RobinJI

Not sure if anyone's heard, but it's been raining quite a bit in Somerset... Which leads me to think about these water replant glass treatments that keep getting mentioned in here. Is there much difference between RainX and the ones you guys seem to rate highly?

I've generally found staying away from the media works wonders for it. (....and most other things) But yeah, it is starting to suck a little. Since starting my new job I've had a total of 4 drives in or out in the dry. I definitely picked the right time to switch to a desk job! Luckily we've had a couple of Sundays where there's just been light showers so I've got out on my off-road bike on the hills. The trails are completely sodden, but it's still great fun. Thankfully I'm in the same situation as Josh in that, despite being in Somerset, I'm basically unaffected by the floods, the biggest inconvenience so far's been turning around and taking a less than 1 mile detour once, and driving through a couple of floods that only just reached over my tyres. All my life's based in Chard/Taunton and a little in Bristol, Chard's 300 feet above the levels, and Taunton 100, with my drive between the two going up from that height to over 1000 feet. We did have the power go out at work for about an hour earlier, hopefully that won't happen often as we're 100% dependent on the computers to get anything done.

My phone seems to think it's snowing, sadly the view out the windows disagrees with it. There was a touch of sleet on the hills on my way home from work though.

Diesel's don't use a throttle to control engine power, so don't need a blow off valve, as the throttle doesn't suddenly shut and obstruct air-flow. (Some diesels do use a throttle like butterfly valve to improve efficiency, but it's not used like a throttle is in a petrol.) My guess would just be that it's probably not a mechanical issue. Either the N75's duff, or something's up with the management, be it mapping or a sensor that's reading incorrectly.

Yeah, I genuinely enjoyed that episode. Good stuff.

This is why despite being rubbish, old cars are definitely brilliant.

Just paid a deposite for my old MX-5, won't be collecting until the end of next month though

It's worth considering 205's and AX's too. Have you seen the video of the 1.4 diesel AX doing a 9:55 around the ring? Looks like a lot of fun! 205's are lighter than 106's once stripped down to the basics you need, especially the smaller engined ones some of which have an all alloy engine. I think if it's something you want to have fun in but actually keep going, then for what you want you'll struggle to have more fun than in a late 80s hatch. I completely get the small want for something basic, light and small engined to thrash knowing it's not breaking the bank. Personally I think the top of my list would be the little Fiats (Cinquecento and Seicento), a mk2 Polo or a basic 205. If you just want to thrash it then scrap it, then something like a 106 will be hard to beat for cheapness and lack of guilt putting it over the bridge!

Adam, I'll add Fiat Cinquecentos, Skoda Favorit/Felicia, Suzuki Swifts, Subaru Justies and Toyota Starlets. Don't forget Clio's either! 4x100 and great fun. Mk2 Polos come up cheap still, and they're insanely simple and easy to work on, the engines love to be revved (the 1.3's square, and the 1.05's the same bore so hugely under square!) and they don't weigh in at much over 700kg. I'd feel a little bad killing one though.

Nick, So pleased to see it out again! Must be great fun. I think really you've got to compare them to the 500 rather than the 126, remember the Mini came out in 1959. I still agree that the Mini's nicer regardless though!

Jake, was it an oily smell or a plastic'y smell? (if you could tell?) I have a vague recollection of you posting some wiring through the bulkhead, and me pointing out that you really should put a grommet on it to prevent it rubbing through. I can't think of much that could drip onto the exhaust on these engines, because they're counter-flow with the inlet and exhaust both on the back, basically everything else is on the front. The only stuff above the exhaust's the inlet manifold and steering rack, and then it's under the bulkhead. Could it have been a jammed water-pump causing the auxiliary belt to slip and get hot?

I'm a bit annoyed to have missed it, but I had a decent ride at least! My one and only picture from yesterday, which happens to feature a car, so can go in this thread:

I fully intended to go to that, completely forgot about it and spent all day on my bike on the Quantocks, then realised at about 7pm that it was that day! Bugger.

Yeah, I've also looked into it a little, but not enough to be confident telling you what to do with regards to something that'll effect your uni grades! (Hence my cop-out answer of 'read up on it'). There's a fair bit of maths behind the theory, but it's all relatively understandable. The engine is giving off sound at certain calculable wave lengths and pitches, and you want a silencer that'll break these frequencies down to and avoid resonance. There's also considerations to do with harmonics for making the sound 'pleasant' so it's more bearable, In the same way a piano note's a lot less annoying than white noise at the same volume. It's not just the silencers to think about, any bends will cause a reflection and resulting change of the sound waves, as will differing lengths of straight pipe. A well tuned system should get away with a relatively small and high-flowing silencer. As I said, there's a lot of info out there on it, just a case of sifting through it and making sure you stick to the reliable sources. (PS, it's not a muffler unless you're from 'murica )

The thing is, my complaint with it isn't that it isn't more of a serious car show, it's just that they're getting to be really quite crap at the scripted humor and silly stuff. They've done plenty of episodes in the past where reviewing cars was way down the list of priorities, but it was still really good because it seemed half genuine. The budget super-cars springs to mind, and the budget coupe's that aren't porsches, plus plenty of others. None of them gave real consumer advice, but they were much better to watch than some completely implausible pissing around. Remember they used to do stuff like firing cars over the edge of a cliff down to a giant target with a caravan in the middle, or jumping a double decker bus over a row of motorcycles. It was actually more ridiculous than what they do now, but they didn't try and mask it as part of a 'test' they just went "we're going to do this, because it'll be funny, and we want to." Which was much more genuine and much more entertaining (regardless of interest in cars.) As for this weeks one, meh, it was still better than most stuff on TV, but nothing special like it used to be.

There's a lot of theory behind it do with with the length of the box vs the length of the sound waves you're trying to dampen. The length and shape of the tail-pipe after the box can have quite a drastic effect too. It's all down to resonance really. There must be plenty of journals on it surely, have a look on your uni's e-library. The info's definitely out there, but I'm not 100% where to look.

I thought that with the bed, mine was a bit different in the execution, a different suspension linkage and with sides to the bed to improve the second moment of area and keep the weight down/strength up. I was aiming for ~1350kg gross weight with a ~1000kg load rating. My idea would have been to have the air on the back of the tow car as well as the trailer, so the whole lot could be dropped down still hitched up. The other major advantage he didn't mention's that when the trailer's empty, it's not sprung for over 150% of it's actual weight! You still have the annoying issue of not being able to open the car doors over the trailer arches, but with a remote for the air you could at least jump in with it up high so the door will clear, then drop it down and drive off. Can't find any screenshots of mine, and I don't have Solidworks on my laptop anymore (we use Creo at work.)

As much as I love Brentacre, they don't seem anywhere near as good for second cars as they are for daily driven cars. Still very, very good customer service, and very flexible, just not as competitive price-wise. Bastereds! I've got CAD designs on my laptop from about 18 months ago when I had that same idea. Designed it all, just never got in a position to build it. Still, glad to see I wasn't the only one thinking that way.

My guess is they're from an A3 1.8T quattro. Only car I can think of that'd have a strut mounted ARB and 288mm brakes.

Why the sad face? I really like them, I'd be tempted by an early one if I was in the market for that sort of thing.

I think the point is, when it first started up, they at least tried to make the dangerous stuff look real, and the funny stuff look spontaneous, where as now in my eyes it's less enjoyable because they take it to stupid levels, and nothing funny happens that doesn't look like the punchline was decided by a comity. Stuff like the cheap car challenges in particular at least had some element of realism in them, which made them really funny and entertaining, where as it's lost that charm now. Don't get me wrong, it's still entertaining, and I'll still be watching, but I do think it's not what it used to be. I've genuinely started to like the american one recently, as the presenters seem to be much more genuine 'car guys', and they seem to concentrate on putting themselves in situations that will always end up being entertaining, without having to be entirely scripted and planned, with (seemingly) genuine comedy on the presenters behalf a lot of the time. It's also well worth checking out a YouTube series called 'RoadKill' on the motor trend channel, it's all muscle cars and drag racing, which isn't really my thing normally, but if you're into cars you can't help like it in my eyes.

Ahh.. that makes sense! Pretty much what I thought about the valve work. I remembered reading something about it on MX-5 Nutz back when I had my 5. I'm not sure if it'll be a keeper, it'll be a car to be used and abused, and may end up as a running-gear donor in the long run. It's as much about the enjoyment of the project for me as it is the end result, I just want something to tinker with, as well as a back-up car to let the Scirocco no longer be needed EVERY day. I'll probably keep the standard engine for now, just getting carried away with ideas of swaps. I've got a bit of an itch to strap some cheap bike throttle bodies to it, but I know they won't do all that much with the low compression, shame. I may try it anyway just for the noise. haha

Jardo, the trip sounds amazing, lucky bastered! Nice work, 94bhp sounds low, even for a 1.6 MX-5! What sort of spec do they run in the race cars? I always though they were basically standard but with some subtle headwork and improved tolerances leading to around 120bhp? I'm trying to make my mind up what I should do with the engine if/when I get my MX-5 back. I'm toying between the ideas of N/A tuning, strapping a turbo onto it, or swapping the whole engine out for something with more power naturally aspirated (either V6 or rotary).

Good stuff (both of you!) Jake, I can't remember, is the Caddy a diesel or petrol? I'm going to be having a massive clearout of car stuff in the next few months and I've got a load of 8v scirocco bits that are not use on the 20v. Might be some useful stuff in there if yours is a petrol. (I know for sure I've got a fully reconditioned head and a 5 speed diesel box lying around, among other stuff.) I might be going to look at my old MX-5 on Saturday, with the view to leaving a deposit then paying the rest and collecting/MOTing it at the end of march. Getting quite excited Also, I got the link for the photos my colleague took at the rally: Link to the full album with other cars.

Yeah, I remember pointing him out to Ben, he did well in his class didn't he?