DRTDVL

Nope i'm actually running front brakes on the rear of the car so they have no cables what so ever. Never had an issue with WOF's for the handbrake (lots for other things tho - generally Racecars and WOF people are like oil and water). A lot of the new hydraulic handbrake mounting kits have locks built into them: You can see the toothed slide and the locking bar that allows the handbrake to be applied for a period of time. It's not recommended for long periods of use as they can loose pressure over time, (i.e. holding a car on a hill) but does "lock on". Yup as it's in-line (well my setup) the foot brake acts through the master for the handbrake allowing for normal pedal braking. The master will always be full of fluid so if your on the brakes and then use the handbrake you will still move the fluid in the handbrake master and apply much higher pressure to the rear calipers than the fronts allowing the rears to lock while still on the brakes for the front. I.e. coming into a hairpin - trail braking to the apex, and using the handbrake to help the back end around. Nice little video explaining what i tried in the hairpin example - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQTML5cIfkk You typically need to fabricate new mounts / modify the hubs to mount the extra caliper. A lot of guys use these when they don't have the right master/caliper piston setup to get enough pressure at the caliper to lock the wheel on the factory setup easily. The Authority card is an LVV cert it states it on the top of my Authority Card (Again WOF people get baffled by this)

I run an in-line hydraulic handbrake in the 205. The best way is to run it in-line. It's probably cheaper in the long run also. Getting the master size right is critical otherwise you won't have enough pressure to lock the rears. Brett at Burton Automotive helped a lot with mine and i can't recommend him enough. Tons of information on-line about them and you can buy fully kits with locks from most rally shops. Mines covered under the motorsport authority card. My master has a bled tap on it also, so should there be an airlock in the master for some strange reason we can bleed it.

Apex and I will be there.

Ron, The issue with the ABS on the wet metal surface occurred irrespective of which tires where on the car, it's also an issue confirmed by a few other 406 owners in other countries - one of which has the problem occur when he's pulling out of his driveway which has a metal grate at the bottom of it when its wet. There could be a fault with the ABS maybe, but as i mentioned above and by others with 406's, the car basically free-wheels (yes i know the difference between a lock-up and freewheel before you ask) for a moment before normal braking is resumed - I'm talking about light braking coasting up to a queue of cars waiting at the lights not heavy braking like one would assume. I've never had any issues with the car's abs on gravel (wet or dry) where you typically get a lot more abs activation, or on any other car in the same conditions. In dry and normal wet conditions (i.e. not a a metal surface) the car stops perfectly fine and grip levels are fine, only twice have i had any issues with the tyres. Sure it a little longer than the Bridgestones when i had to avoid a Bus pulling out that didn't see me this morning, but not by much. 1st - When they where brand new in the wet (less than 500km) they where a little slippery since they have worn a bit this has not an issue since - i'm writing this up to the mold releasing agent needing to wear off. 2nd - A little understeer when going around a corner in the wet that is renown for being slippery (The GF spun her car the day before so i wanted to see just how slippery it was). I've driven a friends 205 at Taupo in the rain (decent / heavy) with kingstars on it, and it was fantastic fun controlling under/oversteer with the throttle but on the road it would have been shear stupidity to push the car that hard with the tyres it had. In regards to Andy's response i've had a couple incidents where i almost wrote off my 306 where heavily braking into a gravel corner and hitting the corrugation that exist at the corner entry/exit and it releasing the braking force changing the weight balance the car and causing the back end to breakaway. There is also cases on snow where the sensitivity of some ABS systems has been known to cause problems where it senses wheel lockup as it's slipping a little on the snow layer, the abs releases the braking force never allowing the wheel to break through the snow layer and onto the actual surface of the road, this causes the braking distance to increase. This was more of a problem with the earlier systems than more modern setups. And my context was regarding the sensitivity of the ABS system in relation to very slippery (i.e. wet metal) where it free-wheeled causing more dangerous situation in my opinion than a small lockup. As i stated before with the way i drive in the 406, i've noticed a minimal amount of difference between good and cheapie tyres - now i know this would be greatly different if they where on my 205 which is much more performance orientated with much much higher initial braking forces (co-efficient of friction of the pads is 0.5) and stiffer suspension (more loading put into the tyre).

Ron, The biggest difference between the GT Radials that the car came with, the Bridgestones i put on it originally, and the cheapies i put on it last time is the wet weather braking performance where the cheapies take a little less for the ABS to kick-in (minimal amount less). In the dry there was no noticeable difference. The biggest fault i have with the CAR in the wet is that the braking system is very quick to throw the ABS system on and actually causes more issues with emergency stopping than compound of the rubber that was on the car at the time. There is a perfect example of this when going down Nelson street in the wet where there is a metal plate in one of the lanes and without fail the ABS system kicks in when you touch this plate and effectively lets the car freewheel unbraked over the plate regardless of the tyres on it. (http://g.co/maps/mcpnw) I would argue that it comes down to many other things than just the tyres on the car that caused the car to be written off. I have a complete hatred for the NZ Driver License system where people are allowed to drive yet they do not have the skills / knowledge to properly drive - this is to me is a much much larger issue than me driving around on cheaper rubber in my 89hp (0 - 100kph in 13 seconds) slug. I'm not going to say I'm an amazing driver, but i like to think I'm competent - i adjust my driving to the conditions and the car I'm driving, I've pulled over and waited for conditions to change, had a nap when sleepy, etc.. before continuing my trips. Typically i would say that cheaper cars tend to run the cheaper tyres, the wreck / repair for insurance companies would be heavily skewed to the wreck thus seeing more cars with cheaper tyres in wreckers. Ron - I guess the question would be if my cheapie tyres arn't suitable to my task of toodling around at or below the speedlimit, never driven remotely quickly, never loaded heavily, etc... what would you recommend? What should i be looking at as the base level commuter tyre in my completely non-performance orientated car that spends 80% of it's life sitting in Auckland traffic at less than 40kph?

I got some lovely cheapies from Johno for my 406. It's basically sitting in traffic or cruising on the motorway. I know it's wet weather performance isn't as good as some brand xyz that i would use as road tyres on the 205 or for Andrea's 307 at three times the price, as it doesn't need them for the type of driving the car does. BUT because i know they aren't the worlds most amazing tyre i compensate when it's wet with slightly longer following distances and a bit more caution coming into corners - especially those i know to be slippery.

I run it in 3rd in the 205. I'd say 4th would be out of the power band for you guys??? A bit too much noise to tell but are you rev matching (heel-toeing down change)??? If the car is unsettled as your lifting off the brake to the gads you could look at trail braking (left-foot braking method) as its fantastic to help settle a unstable situation - a lot of motorcyclists and rally drivers use it.

Semi's will help a bit as you won't be rolling the sidewalls as much. What tyre pressures where you running cold / when you came off the track? I was playing with the 205's pressures at hamptons and had massive issues with sidewall roll in the rear because the pressure was too low, which was causing a lot of float/oversteer on corner exit. And the pressures in the front where too low also causing roll/float and understeer on entry to the corners. We where getting a fairly even heat across the tyre just there was way too much roll/float in the sidewalls. You could try something like this - http://www.tcmotorsports.net/blog/index.ph...s-at-the-track/ We did something like this when i took the 306 to taupo and found we where running onto the top of the B of the Bridgestone on the sidewall... You could try an old cheap bastards method for semi's - Get some snow and mud tyres shave off most of the tread and you have a very stiff side-walled tyre that has a soft compound rubber

Something like this: http://www.ground-control-store.com/produc...p/II=700/CA=184 Might help, adding more caster will allow you to run less static camber but will give you the same mid-corner camber. Info here about caster... http://www.motoiq.com/magazine_articles/id...-and-scrub.aspx Where were you getting the understeer?

Just make sure you ask which one it is, as a lot of stores are trying to dump the old model off right now.

Just thought i would let you know... I had a chat to the guys at Elf about oil temps as i was curious and they where saying that with their 10w40 Competition GT that it's good to 120^C if i was seeing above that i needed to look at a 20w50 which is good till 130^C and i was seeing higher than that i would need to seriously look at cooling the oil. He also commented that it would be ok for short periods at those upper temps provided that the oil pressure doesn't drop too much.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Plasticare-Trim-...t-/250882987859 http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Plasticare-Trim-...t-/260844394511

Everything i've ever read says oil starts to breakdown around 120^C

on a vehicle... so if you have a screamer do it on the ground.

Oldschool has a setup like that... A project thread and a separate discussion thread.

i wish i had the skills and space to do stuff like this...

better?

Haha planning for the Motorkhana on saturday so Brian there will be some squealing....

pipe dream... eye on the prize... wishlist... the goal... final destination... take you pick...

Cam - get this: Visit My Website

Just for trackday fun Broom Broom

Ohhh it reminds me of living in the states... but with less snow in the photos... Time to go get some winter tyres!

Josh, i've got a 20ltr fuel thingy if you want to borrow it. Your on the shore right?