Be Excellent To Each Other

Oh fuck off!

She was on Dragons Den...

At Ling's, £372/mo for a Twingo Gordini over 3 years works out about £100 less than I paid for mine. Except mine's got the Cup chassis.

I've been dropping hints around the MD this week, concerning my car. He said last year he'd look at getting me something in the spring so yesterday I slipped into conversation that it had 75k on the clock (which is a lot for a 3.5 year old car on a 36 mile long island) and I'm only getting 38mpg out of it (shut up, nothing to do with how I drive it). Plus, over Christmas it needed a new hose to the turbo charger so stuff is starting to go wrong with it...

I'm patiently waiting to be told I can go shopping for a new one. I have no idea what to get.

That's a Micra.

This one Flis..

I have no words.

I thought you just got a new one then stacked it in the car park?

Get an electric one?

From Lombard, but via a scheme the wife's employer operates.

Grim... bought Craster outright.

Heh, I got the car that was sat in the garage up at the office, in August, when I passed my test. Now I want a new, new one. What's all shiny and fast.

MOT and service done. Every time I drive off after being parked a metallic 'ping!' is heard.

The mechanic agrees with my theory that it's likely to be one of the parking brake shoes retracting. He said the Celica, unlike many cars, has a dedicated parking brake that sees no wear apart from when it's used, and suggested when I was driving along (if I do this, it'll be in an empty parking lot!) just pulling it on a tiny bit so the wheel rubs it, as that might sort it out.

Pretty much all cars with rear discs have a dedicated parking brake. If you clamp a disc calliper on when its hot, it gives way as it cools and then the car rolls off; that's what happened to all those Citroen Xaras back in the day.

Did you take it to Mike?

B.E.T.S. in Thornhill. I'd forgotten about him!

The guy said a number of cars apply the parking brake to with you use the footbrake (which is a new one on me) so I dunno.

The advice for people taking their cars to trackdays is "JESUS FUCK DON'T PUT THE HANDBRAKE ON IN THE PITS!" because you might weld the pads to the discs. Instead, you're told to leave it in gear and if you're really worried use chocks.

Dunno how much of that is just arse-covering.

It's that it has to be cable operated, so that you've got a backup in case the hydraulic brakes fail. That's very unlikely now with dual-circuit as standard, but it's probably been a law since 1912 or whatever. That's why the Americans call it an emergency brake, as they don't use it for parking.

Cars with electric parking brakes still have a cable between the motor and the mechanism, I suspect to comply with that.

I'd say that's more to do with them all driving automatics with transmission lock, so not needing to use it for parking. The people with manual transmissions presumably still rely on it just as much as we do.

Even then, some of them park with it -- like everyone parked on a hill in San Francisco (they also kerb the wheels. SF is hilly.)

correctomundo, also the electric windy park brake is proper evil when it goes wrong.


really? I'd say only about 30% of cars have this, its mostly a jap or high-end thing. It is good though, the alternative is a large threaded thing that lives inside the rear calliper and fucks up every now and then in an un-fixable manner.

some volvo V70 models have a park brake that adjusts itself electrically (it still lives inside the calliper mind and has a cable to it) and to wind the piston back to put new pads in you have to plug in diagnostics and tell it to wind back!

Are you talking about an internal shoe brake mounted inside a small drum which is itself part of one rear disc? Because that's also a "dedicated parking brake" in my book, as it's a separate mechanism. What I meant was, they don't use the disc calliper itself. Presumably these could suffer at track days, as the drum could be very hot.

The alternative is an entirely separate housing with a drum somewhere on the rear axle.

These auto-adjust things are, I am reliably informed, "fucking hard work". (My dad worked for 20+ years in a company that made brakes; I have a lot of second hand knowledge in this area!)

Yes, that's precisely what I meant

Neither do I now either, in fact the one on my van hasn't even worked since the day after its MOT...

Walking away from a car and leaving the handbrake off freaks me out. But on the few occasions we've shared a car, Danielle has managed to drive off with the handbrake on, because she doesn't think to disengage or even check it.

I was talking about disc brakes that have a small drum built into the centre that is the hand brake mechanism (seperate), I have never seen this done on only one side though, usually its both sides.

nearly all fords and most french stuff use a dual purpose rear calliper that works as a normal brake untill you pull the handbrake then a small lever and worm gear type thing take over. I used to work at ford so maybe thats why I think its the norm.

Against all the odds the drum in disc type brake has always been the best system, especially for racing. So much so that I believe nissan used it on their new GTR track monster thing.

the drum on the rear axle thing has been tried (see lancia aurelia, various open wheel racing cars (although this was to reduce unsprung weight) and even landrover have something similar) and works fine (with the exception of landrover ) The problems come when servicing because you have to dismantle drive shafts and they can be very hard to get to. anyway most modern cars are fwd so there is no rear axle as such.

A Lancia transaxle with in board brakes

Morons don't. Expecting the transmission to hold the weight of the car in place on its own isn't wise.

(note: I am not calling Mrs G a moron)



On the really hilly streets (such as the one leading to the Coit Tower from Columbus Square) you are instructed to park perpendicular to the hill. Likewise, while visiting Mrs Meaty's older sister at her old house in Knowle, Brizzle, I had to find somewhere else to park as the handbrake alone wouldn't hold the Octavia on the hill, and I didn't trust curbing AND putting it in gear to be enough.

Changing the subject slightly - I just bought a new car, after 5 months of borrowing my brother's poor old Celica ST.

It's an Audi A3 1.8 T-Sport, so turbocharged and easily the quickest car I've ever had. It's an S-reg, so 14 years old, but in immaculate condition (seriously, it's probably in better nick than the '56-plate Civic I had was when I sold that) and has 128,000 miles on the clock, so a lot, but since I only paid £1050 for it (plus it's taxed till June and MOT'd till September), I'm pretty happy.

There's a few minor niggles, the most pressing of which is that the coolant temp gauge doesn't work, so will need to get that sorted. Also the radio has an annoying glitch with the volume control which appears to have plagued all Audis of that vintage, but it's hardly a major issue. Mechanically it all seems very sound, which is the main thing. So yeah: 'tis good. Makes me feel a dick for spending so much on the Civic like I did.

Yay! Same engine as my Audi! Start saving!


Oh, just me eh, that's fine

I disagree anyway - The parking pawl will not let the car move, a flaky handbrake often will. It's not wise to use just the transmission brake on a very steep hill though, as you might have trouble getting it to disengage - so I use both in that case (subject the handbrake working). But the rest of the time, not a problem, bang it into park.

I have light to shed here, the parking pawl has a safety system to stop it being ripped off, I know this because I put an auto into park while doing about 20mph once by accident. What happened was a loud clicking noise and thereafter it was business as usual. thinking about it that means that if you parked on a steep hill in park E-brake off and then someone leaned on it or something then force 'x' overcomes the park safety mech and BOOM, its Traffic Panic at the intersection.

No, that's not how it works, it's that the shape of the pawl and the weak spring pressure to engage it is such that it won't if the gear is turning, it just bounces over the top. Once the pawl does go in it ain't coming out again by itself.
That's how it is on the one I took to bits anyway, disclaimer

aaaahhhhh. *gets put in place*

Excellent! I just worked out that since getting the 306, it has cost £140 a month, including fuel at £1.40 a litre. Which is pleasing. Hopefully yours will be the same!
Also, you probably won't mind about revering into Walls/posts/most things as it's awesome value!

EDIT: 22,000 miles @ 50mpg *4.54*£1.4+£1,000+£400/30

Wuss.

I lease my car. And I know about money and shit. So yeah, lease. *



*may only have leased car as it brought delivery date forward 3 months.

I'm sure Chinny would post this if he was here:

http://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C271758

Oddly enough, a mate picked me up from the train station in his new M3 last night.
Bugger me, it was a bit cramped
I know I'm a big bugger, but even so...

That isn't worth £11k, I don't care who it belonged to.

Less cramped than, for example, my car though, I'd assume?

Do you know, I'm not convinced. There's far more room in the back of the BMW than your Clio, obviously, but the front really was bad.

You haven't seen cramped til you've been in a twingo gordini. I actually have to remove clothes to fit in the drivers seat.

You're a decent sized dude and you bought a car the same size as a g-wiz. You brought it upon yourself rather

The all-new Porsche Boxster has arrived:

http://www.porsche.com/uk/

I love it personally; slight echoes of the Carrera GT?
My only concern would be that bloody electro-bollocks steering?

Mind you, nearly 40mpg from a mid-engine, non-turbo, pretty damn quick petrol roadster can't be bad (and Porsche's claimed performance/mpg figures are actually pretty real world and attainable in my experience, unlike the likes of BMW etc.).

It's got a bit of a fat bum.

I like it.

They're turning it into the 911 cabrio, though.

Electric power steering doesn't have to be shit. The GT86 has it and apparently handles bloody superbly.

b

Yeah I read that too mate. Sounds promising I must say - but do you trust bloody motoring journos though?

Yeah, it shares so many parts and has the same basic platform though, so I guess that's inevitable? (I think that's a good thing though - 911 cab with a few boxes ticked costs £80k or more - why bother? Boxster S is very nearly as fast and being mid- rather than rear engined, is a better handler, for half the dosh!)

Yeah, but fat bottomed girls make the rockin' world go round, man!