dr_mat

You have an oil pressure guage on the dash? Handy! Where's it taking it's reading from? What oil are you using?

How long does it run on for? IIRC this is normal when you switch the engine off hot. Same for the fans and the leccie water pump (on the VR).

I would imagine it's all dependant on who built it ... Being a teensy bit non-standard ...

I was kinda referring to mainstream gear and DAC chips .. I don't have a shortage of bass at home, either .. (and really I'm referring to clean, smooth bass extension into silly low notes rather than boomy chav chariot "I've got 100db at 28 Hz" .. )

We forgot how to do bass in the last few decades. It used to be easy, but now too much stuff has band-pass filters or insufficient power supply capability to drive the near-DC ultra low frequency signals we are missing .. Back in the old days of massively over-specifying everything, bass was easy ..

I am told, though haven't compared side-to-side, that C+R Enterprises can sell you a full set of OE VR6 leads with factory ends for about £60. Only they're in black, not red. PLUS I note that if you do a search you'll find Mr Kev espousing the virtues of Blue Igniters back in 2003! We always said OE was best at the time, but it's taken him a while to come round to our way of thinking.. ;)

We're only 1.5 years away from 64GB compact flash cards with write speeds equivalent to a current generation hard drive, and almost unlimited overwrite capability... Of course, by then, we will have 2TB SATA hard drives for £300, and your OS will require 150GB..

Right, I'll have to get that panel off then. Just the two screws holding it in place? The ones you can see when you remove the control panel?

It's even better flicking through a big box full of vinyl ... Now *that's* satisfying .. :)

try http://www.sparkplugs.co.uk..

The roof slid back and then decided it wouldn't slide forward. And it wasn't the guides/cables/motor, because I couldn't hear the relay switching - it wasn't even trying to wind the roof closed. I got it going again by disconnecting the switch and reconnecting it (the roof then closed quickly without fuss or bovver), but I suspect the control relay might be iffy.

WMA is better than mp3 in many respects. But I never argued against any of this, anyway. In-car -- MP3/WMA/OGG is fine. But there's no way I'll be getting rid of my CD player at home... :)

Anyone know where it is? I think it's in the light/motor unit in the front of the roof lining, cos I can hear it (the relay) clicking when you push the roof controls, but I don't think it's on the back of the controls and light cluster. I didn't go as far as removing the cover plate over the sunroof motor the other day (I was driving along at the time..) And for my second question - does anyone have a spare control relay?

that is the key point right there. Its the ratio of sprung to unsprung weight what is the big factor .. and if you change the ratio of sprung/unsprung mass, you have to adjust the spring and damping rates to compensate. So when you upgrade to larger (read: "heavier") wheels, you should also: - increase the power of your engine - increase the stiffness of your dampers - decrease the stiffness of your suspension bushes - increase the amount of steering force assistance provided. And if you do all this, you won't notice any degradation in the handling/performance ** . ;) ** assuming of course that you don't fit *wider* tyres..

BMW designed the car that way. It has bushing designed to cope with the harsher ride of the very low profile tyres so you don't feel it in the car as much. Plus the car weighs about 500kg more than the Corrado, so that helps to damp. Despite those wheels being very large, the ratio of sprung-unsprung mass is still similar because the car weighs a shed load. If the VWs had been designed for 17" wheels we'd be having the same argument about whether or not it was reasonable to "upgrade" to 19" or not ...

Ermmm. not really. Anything you disconnect will show up on VAGCOM, whether it was working fine or not beforehand. For some particular sensors (mainly the damn MAF) you have really only one option - swap it and see if the car behaves differently. OBD1 isn't very good at diagnosing faulty sensors, unless they're actually electrically broken.

Sounds like you have a lambda sensor problem .. but unless you quote EXACTLY which lambda sensor error you saw, we can't be sure.

They won't cover it due to the "age of the car"?!?! wtf? Does it say that in the small print??! What won't they cover? The paint damage or the windscreen? If you have fully comp they will replace the screen anyway, regardless of the reason for the stone chip. The paint damage, by the sound of it, would probably cost less than the excess to fix.

Well I would say that with the right in-car hifi the "mp3 signature" wouldn't be too hard to spot. But I would also say that I think mp3/ogg is adequate for listening in the car - for me. At home is a different matter - lossless is realistically the only way you get something worth listening to. Didn't disagree. Doesn't mean either of us are wrong. What would (will be?) depressing is when the music industry deems CDs too troublesome to distribute and gives us 192Kb CBR mp3s instead. "Good enough" for most people eh?

Did you get the timing right .. ?

Due to 1) thicker oil 2) battery leaks power quicker due to increased dampness anything else? Batteries are less effective in cold weather because their internal resistance increases, drastically, due to the fact that current transmission involves the movement of ions through the liquid and the liquid is more viscous. My Bosch Silver has been known to start the car when reading 11.75V, and I got one start out of a previous battery which was showing 10.5, but I think that was due to it having 5 charged cells and one screwed one, rather than 6 discharged ones... Simple answer, that other car manufacturers appear to have sussed, is that cars should not drain in the 100s of mAh when left standing. A small battery would be more than adequate, and standard lead-acid batteries don't significantly self-discharge when left (even in the cold/damp unless they're spectacularly dirty) if this were the case. In future I suspect I'll be disconnecting the battery if I leave the car for more than a week without running it!

Funny you should mention that .. http://www.dabs.com/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=3YLY http://www.dabs.com/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=44FC Less than £50 for 250GB now ... And the samsung one was down to £46.xx earlier this week. I bought one ... :)

"For you". I can tell you that no matter how much time I spend on mp3 (or ogg for that matter) it WILL NOT sound the same as a CD. The main reasons? Splashy, ill defined treble, and a complete absence of any low frequency information. (these encoders throw away everything below about 35 Hz - that's how it is.) I promise ya, you can tell the difference. In fact, even playing FLAC on the same laptop as the OGGs/MP3s come out of shows a noticeable improvement in definition, and then of course playing the CD on a £300 CD player blows it out the water. You are right in that most people can't tell the difference. Perhaps you are one of those people. But that doesn't mean they sound the same. Interestingly, you seem to imply that you realise OGG has more potential, yet you still go on to claim that MP3s sound exactly the same as CDs. This would seem on the surface to be a little inconsistent. MP3/OGG and co are adequate for the convenience of instant access to my entire music collection for background noise, but if I really want to *listen* to something, it's gotta be the CD. Looks like we're both in the 0.1% .. !

Yeah but they always calibrate the cameras every morning before they go out on duty. Your best hope is that they didn't log your address correctly. And actually, that may well be your fault too - if they can accuse you of giving incorrect details you'll be in more trouble. Of course, the address they'll send the ticket to (you had a verbal NIP if they pulled you over in person by the way - they don't need to send you anything at all other than the fine), will be based on the DVLA records of your number plate, so that should be correct.

Actually I'm suggesting that a sensor might be disconnected/broken. VAG-COM it too.