SRT-4 review in the Washington Post
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Le Grand Illusion
Joined: Oct 2002
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From: Damascus, MD
SRT-4 review in the Washington Post
Here's a link to Warren Brown, the Washington Post's car reviewer, giving his take on the Neon SRT-4:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2003Oct10.html
And here is the text:
"Horses for the Coarse
By Warren Brown
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 12, 2003; Page G01
The 2004 Dodge Neon SRT-4 sedan is a talented kid from the wrong side of the tracks. It runs and handles better than many costlier sports cars. But what it has in driving competence, it lacks in class.
That is a good and bad thing.
The SRT-4's mission is to provide maximum performance -- speed, gear transitions and handling -- at a minimum price. With a turbocharged, 230-horsepower four-cylinder engine stuffed inside of a body weighing 2,900 pounds -- all of it at a base price below $21,000 -- it does that and more.
But if you're looking for sophistication, look elsewhere. This is a rolled-sleeve, weekend hell-raising, track-running kind of a car.
The SRT-4's only concessions to urbanity are its wonderfully bolstered front seats. The side bolsters are high enough to keep very big adult bodies in place in quick turns -- assuming those bodies are properly belted.
The people for whom the SRT-4 is built are performance hedonists. They eschew fancy interior trim in pursuit of the slightest gain in miles per hour, the smallest advantage in handling.
DaimlerChrysler Corp.'s Chrysler Group Performance Vehicle Operations, which produces the SRT-4, knows this. So do the people at Nissan Motor Co., who make the 175-horsepower SE-R Spec V; the folks at Subaru, who turn out the incredibly fast, 300-hp Subaru Impreza WRX STi; and the people at Mitsubishi, who developed the 271-hp Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution.
Those little cars are aimed at the fast and furious crowd -- people who delight in buying relatively cheap runners and beating the heck out of substantially more expensive, certainly more prestigious European models.
There is a seductive giddiness to all this -- and it can entrap you regardless of your age, sex or station.
You are sitting at a red light in your electric-blue SRT-4 minding your own business. Your engine is idling, sending partially burned fuel through the exhaust system, where it completes combustion in pop-pop, gurgle-roar noises reminiscent of sounds from NASCAR and Grand Prix race cars.
Still, you're being quite sanguine, innocent, although everything about the SRT-4 -- from its scooped hood to its flying rear spoiler -- shouts a desire to run. Then some twerp in a Porsche Boxster pulls up next to you with body language that says he's richer, he's better and he's going to put you in your place.
So, when the light turns green, you pop the SRT-4 into first gear, for which it has little tolerance, and then quickly drop it into second and spank the Boxster boy's butt.
Yes, I know. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. Please forgive me, for I have sinned. But what do you expect?
I was reared with affection for the underdog, the improbable victor. The front-wheel-drive SRT-4, with its Wal-Mart interior and fire-breathing performance -- 0 to 60 miles per hour in 5.6 seconds, and lots and lots of torque -- speaks to my cultural bias.
I just couldn't help myself. "
Any opinions?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2003Oct10.html
And here is the text:
"Horses for the Coarse
By Warren Brown
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 12, 2003; Page G01
The 2004 Dodge Neon SRT-4 sedan is a talented kid from the wrong side of the tracks. It runs and handles better than many costlier sports cars. But what it has in driving competence, it lacks in class.
That is a good and bad thing.
The SRT-4's mission is to provide maximum performance -- speed, gear transitions and handling -- at a minimum price. With a turbocharged, 230-horsepower four-cylinder engine stuffed inside of a body weighing 2,900 pounds -- all of it at a base price below $21,000 -- it does that and more.
But if you're looking for sophistication, look elsewhere. This is a rolled-sleeve, weekend hell-raising, track-running kind of a car.
The SRT-4's only concessions to urbanity are its wonderfully bolstered front seats. The side bolsters are high enough to keep very big adult bodies in place in quick turns -- assuming those bodies are properly belted.
The people for whom the SRT-4 is built are performance hedonists. They eschew fancy interior trim in pursuit of the slightest gain in miles per hour, the smallest advantage in handling.
DaimlerChrysler Corp.'s Chrysler Group Performance Vehicle Operations, which produces the SRT-4, knows this. So do the people at Nissan Motor Co., who make the 175-horsepower SE-R Spec V; the folks at Subaru, who turn out the incredibly fast, 300-hp Subaru Impreza WRX STi; and the people at Mitsubishi, who developed the 271-hp Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution.
Those little cars are aimed at the fast and furious crowd -- people who delight in buying relatively cheap runners and beating the heck out of substantially more expensive, certainly more prestigious European models.
There is a seductive giddiness to all this -- and it can entrap you regardless of your age, sex or station.
You are sitting at a red light in your electric-blue SRT-4 minding your own business. Your engine is idling, sending partially burned fuel through the exhaust system, where it completes combustion in pop-pop, gurgle-roar noises reminiscent of sounds from NASCAR and Grand Prix race cars.
Still, you're being quite sanguine, innocent, although everything about the SRT-4 -- from its scooped hood to its flying rear spoiler -- shouts a desire to run. Then some twerp in a Porsche Boxster pulls up next to you with body language that says he's richer, he's better and he's going to put you in your place.
So, when the light turns green, you pop the SRT-4 into first gear, for which it has little tolerance, and then quickly drop it into second and spank the Boxster boy's butt.
Yes, I know. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. Please forgive me, for I have sinned. But what do you expect?
I was reared with affection for the underdog, the improbable victor. The front-wheel-drive SRT-4, with its Wal-Mart interior and fire-breathing performance -- 0 to 60 miles per hour in 5.6 seconds, and lots and lots of torque -- speaks to my cultural bias.
I just couldn't help myself. "
Any opinions?
snitches get stitches
Joined: May 2002
Posts: 49,696
Likes: 1
From: Portland, OR
Originally posted by hollaboyz
id take one for a daily driver, no second thoughts
id take one for a daily driver, no second thoughts
h: