a production car. It is a modified Lotus Chassis and a modified GM engine.

20

Good info, thanx. I have to say, if it’s not an actual production car, I’m now not impressed in the least. Anyone can make a “one of” car to hit those speeds. When a car can do that as a production/factory offering, hence the “worlds fastest production car” that’s far more impressive.