Sonicriot13

Why ever not? :? That looked like fun. I'd love to do something like that. Not swap to a diesel but just do an engine swap of some kind. 18T most likely.... :D That is a nice engine though. My mk3 had one of those.

Even if I hit the (relative) big time and get a mk5 GTI or something I'm going to be driving down the motorway having the time of my life, and then I'm going to see somebody in a mint mystic VR rolling down the road low as you like on 17s and I'm going to think "scrollox, I knew I should have got one of those". Oh well, I'll find out about the job I'm going for on the 27th/28th as had my final interview on Saturday. Went pretty well, spent two hours there and he went through the payment structure and company car stuff so I'm quietly confident but not getting my hopes up too much.

That Alfa is heartbreakingly lovely, and I know I'm going to be shot down for saying this, but every time I see it I just think Enzo. There's just something about the front end. It's no carbon copy I can see that, but it just reminds me of an Enzo. :?

I know that if I decide not to go for another rado I'd better do everything in my power to make sure I never drive one again...! I know how good it feels to get back in one after not having driven one for a while.

She's a lovely. Very clean! :thumbleft: I actually don't mind admitting I'm a little jealous. :lol:

I second, third an fourth that!!!! as for you other two up there^^^, Buy mine!! viewtopic.php?f=12&t=63740 problem solved!! :D Don't tempt me! :lol: And you're right Boj, there is nothing better for the money. Not by a long shot IMO. Who knows what I'll be getting next. Depends what job I'm in.

:lol: Quality! And spot on I might add....

She's been gone for a couple of weeks now :(. I have been driving around in my Girlfriend's Gen 7 Celica which is a beast and I have really learned to appreciate it after driving it regularly. To the point where I've joined a Celica forum [traitor!] just so I can talk about a car I actually get to drive. Seriously though, I would have one myself. It's a different experience to the Rado, the steering is a lot lighter, but the handling is superb, the throttle response p!$$es on the G60, and the 16v engine is very eager but very, very smooth. My only complaints are the torque delivery doesn't match the Rado (obviously, it was a G60 after all) and you do have to work hard to keep it in the power band (typical Japanese engine). It may well end my love affair with old cars though.... But I still miss the Rado. Even though I did sell it out of necessity. I miss walking home from somewhere and just seeing it sat there with it's little black and white face looking like it wants to go for a drive. I miss the whine (or is that wheeze?) of the charger, I miss people in Golfs rubber necking, I miss the potentially superfluous automatic spoiler, I miss trying to guess which bit is going to break next, and I miss always having something to do/fix at the weekend. I'm finding jobs I can do on the Celica just so my torque wrench sees the light of day. In short, don't sell up, sell a kidney, f*ck sell your liver, just keep the Rado. It may be getting old, it may be falling apart, it may be in a ridiculously high insurance group for what it is, but there is nothing else that feels like a Rado.

An automatic? Eeeeewwwwww!!!!! Some cars should just never be allowed to have auto boxes. :lol: Say that when you ain't driven for seven weeks 'cos of a busted left ankle, man! :lol: I used to agree with your sentiments, but it is always a revealing experience to view things from another perspective. (PS - Only pulling your leg - I have been having negative thoughts since plaster cast came off and damned ankle is still a bit swollen. Still, doc says fluid can take up to six months to disperse, and I would not have been taking C out in all this salt and frost we have had, anyway.) :reindeer: joker: No offense intended my man. Just being all reactionary as usual.... :lol: Of course autos have they're place. It's just the thought of that place being a 1.6 Mazda 3.... Hope the leg gets better soon bud. It's awful waiting for something to heal, you keep telling yourself tomorrow I'll feel better, and then you wake up and it's the same. At least I was like that when I kanackered my back in ultra mega whiplash big style. And everyone around me telling me to be patient with it didn't help.

:lol: - but pea roast surely?

An automatic? Eeeeewwwwww!!!!! Some cars should just never be allowed to have auto boxes.

Yeah, it is something else isn't it. I'm sure Top Gear said they are only officially importing one in to the UK?! :shock:

Yeah, I suppose.... :lol: That safety thing annoys me a bit though. Yeah, their kids are safer but they are more of a dnager if they hit someone elses child. And I remember that thing on TV where they lined up like twenty kids behind this 4x4 and the driver couldn't see any of them. So visibility isn't all that great in reality. That said I always thought the visibility out of my G60 wasn't all that great, not quite that bad though. I don't know. Each to their own as you say, and it's not like people are going to stop buying them. That "coupe" is going to fly out of the show rooms like it or not.

:shock: I was drooling over the S5... then I scrolled down a bit.... :D

My problem with it is not the way it looks or the amount of CO2 it emits, I couldn't really care less about either of those things. This global warming hype is just the government finding ways of raising revenue. I'm surprised they haven't tried to tax people's fear of terrorism. My problem is the above cars serve no purpose. If I want to go off road I'll buy a Range Rover. Of course I will. If I want a driver's car that handles well and looks cool I'll buy a coupe. If I want a car that looks like a Range Rover on lowered suspension, probably doesn't handle all that well, can't go off road, returns about 7 mpg despite being relatively slow, and is an epic waste of money I'll buy one of those... things. And I can't see that happening any time soon. It's not a coupe and it's not an off roader. It's just pointless.

Thanks for that, that's really interesting to know. And you're right, a bit scary! That one about establishing a rapport with the customer. After working in customer service roles for over five years (it's all I've done since leaving college) that is my number one rule. Always establish a rapport with them. This became most apparent in working in complaints teams. The amount of times I've turned a raging, livid customer into a laughing, joking one just by engaging them in a bit of banter, could be about anything just treat them like a human being, it's unreal. That one should defo be 100%. Looking at those I can see why the guys went to so much trouble on Thursday. Cheers for the offer Andy. I did try to send you my CV before but it didn't work for whatever reason. The next interview will be in the next week or so and they said I will know if I've got the job before the end of the year. But if I don't get it I will be in touch. Hell, if the email doesn't work again I'll just post my CV to you or something! :D

Best way buddy, if you're not confident with taking the sump off and taking it to pieces best to just take it easy and keep an eye on it until you can get it looked at.

The more I think about it the more I want to do it. And the way I'm looking at it at the moment, if I have to go to an interview with every garage in Suffolk then so be it. If I get the job with the last place I go to then I've succeeded in what I set out to do. But lets hope it doesn't come to that.... :D

Both seem like good opportunities but you're right about them being very different. This is one of the main things that attracts me to the motor industry. Apart from my love of cars the possibilities/opportunities are only limited by how much work you want to put into it. You really are the maker of your own destiny. Much more so than in anything I've ever done before. If I get the job I'm going for it will be really hard work and long hours but the rewards sound excellent.

That's a good place to be buddy. Thought any more about the VW one? I just can't wait to see what my current employers are gonna offer to try and keep me here if I do get the job. There's nothing they could give me that would make me stay though so it doesn't really matter. I know what I want to do.

It gets better, here's the official attempt: http://www.autotrader.co.uk/EDITORIAL/c ... 38476.html Mmmm... a coupe SUV. Just what the world needs. Just a deliberate attempt at pointless cr@p for status anxiety sufferers. If they really want to make a coupe why don't they just design a new car? Why take something that isn't a coupe and try to turn it into one? It's just so cynical.

Why? Why why why why why? http://cars.uk.msn.com/news/car_news_ar ... id=6750937

Tell me you valeted it before you sold it.... :lol:

Those lights aren't all that reliable. There's a girl I work with whose car just blew up because there was literally no oil in it and she says the oil light never came on. My girlfriend's brother bought a BMW that had no warning lights on the dash showing but when I checked it there was no oil in that either. Plus if the warining light is functioning properly I think the oil has to be really very low indeed before it comes on anyway, so if it does you're already in trouble. I just check the oil every week (well, at least I did when I had a car), even if I "know" it's going to be ok. When I had my G60 I belted it on numerous occasions and I never noticed a beep. Mind you, it's hard to hear much over Sepultura and Incubus at 2500000db!

Yeah, it was steer development but it was Howard Gudge running the event. I wasn't quite as good as you but I did manage to negotiate a five year contract without going over the maximum discount allowed. He managed to get me to the maximum but there was just no way I was going to budge from there! :lol: That was the thing I found the hardest and when I passed it I started to relax a lot more. In the phone call role play we weren't expected to know any real product knowledge and we were just supposed to make it up, but when he phoned me to arrange a test drive in a coupe I rattled off all the actual engine variants they do. That went down really well! :D Anyway, just waiting to hear when my next interview is now but I'm still on a high after thursday. It was mad!