Kinks

last year a group of us ran our own tipping site, custom rules etc. the back end needs a bit of work but i'm struggling to find motivation for F1 this year let alone running a comp.. thanks Bernie!

how long is their appendage?

Interesting. Mine are brand new.

That video is fail, but I knew it would be as soon as I saw those stupid f**king wheels poking out with ridiculous camber. Aside from no suspension travel he's practically riding on the sidewalls. Thanks for the advice otherwise, I know what feels right and wrong and the back end was all kinds of wrong. It's back at the shop, and I'll call them in the morning to make sure they fix it properly. I'm mainly wondering what a sensible amount of droop is (how much the centre of wheel to guard changes when you jack up one corner, is the droop)

How much travel in the + and - direction should an R34 GTT have? I just had a set of Bilsteins fitted using std springs and the rear felt weird.. very unsettled and "hoppy" and made some ugly mechanical clunks when going over bumps. It felt like I didn't have proper suspension travel. I took it back to the shop and with standard springs and standard circlip groove there is *zero* suspension travel in the droop direction. ie, the mechanic jacked up both sides of the car and the suspension arms didn't move at all, the car simply lifted off the ground and the wheel went with it. No wonder it felt weird, I only had "bump" travel.. no rebound travel. Mechanic suggested extra grooves and lowering approx 20mm. I'm fine with this as it ended up a bit higher than standard with new shocks and subframe bushes. However, I'm wondering if 20mm of spring platform change is going to give the suspension enough travel. What's the normal travel figure? It almost sounds like they've put the wrong shocks in.

that is dead sexy! ahh melbourne. you'll never host a grand prix race again* * just an annual parade of ugly F1 cars with penis noses playing follow the leader

Just wait till the season starts. None of the drivers will use more than 70% throttle because they'll be too busy saving fuel. I want to look forward to it, but I can't shake the feeling that Bernie has bent this formula over and is giving it the no-lube cavity search for cash. It's f**ked. Gimmick ideas like DRS to "make a better show" - gay. No refuelling on "safety" grounds yet the lack of fuel load as a strategy variable means everyone just tries to ration it. Tyres that deliberately go off and have a narrow operating window means everyone rations this too. Can't drive too hard - can't afford the fuel bill or to have the tyres go off. JAS-25T you better upload that 2004 vid before I slit my wrists, this season is depressing and it hasn't even started yet

Brazil makes ethanol using sugar cane, not "weeds". Sugar cane is the best material to make ethanol fuel from because the energy balance (ratio of how much energy you get from burning it, vs the amount of energy taken to create and refine the fuel) is between 8 and 10. The USA uses corn to produce ethanol but the energy balance is 1.3. This is pretty stupid. Corn is not a good fuel to make Ethanol fuel out of. They are experimenting with cellulosic techniques now (which does use any plant matter and should be more efficient) but they're not currently in production. Nobody is making energy from weeds on a commercial basis... YET. We do need renewable fuels, I think ethanol made from sugar cane is a great idea until we develop something better. Only downside is it requires a tropical environment to grow the stuff.

I have personally seen a poo-brown old style VW beetle run 295rwkw on the dyno. It was a friend's car and I'm sure he still has a printout. When we had all finished falling about laughing the dyno operators did a real run and it got 25kw. So it's trivial to manipulate the dyno settings to get a particular result. It does look like you are hitting a flow limit, because power ramps up and then suddenly gets capped. Make sure the turbo intake pipe isn't sucking shut, shouldn't happen at those power levels but you never know.

^^ agreed. The number of trucks doing more than 100 makes it obvious that efforts to install "big brother" devices in vehicles simply doesn't work. http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/truck-drivers-arms-race-frustrates-police-20130908-2te2b.html Having said that, external devices like safety cam and average speed cameras makes it hard for them to bend the law significantly. Rather than fitting remote stopping devices, how about catching them and beating the shit out of them before leaving them to rot in jail? I have no sympathy for those who run from the police but removing the ability for us to choose between right and wrong just makes us all prisoners of "the system" by default.

you are a moron. octane is octane. it's a way of measuring any fuel. LPG has an octane rating too. E85 is ~105-110 octane depending on the exact blend. United's E100 works really well. In my R33 it was noticeably better than 98RON. 50% worse? It's either your right foot or something is seriously out of whack with your car. I ran United E100 all the time and it made almost no difference to my fuel usage. O2 sensors work by sensing lambda, not AFR. They measure the ratio of oxygen in the exhaust gas to oxygen in the air, and their output changes around lambda 1 regardless of fuel. The O2 sensor doesn't know you've squirted 14.7:1 worth of fuel into the motor, it doesn't care. All it cares about is how much oxygen is left in the exhaust gases and that is lambda.

3mm of toe on the front and 5mm on the back? woah. WAY too much. +1mm max. I actually found my R33 felt way nicer with 0 front and back. 1mm front and back was enough to make it feel very boring to drive. safe but boring.

Hmm.. if I can get my car sorted out in time I am interested...

There are 3 things you need to know when you start driving a Skyline (I'm guessing nobody told you these very important rules): 1) Don't accelerate around corners 2) Don't accelerate around corners 3) Don't accelerate around corners Don't blame the lack of TCS. Blame your right foot. Second day of owning a new car and "relying" on TCS is foolhardy. That's the nicest way I could possibly put it. Also, do an advanced driver training day. Can't recommend them highly enough.

TCS module is the one in front of the throttle body (R34 has 2 throttle bodies, the first one the air flows through is electronically actuated by TCS the second one is mechanically activated by the accelerator pedal. TCS module has two plugs, one on the "front" of the TCS module and one on the "back" of the TCS module (back means nearest the firewall). You need both. The rear plug on mine has loose pins that slip out if you move the plug so double check your connections.

5W40 is the perfect oil for the street. It gives you free-flowing oil when cold, and enough viscosity to handle a bit of load (street/enthusiast driving). You cannot possibly need a 50 or 60 weight oil for the street, they are too thick. On the track, a 50 or 60 weight will act as cheap insurance for your motor in case you do several hard laps on a modified motor and your oil temps get high. Oil gets thinner when it gets hot, and a thicker oil will maintain lubrication under these adverse conditions. Really you should be running an oil cooler if your oil gets this hot, but it's cheap insurance.

wait, what? gunk in E85 from the manufacturer? (I thought it might happen if petrol stations filled ULP tanks with E85 without cleaning the tank first). Is this a common problem or isolated?

Yep I am looking forward to getting it all fitted, life has gotten in the way lately. I'm sure a March 21U will still wake my engine up in a big way Thanks Stao, that's interesting stuff. If you're happy to show a comparison photo that would be great too!

Agreed, mine leaked at about 160k and they were rock hard. Chalk that up as number 6 on the list of things the dropkick knuckledraggers I took it to for the 100k service didn't do properly.

+1 I bought mine back in March (wow) but have yet to fit it. Curious what the changes are to allow more power, did low-end response suffer at all?

Johnny's list is solid. If you want to go further than that you will find out that everything on the R33 has been sized just right for factory output plus a little more. Figure out what your ultimate power goal is and work back from there to see what needs to be done.

I thought fatz never used his brakes

I've gone to Melbourne a few times using www.grandprixtravel.com.au www.grandprix.com.au is the same site with a different layout and inflated prices, the travel URL expects you to buy tickets with accom so it ends up being a package deal. If you have someone's couch to sleep on then buy tickets by themselves but otherwise it is better to do a package deal and get everything together. Accom pricing is massively inflated, the biggest tip I have is do not stay at the Mercure Welcome, Mercure is a good name but adding the Welcome part is like saying I want to eat at Crown Casino Dumpster. For slightly more money you can stay somewhere MUCH nicer (you are getting ripped off anyway you might as well pay a bit more and enjoy the experience).

I can't stand the V8 engines they currently have. Well.. not quite.. I'll tolerate them but they don't do much for me. The V10's on the other hand.. they gave me an eargasm. Never saw a race with V12's but I would probably cream myself. Turbo + wastegate should sound good.

Yeah I was pissed at Webber's penalty until I saw the CCTV footage. That was dumb, stopping just around from a blind corner was dumb. Alonso should have pulled off the track. Webber shouldn't have played frogger with other cars on cooldown lap to get a lift. A reprimand for both drivers is justified IMO. 10 spots is a harsh penalty, Mark seems to cop it from all sides sometimes but it's a consequence of a 3rd reprimand so fair enough. tough luck, son. F1 should be held to the highest standard for all concerned, just because something happened in GP2 doesn't make it OK for F1 to lower its standards. Having said that, some leeway for sportsmanship and showmanship should be given. Schuey used to dance and sing a bit on the podium until some grand poo-bah got their nose out of joint, and drivers used to do a bit of a burnout to celebrate now and then. none of that happens, it's f**king boring yes sir no sir i have a really itchy spot on my forehead by the way did you see the nice big watch i'm flashing in front of the camera (massa is an expert of that move during post-race interviews). I agree with burnouts at brazil until the tyres pop. it would be so worth it. f**k bernie and his increasingly shitty formula.