Ricey

Think it was a fellow ginger but it was a bit too dark to see.

I'll try and do it at the weekend.....no home computer at the mo because power transformer for the laptop started to reek of burning then blew up! Waiting for a new lead then I'll get no it!

If your not fussed about he money he's actually done you a favour thats emotionally worth far more than a grand. 1) He's shown you just how good of a dad YOU are and that having a gash father doesn't mean you instantly grow up to be a cretin or a bad father yourself. 2) He's hit the final nail in your relationship with him. You now never have to wonder if you could/should of done more to have a relationship with him. Decision made - no regrets. You'll note many of my posts ask for 'Dad' advice........there's a reason for that! In the words of Keanu Reeves in Parenthood....... 'You need a license to drive a car,you even need a license to fish. But any buttreeming asshole can be a father'. ......never a truer statement made. Stroll with a smile on your face mate.

Really?? I had mine from Halfrauds.... paid a complete fortune for it, I think about £50'odd quid. Although I believe this is the middle of the road one, like rtbiscuit says.... Funnily enough that was the first one I looked at and it has some right good reviews.......bit pricier than I wanted to pay but it old adage 'you get what you pay for' has come back to haunt me many a time.

Yip thats the one I had on the Merc.......switch on the brake or something.

Cheers all. I was hoping the Biscuits answer wouldn't crop up but I did have a suspicion that might be the case. Might have to ask Santa for some.

'Dad' advice required again! Following my hideous bolt head stripping experiences at the weekend I've decided to invest in a torque wrench. Prices seem to vary hugely and whilst I don't want a 'Wilkinson value happy shopper range' wrench I similarly don't want a 'snap-on bolt-bummer deluxe' effort. Also totally ignorant of what nm range I require for general fiddling with the car jobs so could do with an pointer in this direction too. Fanks!

Ok are you deffo setting the cruise properly?...not being funny with you its just it took me ages to work out how to set it (pulling the top switch down after activating cruise control). I had a merc where it wouldnt activate and that was a brake sensor. Other than that i'll leave it to the tech heros on here!

No doubt it'll be for sale on autotrader before long 'immaculate condition. Good tyres. Mild kerbing on the alloys. Cambelt recently changed.' The cambelt one is always my favourite when I see it on an advert......I generally take the time to pretend to be interested with the buyer and quiz them about it.

Gold??....what kind of sicko respays a zed gold ffs!

Fair play........that guy is funnier than hell. He was actually probably more enjoyable than Frankie Boyle. Fair do's Frankie is funny but you spend at least 80% of the time cringing before laughing.......he's less 'close to the bone' as he is 'flaying the skin of, then snapping the bone, running the bone over and hoovering the bone dust up'. I'd say 70% of the stuff he does on TV must get edited out.

NO NO NO!!!! Going off quietly into the sunset is exactly the reason this country is going to @*!# and butt reaming tossweasels like your landlord are allowed to collect rent on a property!.......if you had failed to pay your rent do you think he would sit their scratching his sack umming and arring??!!? No - he'd be round there with his 6 biggest mates holding you by one leg and shaking you upside down. Similarly if you complain you've got to ensure you; a) Don't expect any results from your actions. Are really doing it to stand up to this kind of kack as opposed to financial reasons c) Will not incur any stress as a result of fighting it (i.e doing it for fun company annoying purposes) All I would do it write a letter to the director/owner of the letting agents advising of their failings. Give 30 days to reply then send a copy of the letter to ARLA or NEAB (whomever they are registered with)........then forget about it - in a couple of months you may see a result. Another sweet way of getting results (only works with bigger companies though) when a company does you over is to go on www.reuters.com - search the company and find out who the directing board are. Then you need to find out how their emails are structured - so for example I want to know how Admirals emails are structures I search '@admiral.co.uk' in google........some PR officer or another will have their address floating around and shebang - you now know the email addresses of the entire directing board Send your complaint on to the entire directing board and you'll have a full response within 7 days (obviously don't do this before you've tried the normal complaints proceedure). I've done this with tonnes of companies who've done me a mischief and had almost instant results. A quote from my email to the directing board of Admiral - ".....Its simply stunning (to the point where I'm nearly impressed) that you can be this bad.............you would literally have to train people to be this incompetent - human beings are not born this ignorant or useless.". Even if the director doesn't take a direct interest he'll have to forward the email to a minion........said minion then shats themselves because a complaint has gone direct to the top........in this case it took 48 hours for a full written response after 8 weeks of waiting Wow this is my longest post thus far!.........and probably most pointless.

Last night.........in the 'secured' parking area. .......and by 'secured' I mean a chav in a luminous jacket taking 6 sheets out of your hand so that you can park on a patch of needle infested scrubland that they don't own.

That was me and it's not an import! Just a Do-Luck rear with a Jap-sized plate. Ahh. I only really caught the bum of it. Looks very nice though. I was snoozing in the passenger seat on my way back to work so I wasn't really paying attention until the last minute!

Finally got round to it today (not deterred by my pop charger incident) . Everything is now greasier than a chippendales crotch and what do you know.......knock has abated. Heard it once in a 30min journey as opposed to every bump in the road. Cheers every one for the advice.

I had similar thing mate.....in fact I only text drove dogs then bought the zed blind. Believe me the difference between a shed and a well looked after one is immense. Depends how you like your cars though......it free revving celica, rx8, vtec engines are your bag then it may not be for you....think carefully though because on day you'll be sat at the lights abd we'll all come along side you with the v6 and all those angry ponies growling away

I'm digging all the sympathy I'm getting here! I was expecting to be lashed back into the stone age and be made to go and take up knitting or something.

Looks immense laugh that does! Where were you Chris....Bala?

There wasn't a little spacer on the OEM intake that's about 3mm thick is there that should have been moved across? (I have NO idea btw - just suggesting) Not that I could see.....and I did look just in case I dropped something (cut forward to Monday when Ricey moves the door mat and finds a tasty looking spacer).....the MAF bit just came straight off and bolted flush on. I had to do the entire thing huddled on my door mat under a half metre wide porch whilst the heavens pelted down around me so I can't of lost anything.

Every time you turn the key and the blipped growl fires out of the back is enough for me. Does the noise of the V6 through the zorst EVER get old as well?!?!?!

Dude dont be put off by my calamity! I'm not entirely sure where I went wrong though because there is no mention in any of the guides that you should use a different sized bolt and I'm sure Dan sent me everything he had (even the little screw for attatching the heat shield was in there).........can't understand what really went wrong - the bolts off the OEM airbox were about 3ml too long Christ - I'm supposed to be fitting a new radiator in the spare room tomorrow........think I might check the house insurance before hand for flood damage cover just to make sure!

All joking apart though people on here (and you 2 are as good an example as any) are fairly inspirational for the 'have a go attitude' that anyone with a love of anything mechanical should have. I'm probably doing myself a dis-service in that I always have a crack at little jobs but not without seemingly leaving a trail of distruction in my wake! As you rightly point out Anders........you live and learn and you'll only ever make the mistake once! Slam plates coming in the week.........mmmmm something else to break.

Aye I guess so mate......you've got to crack a few eggs to make an omlette and all that. I was too angry, wet and covered in muck to even take it out........it was fairly whooooosh brummmbrummmbrumm reving it on the drive though.

I actually nearly titled this thread 'Riceys fail for Huskys amusement'...........fair play at least this fail was quickly fixable! I wouldn't mind but I've done something similar before......putting new alloys on my Merc CLK and decided to be clever and use the Merc locking nuts which were half an inch longer than the ones supplied.... .....what difference will that make I thought. .....well I'll tell you. Its the difference between smashing your entire parking brake mechanism into oblivion. Stew........those bolts are not being moved, touched, breathed on or even looked at the wrong way!! In fairness we had cut them down to the right size so they've not been overtightened or anything. I need to get a torque wrench urgently!