Lacks Power (maxpower.co.uk)

Name: blackbob

Hello doyoo user, You have to be logged in to use these functions... Login or register Close window

Send message to member

Product:	maxpower.co.uk
Date:	06/02/04 (301 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Glossy pictures, Semi naked womrn, Quality table mat

Disadvantages: Not very in-depth, Unimaginative, Writing style annoys very quickly

Lacks Power

I'm a car mad sort who just cannot leave a car standard.It's like an itch and I don't have will power to stop scratching.I was a 'boy racer' when that expression stressed the racer but now it is a lifestyle definition and the people who come into this grouping spend their friday nights parked up competing in contest to have the newest and largest alloy wheels or the latest carbon-fibre/neon washer jets.It has developed into a massive lifestyle market and this is what MP caters for.

I've been reading 'Max Power' and it's bretheren for years and although I know the magazine well I've always tended towards it's rival 'Fast Car'.I know I'm supposed to be reviewing Max Power but I include Fast Car and Revs because they all do the same stuff in much the same way what goes for one equally applies to the other

I first bought 'Fast Car' back in 1991 and I found it a revelation.It was jammed packed full of all-sorts of interesting cars,pictures and technical sections.What I loved more than anything though were the technical articles explaining the theory behind tuning plus lots of advice and pieces on DIY,Blue Peter style tips about how to tune your engine on the cheap.I mean I was 19 badly paid and my knowledge though good fell short of my enthusiasm and 'Fast Car' more then any other gave me a few options to try and stimulated the idea of experimenting there was always pages on anything from areodynamics of airflow to easy but extremely accurate ways to time your cams from luminaries such as David Vizard,for example,who was and is a legend in engine tuning.

Max Power,Revs, and I am sorry to say Fast Car have for a good while now been the Hello of the tuning market.Don't get me wrong it's not the half naked girls I object to so much though if that was what I wanted I'd be aswell looking a few shelves higher,it's the fact that they'v
e managed to turn a lifelong passion of mine into the domain of the teenage schoolboy.

What used to be a form of personal expression is now a fashion accessory and if you drive anything other than a Citreon Saxo or Nissan Skyline you're not 'in'.They seem to have lost the point somewhere I mean when you've seen one Japanese car done up like just like a car out of Fast and Furious they think what you need is to see another ten.It's all about who's got the biggest wheels,biggest bodykit,loudest stereo and the most expensive outrageous paint.I've got the Jan '04 issue of MP here and I wonder why I wasted my money - at £3.95 because I realise now that it's no longer aimed at me.Buying the fanciest exhaust or the most expensive leather bucket seats and then fitting it and printing a series of photos with captions leaves me wondering what the writers actually understand about their subject.It's just that it's not exactly rocket science and goes to prove that the target audience is getting ever younger.They seem to recycle the same A to B route on how to go about tuning that I'm sure they all read the back of the same cornflakes packet.I regularly end up shaking my head at their lack of knowledge,imagination and the way they all cough up the same turgid nonsense parrot fashion.I go into town on a Friday night to be confronted with the max power clones in their Saxo VTRs and Corsas with a Mitsubishi Evo bonnet vent grafted on and a kit to make flames come out exhaust or some lad at work tells me that I should put a pipercross viper on my car to get 20bhp because it said so in MP even though in fact you'd be lucky to get 5bhp if that,of course neither he nor MP explain how it gets such a power hike it just does.

My first car was a T-reg Fiesta 1.1L which I bought an XR2 engine for and put it in with a 1300 4spd g/box,both sourced from a scrapyard,where I also bought 13" wide rim Cortina wheels and
put them on instead of my standard 12's no-one at the time thought of 17" or 18" alloy wheels not even FC but they're essential now and this is what I hate about these magazines the fact that they're exclusive - you just have to have the right car and the right kit or your not a proper car modder.We use to tune our cars with a mixture of self-taught knowledge,buckets of enthusiasm and a copy of FC with it's accessible but in-depth articles by true engine tuning experts,then you got cars ranging from Sierra Cosworths through to a Marinas the point being it was about cars and it no longer is.

Sorry,one more gripe.Now I know many may think and would be within their rights to say 'what gives you the right to judge' well I'd be happy to talk engine tuning to anyone and love talking with anybody who knows what they know through experience and a true depth of knowledge but I have to vent my constant exasperation when all the main tuning magazines have to resort to this tiresome style of writing styled on the bottom of the class in a primary 2 spelling test,a bold statement invoking images of pots and kettles some might add,but I just get the feeling that they try to deliberetly talk down to their readership and think they have to play up to this obvious stereotype that just grates on me

Luckily for you I'm shortly coming to the end of this rant and equally lucky for both me and those truly interested in cars there are plenty of much more informative magazines out there.For the brand specific there's the like of Perfomance Ford or Total Vauxhall while for the general lover of cars I find Retro Cars which started up during the summer '03 to be particularly good in fact,much more like the Fast Car of ten years ago.The cars range from Triumph Dolomites to Fiat 131s to VW Golfs and beyond.It is with the same conviction that I praise these three magazines and condemn Max Power,Revs and of course Fast Car. <
br>
It's the fact that Fast Car,more than any,started out as a truly excellent magazine of true quality written by people who obviously shared their passion with their readers that gets under my skin like it does.I don't think even one of the original contributers still writes for it and if you wrote to them and mentioned names like David Vizard or A Graham Bell they'd probably wonder what you on.So if you detect any venom in this review then maybe it's disappiontment at seeing something once so good descend so far.

In conclusion,if you're truly interested tuning cars and can your past just looking at brightly coloured photos then this magazine isn't for you though your little brother will adore it.BB

Summary: