Tadashi

We went for a fun drive around the neighborhood for about 15 minutes then Brian pulled over and let me drive! Woo Hoo! Two Beats, two years in a row!

I can't wait until September when (hopefully) Steven drives down from Nova Scotia and we will have TWO BEATS at the Gathering!

zzziippyyy

So Ellen was it inspiring to drive performance wise?

Tadashi

For a little 3 cylinder it has ALOT of pep! More than my Civic for sure and it does not weigh nearly much - it moves right along. AND it has a 9k redline which sounds GREAT! I didn't rev it that high but Brian did

Brian is like a little kid over this car

A 2

Nice car and I'm glad you got to drive it. I hope I get to see it when I stop by next week.

Tadashi

Here's one that Brian sent from up in Canada.

He's not working that Saturday Aashish - I asked. He will definitely be around for the car show in June if you can make that. I asked Steven if he might be there from Canada but he's busy already that date.

My friend Ken who is in PA just bought an S2K and he is planning to be at the car show too. I'm trying to get him to signup at s2ki

zzziippyyy

Jut read the wiki on the beat, thats got a hell of a story behind it. Pinanfirina styled, last car approved by sochiro mrtec power plant.
and design is now owned by Mg.
Interesting reading there.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_Beat


FTR this is the new beat, under the MG badge

NNY S2k

What's it like to drive from the right hand side of the car?

Tadashi

Hi Levi! It is strange - you have to really pay attention to staying in the right place on the road. But at least with these little cars you only take up 1/2 the space anyway The hardest thing is suppressing the "muscle memory" of shifting with your right hand

I did much better this time than I did the first time (with Steven's Beat). I think a few days of driving the car and you would just do things w/o thinking... the other strange thing (like old German cars) is that the wipers and turn signal stalks are reversed! I kept hitting the wipers when I wanted to turn

Speaking of turning - the turning radius on this car is crazy! It must be like 20 feet to make a u turn. My Civic is about 30-35, not sure what the S is but we did a turn around at a T junction in the road where I was sure there would not be enough space without trying to find reverse.

Pretty cool to drive the S there, then the Beat then the S home. It is definitely on my list of "wish" cars -- but then again it has been since 1995 or so when I first read about them on the web

Tadashi

Thanks for the link Dave. I did not know all that. Sad that Honda sold the design. I do remember reading that MG was making new cars... I did not get the connection though, only that it was a cute car

Hopefully Honda will remake the Beat (TOV rumors) although I doubt it will be available here in the US. Too small and specialized for most Americans. The Beat makes the S2000 look like a full size sedan

zzziippyyy

I was just thinking about this, we have an italian styled car built by the japanese than pawned off onto the british