warps

Why? What was the poster actually asking? Straight line? around a circuit? I still think that normal drivers on a normal track (wet or not - the cars were sharing the same conditions)gives a far better representation of overall performance than 1/4 times (unless you are one of these people who can't handle corners and only care about straight line acceleration). In the dry, the GTR and modded WRX were neck and neck in times, with the stock WRX (and first ever track day for that particular WRX driver) about a second off the pace. Given the GTR had over 450hp at the wheels, I think I can safely say that the stock WRX would have come close to a stock GTR's times, if not beaten them (it was hosing modded R33 GTSt's - wet and dry). Current model WRX and a stock GTR - no contest. The WRX would kill the GTR around a racetrack - specially if the race consisted of more than 5 laps. But then what would you expect from a 20 year old Datsun? GTR's are great cars, but c'mon guys - let's be realistic here.

Depends. Around a wet racetrack on a track day I did a few years ago, the WRX's killed everything else - including 2 modded GTR's (both Rexes were MY02 models, one stock). Current Rex is pretty quick, and probably quicker around a track than an R32, but in a straight line I think the GTR might still beat it. Just coz the REx is ugly don't make it slow.

Yeh I've done the ebay thing already. I don't think those ones come with a boss, though - not at that price. I was hoping that someone had replaced their stocky, or had a dodgy looking old one that they've replaced, and wanted to get rid of the old one for beer money Oh, I'm on the Gold Coast by the way. Cheers

Thanks, Marlin - you might be right there. I have a friend who's logbooked a few cars lately, and he's used the RCO (Rally Car Other) classification for stuff that doesn't fit into any other category. This is new to me, so I was wanting to find out more about the particular class that an R32 would fit into.

Calling all R32 GTSt tarmac rally competitors I'm after some information on logbooks and CAMS calssification of R32 GTSt in tarmac rallying or any other form of CAMS recgnised motorsport in australia. What have your cars been logbooked as? Have you had to apply to CAMS to have the car put into a list of approved models, or doesn't tarmac rallying work like that? Keen to find out any more info I can PM if you prefer to keep discussion offline Thanks

I'm after a CHEAP steering wheel that will fit onto an R32. Doesn't have to be fancy, or great condition. Just something for a project (standard size or smaller preferred) Let me know what you've got. Because I'm such a tightarse, I probably won't want to spring for postage, so prefer local. PM or call Peter on 0431 772 736 Thanks all

I've run at Willowbank autocross track a few times on road tyres, and it's the same in that the track packs down throughout the day and gets more and more like bitumen. The guys on R spec rubber are usually the quickest by the end of the day. I had my stock Forester XT out there a couple of years ago (complete with 60,000km old Geolanders ), and it was setting fastest time of the day early on while the track was still slippery. By the end of the day quite a few of the 2WD specials were beating me as they had much more cornering grip, and the AWD advantage wasn't so great on the grippy track.

+1 Unless you want to polish it or keep it out in the salt spray, mild steel is heaps cheaper, and will still last. If you're worried, paint the welds with zinc-it, and it will last. I have shelves I built over 10 years ago, have lived in moist garden sheds for the last 6-7 years and have nothing more than surface rust on the welds (I was too lazy to even paint the welds). If rust concerns you, you can always make it out of duragal, and paint the welds. Looks pretty enough, and will last a lifetime (just make sure you weld in a very well ventilated area) I made a nice tyre rack that holds about 16-24 wheels / tyres depending on tyre width. It bolts together so I can flat pack it for storage. Oh, ALWAYS wear safety glasses when chipping slag. I wear them under my welding helmet (helps that they are prescription glasses, so I can actually see what I'm welding now)

GTS4 - that's N/A No? That's not too bad - you can strip it out and get it as light as possible, without going under any weight limits (weight limit for a 2.5L is pretty light). You can also fit 15" rims over the brakes too, can't you? Good for getting rally tyres on the car (if your class lets you run them) If you have a race series you can compete in, and you can prep the car fairly cheaply (ie not a full rally car build) then why not go for it? Always good to see something different competing in gravel events. I was convinced I'd build a Silvia next, but it seems every second person I talk to is building, has built or will build for their next car a Silvia. They're a great gravel rally car, but so was (is) the 1600, and I'm sick of the sight of them. As far as setup goes, keep it soft compared to any tarmace based events. In fact, stock springs and harder shocks works a treat (specially in the back of RWD rally cars). Of course, I have zero experience setting up AWD rally cars, so can't really offer anything concrete.

Boy, I'd better stay out of your way then . Until very recently, I was the owner of a modified rotary AND a WRX. And I haven't ruled out buying another modified rotary, although if I do, it will have to have a turbo/.

R33 N/A and R32 GTR are the only ones homologated for gravel rally in australia, so not too many people wanting to spend $30k+ to build a rally car that doesn't qualify for points in anything. GTR will have to run the silly turbo restrictors which would make it slower than a standard Hyundai Excel in the forest There's a guy up north (Townsville I think) who runs his Skyline in gravel events, and a guy in NZ who has a gravel only RB20DE R32 Skyline. These are the only ones I know of. I'm half serious about building a gravel spec R32 GTSt, but have to come to terms with the notion of spending that kind of money on a white elephant that I can't contest any championships with, when for less $$ I could buy an outright competitive Evorex. Still, when I finish with the Skyline I could always try to sell it to the drift boyz or tar babies. Edit: If you go GTR you'll struggle to get 15" rims to fit over the brakes (16" rally tyres are rare as hens teeth). NA R33 would probably be the go, but again why bother when a 240k or RX7 will have much better power to weight ratio

More like 95%. Just that the other 65% of owners don't realise it yet. If it's anything like rallying, most of the cars never get advertised. There are plenty of gems "for sale" which never get advertised, and get sold through word of mouth, often for very cheap prices. Again, can't speak for the track cars on MY105, but a lot of the rally cars I see advertised there are way over priced.

If you said "I've had my CAMS licence and competed in khanacrosses, sprints, and circuit racing since I was 14, done XYZ advanced driver training courses, and raced karts since I was 7, so I think I am a reasonably good driver", then we might believe you. I'm sorry but 17 year olds who think they are good drivers are the most dangerous kind. I know when I was 17 I was the ducks nuts. The only reason I'm here is because the "fast" car in the family was an auomatic Ford Laser. I finally could afford a car with a bit of performance when I was 21 (a rally 180B) and then thankfully I was smart enough to take it bush where I wasn't going to kill other road users. Oh, don't think that an R33 GTSt is going to be any less dangerous than a GTR. A highly powered RWD on cheap tyres (c'mon, let's face it, You're hardly going to be throwing exotic rubber at it) can be a real handful in most hands, specially over confident 17 year olds. Again, not trying to be mean or harsh, but that's the unfortunate truth, and the reason the authorities come down so hard on young drivers.

The Gold Coast Kart Club track near our place was closed down a couple of months after we moved into the house, and now a school has been built where the track was. This track was less than 2km from our home, and I had planned to get both kids into karting. This track was built in 1971, when there would have been less than 5 houses in a 10km radius. Now the area is swarming with new development, and of course the new residents didn't like the thought of all that noise, so the track was torn up and a school built. Apparently the club is struggling to find a new venue, because existing residents lobby against them whenever they propose a new site. Nobody wants a race track in their back yard (except me - my dream house had finally come true, and the bastards ripped up the track!!) That's progress I suppose. Oh yeah, I did get a chance to drive on that track too - about 5 years before I even dreamed I'd be living in the area.

You can run it up to temperature with the cap off, and you shouldn't lose any coolant. It's just that with a sealed system it builds up pressure when it warms up. This will cause it to spit water out when you open the cap. A good way to tell if your radiator is being effected by electrolysis is to check the colour of the alloy inside the rad. If it's going black, then it is corroding and you need to do something about it. Another trap is if your battery is in the boot. You need to run your earth cable (fat) all the way to the front firewall. Bolt the cable to the firewall, and then run another fat earth strap from the same bolt (on the engine side) to your engine block. This means that most of the current will run through the battery earth lead, rather than the car's chassis, which can cause stray currents through your radiator.

I recall the early 2.5's (around 2005 or so) had a problem with oil consumption in the first 10,000km. A few owners neglected to check their oil levels and seized their engines. Also, apparently the 08 WRX's had an oil flow problem to the turbo, meaning that turbos were lunching themselves at 5000km. This has been fixed on the 09. The 09 is a surprise package compared to previous models. I went from a MY06 Forester XT (which at the time was faster in a straight line than the WRX) to an 09 Rex. The MY09 WRX murders the Forester in a straight line (and corners, obviously). If the biggest criticism of the car is that it's ugly, then I can live with that. I actually liek the fact that it doesn't draw attention, and that the 08 was such a disappointment. To 90% of motorists, mine looks like an ugly betty, and has the performance of a Kia Rio. That suits me fine, as I don't get the wanker crowd wanting to race me at every set of lights.

Green QI FTW. I have a glass a couple of hours before an event or big training session. That with a Ming Gold and I'm bouncing off the walls - keeps you going all day too.

surely you're not suggesting I let my beer go flat before I drink it? But seriously - definitely keep up the fluids. We stick to water - sip it all day. During an event, I just munch on fruit and nuts, with maybe a bread roll or some crackers thrown in. I'm never hungry, and have to force stuff down, otherwisw I do start to fade. I find if I have anything heavy (cheese, dairy, meat) it makes me feel doughy so I avoid it. Mind you, once the action is over, I chow down on the biggest fkoff steak burger I can find, and wash it down with several scotches (or beers)

So, when I say it, I'm being soft, but when you pay someone to tell you, it's a valid point A 5 lap session is hardly going to tax you, but when you string a dozen of them together over a day, it does wear you down, despite how hard youo think you may be. Keeping cool and refreshed certainly makes you more alert and slows down the onset of fatigue. We find the same in rallies - none of the individual stages are exactly taxing, but when you string together a whole day of them, you end up absolutely knackered. Anything that can help you stay alert in the last few stages (which are often 9pm or later - used to finish after midnight in the good old days) has got to be a good thing. Hot and sweaty definitely has its place. I like to engage in hot and sweaty action with my navigator after the event - not during it.

Of course he doesn't!! Nobody possibly could. The best one could hope to achieve with a car they have never dealt with before is plug the key parameters into a computer program to achieve a good starting point. Then you fine tune it from there (although if you are close with spring rates, then there are a lot of other methods of fine tuning without resorting to replacing springs).. I spoke to Murray about suspension for my new rally car. As there aren't any out there rallying yet (certainly not with MCA gear), he has no data to draw from, and he threw a couple of figures at me, saying these are very rough guesses, which he can refine after putting the car on his corner weight scales. The numbers were similar to what I had in mind, just extrapolating similar size and spec gravel rally cars that I've seen, but again that would be a very basic starting point for me. I would expect after corner weighting the car in final trim, we should have a better idea of where to start. Then if in doubt, I will probably go softer than what the maths tell me - byt that's just my personal preference.

So, Rice and SydneyKid both agree that in a full cycle, a 13B is a 3.9 litre (2 stroke vs 4 stroke aside) Why the angst? Rice, I think you should research your adversaries a bit more before resorting to name calling and personal insults. Gary was building race cars (including rotaries) when you were still playing with toy trucks in your sandbox. Hell, you're probably using parts Gary himself developed in your all conquering uber SP. And as far as starting a credentials war - hoo boy did you pick the wrong fight there Now, you obviously have something intelligent to say. How about keeping it on topic, and try to resist your typical urge to insult anyone whose opinion differs from your own. Despite what you might think - I didn't see very much rotary hate in this thread at all (and I came into this thread as a rotary defender). In fact, the hate only started after you made an appearance. Not that different to Ausrotary, really. I too have had differences of opinion with Gary, and every time I have challenged him he has responded professionally and backed up his arguments with technical merit. Yes, I did get an honours degree in Mech eng, (and did exctemely well at thermodynamics and fluid mechanics btw) so have a grasp of the concepts being discussed. I would hardly claim that any of that makes me an expert in engine design, and I think that anyone trying to show off because hey have the same qualifications is a bit of a fool.

I've driven around Amaroo (in 96 I think) Been to and serviced at Surfers international (never drove there tho) Driven around the Southport 1954 grand prix circuit (99% of Gold Coasters don't even know there was ever a street GP held here in the olden era) Have also driven of several of the existing tracks, but meh - that doesn't hold the same appeal

Probably better to talk to your local rally clubs. While rallies are generally run on public roads, there are usually a couple of autocross tracks available for use, but normally only if you know the property owners well. You'll probably find that there are a number of rallysprint / autocross events run each year, and may use 2 or 3 different venues. Not knowing your area, I can't really comment, but for example, there are about 4 different venues within 15 minutes drive from me (Gold Coast) that are used for rally type competition throughout the year (probably 8-10 events a year across those venues). I know that one of these venues is available for private practice, if you know the owners well. most of the others are temporary venues, so you can only access them when there's an event on. If I go further afield (up to 2 hours drive) there would be at least a dozen gravel sprints / khanacross type events each year, possibly up to 20 if I added them all up. Hope that helps you a bit.

Even if it is the real thing - so what? It got its arse handed to it by a rotary, and we all know how much they suck. for shame Sorry for the hijack - just cross threading here

I would consider looking in the rearview mirror before deciding whether it's safer to stop or not. That's a bit like checking for traffic after you've driven through a give way sign.