Doomed

[Ray W]

Just a small reminder. When the Viper came out. You could buy for the same money a Corvette ZR1 with every comfort and option known to man. Yet a bunch of Mopar Loving Motorheads plopped their money down on a car with no air,windows or much of anything else. We put up with and loved it for being simple and fast.

We are still here and though I like the new car. I would be happier with a stripped down 750hp monster with a toupe' given a choice. All the options are there to make up for the fact that you are no longer top dog in all categories. Now put an automatic in it and a rack for my electric cart so I can still have the Viper experience.

 

[Andrew/USPWR]

BM1 has Obama for four more years and still a hater. WTHClassic socialist attitude.

 

[Brian GTS]

I don't give a rat's hoot about how the performance figures of the Gen V compare to other cars. I love the Viper for what it is. 0-60 somewhere in the 3's....great! 1/4 in the 11's...awesome....just icing on the cake.

My favorite Viper is still my measly 450hp 99 RT/10. A lot of cars can easily take her down these days, but still my personal favorite.

 

[Bobpantax]

This thread may be our first "stir crazy" winter thread. It happens every year. BM1, Keith, has a long history of making an incendiary remark and then disappearing for awhile. He also, if countered with facts, will use a diversion tactic and ignore those facts and later come back and post an even more inflammatory remark. Keith likes to stir things up. Since he has not posted for months, he must be Viperless and bored. His modified Gen III with a built engine was wrecked. There is a thread on that. We should pray for him. LOL.

 

[SLViper]

I may be biased here, but why the hate on the Gen IV? It's a beautiful car. I see people taking vid and pictures of my car all the time. I just came out of a Z06 and that was forgettable. People absolutely dig the Gen IV! And it scares the crap out of me daily. What more could I ask for? Keeps me on my toes and full of respect.

I love my 2010 as well, it's hands down the best Viper ever! Civil enough to be a daily driver, evil enough to kill you if you do not respect it.
Will beat any car you are likely to meet on the street. I can live with the New Viper being 1/10 faster in the quarter mile. Little known fact, the revised gear ratio is a very big improvement. Also will get to 200 MPH 14 seconds faster than previous Gen IV! 5 yr 100k warranty. It was half price of the loaded Gen V ! No disrespect to the new Viper I intend on purchasing the roadster in a few years!

 

[madninjaskillz]

I may be biased here, but why the hate on the Gen IV? It's a beautiful car. I see people taking vid and pictures of my car all the time. I just came out of a Z06 and that was forgettable. People absolutely dig the Gen IV! And it scares the crap out of me daily. What more could I ask for? Keeps me on my toes and full of respect.

Don't feed the trolls. I also have a GenIII/IV and it always gets looks. I love the performance, the feel and the sound. That being said, someone else is going to come along and run mid 10s in a stock GenV before too long. You can put the bank on that one. Edmunds has usually produced $hitty numbers on testing high performance cars.

 

[bluestreak]

I may be biased here, but why the hate on the Gen IV? It's a beautiful car. I see people taking vid and pictures of my car all the time. I just came out of a Z06 and that was forgettable. People absolutely dig the Gen IV! And it scares the crap out of me daily. What more could I ask for? Keeps me on my toes and full of respect.

I'm not trying to hate on the Gen IV, I'm talking about based on performance numbers only. The magazine bench racers whining about dyno and 0-60's seem to have forgotten that the Gen IV was no world ******. A feat a LOT harder to accomplish these days than it was in the 90's. You might actually have to drive better than your competition to go faster, something people who own Vipers should relish, but instead want ignorant hp they can't handle all the while whining about having to have TC. It's ridiculous.

Would love to see some video of the people complaining about the Gen V actually driving their Vipers at the limit. We won't know a verdict on the Gen V until it gets into the hands of pro drivers on a circuit or great drag racers on the strip. Just trying to shed some light on the doomsday theorists around here. Yeah, some people might want to keep their Gen IV, nothing wrong with that but they don't have to spend all of their time justifying why they aren't upgrading.

 

[SADVIPER]

So I had a friend who sold all of his exotic cars worth 2 million

 

[v10enomous]

Today's technology and engineering is so good that comparing these performance numbers is like splitting hairs. When you look beyond the numbers what you're left with is whether or not you identify with the car enough to go out and buy one. People that are considering a Viper have a pretty good feel for the identity and character of the car. It's American, it's a 2 seater, it has the biggest motor, bold an unique styling, hand built in low numbers and it's a serious driver's car with heritage and racing history. Now they've made the car a little more friendly and easier to live with while either maintaining or improving upon almost every aspect of the car but at the end of the day when you write the check you are still getting a Viper.

There are two models now with distinct differences at different price points and the car should have a little broader appeal and that hopefully makes the business case more viable. Current Viper enthusiasts are going to want the car and hopefully so will some new folks. I say best to focus on the total package than to dissect individual numbers on the first test of the first car of a new generation.

 

[strykergts]

if you are only buying a car based on the times and power numbers a magazine reports, then you will be doomed to changing cars every 3 months or so when the next big horsepower king is crowned. It amazes me the number of people who will ***** and complain about magazine reviews after buying a car they thought was "king of the hill"

Simply look at the offerings over the past few years, the crown has bounced around repeatedly from z06 to gt500 to viper to gtr to zr1 to zl1 to gt500 and god knows what next. Buy a car for what you want, not what some editor tells you to like. I remember when the gtr came out and all the z06 guys were bummed, some of whom jumped ship immediately to nissan. Over half of them were back in a year in another z06 or upgraded to a zr1. Number are great for bragging, but tell nothing about the cars personality/persona

 

[JAY]

Good Point !!!

if you are only buying a car based on the times and power numbers a magazine reports, then you will be doomed to changing cars every 3 months or so when the next big horsepower king is crowned. It amazes me the number of people who will ***** and complain about magazine reviews after buying a car they thought was "king of the hill"

Simply look at the offerings over the past few years, the crown has bounced around repeatedly from z06 to gt500 to viper to gtr to zr1 to zl1 to gt500 and god knows what next. Buy a car for what you want, not what some editor tells you to like. I remember when the gtr came out and all the z06 guys were bummed, some of whom jumped ship immediately to nissan. Over half of them were back in a year in another z06 or upgraded to a zr1. Number are great for bragging, but tell nothing about the cars personality/persona

 

[GreenVenom]

So I had a friend who sold all of his exotic cars worth 2 million

I have a friend that sold his Victorian era bicycle collection for 4 million.

 

[PatentLaw]

Today's technology and engineering is so good that comparing these performance numbers is like splitting hairs. When you look beyond the numbers what you're left with is whether or not you identify with the car enough to go out and buy one. People that are considering a Viper have a pretty good feel for the identity and character of the car. It's American, it's a 2 seater, it has the biggest motor, bold an unique styling, hand built in low numbers and it's a serious driver's car with heritage and racing history. Now they've made the car a little more friendly and easier to live with while either maintaining or improving upon almost every aspect of the car but at the end of the day when you write the check you are still getting a Viper.

There are two models now with distinct differences at different price points and the car should have a little broader appeal and that hopefully makes the business case more viable. Current Viper enthusiasts are going to want the car and hopefully so will some new folks. I say best to focus on the total package than to dissect individual numbers on the first test of the first car of a new generation.

Totally correct. Additionally, besides all the bull flying in here....the car is better than 95% of the drivers. People worry to no end about what wax they are using.....do you actually think that they are going to be stringing their cars out to 100 percent capacity? Not on your life. This is an ego thing......nothing more.

If you have 640 hp or a bejillion hp, the car is still governed by the laws of physics. The tires will break loose.

 

[SlateEd]

The 662 hp Mustang is running 11.6.
The 2012 Porsche Turbo is running 10.7
The 2012 Ferrari Italia is running 11.0
The Lambo Aventador is running 10.6.
The GTR is running 10.9.

What this means is that this new Viper will be embarassed by practically every sports car in its cateragory and practically every single sports car in its price range except the Audi R8

These numbers are pointless, whether they're accurate or not. Drag racing can be a science for the pros, but drag racing for the rest of us is bulls@#$ and we all know it.

I've taken my (poor little) Gen III out to an airstrip with a local exotic car club. No traps, just a "measured" 1/4 mile of pavement with a flag-man and a long braking zone. The group that goes there consists of a mix of driver levels from total beginner through strong intermediate, but certainly no one who is setting any records.

On one run, I beat a brand new 662hp Mustang by a hood length... on a second run he gets me by the same.
Another VCA guy who posts on this board often about wanting to tune his gen IV beats a brand new Lambo that had spanked almost everyone else all day. (kick a$$ dude!)
A local guy with a "creampuff" RT-10, 3.73 gears, and apparently a lot of experience beats me by 2-3 lengths a few times in a row.
A brand new McLaren mp4-12c smokes everything... except of course for the heavily modified GTRs, which end up racing each other to see whose engine gets heat-soaked first.


...which brings me back to the conclusion that for MOST OF US drag racing is bulls#$% anyway. If you look at published numbers/specs only, none of those results make sense. But those are exactly the facts as they happened, no fish stories.

We need professional drivers to break the records that create "street cred" for the GenV, because magazine numbers and amateurs like most of us are not going to do it. And even after that, all the measured numbers and broken records don't mean that we will be "dominant" at the strip or the circuit.

 

[plumcrazy]

SlateEd for the win.

then if you go a roadcourse, give me the best viper in the world and a guy like acrsteve or chuck a volkswagen bug, he beats my time everytime we run

 

[Solid Red 98]

This car is not doomed. It is so good, in fact, that they might actually be regularly seen on the road--if that is a good thing.

 

[black mamba1]

"why in the hell do you write **** like that when you know its only going to make people mad as hell?"

I dont know, my mom taught me to always tell the truth.

"LOL so what are you some kind of mama's boy? This is the real world and people have passions that defy reason...hell you understand that dont you? Hell, you have passions that defy reason! You are the poster child for a guy that defies reason!"

You are right.

"So why did you go and write something so inflammatory?"

I dont know. I thought we were all adult enough to handle the truth. The truth is most cars in the Vipers price range will kick the Gen 5's ass in a drag race. And most races are some form of drag race.

"I see. So why condemn the car publicly and then declare you will buy one?"

Well, two reasons. 1. The Viper is iconic and hell, everybody in here knows MOST OF US are gonna throw on some headers and superchargers and still kick ass and take names and 2. owning a Viper is not like owning a Corvette. Owning a Viper is owning a lifestyle, an idealogoy, and becoming part of a small select brotherhood that only those of you in that brotherhood can understand. We are stubborn to a fault, but we are also loyal to a fault...and no matter what...we persevere and stay true to our brand, to each other, and to what we believe. We argue amongst ourselves like any family does...but in the end we are Viper and will defend the Viper ferociously. Irregardless of the mag stats, irregardless of SRT factory horsepower, irregardless of what people think...we are Viper...we mod our Vipers, we race our Vipers we drive our Vipers like sports cars are supposed to be driven...we disagree..but we come together...we dont do well in the mags, but we set Nurbergring records, we are Viper.

We are Old School.
We kick ass.
We take names

We never surrender and we will never be broken....cuz we are Viiper.

We are stubborn and relentless.....and we represent something traditional and despite the challenges we face we persevere.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjnouzyUkAs

Understand?

 

[madninjaskillz]

Irregardless... you keep using that word. I don't think it means what you think it means.

 

[IWishIHadaViper]

Why is there always somebody that has to bring politics into a non-political thread?

 

[Bobpantax]

Keith. You are not old school. You are just old. A significant number of the new Gen V owners will not be "Viper". They will just be people who like cars and have the money to buy a beautiful, fast, manageable car. The Clint Eastwood Viper is dead. Now we have the James Bond Viper. And that's just fine since the Clint Eastwood version can no longer be lawfully manufactured for sale and use in the U.S.

LOL.

"why in the hell do you write **** like that when you know its only going to make people mad as hell?"

I dont know, my mom taught me to always tell the truth.

"LOL so what are you some kind of mama's boy? This is the real world and people have passions that defy reason...hell you understand that dont you? Hell, you have passions that defy reason! You are the poster child for a guy that defies reason!"

You are right.

"So why did you go and write something so inflammatory?"

I dont know. I thought we were all adult enough to handle the truth. The truth is most cars in the Vipers price range will kick the Gen 5's ass in a drag race. And most races are some form of drag race.

"I see. So why condemn the car publicly and then declare you will buy one?"

Well, two reasons. 1. The Viper is iconic and hell, everybody in here knows MOST OF US are gonna throw on some headers and superchargers and still kick ass and take names and 2. owning a Viper is not like owning a Corvette. Owning a Viper is owning a lifestyle, an idealogoy, and becoming part of a small select brotherhood that only those of you in that brotherhood can understand. We are stubborn to a fault, but we are also loyal to a fault...and no matter what...we persevere and stay true to our brand, to each other, and to what we believe. We argue amongst ourselves like any family does...but in the end we are Viper and will defend the Viper ferociously. Irregardless of the mag stats, irregardless of SRT factory horsepower, irregardless of what people think...we are Viper...we mod our Vipers, we race our Vipers we drive our Vipers like sports cars are supposed to be driven...we disagree..but we come together...we dont do well in the mags, but we set Nurbergring records, we are Viper.

We are Old School.
We kick ass.
We take names

We never surrender and we will never be broken....cuz we are Viiper.

We are stubborn and relentless.....and we represent something traditional and despite the challenges we face we persevere.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjnouzyUkAs

Understand?

 

[I Bin Therbefor]

"a 640 hp Viper being released in 2013 IS NOT A COMPETITIVE SPORTS CAR.

So...what was once the WORLDS MOST FEARED and highly respected sports car has been Europeanized and is now actually SLOWER in a drag race than 95% of everyting else in its cateragory.

So, yes, we will still have a Viper that will dominate on the track (probably) but we will also have a Viper that cannot hold its own red light to red light against practically every car in its cateragory...and we all know that THATS where bragging rights really come from."

I was confused about this post until I realized my problem. I don't share the definition that a competitive sports car is one that dominates from stop light to stop light. The emphasis being on competitive sports car. If street racing from stop light to stop light is the definition of a competitive sports car then there are a bunch of modified ricers out there that are competitive sports cars. Even if the definition is extended to the quarter mile, my statement holds. IMO, competitive sports car refers to performance over a road course or even a canyon runner, not a drag racer.

 

[Solid Red 98]

I was in Southern California during the International Auto Show, and I, naturally went straight over to the SRT/Dodge/Chrysler display where they had the black/gun metal striped Gen 5 for all to see. I was really impressed at the amount of interest in the Viper, in particular, and the other product offerings in general. I overheard many favorable comments, with a line of people signing up for test drives. The Viper had a constant crowd surrounding it with people taking pictures and trying to get a look inside. Unfortunately, it wasn't on a turntable, so it was a bit hard to get a good look at the whole car. Still, the model was hot, the car was hot, and the energetic scene was very encouraging. Nobody was talking about numbers, just how beautiful and together the car looked. The point has been made, ad-nauseum, that this car is about NICE as well as fast, so I will not restate it her--even though I just did.... When you are not at WOT, 99.975% of the time, the car will make the Viper statement that is known and loved by those who appreciate the mark--no worries. On the street, a driver worth his salt will know how to use the power available better than some floorboard slamming hormone jockey out to prove he has some hp to play with. It is not always about power alone, but finesse, judgment and reaction time. We shall soon see.

 

[SilveRT8]

I was in Southern California during the International Auto Show, and I, naturally went straight over to the SRT/Dodge/Chrysler display where they had the black/gun metal striped Gen 5 for all to see. I was really impressed at the amount of interest in the Viper, in particular, and the other product offerings in general. I overheard many favorable comments, with a line of people signing up for test drives. The Viper had a constant crowd surrounding it with people taking pictures and trying to get a look inside. Unfortunately, it wasn't on a turntable, so it was a bit hard to get a good look at the whole car. Still, the model was hot, the car was hot, and the energetic scene was very encouraging. Nobody was talking about numbers, just how beautiful and together the car looked. The point has been made, ad-nauseum, that this car is about NICE as well as fast, so I will not restate it her--even though I just did.... When you are not at WOT, 99.975% of the time, the car will make the Viper statement that is known and loved by those who appreciate the mark--no worries. On the street, a driver worth his salt will know how to use the power available better than some floorboard slamming hormone jockey out to prove he has some hp to play with. It is not always about power alone, but finesse, judgment and reaction time. We shall soon see.

I think you nailed it ! The 'essence' of this new model will mean a lot

 

[SnakeBitten]

Irregardless... you keep using that word. I don't think it means what you think it means.

Ok Inigo Montoya. I see what you did there.

On topic I dont think the car is doomed at all especially if it does draw a lot of conquest buyers. I think it will be a disappointment to a few of us because its not as dominant in all areas as it once was. I think when the DCT like tranny hits it will give the Viper a better shot at the stop light races, roll racing etc that is part of car culture. To lambast people that are into that aspect of the culture is silly imho. People wanted what the Viper had in the past. Pretty dominant in all areas. You cant please all the people all the time. But Im sure SRT will have something for those folks in the future. Maybe FI as we see the use of forged internals.

 

[Camfab]

"Irregardless"?

 

[VYPR BYT 94]

"Irregardless"?

Yes... it means the same thing as "unloosen"
can't believe you don't know that

 

[Alabaster Mamba]

Question: What do many if not most Viper owners and VCA members have in common with Mitt Romney, Carl Rove, and Dick Morris?

Answer: Well most Viper Owners have jobs and worked for what they have and understand what hard work is. Unlike, the majority of those who supported the Socialist in Charge. The majority of Viper owners know what it takes to run a successful business unlike being a community organizer like some other person who has more in common with Adolph, also a community organizer. Also. most Viper Owners are full of class unlike most of Obama's followers who are full of something else.

 

[v10enomous]

You Doomed Guys can't be for real... The new car is fabulous. If you want a gorgeous hand built exclusive low volume, American exotic sports car with a great interior, huge NA motor and stellar performance, attitude, rock solid reliability in the low $100k range with maintenance costs you can live with then there is only one game in town.

 

[KNG SNKE]

What an embarrassing post. The Viper was NEVER designed for quarter mile times. NEVER designed for "red light bragging rights". Please sell your Viper and invest in business education/vehicle uses. I still can't figure out why my Dodge Ram is so slow in the quarter mile. Oh yeah, Dodge didn't create that for drag racing either!

The car will be doomed, but not by Dodge. The government will doom it long before Dodge does if they keep setting records.

 

[Mopar488]

I am a little curious as to why all previous generation Vipers are referred to as a POS by the media and some current Viper owners since the Gen 5 is on the horizon. I have not had the privilege of seeing the new Viper, but I am sure it is great and someday I may get one, but in the meantime I think everybody ought to realize that previous Vipers were what they were supposed to be and I am not making excuses for any of them. I liked all of them.