The Riverside Esses Were Rather Awesome!
Here is the first of a series of posts on some of my favourite slot cars. Where to start was difficult, especially as all my slot cars are currently packed away awaiting yet another house move. So these were picked almost at random. Both are the usual very approximate 1/64th scale and are made for home racing rather than the display shelf. Although, relatively common in the USA, they did have a little rarity value in the UK. For those interested in such things the photos were taken on some old Faller track bordered by fake turf from the garden centre. By the time the No.5 car came out a few years later, it would appear that Tyco and McLaren had come to some sort of agreement. This is the McLaren M8F that was raced in 1971. It was the final year that McLaren won the championship, this time with Peter Revson driving the top car.
The No.5 car was raced by Denny Hulme to second place in the championship with wins at Mosport, Edmonton and Riverside. This originally came out on a Tyco pro chassis but is seen here on a 440X2 pan chassis to give it higher performance. The colour scheme is perhaps more reminiscent of a 1972 M20. Toy HO slot cars never were that worried about accuracy. Of course 1972 was the year when McLaren were beaten for the first time since 1966 to the Can Am championship, by George Follmer in the Porsche 917/10K . Denny did come a distant second in the standings winning only at Mosport and Watkins Glen. When I was a serious racer of slot cars in the early nineties I used to sometimes travel with a diorama to show off my Can Am and other slot cars as shown below. Some of the Can-Am tracks were also used as a base for the meetings I organised in Mortlake. Watkins Glen and Riverside were two such examples and are shown below. The Riverside esses were rather awesome!
In either case, any BMW ConnectedDrive unit with the latest version of iDrive, would鈥檝e bested them both. This makes life more convenient in the AMG, when you want to switch from 鈥楽port sharp鈥?to 鈥楥omfort鈥?while at idle next to a police car. Both the exhaust and suspension can be independently toggled using separate buttons as well. The AMG鈥檚 steering wheel-mounted paddle shifters are also much longer than the Audi鈥檚 near miniature-sized ones, making it easier to change gears when you鈥檙e in the thick of things. The standard panoramic sunroof in the AMG is covered with a rather thin and see-through piece of fabric that lets a reasonable amount of heat in. Worth noting if you deal with the remorseless Queensland sun, for example. The Audi鈥檚 Bang and Olufsen sound system (part of the RS package) is just that little bit better than the stereo in the AMG, but then again you鈥檙e paying more for it, so it鈥檚 expected.
A similar system is optional for the A45, however. You really don鈥檛 need it though, as it鈥檚 more than good enough how it is. Arguably the fit and finish of the Audi鈥檚 interior is better than the Mercedes, as is its general cabin ambience. But where the Audi oozes understated class, the Mercedes is inherently a performance car with little touches, such as red seatbelts, adding that extra sense of urgency to the cabin. It鈥檚 what your friends will notice when they jump in, and that鈥檚 important. With its smoother dual-clutch transmission and ride, it鈥檚 in traffic that we expected the Audi to justify its purchase as a daily drive over the AMG. And we weren鈥檛 disappointed. The RS3 is a genuinely practical car you can drive every day of the week. Then again, so is the new AMG. And that鈥檚 the real surprise here. The previous model was unbearably harsh on suburban roads. Its suspension was designed for smooth European roads and it didn鈥檛 have adjustable suspension (like the new car), and, as such, it was best suited for drives straight to a racetrack or to a chiropractor.