Kinks

never again. A mate flogged a set to me saying it wasn't that bad and if I put them on the back I'd never notice. yeah, right. I started to evaluate just how good a mate he was after that

any osmosis or capillary action is going to take forever to dry the seats. you're better off pointing a heater at them and squeezing the seat every few minutes. that should at least push some of the water to the outer layers where the heater can dry it, then squeeze again and repeat. it's going to take a long time to dry the seats out completely though.

That would be awesome. I'd back the Iceman over the Crybaby any time.

People quickly learn that anything not bolted to something else in my car, moves. I don't leave drinks in the console for the same reason, besides which it's not deep enough and it gets in the way of changing gears. I suppose that's a minor annoyance but it doesn't bother me *shrug* Boot space is pretty bad but I think it is designed for the jap businessman who only needs to carry golf clubs.

change the oil, every 40,000km. there will be a thread in the DIY section about it. besides that, mechanical sympathy will prolong its life.

In my experience, fridges often have beer in them. I don't see the problem? Re R33 antennas, mine went crazy one day and went all the way up on half. i turned it to full, and nothing happened. turned it back to half and it went all the way in. turned the radio off and then back on again and it stayed in. turned it to full and it went all the way up. a day later it mysteriously fixed itself and went back to normal :laughing-smiley-014: R33 has very, very few things that bother me. They are a well sorted car.

make sure the gasket cement is rated for use on exhausts, as they get to several hundred degrees. that said, i've never used it and never had any leaks.

oh for sure it goes on, but when the cover is blown so publicly heads will roll. it's like the saying "it's only illegal if you get caught".

It doesn't matter whether McLaren used the information or not. They should still be penalised for having it. That's like saying "oh, you were doing double the speed limit... but you didn't kill anyone so that's OK just don't do it again" get real.

The irony is that a lot of the people saying they respect Alonso (for being a complete c*nt) are probably the same ones who criticised Schumacher for his tactics. Alonso is a brat, he is a sook and he is as underhanded as they come. Just look at how much of a cry he was having when Hamilton was beating him... he buzzed his pit wall a few races ago when he was annoyed at being second to hamilton. Boo hoo the rookie's better than me you should tell him to slow down so I can win! pussy.

For the simple reason that McLaren are the ones who stood to gain from it. Ferrari was having their information leaked, which hurts them. Fining them would only add insult to injury. Ron Dennis was completely honest about what he knew. A good number of other team members were privy to the Ferrari data and kept it under their hat - this is wrong. With several people in the team involved, the team should be punished as a whole. Unfortunately, when you punish the team you punish Ron and that is the part that isn't fair. Suffice to say I never really paid attention to McLaren, have always been a Ferrari fan despite them being a pack of spoilt whingers. Ron Dennis has earned a huge chunk of respect from me for putting fair play above all else. I was reading the ITV's website and James Allen had some very interesting things to say about just how much this will punish McLaren - for instance being the 11th team means they get 2 garages next year instead of 5. That's going to sting. Ron has done the right thing every step of the way and he's been left a flaming bag of dog shit. I disagree with Alonso getting away scott free. I hope there is a clause in his contract that says if he's found to be engaged in this sort of activity he can kiss his salary goodbye. The unfortunate thing is that this year the drivers championship is an absolute ripper of a battle. F1 would be labelled a farce if the McLaren drivers were stripped of their points and Ferrari were handed both championships. People want to see it go down to the last race. Another thing to consider is that this sort of thing has gone on since F1 existed. That doesn't make it right, and I think another part of this is that it was a public incident and once the depth of the problem was revealed someone had to be made an example of. You can't let that sort of thing go unpunished once discovered. In the future I think we'll be seeing a lot more accountability in F1, with staff communications being monitored by the team principal. It may be a positive step in stamping out impropriety.

you'll always be older than the rest of us, gramps

Found an advertisement for a minivan in the glovebox. I think the guy who owned my car in Japan must have met a woman and knocked her up a couple of times... had to sell the sports car... poor bastard :laughing-smiley-014: (it was a mint car, so he must have cherished it)

if you pull all the plugs out it's probably even better, because there is no compression to load the engine. crank it until you get oil pressure then put the plugs back in and fire it up. Pulling the CAS plug is easier tho

Yep.. but like daveo says 99% of the time it only makes things worse. Probably because if you're struggling to rub 2 brain cells together you drive like a f**ktard and you're also too stupid to understand why people get upset with you, so you assume the problem is with them. Leave it be. He was the one who got pissed and was driving like a twit, you were trying to do the right thing so don't lose sleep over it!

A welded diff can be stronger than an LSD, if you weld it properly. Minispools will definitely be stronger, however the driveline harshness around tight corners or dropping the clutch can break driveshafts instead, if your car has weak ones. Handling definitely suffers. No idea whether V8 supercars run spools because their LSDs shit themselves or just for financial reasons (chuck a spool in and drive around it vs rebuild LSD every race meet). Locked diffs oversteer on the throttle and understeer off the throttle. The danger in the former is obvious, the danger in the latter is if you overcook a corner and jump on the brakes you can find yourself heading straight for the armco. LSDs handle much, MUCH better.

I'm in for a Palmie cruise, will try to keep my eye on Events but if someone remembers to shoot me a PM that would be great... I go through busy periods where I don't get on here much!

Collaroy, silver R33 GTs-t S2.

well if vtec kicked in that explains it! I was just ahead of carlo and while I agree that it's the wrong place for it, the guy was lock to lock and as a former R31 owner, seeing an R31 that sideways brought a tear to my eye. If he'd done it on the track I would have been cheering

Were they defecting people or just booking them for misbehaving? I have a problem with the former, absolutely. You shouldn't fear a sticker for participating (entrant or spectator) in legal, safe, off-street motorsport. However, if they only targeted people misbehaving that is a little different. I disagree with being draconian, though. After watching for a few hours you get revved up and want to have a squirt yourself. I think a "sting" just antagonises people. Park a few highways around in full view and with their lights on. That will slow people down. If they persist in trying to double the speed limit then book them. Sneaking around just proves their intentions are to f**k you up the arse for their own entertainment. Be public, say "slow down because we are watching". And prove it by sticking your car in full view. gold

shimming it is a povo way of increasing the pre-load. if it's a drift car, minispool. had one in the R31 and it loved being sideways. if it's a street car, get the 1.5 way sorted. locked diffs are illegal and dangerous in the wet, and they compromise the handling badly unless you ARE sideways.

had nexen 2000's (compliance tyres) in 225/50/R16 dry: 4/10 wet: -1/10 value: 9/10 rock hard, used to drive it so the rear crabbed out of corners (not sideways, but needed less steering input than usual). rears wore faster than the fronts of course. OK fun in the dry but push it around a corner and you would run out of grip quickly. once half worn they were totally, totally unsafe in the wet. I would rate them on par with falken 326 in the wet. don't buy them. just bought dunlop 3000A in 205/55/R16 (sidewall flex sucks!) dry: 7/10 wet: 7/10 value: 7/10?? good quality tyre, plenty of grip in the dry and wet. not sure how fast they wear, i have been leaning on them to find their limit so probably not that long has plenty of grip on the street, and most importantly they don't let go in the wet unless you are quite deliberate about it.

what's the usual reaction you get after saying that? :laughing-smiley-014: unsure of my plans for tomorrow at this stage..

you were supposed to say "hi officer good thing you didn't catch me 5 minutes ago i was doing 160km/h while drifting through a roundabout and trying not to spill my beer while i snorted a line of coke off a prostitute's stomach.. oh by the way my tyres are bald and there are numerous unsafe mods to my car". good thing I corrected you mate, you'll save everyone embarrassment if you just stick to the script next time

standard, no. a lot of them had dimmers fitted for compliance though. me, I put brighter globes in. the standard dash is dimmed from the factory LEDs have a fixed voltage across them, but more than that they don't scale linearly with current. If you put 20mA through one it's not twice as bright as if you put 10mA through one. Unlike a regular bulb which drops off in brightness very quickly if you try and dim it.