New car - a GSF

[mrfunex]

Well, in anticipation of the creation of a giant 'F' section of the forum, and as a previous ISF owner; I thought I'd leave this here:

I’ve gone and bought a GSF! I’d had my ISF for around two and a half years and after sorting out what was, in my opinion, a hilariously firm OEM suspension setup, it was smooth sailing all the way. I loved that car – great looks, biblical noise (thanks, H&S) and a real Jekyll and Hyde personality. The last bit was so important to me as the old ‘race car for the road’ adage gets pretty uncomfortable and wearing on a daily driver. I’d covered 12,000 miles, taken it to Le Mans, done a Silverstone track day and on one occasion discovered the speed limiter – yes, there is one and yes, it’s around 170mph…

The trouble is, just after it was launched, my local Hedge End dealer had a black GSF in the showroom and ever since I’d sat in it – I’d wanted one. I’ll stop the preamble now with – I caved eventually; it’s around 16months old, it was previously owned by the area manager for Lexus, travelling the South West, and it has 17,500miles on the clock.

What’s it like in the cabin?

I’ll start with the seats – they are a vastly improved over the ISF, which weren’t bad at all! – they’re heated and ventilated. There’s a cornucopia of materials used all over the dashboard etc, which displeases some people. I like it. I love the alcantara topped dash, the bespoke clock and the carbon fibre detailing. There is a bewildering array of settings, both for the radio/sat nav and the dashboard hidden within menus and submenus, but thankfully the basic controls are simple and easy to use. The Mark Levinson stereo (is it still a stereo if it has a dozen speakers?) is excellent and Bluetooth integration is seamless. The screen is over a foot wide and makes the satnav look spectacular, where post code lookup is available!

Driving?

The engine sounds different to the ISF, despite being of very similar design and the noise in the cabin is a bit more aggressive on cold start. The rev limit is now 7300rpm and the gearbox seems identical to the ISF with slightly smoother shifts. There are 4 drive modes – eco, normal, sport and sport+. These progressively quicken gear changes, firm up the steering, sharpen throttle response and change the behaviour of the torque-vectoring differential (which I believe acts more like a traditional LSD than the e-diff on the early ISFs, which applied the brakes to the wheel struggling for grip). Sport and sport+ also introduce more engine noise to the cabin through first the rear speakers, then the fronts as well in sport+. The brakes are exceptional – grooved discs now rather than drilled.

On the move, the ride is slightly softer but definitely more composed, and the car feels a lot more grown up over my local potholed roads. It’s bigger than the ISF (obviously) and more powerful, but I would guess the performance to be fairly similar. Initial journeys suggest it’s slightly more economical than the ISF too, perhaps 2/3mpg better on average.

Other random musings…

The boot is HUGE – utterly cavernous!

I love the noise it makes – the over-flowery blips on the down change are still there!

The headlights are the clearest/brightest I have ever seen.

The carbon rear spoiler is extremely pretty.

The carbon front splitter is a magnet for stone-chips.

The steering wheel is pleasantly chunky.

The high build quality is obvious immediately – it’s like the thing has been hewn out of granite.

A head-up display makes me feel like a fighter pilot.

The previous owner ought to be horrified that this car has lost £2/mile in depreciation alone.

The amount of information you can display on the dashboard is enormous – amount of torque applied to each wheel – yup, G-force – of course, lap timer – no problem!

 

 

So, there we have it. It might seem like I’ve only got positive things to say*, but I liked the ISF so much, and this is essentially a newer version with everything turned up to 120%. I’ve only had the car for a couple of days, but I shall keep this thread updated every once in a while. Happy to answer any questions….

 

*One negative. I had real trouble getting the headlights to switch to full beam. It turns out that there are TWO auto settings for the lights. One for switching them on automatically as it gets dark, and the other for auto full beam (switching back to dipped beam in the face of oncoming traffic and a few other parameters). Human Factors obviously has a day off when they put these two switches on opposite sides of the driving position! It’s all sorted now!

[Big Rat]

@mrfunex Congratulations Stuart great choice IMO they have great presence. A good write up I’ve driven them many times and had it in my head it was for me some time in the future.

I know you are going to enjoy 😊

Big Rat

 

[Flytvr]

Congrats!!!

I agree, the headlights are just fabulous!

[Guest]

Congrats :)

Almost want to buy my rcf again so I can have that initial excitement all over again. I upgraded from an is250 so was a bigger jump.



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[mike m]

Very nice congrats.

All this car shuffling going on is giving me itchy feet lol

[Big Rat]

7 minutes ago, mike m said:

Very nice congrats.

All this car shuffling going on is giving me itchy feet lol

@mike m Oi no you just behave 😂

🐀

[Warrington guy]

Great write up about the car . Congratulations. Looks lovely in black 

[Big Rat]

@Warrington guy Here Dave Chester have got a White Rcf went on sale today £33k, 33k miles........ 😬

🐀

[Warrington guy]

Big rat it’s done more miles than my isf , not for me matey

[Big Rat]

@Warrington guy Just messing, that's going to be the difficulty for buyers as time goes on as the price points start to merge.

🐀

[Warrington guy]

Big rat . The price is right. 30k would buy It tho especially this time of year 

[Flytvr]

Just now, Warrington guy said:

Big rat . The price is right. 30k would buy It tho especially this time of year 

You know you want a...... GS-F!

[Warrington guy]

Flytvr you know what I want . . I waiting for a update from you . Are you enjoying the Rcf? 

[Big Rat]

@Flytvr Yeah you know what we want we'res your lengthy write up update what's it like after a month........🤓

🐀

[Big Rat]

@Warrington guy Ah well Dave us poor builder types will just have to satisfy ourselves with one of these, what colour for you matey........

http://dc.kyosho.com/en/banner/samurai-gs-f.html/

🐀

[Warrington guy]

White with red interior. Dav’s favourite colour. 

[Flytvr]

Only driven it 3 times. Too early to write anything meaningful. Still find myself looking at old videos of my IS-F 

Here you go.

[Warrington guy]

Yep can totally understand Dav . 

[Flytvr]

@Big Rat - that's what yours sounds like under gentle acceleration!

[Big Rat]

6 minutes ago, Flytvr said:

Only driven it 3 times. Too early to write anything meaningful. Still find myself looking at old videos of my IS-F 

Here you go.

@FlytvrYes it's very sad, my previous part ex offer still stands........ you know the barrow alone is hard to resist 😐

[Big Rat]

3 minutes ago, Flytvr said:

@Big Rat - that's what yours sounds like under gentle acceleration!

Dav what does gentle mean ?

🐀

[Flytvr]

1 minute ago, Big Rat said:

Dav what does gentle mean ?

🐀

Gentle - as I drove my IS-F - that was gentle.

At the other end of the scale, you'll need to talk to @Mark G and @Rusty Crobar OR take a look in the mirror 

[Big Rat]

56 minutes ago, Flytvr said:

@Big Rat - that's what yours sounds like under gentle acceleration!

@Flytvr Yes I know but I used to be indecisive now I'm not sure 🙄

🐀

[Big Rat]

52 minutes ago, Flytvr said:

Gentle - as I drove my IS-F - that was gentle.

At the other end of the scale, you'll need to talk to @Mark G and @Rusty Crobar OR take a look in the mirror 

@Flytvr Yes well you've got me there 😇

🐀

[JonP]

I am severely jealous.  Orangery/happy wife vs GSF/RCF decision, there is only one way that was going to go. I guess I will have to see what 2018 brings..