Interesting!
As I have mentioned previously, we also own a Nissan Almera N16 1.5. This has always been the "nicer" car when we had the K11 Micra and as such has been mostly sat idle at the bottom of the drive for weeks on end (the wife gets the train to work and 99% of the time I take her and pick her up from the train station), apart from when I occasionally take it out for a quick run or need the larger car for whatever reason... It has also been the quicker car and IMHO more fun to drive compared the K11....
I have been driving the DIG-S for a little over a week to ensure all is fine with it but now is the time to swap them around and drive the Almera more (its older, more miles on the engine so trying to eek out our money’s worth from it now and ramp up the miles on it). Swapped them around and it feels a completely different car compared to when I have driven it in the past! Compared the K13 it feels a lot sharper in clutch/gear changes and the accelerator responds quicker, however the NA engine despite it being roughly the same power as the supercharged Micra, it really shows its lack of being able to accelerate easily through the rev range. On paper I think they should be fairly similar however the K13 *feels* a much quicker car to drive. The lack of weight helps, along with the extra tech such as the blower, higher compression ratio and being lighter but I wasn’t expecting to be that much difference!
Hhmm – I wonder if the other half will allow me to take the K13 down to Shakespeare raceway in April and “accidently” take it up the strip to see how it compares to the N16!
