tomfromthenorth

Spin doctor Mate, your car is fairly lairy, but at least you have done a good job of it and it looks great, even a saxo that looks like a fairground ride I have respect for if the owner has put some love into it and some attention to detail. Your car is what those guys dream of :thumbup1:

I had a moment of clarity the other day, I honestly think my wheels are the coolest things in the world. I didn't expect every one to agree but when I had my car in the hangar 10 engineers and the rest of the crew all thought they looked really stupid. I don't mind what they think, but expected at least a 50/50 split, I thought my car was styled so that all the mods go together and that it overall looks good. I should try and view it from an impartial perspective and consider that I may be a F&F car owner. But, I still love it, and I really care for the car, I can't garage it but it never sits dirty or salty and never wants for a service. It is driven fast but with care and sympathy, it is warmed and cooled and I have a worried ear out at all times for any discomfort from the car. So it isn't a mod for mods sake sort of car, where every panel is somehow custom! And is not seen as cheap speed, I am in it for the long run. Stock zeds are lovely machines, but I didn't buy mine stock so it is where it is today.

http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-25618878 Thanks guys, turns out he was 25, shows what I know, however he was black and blue and I had it turns out 'hydraulic fluid' in my eye. Go to the med centre, directly to the med centre do not pass go lol.

I can't sleep because my ears are ringing my back is sore and my mind is still going full tilt. We have just finished a 6 hour job that has really blown the cobwebs away after my leave. We were tasked to a car crash but immediately retasked to the Cairngorms where a teenager had fallen down the back of a bowl. He had been stood on what turned out to be a outcrop of snow and ice that protruded beyond the solid rock of the mountain and gave way under his feet. It was just getting dark as we entered the mountains, fortunately while it was only snowing lightly and wasnt dark we got our eye in crawling under the cloud up the Larig Ghru (valley floor) because we did a lot more of it after. As we neared the position (reversing backwards at a walking pace up Ben Mac Duie in the dark squinting into 60mph snow with 20 feet under the tail) it was clear that it would be death or medals if we were to continue up into the freezing cloud base. We spent a few hours ferrying mountain rescue up the hill using the same technique each time. Smash up the valley at 120mph groundspeed doing a 180 quick stop (helicopter handbrake turn) to point into the wind then reverse the last bit. We took 3 groups of 5 plus one SARDA border collie, we winched them all to a flatish area 1km from the casualty. We had to take 2 refuels from remote drumstock, these are scattered in the hills in big iso containers with an intimidating array of pipes and valves for me and the winchman to operate inside, they are more complicated than a starbucks coffee machine! On a run back for fuel we found the lads father and brother walking off the hill and picked them up. I can only imagine how they must have felt as they had no idea what had happened to the lad who fell and were battling down hill in a blizzard (mild blizzard... very windy snow). It was amazing to see their response when I said their son/brother had just been found and was alive. We returned once more into the hills but (im not being dramatic) it was now harry darkers and proper snowing. We couldnt hang about but just as I was checking my winchman who was wearing an avalanche tranciever under his survival jacket I got something in my eyes. The right hand engine had just thrown a load of oil down the side of the aircraft and the pilots were clearly having a hard time hovering in the conditions. I winched out while pouring bottles of highland spring into my face (which is ****ing refreshing in 60mph snow!) And we recovered a MR paramedic and the casualty. We took him to Aberdeen hospital and he should survive. No pictures im afraid but I find it cathartic to write these sometimes and as I have sea king tinutis and engine oil eyeball I cant get to sleep. It was a good job in some ways, a happy ending, challenging experiences but there were a number of nasty frights. We ended up in zero vis pulling G to dodge wind farms and all sorts. I am so grateful to the two pilots who took us safely through it all, only a handful of pilots in the world could have, and they are all RAF SARF pilots. Thanks for reading, be bloody careful, the world is out to kill you lol

Happy Birthday! Slightly cheaper insurance even though you can now drink more easilly :thumbup:

No, I always keep an eye out for a nice mark 1 with a supercharger but that would probably have to replace the zed as a pride and joy and I dont want to do that. I think a turbo would spoil an mx5. I test drove a 1.8 sport yesterday with the 150 bhp vvt engine. Didn't like it, it had a sluggish heavy feel to the engine a heavy clutch it tapped at the top end and just wasn't an mx5 to me. My 1.6 is hardly any slower amd revs like a flymo.

We have had a similar car history Gary :-) No it didn't, my last one did but I spent my life finding places to keep it so im not too bothered. But it would look wicked with a purple hard top, ive always wanted a midnight purple zed/skyline so its a happy near miss. I tried to do a square corner out of a junction earlier and failed, my passenger reminded me "Tom, You're missing 2 cylinders, 2 turbos, 1400cc and a diff!" I didn't get it to be fast, they just cheer me up even on the way to the shops.

I may have mentioned this before lol, but "I LOVE MX5s!" Just burned some CDs (how retro) and i'm off out for a shakedown.

Turkish racing purple/12 hour black. 65000 miles really good condition I am over the moon with it. How do you like the mascot on the mirror!

Merry Christmas everybody :thumbup:

Well the only time I have been on boats has been via a helicopter and it always immediately makes me want to stare at the horizon and hold my breath! The problem with Edinburgh is that it is in the middle of Boulmer and Lossiemouth, you're not really well placed for being rescued. We never go that far from base so that we can go off in any direction quickly and aren't far from fuel if we need it. But if your'e ever in the Moray firth I'll come down with some SAR Force ice scrapers and other media gizzets for you lol I once did a job on the isle of May flying from Boulmer, a 28 stone, 5 foot 5 inch German woman, "She vos looking at ze puu-fins. Ven she fell uhver, unt shattered her feee-mur!" She was carried to the aircraft in a sheep trailer behind a quad bike. Again an inappropriate photo opportunity.

Only £17 too, I'll fit one of those one day. Yowser I finally finished that switch-able HICAS mod. I don't know how I made such a simple job seem difficult I must have gone 'full' retard lol. But It is in really neatly and it works. Very hard to say if it is better without the HICAS, I will open a can of worms some time and discuss HICAS Vs lockout but before then I need to do more "testing". It is easier to slide about with it locked but I quite like the feel of working HICAS the rest of the time. Thanks for your help on the matter.

Those are some very kind words mate thanks, but we do enjoy doing it 99% of the time. I think that is an RAF Valley cab because it has the 70 years of life saving thing on the side, it's a cool picture. That would be a good boat to train with, the back end looks quite short so we would be quite high to clear that mast, make things a bit more challenging but there are no nasty Winchman impaling devices on it, unlike this thing for example What is it that you do exactly Lexx?

It's been a while I haven't had many jobs that stick in my mind but thought I'd share a few pictures. Proving the old ones are the best, two machines very close to my heart. The job the other day with the car crash wasn't the sort of job you take pictures of but this one was... "Waves as big as houses" etc etc... It wasn't my biggest or roughest night deck but it was still a challenge. Understandably one of the sailors had fallen over, he had either broken his collarbone or dislocated his arm and had it go back in; the problem was that it had cut off the circulation to his arm and it was going numb. We got him in from about 150 miles out in a couple of hours rather than, however long it takes a boat, 15kts perhaps, in that sea, he would have been having a crap time anyway so we got him off. I am trying to take more pictures because I will never have another job as good as this and It is a piece of history, but whenever things get 'interesting' it is not appropriate to start taking photos. I hope you enjoy them there will be more to come I am sure, I just hope I don't hear "RESCUE 137 THIS IS KINLOSS RESCUE... TASKING... 300ZX... UP A TREE... NEAR INVERNESS... OVER!"

Funny you posted this I just saw something about these in the Silvia world. I can see how it would remove slop from steering input, not that it is particularly sloppy stock. It seems a straight forward swap of a bush but, is it something that you can do on a drive without too much hassle and are there any downsides for life day to day on the road like vibration or whatever? Thanks.

Well the other thing I have learned in this job is you can survive anything... or you can die very easilly. Ive seen a dead blokes brain with no more than an egg cup of blood on the floor, whereas tonight there were about 3 pints going up the walls! There is no pattern to it at all.

We both made full recoveries mum was alright but did break a vertebre in her neck cut head sprains and flail injuries and really cut her leg on the pedals. I had whiplash on everything lol and punched my righ hand 6 inches into the dash!

Thanks Garry, I'm just annoyed I got blood on my lucky gloves :-( new shiny ones make you look like the work experience boy when you arrive on scene! Bolt, I dont really know about the brake pedal leg thing but its possible depending on seat position that you could have it totally straight which isnt good. The floppy thing definitely works, when I was a teenager my mum crashed a 306 with me in it. We went off the road at 60 and it was about a 10 foot drop into the field. During this drop I got slow Motion and a flashback to when I was much younger and my uncle (a motorcrosser) was telling me to go limp in a crash which I did and I was far less hurt than mum was. The car did 2 full front flips and 5 rolls side over side.

I have just been to a car crash by Huntly near Aberdeen, it was on STV news if anyone saw. An articulated lorry had clipped the back of a honda jazz and ended up going into the oncoming lane and hitting a focus (I think it was) head on at about 50 and 50. This was all on a country road and they ended up in the side together. Everyone was a bit hurt but the driver of the focus was really quite badly injured. His left arm had open fractures (bone sticking out) and his right femur had a closed fracture. The femur was the big issue because, 1, if you break your femur you have done something very energetic it takes a lot and 2, you can bleed a lot into your thigh (like a litre or more). His right thigh was half the length of his left but massively swolen with fluid inside. But there wasn't an obvious impact on his knee or lower leg, I have a theory that the right leg broke because it was pressed against the brake pedal and tried to take a million kilojoules of car crash through it. Something had to give. I have heard of this before that you find broken wrists and right legs. So, having been in a massive car crash myself (passenger) and this, I reckon it's a good idea to relax and let go of the controls if you can. Probably sit up straight feet flat on the floor your back against the seat, shut your eyes and think of somewhere else. Probably only possible if you get some car crash slow motion to give you the chance. Correct me if anyone thinks this is duff advice and shout up if you can back up the right leg gets smashed through the brake pedal theory. Stay safe this christmas.

Centre of gravity, I can feel the difference between a full boot and an empty one. Don't know how much it will affect front grip, in theory it will be a bit better, but will make the tail easier to get back into line.

Interesting mate, I've never heard anti squat talked about, but I have had that horrible "BA-BA-BA-BA-BA... squeak!" coming from the back axle when it isn't quite spinning the wheels, but it is jumping around. The steering is light on my car, but I've never thought it to be vague, just lighter than other cars, check your pressures, you don't have coilovers do you? Is your tracking right? I have zeta S coilovers and have them near the middle of their range and almost at full ride height. The car is a bit higher at the back and a bit stiffer too but it is just right for me, the back end follows the eager nose and lets go just before. Take your spare tyre out the boot try and get the CofG forward an inch.

Devil's advocate...

"that would be inside the cabin..." Oh of course it is :blink: silly me, you could save some weight as you wouldn't need a heater after that mod lol

That looks pretty cool, really racey. I want to say do it but I think you will get mucky marks down the side of the bumper behind the exhaust. Is it possible to put one further forward in front of the rear wheel?

You are exactly right Richard, I just get worried at the lights when a 2.5l volvo automatic keeps his foot down and I change up sympathetically and he ends up telling the lads in the pub how he burned off some sort of ferrari looking thing lol