Be Excellent To Each Other

I believe MAngle was being sarcastic

Anyway, here's a Q for you bikers - I'm after a helmet that I can take with me on trackdays. Don't have a lot of money for one, as it won't be used very often and as I'm in a car with a roof I guess it's not quite as important to have one that can withstand lots of impact as if I was on a bike or in a spyder.

Any recommendations? Could do with two really so I can have a passenger without having to hire a helmet for them too.

Go to your local bike dealer (or a Hein Gericke if you have one nearby) and try some on. The most important things are that it fits you and is comfortable. THEN you can worry about the price. My helmets (one was Shark, one was HJC) have both cost around £150, though you will likely find one for less.

I'd recommend an open-face one too, if they are allowed. Better visibility.

And you can sell it as a 70s retro chair to the Doc when you're done with it.

I've heard he jumps the gun.

Only if it's on the floor and he has a run up.

He crashed on a straight bit, though...

If you pay a fiver a day to hire a helmet for you, or a tenner for two, then you've got to do 30 trackdays until it becomes worth the while. And that's 10 years worth at current rates...

The problem isn't the cost of hiring helmets, it's the availability of helmets for hire on any given track day. The two I've been to so far have had plenty, but this next one only has about 5 and I wouldn't be at all surprised if they're all taken already.

Ah, right.
get one that fits comfortably and open face is what the cool kids wear.

There is no way my clutch was this fucked before the garage had it - it hits the red line in 3rd at 85 now, rather than the 100 it did before. Of course, if pressed they'll say it was, and I can't prove otherwise.

So, new garage time. I still want to take it to Thorney Motorsport, but simply don't have any leave and I doubt they'd be happy me having a courtesy car for a week and putting at least 1k on it. Time to get very gentle.

That clutch is ruined!
How do you even pull away?

With my awesome driving skills. Just don't let me get too close on a track.

It could always be electrical, the alarm's still fucked as well. It doesn't feel like it's slipping that much (though it does a bit, now, more than before) - it's really not that hard to pull away, and mid-range part-throttle it's quite drivable.

Also: they topped off the gearbox oil; could they have contaminated/spilled on the clutch?

Grim...! I'm in Oxford this weekend, you could pop up and tell me what you think. The only other I know of is MaliA and.... well : suspicious: .

Unless your speedo is reading wrong, I can't see how. Electric faults can't adjust the gear ratios.


It's possible (in theory - I have no idea how BMW do their gearbox oil), but surely unlikely.


I met Mali on Saturday. I fear it's all part of a long-con griefing process, which will end up with Mrs Grim... running off with him or something.

And undoubtedly a rage quit.

A real-life rage quit would involve a shotgun, wouldn't it?

It couldn't be electrical, and what you said the alarm was doing sounded like it was working.


If you've been slipping it on full power like that, you should be able to smell it. Also if the RPM dropped again quickly when you took your foot off, without the car slowing, that's the clutch.


No.

It's more likely that the clutch was on the point of failing anyway, and sitting for a week has made it more noticeable.

I know not a lot about M3 spannawanka-ing, sorry. I'm about in town that evening i think, but I has little to no cash at present I'll try and discover what the plans that have been amde for me are, though.



MaliA in "charming young pirate" shock.

It's a clip around the ear and then a bag of pick and mix being thrown after you as any fool knows.

I'm still 50-50 on that.
I could smell something this morning, that I've not smelled before. More like malted grains than burning asbestos, peculiarly.
It hasn't been sitting, I drove it there and back on Friday, it sat for the weekend, then I've been commuting in it, but being quite responsible. I only thought I'd see what happens at high revs this morning.

Well, anyway it's unlikely the garage has anything to do with it now slipping, unless you suspect them of excessively razzing it at high speed when they should have been fixing it.

It's possible it was just nearly worn out and you testing it was the final straw.

I would avoid testing it again on purpose unless you want to make it a lot worse!

The clutch can be a bit of an issue on M3s can't it? I'm sure I've read somewhere that the power of the engine means it's very easy to totally fuck the clutch if you're not being careful with your gear changes - I'm not saying you're not being careful Bik, but maybe someone in the garage hasn't been?

On a not remarkably similar note, this reminds me of the story relayed to me by a friend who works in freight at Heathrow Airport. One day an Enzo Ferrari passed through the airport on the way to it's owner, packaged with the keys, so the boys working there couldn't resist having a muck around with it (but obviously not actually driving it at all). Before long their fooling around had emptied the battery in the car. My friend still has the photo on his phone of him and his chums desperately trying to jump start an Enzo with his battered old Mini.

"Testing" it by accelerating at wide-open-throttle from 30? That's just using it! But yes, no more high revving or full throttle until it's fixed.

As (I think) I've said, I didn't think it was slipping much or at all, then after they've had it it's fucked. Maybe they did it on purpose, maybe they're just shit drivers, who knows, but it came back worse than it went.I've not seen any particular mention of weakness in the clutch. It's just about the only thing that seems reasonably reliable! They've definitely pushed it over the edge; how close it was before I don't know.

I do know I wasn't expecting to be told I needed a new clutch.

Without wishing to sound unkind Bik, if it were a horse, you would have shot it long ago.

On an unrelated note, I saw a bright green Cayman S the onther day hooning up the M40 with the number plate MINJA which I thought was awesome and really hoped it was Cavey.

I'm getting closer and closer to getting shut. Unfortunately, I'm too honest to "lose" the paperwork before passing it on - I'll get stuff fixed where reasonable and keep it until April, I think, when it's tax, insurance and summer time.

And anyway, it should be reasonably reliable once I've got the kinks out. I'm just rubbish at getting stuff done.

Ha!
I saw a numberplate (last year now) on an Evo10 that said 'EV08 ABY', but with a comma and iffy spacing so it read 'EV0, 8ABY'. I fucking loved that.

"Red lining it at 100" sounds like testing to me
Seriously though, I'd avoid slipping it deliberately unless you want to suddenly be walking. For a normal car, the test is to accelerate fully in top gear (at about 60), pop the clutch in and out very quickly, and check that the RPM immediately drops back again.

Your car sounds like it's very powerful - if you dump 200 horsepower into a friction lining that's 3mm thick, it won't stand it for very long before disappearing in a cloud of smoke.

I saw a Discovery with the plate "M8NEY" two days ago.

I sicked in my mouth.

Anyone with a white Range Rover is either a drug dealer or a cunt.

And probably both.

Shit man, I routinely redline my car in 2nd and 3rd


E36 M3? Try 280

M3 Evo? Try 321.

I wish it was still 321

It's a shame yours isn't in better nick, I'd have had it off your hands.

Another grand (sob) and a few hours of doing bits (cleaning, undertray, replacing perished window/roof seals) myself and I probably won't want to lose it, again.

There was some kind of Beemer owned by someone in the Personal Trainer place near my old work with the numberplate 'E553NCE'. I always puked a little seeing that, too.

New contender for the world's ugliest car, the Lincoln MKT:



All late-model Lincolns have a horrendous front grille (only the Town Car manages to pull it off) but that is just horrible.

#description" class="postlink">Rather spiffing Vectra tail lights for sale, what what.

There's an MR2 round Cardiff with D7RTY as the plate. And a hot blonde in it. I bet she is too.

What's 'extra urban' fuel consumption? Out of town?

Saw a BMW 5 series with the plate "9OD" today. If that wasn't the Archbishop of Canterbury, then he's a twat.

A roads, basically - what they used to call 56mph.

*lovely*

Thank you.

The first car with male pattern baldness.

And a cleft palette.

Unfortunately not mate; mine's only silver and it doesn't have a private plate either... C8 VEY would be much awesomeness.

Talking of cars, some young blade in a Clio 182 Cup gave me a real run for my money last night, on the way home from work. Sure, I vanquished the lad in the end, but then so I bloody should, given the price and performance differential involved. It's not as though there was that much of a margin either... those sporty Clios are ace little hatches. Loved my boggo, non Cup 172, back in the day.

I'm going to look at a Volkswagen Passat (for me, not Darryl), anything I should be wary of?

Yes. Buying a Volkswagen Passat.

But it's got 12 months MOT and everything!