warps

How so? http://www.wrc.com/results/ Last time I studied maths, 21>0 Regardless of what you think about the guy, he's doing wonders for raising the profile of rally. Hell, even if 0.01% of the US population become interested in rallying because of Ken Block, then that's a fantastic thing. Yeh - he loves himself. Yeh he's not the best driver in the world. I still think he's a great ambassador for the sport, and that makes him OK in my books.

And natural order has been restored Yes I know - I'm being provocative. Just getting into the Honda fanboy mode so I can fit in here at the dark side. What you say is true though. Some of those shopping trolleys are a lot quicker than the laws of physics should ever allow them to be

Nice work, Les. I like the practice control arm pic - looks like you want to make sure the sucker gets all the grease it possibly can lol How do you turn the drill chuck when you're cutting the thread? Do you use the chuck key (sounds a bit "hows your father" to me) or do you use the pulleys at the top, or put the belts onto low speed configuration and use the motor pulley to turn it?

LOL at the RWD muppets. Anyone who has tried to drive a FWD on a race track can come here and sh!t can them - anyone else can go and get an education. Birds is 100% correct - FWD has huge potential, and in fact their driving style lends them to being very effective, specially on slippery tracks. FWD > RWD on gravel - that fact is indisputable. The best FWD rally cars are pushing out maybe 200BHP (at the flywheel) whereas there are plenty of RWD rally cars putting out over double that. The FWD's are still very competitive with them. My most recent example is a dirt sprint I did at Willowbank 2 weeks ago. My poxy 120kW (1000+kg) Civic was 5th fastest on the day (out of 35 or so cars), beaten by one very well driven rally escort, anda bunch of 4wd turbos. After the 4th run of the day, I was 3rd fastest with only 2 of the AWD turbos in front of me, but I copped penalties in the last 2 runs by running over the witches hats so dropped to 5th at the end of the day. I still managed to beat the rest of the 4WD turbos (WRX's), and all of the other RWD's competing on the day. I know, many of the other cars were road spec, and mine is "rally spec", but there was one very well driven Silvia rally car (admittedly still in development) which I was consistantly beating, and I can guarantee that it had nothing to do with driver skill (the Silvia driver has more Australian Rally champinships under his belt than I do). This was my second ever time on gravel in this car, and 3rd time ever driving it in anger, so driver skill had little to do with my success. If you think about driving in slippery conditions, you'll find that the inherent "weaknesses" of FWD layout (ie they power understeer) are actually a big advantage. When you go in to a corner too hard in a RWD, you have to dance on the throttle as the tail tries to overtake the front. When you do the same in a FWD, you have to drive it even harder to avoid spinning. So, basically, in a FWD, go into the corner too fast, then drive even faster to avoid spinning. Which do you think is going to ccome out of the corner faster? As for race track success - well I have very limited experience to draw on, and I'll admit hat the high hp RWD's walked all over me at the one and only track day I've ever done in a FWD. I do know, however, that there are some very quick FWD IPRA cars, competing along with the same set of rules as the RWD's. I get that some people hate FWD's and I'm not going ot try to convert them. I myself am a die hard RWD guy, and bought the civic so my kids could get into motorsport as they get older. Proiblem is, driving this car is the most fun I've ever had in a car (including several RWD rally cars) so I'm not so sure I want to give it up for my kids. As I said at the start, if you're going to sh!t can a FWD race car, then have a go at one first. They're not for everybody, but you might be surprised how fast and fun they can be. As for torque steer, well mine has a tiny amount, but all it means is that you actually concentrate on holding the wheel steady while threading the car through the trees, rather than reefing at the wheel like I used to in the old RWD's. And the power understeer wasn't even noticeable on tarmac - must be all that power I've got.

Yeh my civic is da bomb! Vtec yo!! I'm interested in the wheels but only if they're 20" or bigger. Ive converted mine to 5 stud so I can fit the big brakes an wheels. I'm running AMG ML63 front brakes (350mm rotors, 8 piston calipers) - they look awesome under the 20" rims. Only problem is I have to run brake heaters because the pads never get enough heat in them otherwise. The brake balance is a bit off too with the stock rear drums but I'm looking to fix that with an adjustable pedal box. I assume you were taking the pi$$ about the rims. If you were serious, then I'm probably not interested. I already have 14 rims for it and they're all 15's (since you can't get gravel tyres any bigger than 15") Back on topic - like I said before I still have fun with GT4, and probably will with GT5 as well. Despite falling short in some of these areas, I'm sure it will still be a fun game.

Oh, and Mr Ping - good call on the manufacturers getting nervous about their cars breaking down. Would be good to have real life reliability too - the french cars would be flat out making it to the finish in any race haha Jokes people - please no flame wars because I offended the citroen / renault owners out there. I was making a funny.

I wasn't suggesting they take away rev limiters - I was trying to use it as an example of ONE way you could DNF a race in GPL - the example i'm using here (rev limiters weren't a big thing in 1967). My point was that DNF is very possible, and didn't turn any serious sim racers away from the game. Of course arcaders won't be into that sort of thing, which is why you need to have the option to turn it off - again very simple coding. Yes, damage will be a good thing and I don't argue that. I hope the penalty thing is better than the stupid infuriating 5 sec penalty they give you in GT4 even if the opposition crashes into you. Not to worry - I'm sure I'll get great enjoyment from playing GT5. When I feel like a real challenge though, (and there are no real races to attend) then I'll just fire up GPL on the PC and get totally immersed in the racing experience belting around lakeside, bathurst, sandown or any of over 100 real life race tracks.

Fixed. If you get a chance, grab a copy of GPL and have a play. It's probably still the most realistic racing sim available today (12 years after it was released). It had various realism settings, and in full GP mode, DNF's were a part of daily life. No rev limiters to bounce off all day, so easy to blow an engine if you drive too hard or miss a gear change (hell, failure to lift the throttle at a gear change would usually be enough to blow an engine). Bump a wall and your steering alignment goes out, causing the car to pull to one side, or uneven tyre heating causing the tyre to go off. There were some random failures too, just like in real life. From memory, on all settings except the gull GP setting, you could reset the car after breaking it, but you started with a full tank of fuel again, and cold tures (and you could only reset when the car had stopped moving, and there were no other cars around). Hey, don't you think that real 24 hr racers get upset if they break the car in the 23rd hour? Why whouldn't we have that option as well (not that I actually do 24 hr races). If you purposely drive other cars off the track, then there's this thing called a black flag - GPL has it. It wouldn't be too hard to build that in to a game for gross rule breaches. If you're the sort of driver who likes to cheat to win, then having damage or not will make no difference, as you can easily drive the opposition off the track anyway. If you drive erratically and risk getting run into, then you will probably be the one who loses out when another car runs into you and damages your car. Like I said, have a go at GPL. It has all these features, and has had some of the most hotly contested racing leagues in the world. As for the "wreckers" who purposely crash into everyone else, well those guys do exist, but funnily enough were a tiny minority, and the whole community pretty quickly sussed out who they were and banned them from races. I know that GT5 will never be a proper sim, and I don't expect it to be (GPL was enough of a headf**k for me). However, I personally think that some of the features I described above, specially a simple thing like selectable damage that CAN cause you to DNF would greatly enhance the realism of the game. Although you might not see any benefit of having this option, believe me, there are plenty of people out there who would want it. Don't start on the "broken bones / injury" arguments either. Those have been done to death over the last decade.

I did play prologue a while ago, but it was just using a controller, so admittedly it didn't give me a true indication of the physics (I use a G25 and cockpit at home - legacy of thousands of wasted hours playing GPL over the last 10 years ) I guess I'm comparing it to GT4 (which I might add I still enjoy for a fun thrash when I'm not in sim mode). All of the things I mentioned above do definitely get under my skin as far as realism goes. 16 cars will be better, but if they could organise big fields in some races (30-40 or even more) then that would be fantastic. Not being able to DNF is a big oversight in anything that tries to call itself realistic IMO. In real racing, consistent finishes will do far more for you than being the fastest hotlapper out there. I guess with track days such a booming business these days, the focus has shifted to punching out that one fast lap in the day, rather than stringing together a day's worth of good laps. Don't worry - I'll still buy a PS3 and GT5 when it comes out - I am looking forward to it. Might have to drop some subtle hints to the Mrs for Xmas pressies.

Escorts and old dattos are lots of things, but cheap and reliable they aint, if you want to belt them around a race track. Maybe 20 years ago, but there are plenty of better options for the budget conscious these days.

Yeh it looks very pretty. What about the important stuff though? What are the physics like? Can you just rail ride around corners or will the cars actually have some semblance to real car handling traits? Will the cars slow down when you lift off the throttle? Will cars suffer actual damage if you hit anything? (i'm not talking about pretty crumpled panels either) Will tyres actually blow if you don't bring it in for a tyre change or run into something? Will tyres heat up / cool down depending on how you drive on them? Is it possible to DNF a race? Will there be more than 6 cars in a race? Will the AI have any realistic behaviour or will they just hold their line and slam into you every time you make a legitimate pass? I'm sure the game will be fun and all, but hardly a simulator by any stretch of the imagination.

Yeh I know Paul through the rally scene (kind of) Actually, a good friend of mine ended up with a Paul Williamson engine in his 1600 back in about 86 or 87 when the whole group G thing was canned. Paul had picked up an L20 off this guy (who's older brother was navigating for Paul at the time) and built a new engine for his rally car. Then they banned Gp G rally cars, so Paul sold the engine back for the cost of the parts only. I remember spending a lot of time sideways or airborne in various car parks / speed bumps at QLD Uni in that Datto Although I never met Paul at the time, I heard a lot about his rally exploits.

Taken from the option 1 website (follow link above) 595 RS-R Motorsport Tyre 195/50R15 $140.00 Seems like the proper ones to me? The joys of driving a shopping trolley

Holy snap! The 595's are $140 a tyre in my size!! I can't even get decent street tyres for that kind of money!! Now I know what to get when the 048's wear out. Note I do as many km on gravel as I do on tarmac with my semis, so probably no point buying the best semis money can buy, just to pick up a second or 2 at Lakeside.

He's been given a car for his money. That is enough consideration to make it a binding contract. Even promising $1 for an action is sufficient consideration to make it a contract And being a private sale, there is no requirement for the goods to be fit for purpose (sect 7 of TPA). If it were a business sale, then that would be a different story, and the 3 month statutory warranty would apply.

I don't know you that well Don't get me wrong - noise is a very important part of the whole spectacle. I think that's one of the major things killing motorsport these days. The noise restrictions at Lakeside are a joke. Frikking morons buying a house next to a race track (which has been there for decades) have the gall to complain about the noise and lobby to shut it down.

True, but personally the current crop of F1 don't do it for me either. Remember, one of the best sounding engines ever was a supercharged 1.5. (I'm sure you've all heard it, but here it is anyway, coz I love listening to it) I think it was redlined at about 13000 RPM, though I'm not certain about that. I know that turbos tend to kill the sound a bit but if they can give the engines some balls, rather than 18,000 RPM mozzies flying around the cicuit then they might just pull it off.

And the ultimate bogan category, drag racing, has always made far more power than F1 ever will. Get over it people - There's plenty more to racing than hp. Personally I like knocking off the big boys with my 120 flywheel kW.

Quite simple, really Subaru >> Nissan Seriously though, the aerodynamics are really onlu going to have a significant impact at speeds above 150km/h or so. At 100, you're chewing up less than 20kW in overcoming the aerodynamic drag. Having said that, reducing drag has a much bigger impact on top speed than increasing power. A doubling of power would increase top speed by about 13% (rough rule of thumb figures - obviously a lot of other things come into play) The CD figure is a pretty basic number used to define a car's overall aerodynamic drag. Essentially it is saying how much drag your car has compared to a house brick with the same frontal area as your car (putting it simply). CD is a comparison of the car's actual drag to the theoretical drag which is calculated from stagnation pressure (1/2 x air density x speed^2) x frontal area. This calculation gives a drag coefficient of 1:1. Your car's drag coefficient is the actual drag divided by the theoretical (house brick) drag edit: this is my recollection from studying this stuff 25 years ago, so I might have missed some fine details.

Haha and it begins.... Just make sure that the harness is correctly adjusted at all times and you should be sweet. As per Marlin's post, tighten the fark out of it until you can't breathe, then give it another nudge for good measure (well, exaggeration, but you get the idea) I'm dreading my next visit to pick up some mud flaps, because I can't seem to walk out without spending at least $500.

I wouldn't be replacing a rubber coupling with solid, as this won't allow any misalignment at all. The rattles / NVH transmission wouldn't be a major drama though. I don't know if there are harder rubber units available, or whether you can replace it with a different type of coupling (spider / uni etc). The RX2 had a spider coupling which I rebuilt with poly cushions. It tightened up the coupling, but unfortunately the rest of the RX2 steering system was made of camembert, so the thing still had terrible steering feel (despite rebuilding / replacing everything that could be unbolted).

Exactly. Not so much under braking, but if you have an accident. It keeps the waist strap from riding up into your abdomen area and causing massive internal injuries. The belt is supposed to go around your hips and pelvis, as this is far less likely to cause serious injury.

An auto sparky told me to run the earth lead from the battery to the front firewall, then from the front firewall to the engine block. This is if you have an alloy radiator, otherwise your cooling system can have some residual current flowing through it, causing electrolysis of the alloy rad. Also if you have a normal wet battery in the boot, you either have to have it in a sealed, vented box (not a marine type battery box) or you need to have a liquid proof firewall between the boot and cabin (CAMS and DOT regulation). If you mount a wet cell battery in the cabin, then it must be in a proper sealed, plumbed battery box.

http://www.racerindustries.com/store/index...products_id=515 These are what I got for my car. I bought some other stuff too, so they did a good deal on the package. I had some brand new Monza 6 point 3" harnesses in the car but just didnt trust them - they were only $200 a set. Not that I could fault them, I just didn't want to trust my life with cheap taiwanese belts and the rotary buckle looked like it would be easy to accidentally undo if you got something caught on it (intercom lead, shirt cuff, etc.).

QFT. I struggle to get time to even look at the tacho. Luckily my last 2 rally cars have had an effective rev limiter / warning system. The rotary had the alternator light come on when I revved past 9000RPM and threw the belt, and the Civic has an 8800RPM cut. Both have been used extensively