1.What's so bad about the driving position?
I'm 187cm, and Ok with the driving position. I have adjusted the angle of the gearstick a little plus shortening it a tiny bit.
Only thing is, when I drive with my winterjacket on, my hairdo gets ruined a bit in the top, otherwise I'm ok with it.
I love all the space in the cabin. I have tried to get into a lotus Europa once, and felt the I was being burried alive. It took me some time extra to get out again, and IT DID NOT LOOK ELEGANT
Some close to where I live, has a Mr2, and I get scary flashbacks, when I see the space in the cabin (or lack of it, compare to a murena).
2.Is rear visibility as awful as most mid-engined cars?
Rear visibility is wonderful I think. Rear sidewindows also help even further.
Something much more annoying is the low stance, meaning headlights from Suv's especially tend to blind you, and you sit and curse, because you thought, they forgot about their longbeam light. BUT... this would be an "all sportscars" problem
3.What is the range of prices for Murenas in the UK?
No idea, sorry
4.How many Murenas are there in the UK?
No idea, sorry
5.What's the handling of the cars like (grip levels, tendency of back end to slide away, low-speed driving, high-speed, etc.)
I love the handling of the Murena.
When parking, you don't need servo-assist, because it's so wonderfully light in the front.
When driving normally, and wanting to switch lanes, it's like cutting with a surgeons knife. It just keeps impressing me, when it does exactly what I want. It's not only a sportscar concerning accelleartion/brakin, but very imporant, also in cornering. Feels aggressive.
When driving fast, you need to "steer" a bit more, than with a normal "heavy nosed" car. All that aggressivenes has to be controlled during hi speed, and it can be a little tirering in the arms for long drives, but common it's a sportscar
Concerning weight distribution, I will have to say, there are serious reasons why center engined sportscars are still highly regarded.
Perhaps the murena could have been a little more heavy nosed.
Basically when you have a center engined sportscar, you have a very "neutral" setup. And that's what all racedrivers want.
Meaning that, feedback from the car, when driving hard, is very good and corresponds very closely to the way you drive it.
Only thing is, that when driving along the limits of the cars handling, it will be more unforgiving, when crossing those limits, because you risk either understeer, or oversteer with the car.
Normal front engined cars are specifically made to understeer in crisis-situations, because that is what most people can react best to. And if you have a car that might either oversteer or understeer, things get much more complicated.
Two weeks ago, me, my wife and our kid (sitting in the middle of course in an autochair - just pulled out the back of the middle seat, and everything fits perfectly - meaning that a murena is a TRUE family car also (as long as you only have one kid
)... everybody sitting in a row, and enjoying the ride together... well back to story
) went to visit my dad. When having to head for Copenhagen again, I fearred having to scrape of ice of the windshield in the cold, but to my surprise, there was only a layer of "slush Ice".... wonderful I thought.... WAAAAAIT a minute..... this also means "brown soap on the road", but I did not think of it.
We started the car, went to the left turn to the ramp that connected to the highway. But just before turning in, I found that we were perhaps going a bit too fast (45 km/ph or so), so I started braking, and we immediately felt the back of the car wanting to pass us, by starting to slide out. By instinct, I let go of the brake and started clutching and the car immediately stopped sliding (that's what I mean by good feedback and response from a mid engined car), trying to brake gently again, just to feel the back starting to slide again. I let go again, and gently steered the car into the corner instead, and the car just followed the line, and we were on the ramp to the highway.
THANK YOU for the 3-day course on Laguna Seca driving mid engined formula cars. It really paid of. I did not have to think of it at all, I just did it.
And you can't blame the murena for this situation. Actually we drove veeeery slow back to Copenhagen, and idiots just passed us doing 110 km/h compared to our 80 Km/h, and after some 15 minutes of driving, traffic started building up, and of course, because of an accident. So I was happy about driving carefully that night.
Otherwise, except from this kind of weather, I feel that the car is very stable during driving (helped alot to get the front wheels lined up, I must say
).
Well, enough about my thoughts. I love the car, I must say.
Jesper