brillomaster

i'd love to see how this pans out when it happens - I fail to see how the DVLA can issue a charge due to their ineptitude at dealing with paperwork, when a seller can easily show what date they sold a car and that they sent the letter off in good time to be processed before the end of a month. Would the DVLA continue to chase for payment even if their systems are already showing that someone else has already paid tax on a car?

loving the hydraulic handbrake! looks factory fitted!

that actually looks quite nice, roof up or roof down I think!

finally found the graph - as you can see, in the various sports modes, the throttle controller gives more throttle opening for a given pedal position - so car respondes quicker to the depression of the pedal. but in all cases 100% pedal press =100 throttle opening. as standard, the car in 1st gear will responde like EC5 in the graph, 2nd gear will be like EC3, and 3rd gear like EC2, say. and then 4th through 6th will be a largely linear relationship between throttle pedal position and throttle opening. so for a given position of the pedal, say, 40% pressed, with the D1 throttle controller you can decide whether you want that to equate to a throttle opening of anywhere between 25% in EC5, all the way up to nearly 70% in SP7.

^ what a charming fellow. clearly us men have been going about this romance business all wrong!

problem is the adverts are difficult to spot - theres a beemer that im looking at that all looks perfectly legitimate, but it will just be because the pictures and advert wording is cloned from a real advert. only difference is the price, which was a good £3-4k cheaper than all other equivalent cars. if something is to good to be true, it usually is. And as Will says, never pay any money for anything without seeing it first.

Evening all! next trackday is now booked for just over a weeks time - back to one of our old favourites, Bedford Autodrome for what will be the last outing of the beemer on cheap rubber hoping the weather is good so we can have the TCS off and torch the remaining tread on the tyres - if you've been in the car with me, you'll know what i mean but even if its truly arctic conditions we'll still have a laugh, after all, it cant get any worse than snetterton was two weeks ago theres still plenty of space available so the more the merrier - get the track car out of hibernation and get out on track!

Excuse me! I have THREE ditchfinders - and one Continental

ohhhhhh.... yes that makes more sense, of course she would be peddling the expensive stuff. bet her own car still runs 4 mismatched ditchfinders though...

have a quick gander through here for inspiration: http://www.350z-uk.com/topic/79656-all-encompassing-wheel-size-offset-thread/

actually I was being unfair to the fairer sex - they'd never replace all four tyres at once!

:o not a woman who knows the importance of good rubber, surely?!?!? I presume she wants you to buy the cheapest, nastiest ditchfinders possible, and thinks its outrageous that you would spend £150 on a single tyre, when she can get 4 tyres for £100 and a cheeky flirt down at her local part worn tyre place?

Post #2 called, it wants its information back. yeah yeah mister keyboard warrior... some of us are trying to make it look like we're doing work! but amusing that we both went to tyreleader for our low price comparison site...

where are you getting that from? I can find plenty of evidence that the ecu restricts throttle timings, but nothing about an actual decrease in power...

what, you mean these ones? http://www.tyreleader.co.uk/car-tyres/falken/azenis-fk-453/245-45-zr18-100y-401913 so you're paying £39 a tyre to have them fitted???

the car isn't throttle or power limited in the first three gears - it just has lazy throttle mapping. The throttle controller removes the laziness in throttle response, so the throttle opens earlier for a given pedal movement.

Nothing for the Japanese? Alright, in that case, i'll award NA engines to Italians, if the Japanese can have turbos. And the Americans can have superchargers.

V6 - Japanese. Flat 6 or straight 6 - German V8 - American V12 - Italian though the Germans have made a good go of a V10 as well - all of them are made by Germans, or owned by Germans!

ah, if you're gonna track it, I wouldn't recommend a 350z. too heavy as standard, will be very hard on brakes and tyres, and you'll need to spend money on suspension mods to make it corner well. for track work you need something light and moderately powerful - a well set up s2000 or a turboed MX5 might be overtaken on the straights by a zed, but will make it up and then some under braking and through the corners. if you get something light AND powerful (S2000 with a supercharger, VX220 turbo with the wick turned up a bit) then it'll monster everything everywhere!

have you considered an S2000? insurance might be more, but the car is a lot lighter and more sporting in nature than a zed - torque light motor though, so it needs to be revved.

or stop racing, and enjoy the zed for what it is! at your age you'll be very hard pressed to get something noticeably faster than a VXR without paying a lot to buy it, or a lot to insure it. if you can get into a 350z when you're 21 i'd say go for it.

Haha excellent, this is most definitely the correct answer! extra points if you'd have insisted on a limited slip differential as well an early zed will beat a VXR, but it's a close run thing - only 0.2 seconds in it. a 350z has more power, but the Astra is lighter, and more easily tuned. but as we've both said, who wants to drive a fwd hatchback? especially an astra

arrrrgh its that damn Astra VXR again! my money would be on a Ford Focus ST, with a remap. that's 270bhp or so. Although that's assuming you're ok with a front wheel drive scrabblewagon torque steering all over the place... which I'm not lol.

ah I see what you mean - yes 0-60 can be good, but a better measure would be something like 50-80 in third gear - the standard A road overtaking move. I reckon for the 'pin you back' feeling you need a turbo - nothing beats the feeling of turbos spooling and providing boost. a characteristic of the zed (and I suspect a 645ci) is a very linear feeling of acceleration. don't get me wrong 260lbft of torque works very nicely when accelerating on a motorway, but nothing beats the kick in the back feeling like a good turbo. considered a 2005-ish era Subaru Impreza turbo? decent kick from the turbo, and 4wd launchability?

if you're looking for pure 0-60 times at the expense of all else, you're definitely looking at the wrong types of car - both a 350z (and a 645ci) will be doing their best work well over legal speeds. Yes, they could put together a reasonable 0-60 time if really pushed, but that's only a by product of so much torque - no-one would actually do a 0-60 in them because you have to abuse the drivetrain so much. they're long distance cruisers, where torque is very useful as it makes for relaxed cruising. if you want a decent 0-60 car you need lightweight over all else - or maybe the mother of all impreza turbos with a weapons grade clutch and sticky tyres - 5000rpm and sidestep the clutch should do it.