Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Morgan Plus Four, Supersport & Plus Six (CX & CXV Generation Vehicles) The Plus Six 'bugs me'

Or an additional one!

Got to agee. I was converted to ABS when I bought my first BMW bike and the demonstrator told me to go out and brake hard on what was a wet greasy road. I managed to work up the courage to do so and to my surprise the front didnt fold under and I didnt end up on my backside.




Here I disagree. I dont see it as a safety aid except perhaps in a car like the Roadster which has IMO dangerously too much power for the chassis. In a well balanced cars a bit of wheelspin is no issue. In fact it can be useful in a FWD car.



Yes more and more cars will be autos. There is fun to be had in blipping down a flappy paddle box as you enter a roundabout at speed but the thing that always got me with the F type , and likely will apply to the Plus 6 with the same box, was that it had way too many gears for the paddles to be any fun. There never was a single right gear to be in. Much of the time you never knew what gear you were in.At 40 mph you effectively had a choice of 7 gears. Ridiculous.

Howard,

I agree 100% with your views on modern auto boxes.
The Plus 8 has a 6 speed box, but only uses 5: in normal Drive it starts in 2nd and gets to 6th as quickly as possible. In Sport it starts in 1st and doesn't use 6th.
Even 5 gears are 1 too many.

The AMG C43 has 8 or 9....I forget. I never know what gear it is in: its choice of gears is dependent on which of the 4 modes you have selected.
The trick is to use the rev counter. Keep below 2000 and the car is economical and easy to drive. From 2500 to 5000 it is quick and from 5000 to 6500 it is an animal. I'd suggest the same applies to the PlusSix.

Wow, abs must be great on a motorbike.
In a car though, which continues in a straight line once the wheels lock, there is no quicker (not necessarily safer) way to stop, in a straight line, than to lock the wheels.
Check out Roadcraft, the police driving handbook.If you, say, go round a corner to find the road completely blocked, locking up is your best chance of stopping.

I can't resist adding this rather controversial thing, which I have to fictionalise but is a truth I assure you.

In 1971 ish a young man was a front seat passenger in a Volvo 145 estate being driven by a member of the security services. The car was heavily loaded with hospital equipment. The vehicle was making extremely rapid progress through the Battersea district when it rounded a corner to find the road completely blocked just a few yards away. The driver then performed a manouvre which consisted of (more or less) spinning the steering wheel to the right and then slamming on the brakes. This positioned the car at 90 degrees across the road (effectively parallel with the obstruction) and we stopped absolutely dead. The car rocked but stopped instantly. The young man was in shock but the driver just grinned and said...."oh yes that's called the xxxxx stop". He then turned us fully round and set off again. Unfortunately no amount of memory raking can produce the missing word. But it's a taught manouvre.
Not one I'd care to try though, but does improve on normal stopping distances, that's for sure.

Great story Nick, however, I cannot see that the car would have stopped any quicker than normal? The same patch of tyre is in contact with the road regardless....just my thoughts?

Mark

This is a moot point, and is often the subject of much bar room debate, but the reality is that if your wheels lock under braking then you've lost control of what's happening. Newton's Law takes over and you continue in the direction you were travelling in, unless something changes that.

ABS is absolutely stunning in use. I had the opportunity to test HGV ABS technology on a test track at Lucas HQ back in the day, and steaming around on a wet & greasy surface in full control was awe inspiring.

Good to know it's there, wrapped up in your "Just in Case" box..

Motorcycle ABS is also many generations along now, too. My new Scrambler has cornering ABS built in, to (hopefully..) avoid those awkward panic moments when leant over on a poor surface.

As others have said, switch it all off when off-road. Still hurts when you fall off, but at least you're going slower..

I can be completely wrong but I understood the story in such a way that the brake performance may be was better, but by putting the car across more space was gained so that the stop could happen without impact.

Well I take my hat off to those with superhuman reactions who cadence brake when they are hurtling towards possible pain or worse, as opposed to those like me who might be inclined to try to bury the brake pedal through the bulkhead... Which causes me to wonder at fitting larger callipers with far more grab potential on the disc in a similar impending situation... they seem bound to lock the wheels up earlier with what effect on overall braking distance...hmm..??

As for throwing it sideways to stop quicker..!!! Saw a fire engine going side on in snow, until it hit a bit of dry Tarmac... You guessed it... the thing rolled...JEEZ... so perhaps best not tried in a Morgan..???

As I built My +8 out of old used Morgan Parts and a few odd bits I ended up with Lorne Goldman's '87 front Girlings and Chevy S10 rear drums which are significantly bigger than Morgans. On one of My first runs I almost rear ended Marge's Beautiful DHC that She had bought new in 1959. Not once but twice. When I got Home I described My peril with My Friend and Mentor. "I don't like those Girlings but the S10 drums are ok but We need to get this rig balanced out with better front Brakes". $1,000 and a bit of machining I was soon breaking in the Rotors and then the Pads. I now had Wilwood Brakes. Kind of the standard for aftermarket brake systems. I initially thought these Wilwood brakes would merely lock up. Not so, but the distance it took Me to stop was dramatically shortened. I had a XJ6 Jag sedan with Brakes with sensors so that if the wheel tried to skid it would not be allowed and the other 3 took up the slack. Anti skid or something. I liked this feature and would entertain this on My +8 if I could easily fit it.

Mark, the new owners of MMC will be pleased, if you look at the reality of us old crocks on here, most of us keep our Mogs too long, to survive MMC need new cars sold, and 'new to Morgan owners' is good news