Tempest

Pretty much summarised it all there, plus the inevitable link to the Karmann website. Thos of you joining in on the Karmann trip will also get a nice glossy brochure on Karmann (still have mine) listing all the cars they've ever built. Renault are also amongst their customers, Merc, Audi. Their current production is Crossfire and Merc SLC (both part of Merc anyway), the Crossfire having been designed by Karmann, but based on the older Merc subframe (hence details such as rigid front frame, wehereas the newer Merc SLC has a removable front frame allowing for the engine to be inserted from the front rather than from the top - all of which was shown to us during the factory tour last year). Crossfires and Mercs are nearing their production end, nothing major on the horizon for Karmann despite sending out 150 offers to various companies a day ! The Audi A3 cabrio was their most recent coup, but production goes to the nearby Rheine plant. It's a major let-down that VW no longer use Karmann for their Mk5 Goof cabio, another reason not to buy VW (unless you want a free whore with every Goof, but that's a different story involving guys like Hartz et al, self-run fake companies in the Czech Republic, etc., costing VW a hefty 23 million Euros alone in not-allocated expenditure!) Tempest

I'm actually just sticking with the standard air filter box, and probably going back to the oem paper filters. Reason: The cone filters not only suck in hot air when not properly shielded, their filtration is alos far less fine than that of a paper filter in the airbox. Those cone and cotton or foam panel filters are all good and well for NA engines that simply burn the little particle crap away, but on a supercharged engine, these tiny particles still need to clear the fast rotating scroll inside the Lader, hitting the scroll at high speed, leaving behind a nice moon-like crater-ridden surface. Peeps in Germany have shown pictures of their scrolls after lenghty use of foam or cotton filters. If you still want to use these foam or cotton filters it's best to very regularly clean and re-oil them. For me, my Lader is worth too much to me, so I'll probably go back to the paper filter. Tempest

Never understood the fact that LHD Rados are apparently worth less than RHD ones. OK, you guys all drive on the wrong side of the road :lol: Surely a true Rado-enthusiast doesn't care where the steering wheel is? As we Rado drivers are surely better drivers than your average British citizen with their Rovers and other rubbish ;-) The thing going for your Rado is the low mileage engine. However not having a G-Lader is its downfall IMHO, as one of those will set you back at least £300 for a 2nd hand one, if not £900 or so for a new one (and those are only via special contacts, a new Lader can cost anywhere up to £2500!!). Tempest

Thanks for your kind words, folks. Picked up the Rado today, bill came to a whopping £270 incl. the MOT fee of £42.10, so that's well over £200 for: 2 rear disks at £22 ex VAT each :mad:, pads at price similar to GSF (not Pagid Fast Road, of course), plus loads of labour to undo seized caliper bolts, caliper bracket bolts, and recondition the calipers (totally seized). I argued whether it would have been cheaper to just replace the whole calipers and be done with it. :roll: They assured me that they had replaced those nasty Allen bolts holding the calipers to the caliper bracket, but a quick look underneath tonight revealed that that was only the case on one side. The other side still had the original bolts, rounded off and all put back in again :mad: As I had also requested them to replace a cracked inner CV boot on the right side of the Rado, and they had forgotten to do that, I'll have to go back on Monday anyway. If they're gonna charge me for that, I'll probably start shouting for help here in the forum very loudly, to see whether someone might be willing to help me do this job :-). Then there's still the waterleak to cure (finally found it: flange on side of engine, finally something I will be able to do myself again), oil in and due to my meshfilter between 2 boost pipes also running down the outside of the pipe to the intercooler (strange, had the Lader rebuilt back in November 2004), and ... that's it till the next thing goes pop. I'm definitely not doing very well with the Rado and getting tired of it compared to my Roccos, and hence the thought of selling is still hovering over me like Damocles' sword. As for selling the Storm Rocco: Nope, done too much work on that and best of all, I actually enjoyed every bit of it, as most jobs were wanted by me, not by the car, unlike with the Rado. The Storm Rocco gives me too much pleasure, nice and simple to tinker with, relaxing after a hard day's work. Can't say that for my Rado at the moment which just gives me grief. Tempest

Well, after having got the 2 Roccos through the MOT, it was the Rado's turn today, promptly to fail. Reason: Rear brakes!! :mad: Do the MOT now test the handbrake on the rollers? I could have sworn that in recent years they just tested the handbrake by hand, whilst the car was still on the bridge. Anyway, I was pretty pi**ed off, as I had already tried to replace the rear disks, only to round off the lower of the 2 allen bolts on each side holding the calipers in place. The upper 2 bolts are even more inaccessible (tank or exhaust in the way for any specialist tools, as allen keys don't do the trick). I left the Rado behind waiting for the quote for repair, after which I might seriously consider selling, as I'm getting quite cheesed off with all this. I have too many cars, spend too much time fixing the damn things, lack certain key skills / equipment / friends that can help me to do everything myself, cost me too much money, and get too little joy out of them this way. Sell? What do you think? Tempest (very cheesed off at the mo')

Seen that one at last year's Volksfest, interesting :-) Tempest

German ADAC, cover you EU-wide for 1 year for €72, yes that's less than £50 a year !! They cover me even though I live in the UK. Get all the usual options like home break down cover (yes, even in the UK), etc. Someone from the AA then turns up if I do break down (which has happened 2x, both with my ex-Polo :lol:). Only requirement: Handy if you can speak German ;-) Tempest

True, but unfortunately little me also disagrees with that newly found definition of the term coupe. Anything with 4 doors is a family saloon, emphasizing the word family. Coupes only have 2 doors (who cares about family in this context :lol:). Tempest

Ah, that was you at the PVW stand on Saturday (on Sunday they weren't even there anymore, just left a locked trailor behind :lol:), as my Mk1 was on Saturday at least, hidden away behind those 2 Mk4 Golfs that we had on our V-Dubs-United stand right next to you guys (against the wall, next to the Audi boys). It's only when your Rado was on the PVW stand, that I actually bothered to go out and have a look at the track action ... Had I known : :roll: Tempest

Must have a look at that one whenever I get a chance :-) Tempest

During my visit to Germany this week, I met up with some of the organisational team for the Karmann meet beginning of September. One of them still works for Karmann in Osnabrück, and his work experience dates back to the days of building Mk2 Roccos and indeed Corrados. He told me that ever since Karmann stopped building the Corrado he hadn't really enjoyed building any of the cars that left Karmann's assembly lines. A real Rocco freak, I suppose ;-) They also joked about having to build right-hand drive Roccos and Rados :lol: He also told me that despite the good news of Karmann having secured the deal on manufacturing the new Audi A3 cabrio, this won't happen at the Osnabrück plant. Although Osnabrück sends out 150 offers a day to all sorts of car companies offering them a range of products etc. they in effect haven't got any work for the next 2 years! This may very well mean that Karmann may be no more in the near future! This also means that this year's Karmann visit (museum and factory tour) may very well be the last one ever! As you all know, it's in Osnabrück that every single Rocco and Rado was built (I've actually touched the holy ground where the original assembly lines were located last year - Crossfires now leaving those lines). So, the moral of the story is, there may very well be an Edition 38 meet next year, but not another visit to Karmann :-(( Right, last night in D, time to get some more beers down :lol:, still on dial-up as well, so no time to check out the Rocco thread here ;-) Tempest

If you're planning on joining in on the Karmann visit beginning of September, then have a look here asap: http://www.the-corrado.net/.archive/forum/viewtopic.php?t=21725&start=30 I need definite people now ;-) Tempest

Have access to Oscotts, a trade only supplier, they do mainly Laser tools and Draper, most of which is fine by me. Some bits I get from Germany whenever I'm there. Tempest

Yup, different peeps have different hobbies, we have ours. The truth, though is that most people just vegitate in front of the tellie most evenings and on weekends ! That makes them mind-numbing dumb ba*stard robots, that happily pay taxes, do as they're told on the tellie (ie. buy this, get that, do this, vote for that), and it makes them to perfect citizens from industry's and politicians' points of view. Or they just vegitate in the chain pub every weekend, keeping the beer industry going (oops, have shares in them :lol:) We're different :-) Fortunately my colleague at work is into cars, too, definitely not as much as me, but he's the one with a rather stonkingly quick Audi 20V TQ jobbie :-) Friends do smile at me, but then admit that at least my car hobby keeps me out of trouble, I spend my money reasonably wisely :lol: and I get to switch on the brain occasionally, whenever I'm tinkering with any of my 3 cars. Now how often do people still get to do that in today's MTV "less than a second attention span" generation :lol:? Tempest

In HIC's defence: When I got rear-ended in my Mk1 Rocco coming back from Utterly Veedubberly back in November 2003, I had my Rocco repaired and up and running again by the end of January following. The only reason it went that quickly, was because I kept on hassling them day and night, by letter, by fax, on the phone, until they ultimately paid me out a cheque to go and take my Rocco to wherever I wanted. Their assessor was a pr*ck as well, didn't know crap about modded cars, body kits etc., and it then doesn't help too much, if you tell him that (I actually referred to him being a w*nker to HIC, which I felt was totally justifiable :lol:). Tempest

I simply got a reel of about 2 metres or so braided fuel lines (to withstand max. pressure of 50 bar) from Demon Tweeks, cut the lengths using the old hoses as pattern, and stuck the new ones on. The old ones had bad signs of cracking along the inner perimtere where the slide onto the fuel rail! The hoses are made of rubber, which contracts and expands with temperature. The clips holding these hoses do not allow for this contraction and expansion, so when it's cold (in the morning), the rubber has contracted, and there is a wee bit of a gap between the hose, the clip (not fully pressurising the hose around the inlet on the fuel rail) and the fuel rail inlet. This is where a small amount of fuel then seeps past the clip on start-up, as the pressure of 3 bar is there straight away from the pump. This has been a reason for a recall on all US-spec Rados (even have the recall document at home) to replace the clips and hoses. Tempest

Time to replace all the fuel hoses in the engine bay (3 in total), or else this may happen, if ignored: http://www.the-corrado.net/.archive/forum/viewtopic.php?t=24695 Welcome aborad, BTW :-) Tempest

2 Roccos, a Mk1 Rieger and a Mk2 Storm, both garaged with the Rado blocking / guarding the Mk1 Rocco :lol: None of the 3 used as daily cars, for that I'm fortunate enough to be able to use my legs and walk into work, thus saving loads of money on useless commuting (the idea alone: To have to pay money in order to be able to earn money :-( ), which is spent on the 3 cars :-) Tempest

OK, let it be me then to subtly challenge that statement. It's true for NA engines, but for G-Lader driven engines I'm actually a bit more sceptical, as the filtration of the K&Ns is not as good as that of standard paper filters. This in turn may lead to little impact marks on the scroll inside of the G-Lader, i.e. a moonsurface slowly building up, as particles that would otherwise be stopped from getting in by a paper filter do get through the K&N and hit the delicate scroll. Not good ... I am therefore actually considering chucking out my K&N again and replacing it with a VAG paper filter again. Opinions on this issue welcome from the likes of G-Werks, though :-) Tempest

Hi Paul, welcome aboard. Well, you've already met some Forum-only folk at BVF :-) Be sure to regularly look in the Events section for meets :-) Cheers, Tempest (Eric)

Don't drive my Rado in the rain :lol: Tempest

Monitoring or not, but who's monitoring the powers that are (police, politicians, big fat CEOs etc.)? Still a bit scary ... Tempest

LMFAO, that's great stuff ! :lol: Tempest

Tribals on a Rado? Noooo! What is that thing on the roof, where normally the sunroof sits? Loads of stickers in the rear quarter windows don't do it for me. Other than that, the yellow actually looks quite nice, and those alloys look like Brocks (similar to the ones on my Mk2 Storm Rocco :-) ). Tempest

Just thinking that, too :lol: Tempest