July 2003
Hi all,
I am collecting an X reg Mondeo 1.8 Zetec on Monday. All four tyres on the vehicle are in good order treadwise, two Avon ZZ1's on the front and a pair of Avon ZZ3's on the back.
The problem is that I have read on a tyre forum that some people have found the ZZ1's to be almost lethal in certain road/weather conditions on certain vehicles.
Does anyone have first hand experience of these ZZ1 tyres or know anyone with first hand experience?
I dont want to change the tyres unnecessarily but if there is a real problem then I'd obviously rather get them off sooner rather than later.
All feedback appreciated.
PP Read more
Having just opted out of the good old company car, I've got £20k to spend on a new, ex-demo or car supermarket car. I do 40000 miles per year, mainly motorway and A-Road. I will be keeping the car for 3 years/120000 miles (ouch!). Running and purchase costs will be funded by employer's car allowance, the ususal 12p per mile for fuel, plus tax relief etc.
What do you forum-contributers think I should buy?...Answers on an email.
Ta! Read more
£20k could also get you a very clean, newish Audi A6 or even A8. All engines and specs are good accross the board (not the 1.8T in the A6 though - underpowered especially if auto)SE spec and up very good. Once the initial depreciation is over they make a sound buy. Quiet, understated luxury, good dealers, brilliant motorway cruisers that can take high miles. 2.5 TD a gem if you are a diesel fan.
Only real downer is servicing costs.
Where is the best place to helmet cheaply?
I am going to keep it for a long time so a new one is preferred but I would also consider a demo one.
How much would I be looking at? (full-face or open-chin)
Thanks,
Garrison Read more
Thanks, I have looked at BookaTrack but I have already got a full face one. The full face helemt is just a little too big for inside my Nissan.
i replace my front brake pads about a month ago and the car has started to pull to the side upon braking, if i pump the pedal a few times it wil brake straight otherwise it will pull to the side , can anyone give me some info? Read more
There was a caliper change early in the life of the ZX, if you have the older calipers, they are a nightmare. The only option is to source a newer model set of calipers (you must change both sides), Got mine from the breakers, less than £50 for the pair inc. brake hoses etc. Never had a problem after that.
Regards,
Alf
We are looking to relocate from Surrey to the Dorset area at the moment. Plenty of property to view, but some are near main roads (such as the A35) which are single carriageway in parts and dual in other stretches. What's the best way to find out about planned widening (and therefore avoid the house which will be on a dual carriageway in the future)?
Is there a planning website showing future road development/widening?
Thanks,
Stu
ps. any Dorset based Backroomers care to email me if they are willing to give general advice re. local areas, services, schools, blah, blah...that would be most welcome off site. Read more
I work in the Highways Agency and we get a lot of property searches to see if there is major road works planned for trunk roads however they are generally from solicitors so I would have thought it would be up to them to contact your local HA office, which is area 2 for the A35, which is a trunk road, and your local district council for the other roads.
hi there i'm new to here but from what i have read you all seem like nice folk, so i was hoping for a little help.
i have a couple of problems with my fiesta (92 K mk3)
1. not very often but occasionally when i go to change gear the clutch goes to the floor with a bit of a crunch and when it comes back up it sort of creaks (maybe a bit like a spring creaking??) I think it maybe the auto adjuster but i'm not sure
any opinions on this??
2. Starting issue
I can start the car fine with clutch fully up (not being touched)
but with the clutch down the car struggles slightly but starts.
with both instances though (mainly with clutch depressed) it initially seems like its going to stall easily so i have to rev it a little to keep it going, once i have started driving its ok
could this be an incorrect idle speed? wrong mixture? i have changed the plugs and air filter in the last couple of months.
3. when going above 50 ish and making let hand manouvres (i.e moving across lanes on the motorway or going round left bends) the car judders quite badly. I have tried the suspension test pushing on the bonnet corners and seeing if they bounce or rise nicely and they rise nicely so that seems to be fine.
I'm thinking wheel bearings possibly.
all help is greatly appreciated and hopefully with my veryveryveryvery limited knowledge i can be of use to some of you as well
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new to cars ans always looking for help Read more
I can't remember what the warranty is off the top of my head
my springs were fine and didn't need replacing
I see Manila has been devastated by serious floods/monsoons/plagues of locusts/etc. and that there have been a a few deaths and tons of damage.
Are you and Growlette OK?
Read more
Well, better not get too OT, I have lots of coup stories including a great one I was involved in in '89 (PM me for that), but I suspect with the torrential rain and the stoppage of Jollibee deliveries by motorbike (Bafta will know this) it was all consigned to that ultimate of Filipino solutions the "Too Hard"" tray, and everyone decided enough was enough and it was time for beer and pulutan. As for the man who walked out of jail, of the several million conspiracy theories, I would place a small bet on a political desire to keep the "terrorist threat" alive so that the country can continue to claim more US aid. After the novelty has worn off they'll capture the guy just to show Dubya they really are in control......
Now we must keep to motoring, so I can say that yesterday traffic conditions were wonderful in our megalopolis (a) because nearly everyone was glued to the tube watching the melodrama unfold, and (b) because many roads were flooded up to a foot or so (viva la SUV!!) Furthermore, being a white monkey (local expression, Bafta again) I sailed through all the military checkpoints.
I've recently bought a 1997 Peugeot 306 meridian, complete with Peugeot roof bars. I'd like to remove the roof bars, but haven't the faintest idea as to how. Any ideas?
Thanks! Read more
Excellent. Success! Thanks a million for your help.
Minor deposits from roof bars underneath the trim, but not much else...
Thanks again
Just to update you folk.
Looking right now at the server stats I see that it is basically being moderately hammered by the usage it is getting.
Even though RAM is not particularly short we hope to increase this on Saturday morning when it is a bit quieter.
The CPU is being kept quite busy and there isn't mcuh we can do about that straight away.
However, any slowdown - from ads or whatever - cause more connections to the database etc. and this was hitting the limit. Clearly old connections were also using up some of this allocation.
The upshot is that of about 10mins ago I have changed some of these settings which hopefully will improve things for the time being.
There are loads of things that can get tweaked. Hopefully I have tweaked the right ones.
Let's hopefully see some improvement from now.
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Stephen Khoo
www.khoosys.net Read more
or....from moi
22 July 23:06 "I don't know much about web hosting though so I could be talking out of my back end...presumably SQL or similar is involved somewhere, it's indexes in that kind of thing which I think might have gone awry. Or, as has been suggested, an internal limit being reached"
Still, a million people can hypothesise but it doesn't fix the problem. Let's hope it's sorted now, it is quick enough this morning.
Someone bumped into the back of the other half yesterday. She had pulled out of a turning and then had to stop for oncoming traffic. The guy behind was to busy looking right to see that she had stopped.
The bumper of our vehicle is badly scratched down to the plastic of the bumper. There are no personal injuries.
I was thinking of getting a quote from the local body shop and asking the man responsible if he would rather pay me to have it repaired. This would make it quicker for us to get it fixed and could save him money in the long run. The body shop is the same place as my insurers use for repairs.
Is this a good idea? Is there anything I should be aware of before following this course of action.
Jon Read more
I was rear ended some years ago, in my Morgan.
The lady who did it paid (although ther ewas about 3 hours of my labour she got for free).
But tell your insurance company you are doing this. Mine said this kept the door open if things started to go wrong. I think I submitted a claim form and wrote on in it Not a Claim - For Information or similar.
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I bought some ZZ1's for the rear of my BMW 850 - 265/40x17
They are truly appalling and I've been patiently waiting for them to reach the point where I can legitimately change them, which thankfully hasnt taken too long.
Previously shod with Continental Sports, the grip was fantastic, wet or dry. Stable, progressive and predictable on the limit.
The ZZ1's were immediately so bad that I took the car back to have them checked out the day after fitting. ATS claimed that they had to bed in due to oil sprayed on them to preserve them. Ive experienced this before so gave them time to wear a little. They got worse and ATS said 'tough'.
In the dry they have poor lateral grip and break away with little provocation when cornering. It feels like you've hit a patch of spilt diesel. They are also incredibly noisy at all times. So much so that I got BMW to check my rear wheel bearings for wear!
In the wet, lateral grip doesnt exist. Its like driving a TVR on snow. Great for doughnuts but not really what you need on a day to day basis! Theyve certainly sharpened up my 'tail catching' technique and god bless the BMW stability & traction control systems. Would I buy again? - I wouldnt have them given free.
The only thing going for them is that they look great and they have a useful rim protector.
They'd make really great fenders for a speed boat.
Id recommend Contis, Yokos and Bridgestones without hesitation. Pirellis and Michelins are great but a wicked price.
Sorry if this review sounded harsh, but I'd class the larger ZZ1's as downright dangerous.