soviet_merlin

Bumping this because it is national you-might-be-running-aircon-through-disgusting-filters awareness day. Did this the other day in my Series 2 Stagea. I was sufficiently disgusted. I presume the filters were changed some time in Japan going by the stickers in the glovebox, but I don't think they have seen any attention since. It's super easy to swap so really no excuse there. The Ryco RCA318P filters that James mentioned seem fine. My lesson learned: try out the fan before screwing everything back in. I had old leaves and shit in the compartment when I took out the old filters. Brushed it it out but didn't vacuum. Put it back together with the new filters, turned on the fan and was blessed with a generous sprinkling of dusty debris. I presume vacuuming may have avoided it. Maybe. This guide has great photos and steps to follow: https://www.driveanotherday.com/stagea-cabin-filter/ Archive link for future generations: https://web.archive.org/web/20220105205535/https://www.driveanotherday.com/stagea-cabin-filter/ Attached is a comparison of the old and new filters. Though photos don't quite do it justice. There is this human instinct to get closer and smell things that look wrong. These looked bad enough that I didn't.

Many here have practically been born in engine bays, but some might still appreciate this. It's the best introduction / explanation of how an engine works that I have seen. Everything is interactive, individually explained and it can be rotated, paused and moved. A+ stuff. https://ciechanow.ski/internal-combustion-engine/ It's a read and a half but worth it.

Hah, no worries! I'm not OP, so their situation might be different. I appreciate the suggestion. Will keep the coating option in mind when some overdue other rust work is scheduled one day and the car is out anyway. My main fear is starting on something like that, getting it all fresh and nice and then noticing how all the other bits around it look a bit worse for wear in comparison. It would never end!

Please do! What turnaround time and ballpark cost are you looking at for getting it done? Or do you just chuck them in with all the other parts you are getting coated? I like the idea of coating them but not having wipers at all for a while feels a bit sketchy.

Yeah, nah, it's still the same Jap version. All I did so far was run OCR on it so the text is actually embedded in the PDF. The original is just a set of images. What did you use to try and translate it? It certainly doesn't help that it is 3000 pages as it rules out doing anything by hand. And from what I have seen so far software doesn't cope well with it either.

How do you mean? What would you like to get a copy of? You can PM Duncan for a Dropbox invite to download the scanned service manual. Otherwise happy to share a link as well. Following up on this: I actually had a look at compressing my scan-with-OCR-copy. I have tried compressing it with ghostscript but it didn't work well. The different settings I tried either compressed hardly at all or too much and it looks like ass. Someone in that thread mentioned that LibreOffice has a compression feature with easier control over the quality. I haven't tried that yet but will have another look during the holidays.

Don't know about this one. Though I spent a lot of time looking at cars that I couldn't buy. This worked for me: 1) Make account on carsales 2) Search for the car you are after, eg. R34 GTRs 3) Save the search and tick the box for notifications 4) Receive email / notification every time a car is listed 5) Save the car by clicking the heart button 6) Go through your saved cars periodically and see which ones stay listed for ages, which ones go down in price and which ones are gone in no time I haven't looked at GTRs, but I noticed a good bargain won't last a week, sometimes not even a weekend. You won't see those if you only search occasionally. The ones that ask for too much don't sell and stick around forever.

Somewhat of an update on this one: we went to Mobility Engineering in Asquith today to see what they can do for the pedal extensions. Nice guys! Just waiting for a quote now and to book in a time to get them fitted. It's interesting what the guy there was saying: Basically, stop thinking of trying to reach the pedals and adjust the seat best in terms of visibility and distance to the steering wheel. And from there they make the pedals work. I'm hopeful now that it will make a big difference. You see so many shorter people driving way too close to the steering wheel and from what my partner was saying it is really not a great experience. Probably very much not safe either with the airbag being too close. See how it goes.

Yes please for more updates! It looks super clean now. Are you actually driving it in winter? I'd be so worried about stuff rusting away. Hah. Did someone say 40 channels of datalogs... looking forward to see what you do with it.

You mean a post counter?

Oh, there's nothing translated yet in my copy. Apologies if I made it sound like it. At this point it's just the first step of running OCR to turn the pdf with just scanned images into a pdf with images and actual text that you can highlight, copy and search for. I'm hoping it might help with translating it but I'm not sure how to go about that. As James mentioned it probably just needs some compression to reduce the ludicrous size. Thanks for the offer though, I'll have a go at reducing the size and get back to you when it is a bit more satellite internet friendly

Ooo, I love the 240z! It's such a timeless design that will always look great. I'm unlikely to be any help with this, but I'd love to see how you go with it

I like to think there is an elderly couple somewhere still waiting for offers on their mint GTR. Bone stock, always garaged, wooden bead seat cushions, umbrella and hat in the back window. 20k on the clock and only driven for Sunday trips to the Hunter. They had an ad in the local gazette but nothing came of it. Their nephew the computer wiz made a thread on SAU but forgot about it and never checked on it. All it takes is one lucky soul to dig up that old thread and get in touch with them. It could be you. You just have to believe.

Out of curiosity, what is considered high and out of control temperatures? For example in my own logs from the last ten or so hours of street driving on my Stagea I'm getting a peak of 97°C degrees and an average of 84°C. No fancy radiator or pumps or crazy power though either.

Does it come with the child seats? (Slightly more constructive: I suggest to empty and clean the interiour for photos for sale. But that may just me. I'm not in any position to buy it so my opinion might be worth exactly nothing) Love the blue on white. Best of luck with the sale!

Ooo, that is such a good idea! I have always avoided serious detailing for fear of messing it up.

Oh man, glad you got it working! I can very much picture the frustration. Could you mention it in the DIY Guide? I'm sure the next person following it would much appreciate it.

Hmmm, good point! I shall have a look and see if it can be compressed. It probably blew up in size because I extracted the pdf to images first. It looks like there is something not quite right with the original pdf and the OCR software throws an error when it tries to parse it. I talked to support about it and they proposed to extract it to image files first and then go from there. Which works fine. Except I didn't want the quality to get worse [0] and I might have picked the wrong quality setting. [0] https://xkcd.com/1683/

Please do, I'd love to see some photos!

I had a go at running OCR on the C34 service manual. Is anyone interested in that? @Duncan, I could send you a link if you want to add it to your dropbox. It was a painful process but worked reasonably well. I have attached some pages from the middle to show what it's like. It didn't get all the text in the diagrams but otherwise it is pretty well covered. It's definitely searchable and reasonably selectable now. Unfortunately it blew up in size and the pdf is now 1.6GB. Which is 1600 megabytes. Which is holy shit better not try to open this on a phone. It works well enough on a computer though. My goal was to have it machine-translated. But I haven't been able to find a good way of doing it. And considering the number of pages there is no way it is worth doing by hand. Open for suggestions though. c34_manual_excerpt.pdf

Hah. I never paid much attention but I would think there is not going to be too much of a difference when it comes to clutch pedals in different cars. At the current rate it will be a bit before I'll get there, but I'll see if they remember.

Thanks for the tip, much appreciated! I did not come across them in my search. Looks like they have a couple of pedal extension that they offer. Plus custom made gear if I see it right. I shall give them a visit once restrictions allow it. This looks so much more promising than blindly ordering from the US. The Twin Mode clutch system sounds a bit invasive. I'm really just after something that you can attach and remove easily as it won't be needed 90% of the time. Though I like to think that it would turn the dad van into some sequentially geared monster.

Hi all, has anyone looked into this before? I'm looking for a way of extending the clutch pedal. Essentially short legs plus heavy duty clutch in my Stagea don't go well together. Even with the seat all the way forward. Not to say that it is super awkward that close to the steering wheel. It should be easy to attach and remove as it will only be needed occasionally. The best I could find so far seems to be PedalMates in the US. See photos below. The problem is they do domestic sales only and paying Shopmate for shipping to AU gets a bit pricey. Thanks!