I've heard that the K series gets better with age, is that true? if so what sort of improvement would I expect to see on for example these "new car" figures; 0-60 11 secs, 115mph and 41.7mpg?

Yes - you are right - the K series engine is a little 'tight' when new and can certainly feel rather lifeless. Depending upon the way in which the car is driven, the engine usually fully loosens up by about the time that the car has covered 6000-9000 miles.

Fuel economy and engine performance will improve as the 'loosening up' process goes on. This rule does not apply to all cars - some VAG products are well renowned for not being well and truly run in and loosened up until 50K!

It's going to be difficult to actually quantify any improvements after the running in period - I guess fuel consumption would be the easiest to measure.

[Edited by Dr Dave on 07-01-2002 at 04:01 PM GMT]

Thanks, Can you have what I would call "Special cars" for example, years ago you may remember the Austin 1300GT, well my mother had 1 that for no reason seemed much better than it should have been, acceleration was incredible, top speed was off the 100mph speedo by a mile and it would easily do 50 mpg, I had 1 later that was nothing like as good. My brother test drove 2 MGB's, 1 would top 115mph and the other had trouble with 95mph, yet neither car had a fault. Does this sort of thing still happen with MGR cars?

Not really, these days. But some cars can be real fliers and others seem a little lifeless - this, I believe is down to the driving style [mainly during the running-in period] the cars have become accustomed to, with the adaptive features of the MEMS Engine Management System adapting to the style of driving and thus tuning the engine accordingly.

In the old days when incorrectly set ignition timing or a poorly tuned carburettor would make a huge difference to the performance of a vehicle - these days, these two variables are [sadly??] no longer adjustable - therefore the chances of two identical cars being radically different in performance is very slim indeed.

[Edited by Dr Dave on 07-01-2002 at 10:12 PM GMT]

Thanks again