How do you enjoy fast cars in Australia/NZ?

[A44RON]

Hi all,

I currently live across the pond in NZ, but the same applies over in Aus, as the authorities here tend to copy your rules.

How do owners of BMW M cars, Audi RS', Porsches, HSVs etc cope?

I've got a Z4 Coupe 3.0SI and I'd wager I never use more than 50% of its performance potential here. Anything with more than 250bhp just seems a waste of time, imo.

How do you feed your passion for driving down here?

Cheers

[romeodelta]

I hear ya.

Options as I see it are:

- Run the risk of losing your license and big fines
- Track days
- Run something that gets it's kicks at lower speeds
- Different form of car enjoyment - off-roading etc.

[mikiec]

Drive a V10 r8. While I haven’t given it death in the top gears I still manage to ring it out in the lower gears and throughly enjoy a good blast in it.
I have a couple of good roads that I’ll take it through (at times they are deserted) plus the odd big road trip making sure I leave at the crack of dawn with my belkin radar detector.

It would be nice to have a big open stretch to take it beyond 200 kms but that certainly doesn’t stop me loving it.

[hman]

Its a good question - I moved here from the UK over a year ago and in that year I have wondered the same thing over and over, in fact I have gone right off the idea of owning something ludicrously fast (car or bike) because there is....no point.

I have concluded that most - if not all of the many many high powered cars driven over here are just driven by posers with little or no interest in really doing more than a quick squirt up the on-ramp from stand still at the lights ( why are those lights even there??) to 100kph.

For those of you not from around these parts let me explain my experience of the attitude to speeding over here:-

There is an overbearing sense of - if you speed you will 100% get nicked and fined heavily.
• Cops with cameras / speedguns hide in hedges,
• Cops with cameras / speedguns sit in the median
• Cops with cameras / speedguns sit in unmarked vehicles parked up at the side of the roads - often!
• The road bridges have cameras,
• The traffic lights have both kinds of cameras
• The tunnels have cameras
• The slip roads have cameras

The speed limits are all over the place as well - the road outside my house is a 60kph road (it really should be a 40 or a 50kph limit) - its a residential street yet most of the motorways through melbourne are at 80kph or 100 kph if you are lucky - the highest I have seen it is 110kph and that was on a road in the country.

Here in Victoria:-

Less than 10kph = 1 point $201
10-24kph over = 3 pt and $322
25kph over = 3 month ban and $443,
30kph over = 3 month ban and $524,
35kph over = 6 month ban and $604,
40kph over = 6 month ban and $685,
45kph or more = 12 month ban and $806

Scenario : I am on the freeway, and the limit is 80kph (50mph) and I am detected at 105 kph (66mph) - which is very easy to do if you were cruising along and missed the change in speed limit from 100kph to 80kph then you've just lost your licence for 3 months and cost yourself $443!!!

Nett result is that very few drivers exceed the posted limit, but they all want to get there as quickly as possible though.. this means :-

• Lane hogging (not moving left) is rife, because apparently drivers think that moving to the left and letting someone past is some sort of affront to their driving prowess
• Undertaking (passing on the left) is rife, because of the lane hogging
• No-one lets you into lane 1 when you joining the motorway, because thats pushing in apparently
• No-one lets you out of a T-junction , that's queue jumping apparently
• No-one lets you in when merging, thats queue jumping apparently
• If you don't move off within a 1/10th of a second of the light changing green you will be punished audibly
• If you stop when the light is amber, god help you.
• Everyone is so paranoid about speeding that they pay more attention to their speedo and not enough attention to the hazards ahead - you see so many rear end shunts its not even funny.

Unfortunately this all has the combined effect that the usual easy going sociable Aussie often turns into an arrogant, aggressive, maniac with few driving skills and even less patience. There is also little respect for the government as they know these speeding fines are just a stealth tax.

I was a little bit disappointed about this when I first started living here, but its become "normal" and so I don't notice it anymore, however one of the things I am looking forward to when I visit the UK later this year is actually getting in a car and driving along some nice stretches of A roads, with roundabouts instead of traffic lights (and therefore no gridlock or stop starting ) and without the aforementioned tttery of driving in Australia - and I'll be making decent progress at the same time.

Anyway, to answer the OP, as I said earlier, I just don't think the intention is there in 99% of drivers, there's a couple of race tracks that do driver days but they are few and far between.

[Bibbs]

And the occasional fine ..

[hman]

are the fines not huge for getting caught with that - and don’t they have radar detector detectors?

[Bibbs]

hman said:

are the fines not huge for getting caught with that - and don’t they have radar detector detectors?

WA they are legal .. and yes, they have detector detectors, by that time I've scrubbed off enough speed and give them a wave.

[Jimmy No Hands]

As far as I can tell (at least in WA) you enjoy yourself by leaving 11's & donuts all over rural areas at ungodly hours. Seriously, I have never, ever seen more tyre on tarmac anywhere in the world. Even at remote junctions.

After driving here for a month we bought a Pajero I had a new Mustang for the day before Christmas and I was just constantly conscious about cameras and police, to the point I just couldn't enjoy it.

They are sneaky bds with cameras, too. I didn't know detectors were legal, thanks for letting me know..

Can't speak for NZ.

[hman]

Yeah nah, totally illegal in Victoria apparently- fines are in the thousands for radar detectors

[Kawasicki]

I moved from the UK to Victoria. I was shocked at the start, got fined regularly and slowed down to the pace of everyone else...that means crawling along at 102 indicated in a clump of cars on an otherwise empty road, trying to fight the boredom. I quickly sold my quick bike...then slowly copped on.

I bought a fast trail bike...and started riding on fairly remote forest gravel roads for fun. The police don’t seem to care about anything other than the bike being fully road legal, so it was gigantic fun...and really dangerous too! Bonus! The trail bike was hilariously good fun on normal public roads also, so it became my main form of transport.

I also had a fast Aussie saloon as a family car. Boring to drive, due to police control, but once again I figured out that gravel backroads aren’t really policed, as there are too many, and they are rarely used....so I did a lot of sliding around on gravel with the car too.

You can have fun, just not on sealed surfaces!

[A44RON]

Bibbs said:

hman said:

are the fines not huge for getting caught with that - and don’t they have radar detector detectors?

WA they are legal .. and yes, they have detector detectors, by that time I've scrubbed off enough speed and give them a wave.

Brilliant

My Valentine V1 radar detector got stolen a few months ago and I'm in two minds about buying another one (they're legal here). Suppose it would pay for itself after a short while.

Some of the boys in blue here do a sneeky thing of turning their radar on only when you're in striking distance (c200 metres) to try and catch you out, if there's no other traffic around.

[hman]

And they wonder why they are loathed by all motorists

[NSNO]

I used to own an E55, which is great for cruising on the autobahn, but not so much for the freeways over here. The acceleration was unreal and you get up to the speed limit in no time. I drove across the Nullarbor and ended up with a total of nearly $1,000 of speeding fines. One was $600 alone from doing 130 in a 110 in the middle of nowhere and the other was going up the Hume Highway by a highway car hiding under the bridge. I had a UK license at the time and eventually decided to get a NSW license to obtain cheaper CTP. However when I exchanged my license, I had six points on it straight away, that I'd picked up on my UK license. I've now got a GTI which is still nippy but a lot more fun on twisty roads. I think the situation is worse on the East coast compared to what I remember out West. During the recent holidays I drove down the coast from Sydney and spotted about eight cop cars in about four hours. The speed limits certainly are strange here, sometimes you can have a single lane road with a speed limit of 100, which seems pretty reasonable but then on the Hume Highway its only a maximum of 110, so if your driving from Sydney to Melbourne then this is mind numbing boring. Also on the Pacific Highway which isn't the best of roads, the speed limit often changes from 110 to 100, with the police hiding in the bushes ready to pounce on anyone not noticing this. I used to enjoy driving on the continent as I found the driving standard a lot better compared to the UK. However I find myself now looking forward to driving in the UK, because it is so bad here. As all of the focus here is on speed, people are constantly looking at their speedometer and haven't got a clue what is going on around them, then you have people overtaking at 2km/h faster than the person they're overtaking.

[hman]

Yep - as I mentioned above the U.K. seems almost a utopia for getting about in a car... luckily Australia has so many other great things to do, but it’s still pity about the focus on speeding and not driving standards..

[Bibbs]

Last few times I've been to the UK, I've noticed a change though.

More cars, and people deliberately hindering progress.

90% of the time I couldn't get near the speed limit if I tried.

As soon as you get out of Perth's CBD, and off the Freeway, you can usually get away with it.

The detector helps, it's saved me multiple times from licence losing speeds.

Edited by Bibbs on Monday 1st July 01:01

[AW111]

Big speeds on public roads have been a no-no here for decades.

If you want to drive fast - motorsport.
Track days, autocross, rallying, etc.; there's plenty of opportunity.

[Pommy]

I don't think you can

Anything over the equivalent of 80mph is a problem and it's bloody hard to enjoy anything slightly quick.

I've got an Astra RSV and I'm very reticent to even put the accelerator down in that - it's insane.

I do however dream of owning something bonkers, removing the number plate and doing Burns Beach freeway entrance to Perth CBD at 2am and reckon it can be done in 6 minutes

[Jimmy No Hands]

Pommy said:

I don't think you can

Anything over the equivalent of 80mph is a problem and it's bloody hard to enjoy anything slightly quick.

I've got an Astra RSV and I'm very reticent to even put the accelerator down in that - it's insane.

I do however dream of owning something bonkers, removing the number plate and doing Burns Beach freeway entrance to Perth CBD at 2am and reckon it can be done in 6 minutes

Get a 25 year old Pajero, I can put my foot flat to the floor for 23 seconds. Exhilarating.

[Pommy]

Jimmy No Hands said:

Pommy said:

I don't think you can

Anything over the equivalent of 80mph is a problem and it's bloody hard to enjoy anything slightly quick.

I've got an Astra RSV and I'm very reticent to even put the accelerator down in that - it's insane.

I do however dream of owning something bonkers, removing the number plate and doing Burns Beach freeway entrance to Perth CBD at 2am and reckon it can be done in 6 minutes

Get a 25 year old Pajero, I can put my foot flat to the floor for 23 seconds. Exhilarating.

At least something in your life takes longer than 22 seconds

[mhh]

Adelaide has the Adelaide Hills, thank god. Still danger from the boys in blue if you aren't careful but there are plenty of empty, fun roads just minutes from the CBD. But for the best driving roads in Australia, get to Tasmania. Or the outback.