Jazzbass

For me - easily summed up. You want cheap and reliable - go Japanese You want style - go Euro You want endless trouble - go American I've had a lot of cars and I've always found the same thing with my Japanese cars. They do everything perfectly, seldom break down etc - BUT - totally souless to drive. I've never regretted selling any Jap car I've had. I've regretted selling every Euro car I've had.

+1

The loudest exhaust I ever had was a length of copper downpiping from a roof. Straight through from the exhaust manifold to the back. Bloody hell it was loud!! Talk about a reasonant volume increase! It eventually split down the folded seam and became useless - but for a few days in the '60s - we terrorised New Plymouth...

- he's right, y'know!! From my own experience, you know you're getting old when you start to fancy the high school girl's mothers more than the girls... its a watershed moment ... Happy birthday, mate.

Yes, that's the problem as I see it also. If they had calibrated sound level meters and compared the noise at a certain set of revs with a chart, I'd be in favour of the legislation, but for it being too loud for any on cop at any time is way too subjective to make any sense. Still, my stock exhaust makes me invisible to their ears...

Hoons in noisy modified cars will feel the full force of tough new penalties that come into effect next week, police say. The new laws give police the power to hand out 10 demerit points and a $250 instant fine to those deemed to be driving overly noisy cars. The Land Transport Act changes will be introduced on January 16. Police say they will be rigorously enforcing the laws to punish hoons who have terrorised residents with noisy modified cars. The law change will also increase the level of automatic punishments for drivers caught well over the speed limit, under the influence of alcohol and recidivist drink-drivers. Acting Canterbury road policing manager Senior Sergeant Trevor Pullen warned: "If you are going to be racing around like a hoon making lots of noise, eventually you are going to lose your licence." Police officers will be able to impose an instant $250 fine, increased from the current level of $150, and demerit points if they felt a car was "significantly louder than it should be", Pullen said. There was no existing legal test of what constituted a noisy vehicle so individual officers had to make their own assessment, he said.

Except American V8s. I have never been able to stomach the sound of either a yank V8, a Hardley or a Subaru. To my ears, they all sound totally naff. I'm not disputing their power - I just find their sound revolting. :puke:

Cool choice. The 330s are rockets!

You mean with the broom handle??? Brooms don't really fly, y'know.... You've been watching too much Harry Potter, mate

Ouch - condolences on losing a friend, mate! Thank the jerries for a decent, strong car - good outcome for your body. Bright side - you can start shopping for a new car - whoo hooo!

Churs, mate!

Smeg! I need a special dictionary to keep up with you buggers!! WTF is 'sacked' ???

While I would EXTREMELY pissed off if anyone ripped my wheels off, looking on the bright side, I'd be able to go shopping for new ones with an insurance cheque.... There's always a bright side....

That was you??? Man, you did scrub up well - you looked almost human in the suit & tie attire ... Just as hard for you - I was in holiday mode - dishevelled, shorts and T-shirt... We tend to place people according to how we met them. LOL - sorry I didn't recognise you - I was just waiting for Ann and browsing, not noticing ppl. How long have you been at Z-One? Congrats, should be a good job for you. Robin seems a decent bloke. :thumb:

I found it interesting that to us, telecom is a huge employer - not sure if its the biggest in our country, but I think it is. So when we study big companies, we think of Telecom. In USA, telecom would be a small to small-mid size company. Its all about scale of relativity and let's not forget, our 4 million people would be about the size of the average drive-thru queue at McDonalds in NYC

All bullshit aside, mate - good on you for doing it. More people like you chasing down the crims and we'd all sleep deeper. Its far too easy to be not bothered. Keep up the vigilance. :thumb:

They have Vodafone in Japan, too. I have two sons living there - one on Vodafone, one on some weird Japanese thingo. We used to live in Korea - they use CDMA too. My kids have roamed all round the world, Vodafone gets them most places. We use telecom here, purely because we can lump everything under one bill, including the prepaid (but we don't actually pre pay - weird) cells, plus our 0800 # and phone line etc. Its just a convenience thing. I too think that Vodafone phones are better.

Y'know how every wanker with a little dick in the world drives a black V8 Ford or Holden? Well, I saw a classic yesterday. The tosser in the black V8 Commode was dragging off at the lights - smoke pissing off the rears, big bore, noisy as all hell etc - everyone turning to look. In the next lane was a woman in a girlie Rav 4. She just took off with no fuss and pwned the wanker clear across the lights, while he was still trying to find traction. As if that wasn't funny enough, Mr Plod was parked just down the road and did the wanker in the Commode. Still grinning! It was almost as funny as the idiot (also in a Holden) who was doing doughnuts down the cul-de-sac where we used to live and snapped his driveshaft.

Man, some collector is going to get a real minter. I know if I lived in USA I'd be seriously interested. What a find!

Now that's a worry..... If you send me your VIN, I should be able to give you the info. Churs, Rog

Are you sure the little revving thing when you coast to a stop isn't the auto selecting first gear?

LOL - I had a Mazda 808 at the time.... its all in comparison... but it certainly was a smooth 6. Bear in mind, it was almost new then...

Yes, I agree. the rust was a major problem. However - if you're dealing with classic cars - rust is always a problem - goes with the times. The smell of fisholene used to permeate my old cars... IMO, if you want to restore and use a 2002, (or for that matter any 30+ year old car) be prepared to sink more money into the project than you expect. It can be a rewarding past-time, but almost never makes sense financially. Speaking of 2002s, I was disappointed that BMW didn't do a 2002 RI in the year 2002. I thought that would have generated some sales....

From my experience, there can be significant differences between what people 'say' and what is real....

I agree - check the alignment, tyre pressures etc as a first, low cost step to sorting the problem. E36s do have a tendency to wear out the steering racks at around 120k, so that is a possibility.