brillomaster

glad you enjoyed it! avatar name change to what, nothing too bad i hope!

yep, awesome day, 225 miles on track covered. Great to meet everyone, and thanks for the rides in the Porsche and 350z Dan and HaydnH. Also thanks Karl for the tuition! New beemer seemed to hold up alright... tyres, brakes and slidey leather seats aside!

other options are drill a 2mm hole, then hammer in a 3mm hex key (or even a torx head), which should give you enough purchase and torque to unscrew the remaining bit. or if you can get hold of one, a left handed drill bit, drill anticlockwise, and the vibrations and turning as you drill should hopefully get the stuck bit out again.

aha, managed to get the snapped off bit in my aerial out enough to be able to screw in a new one... its a 5 mmm thread, so basically attacked it with a 4mm drill bit to drill out the core, then it just kind of crumbles away and you can screw a new aerial in. I basically thought it cant be any worse than it already is, so might as well take a drill to it and see what happens. and then when screwing in the new aerial, have applied a dab of copper grease to hopefully stop it rusting up again, but well happy now, new rdx stubby is on!

only the finest sainsburys car wash for me

bring it on

still don't get what the obsession everyone has with a nismo exhaust system is! there are plenty of other excellent systems that are a) available and b ) don't cost the earth! Scorpion, Cobra, Buddyclub, Milltek, Invidia, Blueflame, ARK all come to mind off the top of my head, PM Tarmac or Cougarstore and take your pick!

if you're in Reading then head down to see Jez at H-Developments in Newbury, he'll sort you out

hmm bit of reading suggests the beemer has two stage DSC... stage one, all systems on... will brake specific wheels and cut engine power. stage 2, sport mode... will NOT cut engine power, but will still brake specific wheels if yaw angle gets too extreme. stage 3, all off... will not cut power or apply brakes. if its dry i'm sure i'll be turning it all off... I hate the feeling of TCS/DSC intruding, just spoils the fluidity of a car, and makes me think something is broken as I've suddenly lost all power

ah good point, yeah I think it affects the attitude of the car by braking specific wheels, since the car doesn't have a proper diff in it. I suspect if we leave it on it'll be going haywire anyways.

oh and something else which will be a first for us... dynamic stability control! i'll probably be turning it off after a few laps, but it'll be duct taped on when McBlock is driving

have been keeping an eagle eye on it the last few days, but yes, it does look encouraging. although a bit of rain would be fine as well, I've heard Linglongs are really good in the wet... on a more serious note, be interesting to see if we can feel a 10mm reduction in rear tyre width compared to the old car... might be a bit more playful now, the old car with 225/245 tyres was predictably neutral to slight understeer, hopefully 225/235 the balance should be spot on (although new car has fractionally more torque)

hmm the full service sounds fairly encouraging, although things I would be looking for are things like spark plug changes, auxiliary belt changes, brake fluid rebleeds, gearbox and diff oil changes. None of these things are covered in a normal service, but certainly need doing fairly regularly, every three years for some things I think.

agreed the voltage should go up under hard acceleration, since the alternator is belt driven and the belt will be driving it faster. might be an idea to check the state of the auxillary belts and that they're all nice and tight, and check the alternator bearings aren't seized or anything.

welcome along! whereabouts in the West Mids are you based?

whoop should be an awesome weekend of motorsport - trackday in the beemer on Saturday, then BTCC and Spa F1 on Sunday, happy days

my guess is the OP has done what I've done... snap the aerial so theres a bit of it still very firmly screwed (and probably rusted) into the base, with no way of removing it...

...assuming they aren't constantly crashing like Maldonado was.

You mean cheaper for the teams to hire the younger drivers? That's clearly going to be the case with Verstappen - he's going to be getting paid peanuts compared the likes of Vettel, Alonso and Hamilton, but they're the names that everyone knows I suppose. To be honest I cant believe how little Ricciardo gets paid compared to his teammate Vettel, and yet Ricciardo is not only quick, hes winning races as well. if I was Ricciardo i'd be saying, an extra $5million please! still, a few new faces will be good for the sport - I think younger drivers are fearless and a little bit reckless, which should hopefully lead to some interesting battles between the new guys and the old guard.

Mmmm that's looking good! yep definitely need some sound clips

ah that's too bad... was looking forward to seeing how she went! ah well, porker it is - I guess we wont be overtaking you on the straights after all!

wouldn't the lower levels of racing be a lot more competitive anyways? I imagine younger drivers will have plenty of racecraft and experience, after all its going to be a lot harder to win in a formula where everyone is using identical cars than one where some manufacturers are clearly miles better than others.

as long as its got some kind of silencing built in I reckon you'll be ok, but even if you cant get on track, sounds like there will be plenty of cars to hop in and out of during the day!