Not hollywood softcore i'm afraid but how long my car was with the OPC. After two false dawns of 'your car is ready for collection' when it was far from it, i finally saw the orange car again as it was delivered to the house about an hour and a half late yesterday."See i told you that we had another car" i proclaimed to the missus as we were starting to think that the 3 had become a thing of myth, so long has it been away.Took the car for a good run out to the green wellie at tyndrum which has a good mix of fast sweepers and twisty bits not to mention the numerous coaches and 7.5tonne trucks (mobile chicanes). So i'm running in a new 3rd gear, 3rd & 4th synchros, new MAF, new accelerator cable and a new battery - the fruits of an 8 week wait.
Road conditons were cold and mildly damp, then wet then back to damp again - not the optimum conditions for grip from my semi'slicks but hey them's the brakes. So it was a moderately spirited pace from the car with only a few full rev blasts and mostly 5k changes for fear of breaking traction. Front end understeery in the slippy conditions and washing slightly wide when chucking it round. Took me about 1hr 10mins to get up there (traffic) and about 55mins to get back (still some traffic) and used the best part of £20 of Shell's finest for my troubles.
Gearshift is now toight (said in the style of goldmember) and feels good. Power delivery is also correct again but the throttle pedal is 'sticky' at about the 60% mark and requires a little extra prod to get to full - not terribly desirable for modulating throttle on exits. Had some grumbles from the TC system as well (it'll be the rear tyre pressures no doubt) so disabled that and the car regained its rev manners. Brakes not quite what they should be and the trackday i've got coming up will be the end of them, certainly the front discs and pads.
The car is not a comfortable companion in these conditions, skitting about, one arm wrestling with the wheel over bumps when you're changing gear, brakes wanting to lock up occasionally...... then you catch up with the 60mph traffic and realise that at 'normal' speed it's actually really easy to pilot and can be used as a torque machine in fifth with the occasional drop down for tighter bends. Almost, dare i say, comfortable and sedate. Then you get bored and smash past them with a howl and switch back into super concentrated skiddy, bouncy potential death trap. Great fun!
Destination ended up being totally dreich which is scottish for pretty feckin awful but did take one pic by running out clicking then running back into the car!
/images/migration/UploadedForumImages/DSC00361.JPG
Migration info. Legacy thread was 117620
Road conditons were cold and mildly damp, then wet then back to damp again - not the optimum conditions for grip from my semi'slicks but hey them's the brakes. So it was a moderately spirited pace from the car with only a few full rev blasts and mostly 5k changes for fear of breaking traction. Front end understeery in the slippy conditions and washing slightly wide when chucking it round. Took me about 1hr 10mins to get up there (traffic) and about 55mins to get back (still some traffic) and used the best part of £20 of Shell's finest for my troubles.
Gearshift is now toight (said in the style of goldmember) and feels good. Power delivery is also correct again but the throttle pedal is 'sticky' at about the 60% mark and requires a little extra prod to get to full - not terribly desirable for modulating throttle on exits. Had some grumbles from the TC system as well (it'll be the rear tyre pressures no doubt) so disabled that and the car regained its rev manners. Brakes not quite what they should be and the trackday i've got coming up will be the end of them, certainly the front discs and pads.
The car is not a comfortable companion in these conditions, skitting about, one arm wrestling with the wheel over bumps when you're changing gear, brakes wanting to lock up occasionally...... then you catch up with the 60mph traffic and realise that at 'normal' speed it's actually really easy to pilot and can be used as a torque machine in fifth with the occasional drop down for tighter bends. Almost, dare i say, comfortable and sedate. Then you get bored and smash past them with a howl and switch back into super concentrated skiddy, bouncy potential death trap. Great fun!
Destination ended up being totally dreich which is scottish for pretty feckin awful but did take one pic by running out clicking then running back into the car!
/images/migration/UploadedForumImages/DSC00361.JPG
Migration info. Legacy thread was 117620
