SimonB

Best I've seen was BL02 JOB on a yellow Corvette coming back from Le Mans last year with two tasty blondes on board. You would not believe the attention they were getting. There were loads of 500 PRA plates on the DVLA, I have R500PRA. Dunno if there are any left.

The trouble with these is that they are GPS based, so if your car is in a container, in a garage or truck or whatever then they can't track it. I think the Tracker Echo that is combined radio/GPS and has a card that you have to carry when driving or it alerts the control center. It's very expensive though, about £1200 installed with lifetime membership IIRC.

You mean this stuff? 40x12" not enough for you? I just bought some, it should be plenty big enough I would have thought.

Oi, I'm not a complete numpty, I am capable of drilling and tapping ! I just don't own a bench drill, and I'm too lazy to search out a engineering shop that does. Mind you, without a lift or pit I wouldn't fancy lying under the car tapping the sump I must admit. I used to have the probe in the oil filter take off return, so I'm expecting the sump temp to be slightly higher than that. I think as long as you know where the reading is being taken from it shouldn't matter too much if it's sump, the line to the cooler, from the cooler or wherever.

The trouble with the constituency I live in is that is has a massive Conservative majority. It's crammed full of "say no to the Euro" retired types. So it really doesn't make any difference who I vote for, the Tory candidate will win for sure. I still vote as I think everyone should, but for national elections you do wonder if there isn't a better system that could be used.

Ok, having had a good search round it seems that Blitz make a series of adaptors for different sump threads for different cars, including a M12x1.25 one, part number 19220. Should save trying to find a machine shop!

Just a quick one that might be of interest to anyone who has SPA gauges (the dual digital ones). They have always had a switchable green/red backlight, but you can now get blue ones (they haven't updated their website yet though). The brilliant thing though, is that you can send your old gauge off to SPA and they will change it to blue/red backlight for £35, which is what I've done now I've got blue dials and heater controls etc. I thought that was excellent service.

Nah it should be OK, the plug is on the side of the sump at an angle and the probe doesn't stick out much. I've found the sump plug thread size, it's M12 x 1.25. So I need an adaptor with a M12 x 1.25 male thread to a 1/8NPT female.

Female, to take the temp probe. I'm not sure what the male thread size and type is on the sump plug itself. Does anyone know - I've just thought I might be able to get an adaptor from Think auto or somewhere if I knew the thread size.

The probe for my oil temp gauge used to live in the take-off plate for my remote oil filter, but I have now changed this when fitting my oil cooler. I was going to put it in a T connector but it sticks out too much into the oil flow so I had to abandon that idea. So what I think I will do is put it in the sump plug. Does anyone know where you can get a sump plug with a hole with a 1/8NPT thread from? I don't have the equipment to drill a hole and tap a sump plug.

It probably means your power steering is wrong too - it will think you're going slower than you are and give too much assistance. Get a Thor speed convertor and it will sort it.

Cliff, have a read of this thread. Basically the E01 can only cope with a linear input properly, as you can only put in the voltages and values at min and max. The AEM wideband has a non-linear output (there should be a graph of it in the instructions) so the best you can do is approximate it. If you look at my post in that thread there is a graph showing the output from the AEM wideband and a straight line which is the approximation. In the middle of the range it will be very close, at the top and bottom the errors are greater. I have the WB without a display - I think the output is slightly different from the one you have.

Yeah definitely would be better, but that's where the stock belts are attached. In fact when I took my seats out I was amazed by how flimsy looking the stock seat clip mounting looks. It was definitely a good move mixing and matching so you have lap belts that you can use the bolt in mounts with. That's going to make life easier - it means you won't be able to just unclip the belts and take them out, but then who cares?

The lap belts on mine have a plate that clips to an eyebolt permanently attached like the pic on the left below, so I couldn't use a plate with a normal bolt attachment like in your attachment there Pete. Looks like you're better off - you should be able to use them and attach to where the seatbelt clip is bolted to the seat if you wanted to. Dude - that looks very nice you definitely want to use the harness bar. If you have shoulder straps with the plates sewn in like my lap belts were then I think you'll need to buy some more shoulder straps. You might not have to buy a whole new harness though. I definitely wouldn't try and use eyebolts.

I go every year too. Forget Sunday, it's WAY too busy normally.

You've got the same setup as me, Sparco harnesses too. Mine have the lightweight shoulder strap adjusters though. The outside lap belts are easy - you just replace the seatbelt mounting bolt with an eyebolt as the mounting bolt is a standard size. You will need a longer eyebolt than the one that comes with the harnesses though. It's the inside lap belt that is the problem. The seat belt clip is attached to the seat with a nut so you can't use that. I tried to get an eyebolt the same size thread as the seat mounting bolt on the transmission tunnel but you can't get them. I ended up drilling it out and using a backing plate on the other side but it was a real PITA. I've got full 6 points now, I don't like 4 point harnesses as the lap belt can be pulled up off your waist in an accident by the shoulder straps tigtening and cause serious injury. You should never mount shoulder straps to the floor or rear seatbelt mount points BTW, the angle is way too steep and would compress your spine in an accident. The harness bar is the way to go for sure. Dude - there are 2 types of shoulder belts, those designed to attach to eyebolts and those designed to wrap around a roll cage or harness bar. The proper ones (like the ones in the picture) just thread around the bar like in the attachment. Here's mine in the car:

That's the motobike approval I was talking about, gold sticker, which would be OK for a bike trackday but not necessarily a car one. Mine has both, that's what I would go for, as several track days I have seen say you must have the type A approval.

As long as it has the relevant approvals either style is fine. Make sure you get one that is BSI BS 6658-85 Type A approved. There should be a little blue label on it. A lot of bike helmets these days are British motorcyle sport approved and not necessarily BS approved. Some track days insist on it. I've never actually seen anyone check, but you may as well get one just in case. I bought mine from a bike helmet place, most were only motorcycle sport approved as the manufacturers didn't bother getting BSI approval, but the cheapish plain ones had the correct approvals.

Call it your commission since you got me the wheels in the first place! You can buy me a beer next time I see you...

Well I guess so but I won't know until they arrive. TTE supply variants of these wheels for various different Toyotas and Lexus (Lexi?) and AFAIK most of them get the TTE caps, only the Lexus GS European market gets the Lexus caps. If you have a look on http://www.tte.de you'll see what I mean.

No idea, I don't know if they are stickers or part of the cap itself. I'll let you know when they turn up!

Here you go, from the TTE website:- http://www.tte.de/tuning/website/images/accessories/Lexus-GS300-S16/lexus-gs430-s16-wheel-01.gif I've ordered some today - they'll be a couple of weeks. The part number I have for them is PZ439-10670-2K. Probably worth waiting until mine turn up so I can make sure that's the right part number though. Jake - I'm not sure if the new ones come with the locking bolt thingies, if not I'll need my old ones. I've got some spare keys for them though. You're welcome to have my old ones.

Yeah, they're pretty corroded though, you'd have to get them refurbed. It might be easier to just order a new set. I just ordered some (hopefully TTE badged ones instead of Lexus) from Toyota - they were £65 for a set of 4. I'll see what turns up and post up the part number once I know it's the right one.

Happy birthday! I think Lee should take you out for steak & chips. There's a good pub in Burley that have really nice juicy steaks...

They've still got the "what to look for" from the MkIII in there too. You know, the bit that says head gaskets are prone to failure. And they've still got the dates all wrong. 97 for REAS and the facelift, 98 for VVTi and production ceasing in 99? Errr, no. Plus the same old myths, 280bhp for the Jspec, small brakes on all Jspecs etc etc. Maybe we should correct all the errors and send them from the club?