Smoke them tyres

Totally agree....how the hell can it be a "super" profits tax if it kicks in at the bond rate?????? A hurdle rate would be the correct rate if it was to be done properly. Krudd and Co seem to be economically "illiterate" and have NFI of the whole impact of their actions. Typical machiavallian character traits..... arrogance and ignorance. Just like his policies....conundrums.

Pat's beat me to this one....... These cars respond relatively easily to the right suspension upgrades, and Pat is on the money. People may disagree....but I'll say it again anyway. IMHO, for more turn in (and less understeer and better grip), pull the rear sway bar off it and put it under the bench. Just because one is fitted at the factory doesn't mean it always has to be there. This means less diagonal transfer of cornering weight to the front and helps stop it being overloaded, thus improving turn in. The rear will then take some more load and make the loading of the rear closer to the front. A better balanced car will occur. IMO, a stiffer rear bar will lessen rear grip to match the front. To me, that would be a slower setup (particularly in the wet), but everybody is different. Sway bars are all about weight transfer.......lateral and diagonal. Also, remove the shims in the upper control arms to gain some more front camber (about -1.5 degrees). That will maximise camber and caster as some camber is lost when trying to increase caster with minimal or no shims fitted. About 1mm of toe in per side should do it with this camber.

Doesn't this proposed idiocy affect anything dug up? Yet it will not increase the cost of living....yeah right. Typical of this mob......convince people that there lives will be better and actually mismanage the situation that they are much worse off. I would judge them on their history. If they don't even have the nouse to do an insulation scheme, what makes people think that they have the expertise and brain power to do this? It beggars belief that they would introduce this when the markets are already nervous. Good timing you retards. Also, what happens to all that "fairer for all Australians" when companies start making losses and will compensate companies for making losses? At the very time (in the future) when they need to boost up expenditure from the govt sector to counteract a recession, they will worsen their own budgetary position. People need to think about the long term exposure that this mob is opening us up to. To apply the tax at the long term "bond rate" just beggars belief. That is not even the weighted average cost of capital (WACC). To do it with such a low kick in, retrospectively and at such a high punitive rate with no warning and negotiation is just another example of economic stupidity typical of this mob

I just can't imagine what possessed GM to put an interior like that in one of their cars. Unbelievable. I hope they continue to use that crap red dash lighting in the VE's. At night it's just awful and damn hard to read. Another GM "try hard" look. The interior design teams at GM have some wonderful (?) ideas on interior design........ Pity GM have to use a Daewoo to get a decent interior. The blue lighting in the XR's is just simply more functional, practical and classy. Love driving the XR at night Wish they had'nt used the green lighting in base models in the BA/F range though.

Definitely NOT a class interior. FG is miles ahead of that. A unbelievably crap GM interior is in the new Camaro's.....2 design teams at work there.......pretty good exterior but WTF interior. What absolute rubbish in design.

Replace the blade link rubber bushes with polyurethane ones and that will solve the tramp. Tramp can quickly find weak links in drivelines, so may be a good idea to do soon. This will quickly stuff the rear diff bush. The blade link std bushes are pretty much useless.

Dumbasses

F6.......Where can we get the parts???

To make it easier to get in the last cm or two, make sure: -Outside diameter of front bearing retainer and bore of bellhousing is clean. A light sand to clean would probably be a good idea as there can be surface rust or a buildup of old clutch dust -a LIGHT smear of grease on the input shaft spines and the bore of the throwout bearing/mating surface Never a good idea to force it with the bolts. It should be "home" before tightening the bolts. Clutch disc marcels (the metal flange bit inbetween the linings) are like pushrods....strong when straight, but weak when bent. Bent ones fail surprisingly easily. Learn to wriggle it into place rather than use the bolts...strong mates and beer help. Don't let the gearbox weight rest/bend on the clutch splines when inserting. This takes some determination, patience and at times swearing. Get a clutch aligning tool. This makes single plate installations easier. Twin plates are best lined up with an old input shaft....T5's are light compared to Top Loaders (50kg).....now they can really induce swearing..... If it has bent the marcels, the clutch has to come out.

Always happy to help. Thanks for the kind words Pat. Happy to contribute and learn. Unfortunately, most people regard suspension as little more than bump absorption. IMO it can be so much more than that. It always seems that engineers design suspension to do a job, but then things get dumbed down with things like silent NVH and reducing grip and balance by inducing understeer, even at the cost of tyre life and driving satisfaction (and sometimes safety). But it is always nice to return it to the standard that the engineers first intended. It is a bit unfortunate that Ford have made the bushes the way they have (although all manufacturers are at it) as issues with moderate km cars can start to have tyre wear issues and detract from great Australian cars that could be sold worldwide. Are you listening Ford US? Better than the domestic stuff they make and force on others. If anyone has not replaced at least the front rubber bushes with poly.....just do it. This mod alone makes the car much more enjoyable and satisfying to drive. A well sorted suspension is just as satisfying as a well sorted engine. Wheel alignments then mean something to the performance of the car and the wheel aligner won't be seeing you every time you fit new tyres. The next mod I may do will to be flip the upper control arm mounts upside down to move the pivot points closer together as I don't believe the front generates enough dynamic camber gain with suspension compression. I have shimmed my UCA's to give me more caster as a current fix, but this means cornering tyre camber to compensate body roll when cornering is more steering dependant (like crap strut suspensions) than load dependant. Not optimum at low speeds with a good amount of lock on. New UCA's would have to be made with revised ball joint angles to prevent them going into bind. This would obviously have to be done in an engineeringly sound manner......NOT BODGED. I believe the effort would be worth it and would lift front end grip to the next level, particularly when our cars are somewhat tyre limited in width. An aftermarket "kit" would also be great as then everyone could take full advantage of the benefits of double wishbones. Kits could be supplied with a shim kit to allow home fitment (if so inclined) and a short drive to wheel alignment shop without destroying a set of tyres.

Cheers....no problem at all. Pat should be able to give you exact pricing on the bushes. My estimate (?????) on the Fulcrum poly bushes would be around the $300 mark for the front lowers and $100 for the front uppers (all plus labour). They can remove the front shims when they do the upper control arms as the std Ford ones only have 2 holes in them necessitating the control arm to be removed to remove the shims. Fulcrum shims are slotted and only require the upper arm to be loosened to remove/fit them. I wouldn't buy the Fulcrum upper control arm mount kit as these are identical to the std ones (except for the V8 ones with their only difference that the nuts to loosen the mounts are in the wheel well, not the engine bay......no problem on the sixes to get to the std nuts in the engine bay, so save a few bucks here and use the std Ford mounts). If you want to put some shims in it (which I wouldn't......unless to correct a difference side to side.....would to just buy a pack of the 1.5mm shims or check that the alignment place has the slotted shims they can fit). Many places give a different wheel alignment setting from left to right to deal with road camber, but in my experience, I have always had them equal side to side and have never had a problem. That theory of difference side to side to me is bunkum. A good wheel alignment front and rear that I have had done cost $100 from of all places K Mart Tyre and Auto. I went to a well recommended place and got treated like crap so I went to K Mart as I had been told that the guys at that branch had a passion for what they do and the quality of their work and customer care I received proved it.

Why do all these plenums use all 12 holes? From what I can see, I would only use the main round ones. They are also cast as a bellmouth on the lower plenum anyway. From my knowledge, intake systems work best with a constant acceleration towards the valve (ala sportsbikes intake ports). These plenums have moderate speed through the ducting, completely slow down in the plenum, speed up through the 12 individual ports, slow down again as they merge and then speed up in the remainder of the lower runner and intake port. A lot of wasted energy. Also, less than optimum off boost throttle response. Also, I don't see how each cylinder can get equal filling under vacuum AND boost due to their "funnelling" of airflow. Volume is one thing, but efficiency and effectiveness is another. Cylinder fill should be equal across ALL cylinders as these engines are not tuned on a cylinder by cylinder basis......perhaps why the std manifold upper is the way it is????....no lean or rich cylinders. I have found that the std upper and lower is not so bad (within limits). A thin sheet laser cut to block off the D shaped long runner ports and flatten the stupid oval hole/depression that the throttle feeds directly onto has sharpened up throttle response quite well and the engine now feels responsive to input instead of "somewhat lazy" off boost and in the 90-100k/hr cruise zone. Cruise litres/100km has gone from 9.5 to 8.5 as a little more velocity and cylinder fill has been gained. Boost response is unchanged, but car is much nicer to drive now. Plenums would appear to solve the volume issue on higher powered cars, but I would be glad to give up a few kw to have a sweet combination on and off boost. Can't say that I would "feed" the airflow to the engine this way for driveability and reliability. Just my 5 cents worth......

Bob the (Bodgy) Builder now doing mechanical work

Anyone?

Front inside tyre wear= Sloppy front control arm bushes (particularly front lowers), but I would replace all of them.....no point in having tyres like that without having sharper response from polyurethane bushes. The wear is from 2 factors- toe out under braking load as the control arms try to move backward (thrust) and poor control of camber (radial) from said bushes. The wheel alignment is only a STATIC calibration. 1600+ kg hanging off rubber bushes with hard cornering does cause them to flex quite a bit. Rear= Lower control arm pivot eccentrics need less camber. The bushes in the cradle for the rear suspension arms are much better at controlling dynamic/actual loads than the front. Poly bushes at your leisure. I would also (IMO) pull ALL of the shims out of the front upper control arms (if at std XR ride height) to gain about 1.5 degrees of neg camber with about 1.5mm toe in per side (std is about 0 degrees camber). These mods will sharpen up turn in, give more sustained lateral grip and improve wear across the whole tyre.

x2

Another environmentally sensible (???????) decision to deal with the greatest moral, social and economic issue of our time.....or something like that. They were going to fix it all. They will end up screwing it all. This mob demanded such high standards for the govt when they were in opposition, but have such low standards for themselves when they are in govt. What a joke. Typical of this mob. Rather than live to a budget, they just raise more revenue to cover their incompetence. There's their final part of their "holy trinity".....alcohol, tobacco and fuel.

I like the quote "tax neutral".......don't make me laugh. What a con job. Why would they go to all the trouble if it was only tax neutral???????? These guys that dream all this up still have a long, long way to go in the common sense stakes.

Good thing that people still exercise their brains and personal judgement in doing their job. Hopefully not all parking people could be so literal. This crap: is "dynamic" management in action for their employees and constituents. What a crime parking in the wrong spot is. Farking pathetic. As the saying goes..... people above look down and see heads, people look up and see 'rrs holes

Try these guys. I have dealt with them before and they were quite good each time. http://www.linearbearings.com.au/Products/RodEnds/tabid/126/Default.aspx The lining material inside the rod body can make a big difference to overall performance of rod ends.

Guys, Spotted Tue this week in Moorooka was one of Qld Police's new covert speed camera cars. This is a pic of the same model and colour spotted. It was parked up just into the 60k/hr zone (previous zone 80k/hr)....... It had what looked like about a 30cm long x 5cm diameter round matt black device on the boot (indicated by arrow) and was angled at about 30 degrees across the line of traffic. It was parked up as the first car traffic passed in a line of cars. Constable plod was inside sitting in the middle of the rear seat. Rego 915LDT.

The audio needs to be translated / subtitled........

outer bushes

Try replacing the hopeless blade link rubber voided bushes with poly ones. You will see that the std bushes don't have a hope in hell of preventing tramp when you see the bushes out of the car.... If someone has a photo of them, it is pretty obvious.

Do it ASAP