dr_mat

I gained 3-5 mpg over the whole range when I replaced my MAF sensor about three years ago. And there was nothing really wrong with the old one, the car ran absolutely fine.

They probably are 90% brighter, in numerical terms.. but your eyes don't see things linearly so to you they look "a bit" brighter. Same with sound, make it twice as loud in watts and it's actually only 3 decibels louder..

Well, it's two stroke, which means it'll never make emissions targets for general use in cars for a start and also goes some way to explaining the potential power output. The second factor in that is that they're talking about being able to run it at "twice the rpm", so think 12,000 rpm .. The "fuel saving" comes from simply being able to shut off a pair of cylinders anytime they like because they don't have to worry about the engine running unbalanced. When under load, it's likely it's going to be about the same economy as a normal two-stroke. All in all, it's an interesting idea for "dirty" uses and has some benefits in terms of size and weight saving, but it's really not the holy grail I think they're talking about.

It'll never catch on ...

The lower balljoint doesn't impart castor, the castor angle is defined by the position of the wishbone relative to the top of the suspension strut (i.e. the top mount). Swap the balljoint and the castor doesn't change.

This *can* point to a dodgy crank sensor, but I wouldn't go rushing out to replace this until you're sure it's faulty, it's rather expensive ...

Insurance companies are always terribly efficient at taking your money. You have no idea how good they are until you actually make a claim, and they know it.

They only want Sciroccos because they see the new one out there on the roads .. I thought the Corrado was going to quietly disappear into the mists of time .. ---------- Post added at 05:51 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:46 PM ---------- Yep, still here. Had a busy year or so and the Corrado has dropped to the back of a long list of things to think about. I hardly ever drive it, for a start! MOTs come and go and the first four digits stay the same on the mileometer.. Really need to get the few rust spots on the car tidied up before it's too late and do a few other jobs too. My Schrick manifold hasn't fully worked since about two years ago - needs a replacement control valve or something, never found the time or interest to sort it out.. It does, on the other hand, still raise a grin when absolutely necessary. :) And when it's not *absolutely* necessary aswell! :)

I thought I'd share this little story.. I got back from hols the other day to find a scrawled note pinned to the front door. It said: "I called round to ask if your Scirroco is for sale. Give me a call when you're back. Chris." The car was on the drive at the time. I checked: its "Corrado" badge was still intact on the back... ;-)

I believe quite a few folks have, yes. Work fine, but I don't think they offer anything more than a longer lifetime over the standard plugs on the whole.

Acshully research shows that lower speed limits increase the throughput of the road, though "maximum flow rate" might be read in various different ways. You, personally, may not get there any quicker, but people drive more closely together, at more even speeds and the overall throughput of the road increases at 50mph compared to 70mph. It gets worse as you go higher. Essentially any technique that puts more cars in the same piece of road improves throughput, no matter how fast those cars are going. The ultimate would be three lanes of cars doing 100 mph inches from each other's bumpers. Never going to happen if you allow humans to drive, we're all too pathetic to cope with that. Why do you think they use variable speed limits on many motorways during busy times? Slow *everyone* down, and the road is less likely to hit standstill and you'll get more cars through. Thimpleth!

Is it just that the springs on 15 year old arms are a bit worn out? How do new, original arms compare to the fabled Lupo conversion? Which I've done, by the way. Wipers are still ****e.

You don't have to prove it's better if it's cheaper and works .. :) Interesting fact. This passed me by earlier on, think I'll file that one somewhere .. ! :)

Actually current carrying capability is almost 100% proportional to cross sectional area of the cable, regardless of whether it's made up of one large strand or multiple smaller strands. You use stranded for flexibility rather than current carrying capability. A stranded cable of X diameter has a smaller current carrying capability than a solid core of the same diameter. (If you manage to do a perfect tesselation of round strands of wire you'll make your fortune..)

The starter is a few inches from the supply, and is connected by enormous cables. If you're prepared to run cables like that all round the car, then by all means run 200 amps at 12v. I don't know how feasible it is, but I know that modern cars are moving towards 48v for this very reason and maybe you can take some of that tech and retro fit it into a Corrado .. ! According to WP, 0 AWG (i.e. 8mm diameter copper) will carry 125-190 amps max, depending on the casing thickness, but the "fusing current" is 1900 amps if it carries it for 10 seconds or less. That's why you can get away with thinner cables for a car with an electronically controlled starter - it can guarantee the starter won't be engaged for more than 5 seconds because you ain't got a key to override the computer's decisions about that.

increasing the volts just means you don't have to run such thick cables everywhere and you don't run such a big risk of setting the whole thing on fire. If you go for an AC alternator you could probably produce 48V AC and distribute that to individual AC->DC step-down transformers. The overall losses would probably be much less than the power loss of running 200A through a copper cable!

That's just silly... :? [/quote:1a8hlj5h] ..or use the car more regularly and convert petrol to 4000 Ah of energy so you can put 30 Ah of electricity into the battery!! :D

It depends on the chemistry of the battery. Lead Acid is best left fully charged and trickle topped up periodically (this is how they are stored before sale). LiIon is best left partially charged (about 40%) and NEVER USED (unfortunately, using it will inevitably shorten its lifetime..), NiMH, NiCd you have to use in full charge/discharge cycles. Of course, buying a trickle charger is *slightly* more expensive than buying a normal charger. Which is slightly less expensive than buying a new battery. But that's the choice isn't it? New battery every few years (£50, £60, £70 as the price of Lead increases) vs one-off trickle charger purchase which means in principle you never replace a battery again. Most people have at least one charger anyway (it's pretty much a requirement when you own a Corrado), so if you have the means to hook it up that way that one charger may as well be a trickle charger that saves you hassle and money in the long term..

Useless fact-et for today. Kev's house is capable of consuming less than one tenth the amount of energy that a completely standard Corrado VR6 is capable of consuming. If you had an electrical power draw in your house equivalent to a VR6 engine's prodigious fuel consumption your electricity bill would be about £300,000 per year. Does that put the price of petrol into context for a few people? :)

Alex, sounds pretty much like your only choice is to take the battery out the car. RW1 and myself have both confirmed that solar chargers are too pathetic in our british daylight to do anything but delay the inevitable flat (and damaged) battery on a Corrado (bloody VWs drain too much current), so you simply have no choice but to use a mains charger. If your car is near enough to the house, then you can get away with cables through windows etc etc, but if not and you're planning on leaving the car unused for some time you've no choice but to take the battery out and leave it on a trickle charger in the house. The point of trickle chargers is that they won't overcharge the battery. And unlike Lithium Ion batteries Lead Acid batteries are BEST when stored fully charged. In fact you damage them by storing them partially charged.

A hundred and thirty quid? That's twice what a set of H&R coilovers cost to make .. ;)

Fortunately I know you're taking the mick.. ;) The Corrado's 120A alternator delivers about 1.4 KW of power. If it was outputting 240 volts it would only produce 6 amps. If it was capable of delivering your 26KW that your house was consuming then it would probably be about the same size as the VR6 it is bolted onto the side of .. !! :)

I might be inclined to go 48volts if I was looking for 200+ amps ... jeez .. !

You trying to keep your beer cool?

IIRC you can only increase the mileage (if you want to decrease it that means buying a new instrument cluster with zero miles on it), but that's the only (possibly useless) fact I can bring to this thread .. good luck .. !