What would it take to get a Commodore to 300+ Km/h?

[sjhugh]

It’s not all about power, a well set up car it a good start but aero is the real secret and in particular under the car.

A stock 2010 C63 with only 336kw, their limiters turned off, a boxy front and not much lighter than the Commodore will on a long stretch of road hit between 310 and 319km/h.
I’ve read and seen many videos of it on the MB forums and the owners talk about how stable the cars are and that it comes from the flat undercarriage of the cars.

The early Series 2 VE’s Commodores that came with the undercarriage panels might be the ones to try a speed test with but even they don’t have all the panelling the AMG has.

My BMW also has a flat undercarriage and even though it isn’t quite as fast as some of my Commodores it definitely feels like it’s hugging the road when accelerating over 200+km/h compared to the Holden’s. The Commodore always feels too fidgety in the front at high speed in my opinion.

[JJW501]

Power has little to do with top speed, it is only a bandaid to poor aero and will not necessarily yield good results even with 1000hp.

Years ago I had an R1 motorcycle. I was at a location not to be named and travelling rather fast, bike would pull an indicated 260kmh in 5th gear. Upon changing to 6th, and applying full throttle, speed did not increase.

I thought this was a bike good for 290+ and was a bit disappointed.

At this time I forced y head down lower and closer to the windscreen. Immediately my speed went to 270, throttle position same.

Then I could feel the wind on my elbows so I tucked them in very tight and my speed went to 280 indicated.

Then I could feel the wind on my outer thighs and thought about trying to squeeze them in but I saw something on the road and by the time I has identified it, I was past it.

At this time I decided I was going plenty fast enough and slowed down to a more sensible speed.

At this time in my life, I was also not able to get more than 1000km out of a rear tyre. At these speeds, the rear tyre is turning faster than the fron, hence why more power is not going to delivery more speed forever.

With 1hp you could accelerate forever if there was no friction or wind resistance slowing you down

By the time you made a passenger car aerodynamic, you could have just invest in a vehicle that had some design features which were intended for high speed.

And that is the problem with these challenges. It is not a challenge, just a pissing contest of who wants to waste the most money. But it sure is a lot of fun along the way, just that chasing a specific record or number seems a bit pointless to me because no matter what you achieve, I can do better with another $100K. Or maybe another $1M!

JJW

[macca_779]

As above. You want to do 300km/h. Go drop $8k on an early bussa.

I'm getting an S1000R in the new year. It's capable of 9sec quarters stock as a rock. But it will only do 255km/h instead of the 300+ the S1000RR will do with basically the same engine.

At first I was dissapointed with this as it's still got 160Hp (RR has 193 but less torque). But it's geared lower which is an easy fix. But then I thought, I'm bloody crazy. It's a street fighter bike so even with appropriate gearing it's still a naked bike so the aero disadvantage isn't going to offer much higher speeds anyway even if I could put up with the wind in my face.

[Micks]

It’s not all about power, a well set up car it a good start but aero is the real secret and in particular under the car.

A stock 2010 C63 with only 336kw, their limiters turned off, a boxy front and not much lighter than the Commodore will on a long stretch of road hit between 310 and 319km/h.
I’ve read and seen many videos of it on the MB forums and the owners talk about how stable the cars are and that it comes from the flat undercarriage of the cars.

The early Series 2 VE’s Commodores that came with the undercarriage panels might be the ones to try a speed test with but even they don’t have all the panelling the AMG has.

My BMW also has a flat undercarriage and even though it isn’t quite as fast as some of my Commodores it definitely feels like it’s hugging the road when accelerating over 200+km/h compared to the Holden’s. The Commodore always feels too fidgety in the front at high speed in my opinion.

Are you serious? & where are we doing 200kmh+ let alone 300kmh!!

[macca_779]

Are you serious? & where are we doing 200kmh+ let alone 300kmh!!

Territory! Dozens of bikes are heading that way for the long ride charity event. I'm going in just over a month and will enjoy some open speed limit action

[A^K^T]

Territory! Dozens of bikes are heading that way for the long ride charity event. I'm going in just over a month and will enjoy some open speed limit action

There's only one road with an open speed limit at the moment isn't there ?

Is there anything to see out there besides the spedo needle flashing past the 110kph mark ?

[macca_779]

There's only one road with an open speed limit at the moment isn't there ?

Is there anything to see out there besides the spedo needle flashing past the 110kph mark ?

Yeah nth of Alice for a few hundred k's. Uluru is Sth of Alice for something to see

[A^K^T]

2500km or 1 day 9 hours away from Perth , pity my Bussa is an 07 and has a speed limiter.

[Bling Bling]

In 1990, Opel did a Lotus turbo version of the Omega A which reached 283 km/h, pissing off BMW and Mercedes. The Omega A was a fleet/family car, pretty much like a VP Commodore.
I presume Lotus did a bit of work on the aero, as well as boosting crap out of the engines. I doubt the humble Omega was designed to go that fast. Most of them had pissy little engines.
The Omega got killed off before they could put a V8 in them. The ones sold in Brazil got a 4 litre engine, wouldn't have been faster than a Dunnydore.

It was called the vauxhall carlton lotus 12 second 1/4 with 4 people in it and 280kms top speed and it is still worth a packet shaped like a brick, it.

[macca_779]

2500km or 1 day 9 hours away from Perth , pity my Bussa is an 07 and has a speed limiter.

You mean you've left it stock!!. Wow

[offshore]

You mean you've left it stock!!. Wow

Lol yea why haven't you at least turbo charged it haha

[Jag530G]

It was called the vauxhall carlton lotus 12 second 1/4 with 4 people in it and 280kms top speed and it is still worth a packet shaped like a brick, it.

Wouldn't knock the aero of the Omega A, aero was all the rage in Germany in the 80s, the influence of the Audi 100 saw to that. Opel went on with the aero theme with the Calibra, CD 0.26 for the 8 valve base model, a record at the time. The Omega A also had the bonus of being relatively narrow compared to the VN Commodore so less frontal area. The truth is the VN sedan was more aerodynamic than any Commodore sedan since excluding the VF. The early VEs, in particular, had bloody hopeless aerodynamics, huge frontal area and a CD of around 0.35+ for the be-spoilered models.

Cheers, Matthew

[amckiwi]

Another requirement would be big brass ones

[sjhugh]

Are you serious? & where are we doing 200kmh+ let alone 300kmh!!

Yes I'm serious.

[C4B]

I was going to say "a cliff" but I'm not sure it's terminal velocity would even be that high.