waltzinblack

Are these people from anywhere in London that was targeted? Because believe me... when you see the town centre that you know so well, and walk down nearly every day, on the front of a newspaper with yobs destroying it and riot police being called in... it changes your outlook on things a bit. I've never felt this disgusted, angry and scared about public disorder before. And everyone I know from my area who have never been as extreme or as me is also advocating the same measures and they don't care how young these people are. I don't care how old they are.. like Cameron said: 'if you're old enough to commit these crimes, you're old enough to face the punishment'. I don't even consider them human beings after what they have done. They threw away their human rights and should be hunted down like the animals they are!!

Maybe we should all install spikes and cowcatchers to the front of the Zeds and disperse them that way! The Met usually get a good 20 horses on scene. We can have 280.. EACH!

I know. It's a shame that we can't take our own action as residents. But then I can't help thinking that would turn the rioters more against the public.. resulting in more innocent people and businesses getting attacked. Also.. it's not workable to send in the army. They just need to allow the police to use more aggressive tactics. Bringing the army in further undermines the police force in front of the public. Plus, if you start brining in guys with guns and tanks, then the South London gangsters are more likely to bring out their OWN firearms. And running battles with batons and planks of wood is better than running battles with automatic weapons.

It's so awful. I am literally 5mins walk from Enfield Town and I live on the main road into the town. Yesterday I saw nearly 50 riot vans speed past my house, and several groups of youths either going to or running back from the town. Luckily it wasn't actually very destructive in Enfield and the police DID act quickly. It's a really spooky feeling when you see in real life riot police guarding the entrances to your town centre. And that picture of the dog handlers tackling youths that is all over the news.. the HSBC in the background is my local branch. It's so sad to see everything you know on the news for such terrible reasons The worst that happened to me personally though was that my bins got thrown in the road. Yesterday it was still very anti-police and looting orientated. Not many attacks on other members of the public. Getting very worried by today's escalation, but am relieved that it hasn't re-emerged in Enfield. It's terrible that they are setting more buildings on fire. Pointless and terrifying. The ONE thing that we can take from this, is that it is a definite minority of disillusioned young scumbags causing trouble. At least we aren't dealing with a nationwide revolution. I just wish the PM would come home and tell the police to use more heavy-handed tactics.

The reason you only have half the bonnet done, is that tests have shown that a very high proportion of stonechips only ever hit the front half and below. I just had my bonnet resprayed, it had 60k miles worth of chips, and not one chip was past the halfway point on the bonnet. Below that there were loads! I think its because the bonnet stops curving up so much and starts to bend ever so slightly flatter in profile with the car. They also usually only do half the wings, sort of going across the line where the top of the headlights are. This pic makes it a bit more obvious: The main reasons to not have the whole bonnet and wings done are: -Cost.. would probably be just over double that standard kit as extra large sheets of material are needed to cut one whole bonnet/wing piece. -Not really needed.. most vulnerable areas are in yellow in that diagram. -Harder to cut and fit for the installer. Big pieces are hard to do, but are obviously better because you want as few joins/edges as possible. As I said, unless you look VERY closely, even with the standard kit that only does half the front as on that Porsche, it's very hard to tell the film is there. The actual line isn't what you notice - it's the light reflecting slightly differently through the film!

I remember when my Nan used to call them Jam sandwiches. Awesome.

Used to help out a mate who install this, and he will be doing my Zed as soon as it gets out of the bodyshop! I don't understand why more people don't have it done, but I think it's because there are so many rumours floating about concerning it. What was said above is correct, it stops nearly all small stone chips, and they don't usually mark the film either, because obviously it is plastic and can absorb the impact and flex back out again. Apparently they were originally designed it to protect helicopter blades, and when the guy I know used to run his own business doing it, he frequently applied it to planes and boats as well as supercars. It does also stop people keying your car.. and doesn't lift or discolour in sunlight or heat. Only on a white car that was left in the sun every day for a year might you notice some very slight discolouring. It does also last a good few years, with maybe only a couple of corners needing touchups. The standard kits are usually done by CAD, and put through a computerised cutting machine, so most of the time the kits come prepared and cut to fit. They aren't universal, they are tailored to the car, and only occasionally will they have to be cut ON the car. But such is the protective ability of the film that cutting on the car does not get through to the paintwork. It is done very carefully by hand. Standard kit when I worked with him was (roughly.. depending on car) front bumper, half bonnet, wingmirrors, headlights, front wings (sometimes full, sometimes half wings, depends on car) and some little bits around the wheelarches. I would say for that you would be looking at roughly £400, again depending on the car. A full cover for the whole car could be around £1500, which is still about half what you're looking at for a full respray! The film IS almost invisible. Only on REALLY close inspection can you see a tiny, tiny thin line around the panel edges, but from more than a foot away I would say you could not notice. The half bonnet kits are the only ones that give it away, you can hardly see the actual line of the film, but the light reflects differently off of the film and the bare bonnet halves. My guy always used 3M film, and I believe he now works for VentureShield, and I'm pretty sure they use 3M as well. It's such a good investment - after 3 or 4 years there will be a lot less noticeable chips and scratches, as the film resists so much more than the paint will. You might still have the odd one or two, but nothing is perfect! And if you have the standard front kits (research has shown that these cover the areas that are SO much more likely to be affected) then you could have the film reapplied 5 times before you'd spent the cost of a full respray (unless you just sprayed the front and risked colour not matching). It's also a good selling point, and if the film is in bad nick when it's time to sell, it is removed fairly easily and you can sell your 5 year old car with factory gleaming paintwork! I also wouldn't advise trying to fit it yourself. It requires preparation to get rid of ALL dust before the adhesive and film are applied. It takes a LOT of skill and time to fit the film accurately and correctly, and to cut any excess carefully. You might think it's just putting a big sticker on, but there's more to it than that! I tried doing a wingmirror on a Murcielago and it took me a good hour to get it anywhere near the standard that my mate had done the whole front end with. And he still came over and finished it off to make it perfect! If you are a perfectionist and are patient, then you might be OK. haha. I hope my experiences with this have been useful to any of you considering it! When I get my car done I will speak more in detail to my mate about every step of the process, and will take lots of pics and make a nice thread for you all!

Well.. hopefully the government will do what they did in Oxfordshire(?) and realise they are too expensive to run and just turn them off! I will always stick by my belief that it is FAR more dangerous to have everyone just drifting along at 70 with their cruise control on. It severely reduces the sense of speed and danger... and awareness of a lot of drivers. It's so monotonous. I KNOW I'm personally a worse driver in that situation.

Hahah.. good I'm glad to hear all this. So does anyone know about what happens if they are turned off, i.e. no speed limit displayed? You see the odd person FLY through them... and I always wonder if they get caught. Some people say if they are not displaying a speed then they don't catch you at all.. some people say they wont catch you unless you are doing over 85, and some say they are still set to 70... Not that I want to go through them at any faster than 70 of course.. I always just wonder about these other people that seem to go flying through!

That's what I thought.. but I'm a worrier! Cheers dude I hope more people say the same ha ha

So just a quick question.. coming up to a queue, I was approaching one of those new gantry mounted variable speed cameras. They are fairly new on that bit (near the Amersham junction), and its only been a month or two since it was still average speed 50mph zone there. Now, I've heard that unless the cameras are displaying a speed.. they can't catch you.. is this correct? That's besides the point though, when we approached this particular gantry it was WHITE FLASHING DOTS and saying 50. No one went through it at 50, and neither did I - I would call braking from 70-50 in the middle lane dangerous if all the cars around you are maintaining their 65/70 ish speed. So if the lights are just flashing, does it mean I've been caught? They were like the picture below, except it wasn't just a sign it had a speed camera sign next to it and was one of the new gantry mounted camera thingys: I was under the impression that you would only get caught if they were displaying a speed with a red ring around it, like this: which the ones in question were NOT.

GT3 or Nissan GTR for lap times. (or is the GT2 faster than the GT3?... and tbh I've been in a GTR on track and there was a GT3 there and it stood no chance! GT3 might feel more involved though.) Sagaris for Crazyness and over the top thrills. Lambo or Ferrari for general feelings of overall win.

Lane hogging only bothers me if they still sit there when there are clearly lots of cars wanting/trying to overtake them. What I really hate is lane hoggers in the left hand lane that REFUSE to move over when there is a joining/merging lane from a junction on a motorway or big A-road. You KNOW cars are going to be trying to move over and join the main carriageway.. give them some space to do so!! And then they have the nerve to swear or honk you when you are running out of merging lane and have to slip tightly in between them and some f*** off lorry. Tailgaters and cyclists top my list of road demons though. So much hate.

For me, no drummer can out Groove Purdie. To the untrained ear it may sound a lot less impressive than other drummers on youtube who go crazy fast on ridiculous kits, but believe me when I say Grooving as well as Purdie is HARD and requires an incredible amount of control. You can't help but nod your head. He brings drums back onto a musical level rather than just trying to impress with speed. The way he controls the ghost notes with his fingers in some of the shuffle videos is just amazing and sounds perfect. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9jXALaMy4o Another one of my favourites is Joe Morello of Dave Brubeck Quartet fame. I don't think any drummer can quite match his ability to play and solo in awkward swing jazz time signatures. If anyone has heard the live recording of Castilian Drums at the Carnegie Hall I'm sure you will remember the stupendous 10 minute solo. This video is awesome, pretty sure it leads into Take Five. WHERE do the sticks come from? :O So funky too. And he uses traditional grip which makes him 100 times cooler. Oh and this one too, wait for the solo: And last but not least, the video that made me fall in love with the Zen Tambour. This is the fabled Hang drum, a very rare and very special instrument that my one only tries to copy! I remember seeing this when it had like 50k views, no one had heard anything like it when I showed them! ENJOY!

Awesome cars... it's no surprise to me that I see so many of them about. My nan owned several and never had major problems with any of them. (didn't have any problems speeding in them either, crazy lady!) Definitely a good first car. The only other thing I'd really trust is a fiesta. A mate has an old S reg fiesta with only 30000 odd miles on the clock and the only problem he has had was a bit of rust. I think the only bit he has had changed was the battery which was the 13 year old original! NEVER even consider a Saxo. The VTRs are actually relatively cheap insurance for how powerful (I use that word lightly, haha) they are, and much MUCH cheaper than the VTS which only has 20 more bhp. But they are both still high of course - quick, and known boy racer cars! I wouldn't buy any other Saxo though as only the VTR/S look any good! The 1.1 is probably stupidly cheap to insure though. And they do a 1.4D which must get crazy mpg. My old VTR was a 1.6i and I reckon it was easily doing in the high 40s on the motorway. However, for all their economical virtues.. after 50k miles or so Saxos fall apart. The engines and gearboxes are generally alright, but the Axles and CV joints and other wheel stuff tend to just start to fall off. I have easily spent £3000 replacing those sort of parts on all different wheels on the car. I only bought the thing for £2800! It was bloody fun for a first car though!

Nail on the head. It's a great car, but it IS only a 350Z at the end of the day. It tries to be more special than it is really... but still it's your pride and joy so he's still a **** for insulting it. We all KNOW it's just a cheap japanese imitation of a proper luxury GT/sports car, but that doesn't mean people need to slag it off to your face. Surprising that he said it though. Usually people are pretty impressed by my Z and think it's a lot better than I do, and think it's a lot better than it really is! It's only Porsche drivers who talk down to it haha.

I've played drums for nearly 8 years. Never bothered with grades.. music was about having fun and enjoying it, not measuring my competence with more bloody exams! My kit is still the original Performance Percussion one I was bought when I first started, albeit upgraded with a nice Snare and Cymbals. The makes don't mean much with drums though.. even some of the worst cymbals I've ever had have produced different interesting tones to the much more expensive ones. It's more about how you play than what you play Even when you get a battered old drum, that trashy sound can be unique and used in some types of music. My old teacher (a jazz prodigy as a child and an absolutely masterful musician) had this one Ride cymbal that he treasured. He said he bought it for £30, left it outside once and it got all tarnished, then he dropped it a few times and then beat it with tools. It had the most incredible spooky, trashy ring to it. I also have a Zen Tambour. Beautiful sound...

Essentially top of the board, when you consider the only things above it were completely track focused hypercars costing hundreds of thousands! I think overall it was 5th/6th ish? But wayyy ahead of any mainstream Ferrari/Lambo

They are incredibly pretty, they perform brilliantly, they are well built with a lovely interior, sound great, and they aren't quite as common as the Caymans (which is the real 'pretend 911'). Also, more people sleight the boxster for being a cheap Porsche and a feminine car etc etc. All the more reason to buy one and take the haters out for a spin to prove them wrong! If I could, I'd buy one of the new Spyders in a heartbeat. It was very close between a 986 S and a 350Z for me. The Z only edged it because I could get a younger one for less, it looked nicer in Blue, and for my hobbies I couldn't live with two little storage bins!

I'm reading lots of things now on the internet about this.. Something about Super Unleaded being better for cars running turbos with high boost pressures (perhaps why that test saw such a change in the Impreza? Do Imprezas use high boost pressures? I wouldn't know.. just a thought) Also some things about Shell V-Power additives actually being BAD for your engine by cleaning it too well... or something. I would be nice for the petrol god to properly clear these rumours up! I always use Super though, because that's what the owners manual recommends. Might leave off the V-Power though. Tesco the best bet?

You sure they weren't using that special BP 100+ Octane race fuel that they sell at like, 8 select petrol stations near race courses? Not trying to start an argument, but I seriously doubt that Super gives you that much more over normal. Maybe 10-15 but not 40. I thought the main benefits of super were slightly cleaner and better additives for the engine, and a little more power.

If that funky two-tone TVR is the one I think it is, then I've worked on.. and TOUCHED it! Diablo is the one for me out of that lot though!! My boyhood dream!

Wow, your detailing work is incredible! Absolutely in awe of the difference I was going to follow up this comment by saying how beautiful the car itself is, but then... ..I saw the GREEN!

I don't think I've ever agreed with a post more. haha. The only Jap cars I like are the proper classics, and the 350, 370 and GTR. Too many Jap tuner cars have turned into Chav mobiles. I appreciate their tuning potential (but I personally HATE bodykits and the stuff some people adorn them with!) and how cheap they are, but because of so many being 'done up' by Chavs, the normal person on the street views your average Jap car with disdain. Generally, it's only the chavs who would see a Skyline/Supra/MR2 etc and say 'look at dat sick whip bruv he's a G', nearly everyone else just looks at you and thinks 'idiot' when they hear your massive exhaust and see your purple spoiler. I'm not that narrow minded to view those cars like that myself, but image DOES play a role in choosing a car for me, and I don't want people looking at my car and thinking that! The 2 modern Zs are sleek and are compared to Z4s, Caymans etc, and most people I know see them as a similar car (and forget the whole, cheap plastic Japanese part ) and because of the new GTRs reputation everyone sees it as a supercar. In the Z, and looking at the Z, I feel like I'm driving a nice GT car as opposed to a cheap Jap tuner car, which is what I feel when I look at most of the others Plus, I've spent time as a passenger in a GTO, Lancer 8, 9, and 10, RX7, an Impreza, GTR and drive a 350Z. The only two of those cars which had interiors that I could bare were the last two! Didn't mean this post to annoy anyone by the way, just my opinion! I respect all of what you Jap lovers do to your cars! Stock Supras are SOOOO pretty on the outside though, but I just couldn't own one!

Thought I'd come in on this as a lot of it applies to me. Personally, I would never have a problem with someone getting nice things bought by their parents. It's more how they act, and how much they show off. I know someone who has a brand new Audi who is my age. Pretty much every facebook update and picture is some sort of attempt to remind the world of how he has a nice car. He's a nice guy, but the fact that he seemingly can't resist showing off bothers me a lot. I'm pretty sure his parents paid for the car, but I wouldn't hold that against him if he was a bit more humble about it. Sure, I'm young and have a Zed, most people think it's awesome. I have put up a pic or two, as I was really excited when I first got it. But I don't go around shouting to the world that I have a nice car, no one likes a show off. I actually feel bad about telling people what car I've got sometimes, I often just say 'a Nissan'. Even if someone has worked hard for something, I can't stand it if they are constantly showing off and bragging about it. There's sharing your nice things with others, which is fine, and then there's being a Plus, you should never judge someone before you know the whole story. If I was to tell you that I got my Zed at 19, you'd probably think I was incredibly lucky, and my parents paid for it all. Well, in a way you'd be right and yes they did. But in my circumstances I wouldn't exactly consider luck to be on my side. That's not some sort of cry for sympathy by the way, but in this case I happen to be a good example of illustrating my own point!