Hertz Donut

Try Alex at Moonlight Racing, www.mlracing.co.nz, he lists some Mishimoto radiators on his site already but I didn't spot a Stagea one, which isn't really surprising since no one seems to care about them. He's in Japan at the moment, I think he has a container coming back soon but I haven't heard a peep from him for a couple of weeks, probably because he found a pantie-dispensing vending machine or something. Tell him Matty from CJC sent you.

2.5 motor was the DD all the way through, no HR for them either. Shame they went to the Skyline Crossover, I'd love to have seen an M36 Stagea with a VQ37VHR.

Sadly, "engineered obsolescence" has been gaining momentum in many product areas for a while now. I have a 26 year old 14in CRT TV that is only now starting to have issues (brightness changes randomly while it warms up) despite it being used pretty much every night, often for several hours. My 13 year old 29in CRT TV operates flawlessly and always has. I would be surprised if any of the TVs being churned out these days would make it past 10 years without a single issue, maybe even past 5 for some of the lower-spec ones. Same story for fridges, washing machines and so on. Cars are heading that way too - why build something that will only bring you revenue right at the start? Why not crank it out with more and more gadgets that require more and more specialised servicing by an approved network? This is why my project car is a boat anchor from the mid '90s - it won't have much technowizardry in it but at least I can change the oil without having to book it into a dealership a week ahead, and I won't require OEM diagnostic equipment to turn off a bloody service light.

I'm on call 24x7x365, and I get paged via SMS to my phone. If I ended up driving a car with this kind of system I'd have to put the phone on the passenger seat and hope it doesn't slide into the Cone of Silence. Whcih is fine until the day I forget to take it out of my pocket while driving.

Pls report back saying it was really easy and quick kthx.

It's worse, it's 1.5 turbo, call me old-fashioned but I just can't get on board with such small engines no matter how much power and torque they make. But it'd be the "next one after the next one", this is the "next" one, which is a FWD 2-litre turbo: http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/honda/civic/85978/honda-civic-type-r-2015-revealed-in-geneva-prices-pics-and-video And it's fairly quick for a FWD: http://www.carthrottle.com/post/watch-a-preproduction-honda-civic-typer-lap-the-nurburgring-in-a-stonking-7m-50s/

Bear in mind driveshafts that will "hande 1000hp" can still break well below that level if you beat on them enough. A guy I know is resurrecting a famous import drag car here in NZ. He had "1000hp" driveshafts in it but still managed to destroy one with a temporary motor making barely 180hp by dumping the clutch at over 8,000rpm with slicks, and the track was barely prepped. I think he'd done about a dozen runs with them. Personally, I think a C/F shaft would be well down the list of mods for me, but I don't know your end goal or current mods, so if it makes you happy then go for it.

As above, it's your car, do what you want, but I voted Nissan because I hate made-up brands that are primarily marketing exercises to sell a JDM product overseas with a "better" image and often with a higher price tag. I'm looking at you too, Acura and Lexus. (Yes, I'm aware Lexus and Infiniti now have their own unique models but the sheer audacity of the origina of the brands still rankles. I can hold a grudge, oh yes, I can hold a grudge...)

What? I reckon they sound pretty sweet in this clip from the V6 Nats. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_EsxukdNXM

Wheels are MUCH better!

But can you fit a fridge in the boot? Or a 7ft ladder? Or a hitchhiker?

I would be very surprised if much went wrong at all with a 2006 Honda in the next 3 years if it was driven like something you owned rather than rented. The K24 is a reliable engine, the gearboxes are good, and anything like balljoint/suspension issues would just be dismissed by the waranty company as wear and tear anyway. So ask yourself: Is it likely to cost me more than $1100 to fix unpredictable failures on this car in the next 3 years?

Unless one of the magazines lists it as a collector's item you're out of luck.

According to most used car dealers, pretty much everything is wear and tear/consumables and therefore outside the scope of a warranty. In NZ we're covered by the Consumer Guarantees Act that states a good must be in serviceable condition for a length of time that would be reasonably expected of that good, so if it fails within that time it's up to the retailer to repair/replace/refund the item. Because of this extended warranties are largely pointless. Of course, "reasonable" is a term that's subjective, and that's where issues come in. You might expect your newly acquired car to go for 24 months without a significant fault but the dealer might think 3 months is long enough. There's bound to be a simliar law in Australia.

Check your heat shields aren't coming loose. I've had a light metal rattling sound since shortly after I got my Stagea, always around 2000-2500rpm on light/medium throttle. I came to the conclusion a long time ago it was most likely a heat shield rattling due to engine harmonics. I'm just super-lazy and haven't bothered crawling under it and prodding things around. Another possibility: I don't know if the V35s are constructed the same as the Stageas but mine has a twin-walled exhaust, with the outer layer having corroded through, meaning lots of thin, small strips of metal to tap against the inner wall. Any day now I'm hoping the inner wall will rust through and I'll be forced to fit something better. Performance hasn't dropped off at all, it burns almost no oil between changes (5,000km) and the noise is always under the same conditions.

Through application of a rigorously defined mathematical equation centred around the inversely proportional relationship between distance traveled by a vehicle (D) and the time since its manufacture (T), a singularity is reached at the 68,000km mark, signifying the nadir of reliability. It's kind of like the equation that shows torque and power possess the same value at 5,252rpm, only more recently made up. HTH. TL;DR: Somewhat unbelievably, about 97% of imports arrive in the country with approximately 60,000km on the clock, no matter how old the car is.

Steve won't touch the turbo if it's attached to the rest of the car. He'll do a good job though.

They're not SC4s, look at the contrasting inlay detail on the rim end of the spokes. The Work inlays are a simpler shape while those wheels have a "step" in the inlay. They're probably copies.

Same with the M35 Stageas, the gauges seem fairly...approximate. I've noticed mine now seems to get down to a bit below a quarter, then bounce back up to a bit below half. I've just taken to filling up every 4-500km and seem to get 50-60 litres in the tank at that point depending on the mix of driving.

I see you had a small guest spot on Speedhunters...

Yep 98 reached somewhere around $2.39 from memory. I'm old enough to remember when fuel companies first tried to push 95 over the $1.00 mark but couldn't because their pumps were only designed to go up to 99.9c. I think that was around the early/mid 1990s.

I just discovered the stations here are playing silly us for fools. Normally there's about an 8c/litre spread between 91, 95 and 98 octane, but yesterday I filled up at a station advertising what seemed to be cheap fuel (91 was $1.759 vs $1.929 in another town) only to discover there was a 26c/litre gap between 91 and 95, so I paid $2.019 for 95. To say I'm mildly peeved about it would be underselling it.

^My first thought too. Weeeelll, looking at it on teh intrawebz... Bumpers are discoloured and scratched up, right rear guard paint is toast and missing a piece of trim near the rear wheel, sills below doors look dodgy, leading edge of bumper is all over the place, interior actually looks alright, Looks like a VG30E so a couple of cams and/or a turbo are missing, it's automatic, and it doesn't seem to come with chest wig and medallion accessories. Other than that I'm sure a staff discount would go some way to rectifying some of these issues.

Yeah it's pretty rank we're paying nearly twice the Aussie price for petrol yet we're almost at parity for the dollar. A huge chunk of our price is government taxes though, somewhere over 60% I think.

Pretty sure that dude used to work in the pits for Red Bull F1, a mere mortal could take much longer than that, up to 3 minutes, maybe even 4.