rabbitstew

Man, I wish I had the spare time to spend 9 hours a week working out!

My standard 123d apparently does 1/4 mile in 14.8 seconds.. id better not mention that. Which is why I said it was more about what the owner of the car felt, rather than peoples perceptions. But even so, on here when there have been threads from people saying "should i buy an HR or a old 276bhp zed" the answer 9/10 is that if you can afford it go for the HR as its a much better car. And I was referring to the Joe Public`s perception of how much a car cost to purchase rather than the cost of tyres or servicing.

I looked at pebble watches earlier in the year when i was also looking at "smart" watches. Quite a few smart watches out there, but you can bet when apple release their "iWatch" they will claim its the first one and they thought of an idea. Ive probably got about 5 watches but tend to stick to a couple of favourite I wear on a daily basis. Most expensive one I have is about £500, but I really cant justify any more than that on a watch. I do have friends however who happily spent £5k on a watch just for daily use! The watch I wear most is a £70 Rotary watch and ive lost count of how many people have complimented me on it thinking its some expensive watch or another!

+1 the hr is hardly different to look at. People are making out its a completely different model! I guess its entirely down to the person judging the cars. The HR had an 80% new engine, more power, improved cooling, higher rev limit, tuned up as much as Nissan possibly could. I cant remember all the differences now between the older 276bhp models & the HR but the Nissan brochure for 2007 had a list as long as your arm, including revised suspension, exhaust, bonnet, as well as mounting engine lower in the car to improve handling. Plus on top of that, the HR models will all be the facelift models compared to the older zeds and all the HR models had Rays wheels as standard. So quite a lot of major differences between models. But, sure, if you parked a £4k early imported zed next to a £12,000 HR model the average Joe Public wouldnt be able to tell the difference as they all look pretty much the same.. Bit like when my missus looks at cars. The other day we saw an Escort Cosworth and I pointed out it was quite a rare car and probably worth about £12,000. She promptly told me it looked like a normal Ford Escort and she wouldnt have said it was worth any more than £200. I guess you can use the same sort of comparison about a lot of cars. Look at the Porsches. Some people assume if you have a Porsche you must be rich and associate them with the likes of Lambourghini`s, Ferrari`s etc.. but you can pick up a Porsche Boxster for less than £3k, a 996 for £7k etc... Even a 997 can be bought for less than a Ford Focus these days. But if you parked a 997 next to a Ford Focus, Or a Boxster next to some old mk4 VW Golf Diesel, I bet the majority of people would assume the Porsche is a much more expensive car. I think its more about what the owner of the car feels rather than what other people think about it.

One thing ive noticed is that the zeds clutch`s life seems to vary drastically. You have some who have only lasted 25k, others 80k. Mine was at 40k and still perfectly fine. Seems to be very variable.

I had a 2007 HR and the only problems i ever had was it was slightly stiff from 1st to 2nd or even from 3rd to 2nd when it was cold. Outside of that it was perfectly fine. Mine had 40k on it, on original clutch etc.

Is it a necessity to own a rare car? I dont know anyone who picks a car purely because its rare. 2CV`s are mega rare now, but i dont see anyone rushing out to buy them. I think most people are like myself. They try a few cars out, workout which one they like, then start looking at that model. When I decided I wanted a 350z, I decided I wanted the best one they did, and for me, that was an HR model. I also wanted a Roadster. At that point in time i didnt know they were mega rare, until I started looking for one, and found only 2 for sale within 100 miles of my postcode. Sure, having a rare car is for me a bonus, as I like to be different and not just be like everyone else. Be a bit of a boring place if everyone drove the same car - even if it was a perfectly good car for them.

Have to agree. When I had my HR Roadster, I lost count of the number of complete strangers who would come up to me and say "nice car!", or start talking to be about it. Most people I met had never seen an HR Roadster and said how rare they were. I used to get kids shouting out at me "nice car mister" as I drove by. I think a lot of it is that 350z`s are pretty rare cars, which is one of the reasons I bought mine. I see hundreds of boxsters (you can pick them up for a couple of grand now), z4`s, rx8`s, 911`s, Audi TT`s etc... but in 18 months of owning my HR zed I only saw 2 other HR roadsters and maybe 2 HR coupe`s at the most. "Normal" zeds I probably only saw about 4 of them. Your not the first person to say that!

Company fuel allowance these days is pretty crap, esp if you are doing high miles. The money my wife`s company pays her barely covers the actual fuel costs on her car.

As above, although depending upon your insurance company you may get various responses. If they see it as a "performance" modification, some will just refuse to insure you. Others will load up your premium. If they see it as just a "replacement exhaust which gives you little or no performance increase" then they may just say its fine and not charge you anything.

I always shop around - just use the comparison websites. I also got quotes from the "specialist" insurers only to find that in my case they were a LOT more expensive. I was staggered when I got my first quote. For someone nearly 40, with 20 years NCB, a long history of high performance cars & motorbikes I was being quoted over £1000 for my zed. Compared to about £500 for an M3 / Scooby WRX and £450 for a lambo gallardo. Go figure. I added my pensioner age parents to the policy, said I parked the car on the road rather than in my drive and managed to get the premium down to £900. Year 2 renewal came in at £650, so it might just have been insurance companies being nervous in year 1.

Welcome!

Shiney!!!! You`ll now be paranoid about keeping them clean! I remember spending months polishing my motorbike wheels, it was impossible to keep them clean!

Looks like RRL are merging with another company, in time honoured RRL tradition shares have plumpeted 30% since they anounced it. I dunno about the £1 gravy train, i bought in at 20.4p, shares are currently not far off 3p.

will do - the insurance is only 600 more than my Z so I hopefully will be able to take it out for a spin or two! very excited! Only £600 more..... feck what you paying on your Zed then 900 - its odd that its so cheap. lets see when we try and insure it this week! haha My zed was costing me £900 and i just had a quote of £450 for a Lambourgini Gallardo.

You saying im old?!

Id better go and inform the 97 year old pensioner in the scary house that she now has 2 years NCB! Too right.... although cheapest I saw was £45k which is about £40k out of my budget....

Great Idea!! Plus the additional driver gets a years NCB which means if oyur added to say 10 other peoples policies would this not be the equivalent of 10 years NCB in one year??? Eh? Additional drivers dont get any NCB. Its only the policy holder who gets the NCB. On my insurance I have my parents added and they dont get any extra NCB as a result. The insurance company also never asks for any copies of their driving licenses or do any checks as to whether they actually exist or not. So, based upon that you could add that 97 year old pensioner who lives in the scary house at the end of the village without their knowledge and still get an insurance reduction. Im not sure whats going on with insurance atm, but my zed cost me £900 to insure last year. This year, out of interest, ive just got a quote for a lambo gallardo worth 60grand and Elephant / Admiral are quoting me just £450 fully comp. And thats with me saying that i`ll leave it parked on the street every night.

Cheers, sort of puts paid to the "never been on a race track" line though.........

Still not ended yet.

Thats not a bad price. Ive a nexus 7 i use at home quite a bit, but for my own android in car install, I opted for a cheapie chinese 7" android tablet instead. simply because the one I used has all on screen controls, whereas for the nexus 7 id have to solder up some external buttons. Also I think on the nexus 7 the glass is bonded to the screen and the circuit board inside is quite big, which makes the tablet a lot bigger than the actual screen itself. The tablet i used has literally no screen surround at all, the screen goes from edge to edge.

I knew my 313 Roadster was originally a Nissan press car, but ive only ever found a couple of mentions of it online. But, recently ive found what look to be some professional photos of it, under its original Nissan reg of L66 UST. http://www.autoevolu...32115.html#sjmp These would have been taken during the cars first year on the road, but as I kept the car imaculate, the car looks identical to this now!

309bhp apparently on the road, although less on the rollers as they have ram-air system which Nissan fitted as standard which gives them more power @ 60mph.

Excellent, i live not far from Northampton so will keep an eye out for you.