Alkatraz

Don't worry, if you pay the extra $30 on your travel insurance they will cover you for the insurance excess on your hired Lambo..........lol.

I dropped a LS2 in my 2001 Ford Fiesta and got it over the pits in WA with no problems at all, I think you will be fine.

I lived in Germany for 5 years when I was in my late teens/early 20's, had just gotten my licence when I went. It was a great place to learn how to drive but there are not actually a hell of a lot of autobahns that have a huge amount of completely open speed limit sections. They are definitely there but you need to know where to go to have as little traffic as possible. The absolute best thing about the autobahns is cruising past a cop while you are doing 250kph and them not even giving you a second look. As for the Nurburgring, it is constantly full of traffic and absolute psycho's in Golf GTI's and on big bikes. Keep in mind that the second your front wheels hit the track, your insurance is null and void, so that $300,000 lambo that you have hired for the day will be a little scarier to drive hard knowing that if a retard in a $15,000 VW Polo gets in your way you will be paying the $300,000 in installments for the rest of your life!!! I hate to be a party pooper but it is not as easy as you may dream about.

To be straight up, i own a series 8 RX7 and love it. I have also recently bought a 370gt which I also love although for completely different reasons. Anyone who feels the need to try to prove that one kind of engine is better than the other is simply insecure and in my opinion, not a true car enthusiest. Trying to say that a v8 is always better than a rotary which is better than a v6 is like saying that a blonde is better than a brunette which is better than redhead. Personally I love them all and would never turn down the opertunity to take any of them for a quick spin. ;-) At the end of the day I think that rotaries have a lot of potential, if they had anywhere near the time and $$$ spent on their development that piston engines have had then who knows what could be produced. I am definitely no master mechanic or an engineer but in my mind the spinning motion of rotary engine is a much more fluid and natural motion than the up/down motion of a piston engine. Take a steam or gas turbine used in power stations as an example, I know that it is completely different but they still use a spinning motion. The largest power stations all use turbines, with internal combustion piston engines only used on smaller stations.

This guy buys a $25,000 car and then complains about $200 to be able to use all of its functions properly??? I dont think that I need any more proof that his dad paid for the car.

That second one works

Chris, the link doesn't seem to be working.

I was actually talking with the CEO of BP Refining worldwide recently (he lives next door) and he said that they had taken a massive hit to their 2010-11 profits due to KFC, Hungry Jacks, McDonalds and the local fish and chip shops muscling in on their industry. He explained that all of the media coverage recently has been about the massive offshore oil platform fires but what doesn't get reported on, and actually hits their bottom line more severely, are all of the fish and chip shops stealing their business. gkzlah, there is no problem at all with using that oil, you just have to be careful that you are getting it from a shop that ACTUALLY uses snapper as there main product. A lot of the smaller fish and chip places actually replace the snapper with hake and we all know what a drastic difference this can make on the performance of your oil. Sunkist, didn't you go to school or are you just plain stupid??? Its common knowledge that the fatty oils provide far better lubrication and actually increase engine power. Think about it this way, do you feel fuller and have more energy after eating a double quarter pounder with cheese meal or a deli choice lettuce roll??? Your car is exactly the same!!!! I do agree with the KFC comment though, Colonel Sanders rolls in a 700hp big block V8 Chevy Mustang so whatever he uses must be good! Plus it has the 11 secret herbs and spices, just between you and me, I think that number 7 is actually a powered version of Nitrous Oxide, but don't tell anyway ok! Ronald McDonald drives around in a clown car so I ain't putting that crap in my engine!

Skyichido, Whatever you do, don't listen to Sunkist, McDonalds oil will kill your engine!!! He obviously has no idea what he is talking about and is just trying to stir you up and cause trouble. Don't worry though people like him always get what is coming to them! Some people are obviously jealous of the success of others and their awesome TRD stickers! What you really need to use is Hungry Jacks oil, apparently it has something to do with the way they flame grill their burgers. If you know the right people you can sometimes even get your hands on the oil from the onion rings, it is perfect for your transmission and I actually found (after rigorous testing) that it even decreases shift times by about .0002 of a second. mmmmmmmmmmmmmm onion rings!! Actually I'm a little hungry now, I think I have some decals around here that I can throw on the bbq. I cant believe that you mix them with water though, it ruins the flavor. TRD Decals should always be cooked just medium rare and then dipped in hot sauce.

Skyichigo, I have a set of 6 inch wheel barrow wheels that I was actually going to save for when I put 3 superchargers on my engine. I was told by a mate who sat in a car one time that Isami Amemiya uses them on all of his performance engines in Japan and swears that they help protect the engine when you're running 75psi. I will send you some pictures of his Touge Monster V8 RX7, its a tough looking machine but not as tough as his TRD R39 GTR V-Spec 3. I have changed my mind and will leave the car stock for now but I can slap a few Ferrari Decals on them and do you a deal if you like? They cost me $6000 but I'll let you have them for $5000. Also, with the stickers that you noticed where the wrong ones but still put on the car anyway, be careful when you take them off because you can completely mess up the handling of the car.

I heard on the radio last week, that Perth has just become the car theft capital of Australia! YAY!!!!! http://www.perthnow.com.au/news/western-australia/wa-car-theft-leads-nation/story-e6frg143-1226133739412 I wonder if this will start to affect insurance premiums in the coming years?

I just re-read my last post and changed my mind, it is actually something personal against you Skyichgo, take the damn TRD stickers off your car before someone punches you in the face on the street. You do realize that what you have done to that car is the exact reason that every bogan in an SS Ute gives Japanese cars crap?? Your not in Tokyo Drift or Initial D and Brembo is not paying you money to advertise their products so why pretend they are???

I was down at the TAB this afternoon putting some money on West Coast Vs Carlton and saw that Skyichgo is running at $1.01 to wrap his nice new TRD Skyline around a tree before he is old enough to drink! Seriously though, does anyone else think that it is crazy for a young kid who cant figure out that + goes up a gear and - goes down a gear can afford a $25,000 car??? What happened to the good ole' days where you scraped together $2000 (if you were lucky!) and bought a piece of crap that had to be bump started every cold morning??? Its nothing personal against Skyichgo, but it scares me to think that there are people driving around in these relatively high powered cars at that age. Then again I'm probably just jealous because I can imagine the amount of "you know what" he will be getting in that car when I generally had the ladies pushing the car down the street so that I could take them home lol.

Try Shannans if you have the car garaged, I know that they normally give ridiculously high quotes (I have tried them on a few of my previous cars) but they were the best on my 370. You just have to say that you watched the F1 on Sunday night and you're in lol, or mention this forum which probably works even better. Mine is around $1300 for $45,000 agreed value and $500 excess for any driver 25 and over. That includes Car Hire, free window replacement etc etc. At first they wanted only to insure myself on the car and no other drivers so I said "ummmmm............no" and they changed it, then they also wanted to make me wait 3 years before protecting my No Claim Bonus so again I said "ummmmmm..............no" and they offered to protect it as long as I could provide the details of my past insurer, which I had the no claim discount with. I had a very similar quote from HBF (I have a feeling they are purely WA), with a lower excess actually, but I know that they have a policy of depreciating the value of an imported car by 20% per year!!! The only way to get the quote with HBF is to go into one of the branches as they don't advertise the fact that they cover imports (I didn't know until FABCar here in Perth told me) and the only drawback is the 20% depreciation (although they did explain that if I had the car assessed by a valuer then they could raise it up). 31 years old (32 soon yikes), License since 17, no at fault accidents, couple of speeding fines over the past few years.

Just out of interest i wonder how far back the computer remembers to give its readings. I know that everytime I have reset the ECU it gives REALLY weird readings for the first tank before it sorts itself out. By the time that I refilled this morning I had done alomst 400km and had 174km left till empty which showed as a tiny bit over a 1/4 tank on the gauge. Based on this I would imagine that I can get around 550km - 600km out of a tank around town with a little bit of freeway driving which would mean I should see around or over 700km if driving 100% highway, 110kph - 130kph.

Thanks for all of the HIGHLY constructive assistance there gentlemen! <INSERT SARCASM> It turns out that it was a very simple issue. It did not happen the entire way to work this morning but when I stopped at the BP for fuel, the entire car was dead when I tried to restart. As soon as this happened I popped the hood, checked the battery terminals and VOILA, the positive terminal was very loose and must have been bouncing around whilst driving yesterday. I probably did not tighten the nut properly after I reinstalled my HID's a few weeks ago, either that or I have battery Gremlins living in the garage (good thing I'm moving this weekend I guess). I would imagine that the warning that was appearing on the nav screen was saying something like "Mr Honourable Driver, your vehicle is suffering from lack of electrical current at the moment. Please inspect the electrical system at your earliest convenience. And by the way, your package is looking great as usual" or at least something along those lines.

Lol, I get that warning too every now and then, I thought that she was just commenting on the size of my package.... The warning that I am talking about is a written warning that appears on the screen not an audible warning. It stays on for a couple of seconds and then disappears, the car is otherwise acting normally. BTW has anyone noticed that when the Japanese lady welcomes you every morning that one of the messages she uses (I'm pretty sure there are at least 2 different ones) sounds like she says "Konichiwa G'DAY MATE"!!!???!!! Listen closely and you will hear what I am talking about.

On the way home from work I was going about 70kph, accelerated at about half or so throttle up to about 90kph and the gauges started flickering, the radio muted and what I would assume is a warning message appeared on the nav screen. After this happened I managed to recreate the fault a couple of times over the next 1km doing the same thing, slowing down to 70kph and then accelerating at around half, three quarter throttle but then after another 1km I couldn't get it to do it again. I will see if it does it again tomorrow but has anyone else experienced this and have any idea what it could be? I have done some google searching with no luck and might start looking through the g37 manual for something similar. Cheers Al

Cheap and Import are probably two words that should not go together, not because it is expensive to import but because any car from Japan that is really cheap, has more than likely been flogged, wound back, flogged again, wound back again, rebuilt, flogged, modified, flogged, crashed, repaired, brought back to stock and then put up for auction. In that order!

Well when I take my next trip to Kalgoorlie I will let you know. I have no idea when that may be though and I'm not sure that I want to spend $220 on fuel as an experiment lol. Basically I think that you should only use the "range to empty" as a VERY rough guide. I reset my trip counter every time that I refuel so that I can keep an eye on the fuel usage, it has alerted me to engine issues in the past so it is a habit that I have gotten into. BTW I am pretty sure that the physical fuel needle gauge (not sure if there is a technical word for that thing) is also directly connected to the range to empty stats and is not actually linked to any physical reading in the fuel tank. Anyone is welcome to correct me if I am wrong but I have watched the needle rise on many occasions in line with the range to empty readout. Jump in the car with the needle on half, drive 20kms on the highway and the needle can be at 5/8ths......I have never seen a car that can do that trick before. EDIT: One more thing, does anyone know exactly how many liters of fuel are left in the tank when the Range to empty hits 0??? From memory I think I read somewhere that it is 2 liters......

I have only had my 370 for about 6 weeks and have only fueled up 3 times from memory but seem to be getting better fuel economy than most thus far. Since I got the car it has really only been used to drive to work and back every day down the Perth Freeway (Stuck in bumper to bumper traffic a lot of the time) and for a few trips with the GF on the weekend. I guess I don't drive like a hoon because I'm not a kid anymore, but generally I'm the one doing all of the overtaking so I don't drive like a grandma either. I only use BP Ultimate 98 Octane (in Perth it doesn't matter where you fill up as all of the fuel in every servo is BP due to BP having the only refinery here) and seem to be getting at least 550km from every tank and have not yet seen the fuel warning. I would imagine that if I drove to Kalgoorlie (600km dead straight, no traffic, 110-130 kph the whole way) that I would get there easily and wouldn't be surprised to see 700-800km from a tank. I know that my rx7 only gets 350km around town but would then get 550km on the trek to Kalgoorlie.... Maybe I am just being optimistic and because I am comparing the fuel economy to my rx7, which is WOEFUL, it simply feels like a much better range. I leave it in standard Drive the majority of the time and just switch over to the paddles for a quick squirt every now and then (or when some dick in an SS is up my ass), no point being in DS when sitting in traffic or just cruising. I have disconnected the battery when I replaced the HID's which wiped the ECU so it had to relearn the fuel consumption and it is quite amusing to leave home with 400km range showing only to drive 60km and have 420km on it when I get back I am guessing that it wont take long for me to start seeing similar numbers to everyone else but at the moment the gauges show that I have done 304km and have 306km till zero so I don't know.....?

If you are going to up the budget a little then I can tell you that if you are patient then you can get a 370 for around the $40k mark if you import. Search for my post in the newbies section and you will see the auction sheet for the car that I just got. I know that I did apparently get an awesome deal as the car now only owes me around $38k. If you are willing to be patient then Im pretty sure that you can get something similar for around the same price. I've had the car for a few weeks now and am over the moon with it. It basically looks and feels like a brand new car. Obviously importing does include time and risk but from my experience it was more than worth the hassle and I would do it again in a heartbeat. I just wish that GTR's could be brought in as I would get one tomorrow at the Japanese prices.

I know that it is probably a scarey proposition but I would recommend importing your own if you have the money. From what I have seen if you buy an import from a dealer then you are taking a risk. If you buy a $35000 car from a dealer then he has to have bought it from Japan cheaply, ie. there was something wrong with it in the first place. I know that some dealers in Japan are probably no better but at least there is some sort of quality control. If you have the cash and can handle waiting then I would recommend speaking with one of the importing specialist on here and having them help you source the perfect car. 350's and 370's are so cheap and plentiful in Japan that you will end up with a much nicer car. Or just go and buy a 370gt base spec model that a dealer in sydney is claiming to be an SP model.......whatever floats your boat.

Just a quick comment on the Kumho KU31's. I had them put on my 370 when it was complied. After reading only great reviews on them and the compliance shop getting a good price on them I jumped at them. One thing I have noticed is that they are quite loud. They do grip well but I have never had tires that were loud enough for me to actually notice them before. They aren't noisy in a straight line but I notice them when turning and I'm not talking about hard cornering just daily driving. Maybe its simply the fact that they are HUGE and I am used to the little 17's on my RX7 but I thought that it was worth mentioning.

Ok so I have settled done, had dinner, watched some tv and it appears that its not something that I have done wrong. I followed the same procedure on the other side and it worked no problem. It is a fiddly little job and I didnt use the brass clip for anything.....? So I guess that something was broken on the first side when it was complied. Any suggestions on what would normally break the easiest? its not the globe because i tested them both and neither worked on that side, it must either be the ballast connections or the ignitor somehow. Great way to spend an afternoon......................NOT