slomove

Yes, correct. I have the spill tube to the ground because I have an aluminum overflow bottle and can not see how much is actually in it. It may be more or less full to start with.

If I understand that correctly it is exactly what I have and it worked well on the road and on the track. I have the Raceline water rail with a single overflow tube from under the pressure cap into the bottom of the overflow bottle. I do have another tube from the top of the bottle to below the floor in case it ever spills over. It is important though, to keep the cap rubber seal fresh and the aluminum sealing surface free of corrosion. If there is a small leak it won't suck the liquid back when cooling down but rather air from outside.

Monday, 8/5. It is a relatively short drive for the day from Kalispell to Pincher Creek but I guess we may stop often to enjoy the scenery, take some pics etc. Therefore we should be coming through Babb probably in the afternoon. Otherwise we should meet latest in Wetaskiwin. We will not stay in Red Deer.

Great! So are you going to join us on our way up from Kalispell (hopefully with a few of the Canadians who are planning to join us for that leg of the trip) or are you coming through another day? Our next stop will be Pincher Creek after that.

Yes the yellow light is supposed to resemble an arrow. I thought it to be a nice touch . This arrow is indeed created by the white LED that fill the gaps while the area behind the arrow is red, running at high current for the brakes and reduced current for the tail light.

Thanks for the link. They do have what I need. I did clean the contacts before and it helped for a while. But they don't seem to like installation in an open car with occasional water exposure and the black surfaces show serious chalking/fading. Now, for the superior replacements...that did not really come to mind although I could probably fabricate something like Frankenstein switches which would look pretty cool on the dash. But seriously, my alternative would be to machine some back lighted adapter plates to fit the square cutout and install regular metal toggle switches in there. Somehow I like them anyway better for the type of car.

Thanks for the nice words. Machining the body isn't that bad in principle. Took me about 90 minutes on my funky machine. With a proper high speed CNC machine center I guess you can cut that down to 15 minutes or so. Wiring the individual LED by hand is a bit maddening and took me 2 evenings But somebody could do a PCB layout and get the boards stuffed with the LED, ballast resistors and some diodes by a contract manufacturer. All possible but even in the best case you would probably have to charge a couple of hundred bucks for it to make money and find there are not that many people willing to shell out that much. I am just not cut out to be an entrepreneur. Too much work to make a living. Maybe when I retire...

Since I am in the middle of a big makeover for my car, I am also looking for replacement dash switches. I still have the stock rectangular rocker switches with symbols and back light as the car came from Birkin. But they are getting unreliable (like a real Lukas part) and faded from the sun. Anybody knows a drop in replacement that fits the panel cutout? Either the same again or if there are some that look nicer that would be even better. Thanks!

I have an older Contour HD with a homemade waterproof housing, external mic and remote. Kind of works but it is a bit big and clunky. I was looking for the HERO3 black that comes with the waterproof shell and had the remote as well. But I read so many user reviews that complain of quality problems (unlike older HERO models) and many people apparently sent it back. I guess i will hang in and wait until they have sorted that out.

Hey, I am an extremely hard working individual. :blueangel: Mostly, that is.... Anyway, other people collect stamps and I have my little projects. Actually I have neglected my poor Seven for the last 2 years and some renovation was overdue. This is a homebuilt 4-axis XYZA moving gantry CNC router (34"x31"x8" range, see below), originally designed for woodworking and another one of my projects. The frame and gantry are actually made from bamboo, but it is rigid and precise enough for some light duty work in aluminum and mild steel. I designed the tail lights in 3D CAD, but used a 2.5D CAM system (Vectric Vcarve-Pro) to create the tool paths. For such pocketing work of mechanical parts, it is more efficient and precise than full 3D CAM. That is more for the artsy stuff. Well, this is not a production machine. For an occasional job in metal it is O.K. but I can not run coolant, there is no tray to catch the chips which are also too heavy to be caught by the dust extractor.That means the chips are flying everywhere and the noise of the high speed spindle in metal is annoying for the neighbors. The tail light is actually shallow enough to be mounted flush with the fender but I had already the cutout and mounting holes so I just left the size and outside mounting position.

I would disconnect the fuel rail and let the pump squirt a few seconds into a glass. Maybe you can see with a magnifier at least what the enemy is (metal or else). For that matter I have two fuel filters. The one in the picture (cheap universal filter from Autozone) on the sucking side to prevent debris clogging the pump and a high pressure filter on the pump outlet to protect the injectors if the pump should act up.

The LED are 5mm Hi-Flux and very bright. The digital camera can not really reproduce the contrast. Driving Light: Brake light: Reverse: Turn signal:

When I removed the tail lights for other repair work, the embrittled plastic broke apart. I know I can buy perfectly good tail lights but I used this as an excuse for a nice project on the CNC machine. 1/2" aluminum plate as blank, inside hogged out. Outside machined and chamfered: Polished: Wired and epoxy encapsulated. Installing and wiring about 190 LED took a little while.....

I had the fuel cell out (for unrelated reasons) and replaced the fuel filter. I cut open the old one and as can be seen below, there are no foam particles in there whatsoever. That means the foam is holding up well after all the years. I am definitely not going to replace it for now.

I used a 1/16" self-adhesive EPDM rubber sheet (McMaster #8610K2) for the rear wings. However, I made it only 12" tall and there are maybe 3-4 more inches on top of the wings where rocks hit. I should have made this taller. The rubber protects very well, is inexpensive, weather resistant, can be easily cut to size and replaced. It holds up to serious rock impact. When treated occasionally with a little ArmorAll, is becomes a deep shiny black. For the exhaust shield you can go to a surface treatment shop and get it brushed or blasted and black anodized. I paid for a similar size job a few years ago $50.

Wow, a V12.....

I am just not using them enough (or anymore?) and if I should ever go to the track in the future I can just leave the road wheels on. These are four lightweight (~10 lbs) 2-piece spun 13" aluminum wheels made by Real Racing Wheels with Hoosier bias ply slicks. The bolt pattern is 4x100 (like Mazda) and the back spacing suitable for a Birkin S3 (can measure if needed). They have full center discs and look very much business, no fancy design. The wheels are lightly used (maybe 15 track days) and the slicks about 3 years old with 3 or 4 track events with most of the rubber still on. Maybe a bit too old for competitive purpose but still pretty good. I believe the slicks are 6" and 8" wide (but must look it up to be sure, might as well be 7" and 8"). The wheels alone are nowadays about $800 and I would sell the whole lot for $500 plus shipping. I could try shipping from my work place to save a few bucks. Please PM if interested. The image below is from the catalog, my wheels are actually now a bit dirty. http://www.realwheel.net/manage/uploaded//Cat16-r15_13inch_nbl.jpg

They are use a lot for boat covers, bimini tops etc. Much more durable than snap buttons and I can not remember the studs ever bothered me on a boat. They are anyway quite stubby and rounded. But I think the biggest drawback is that they are probably twice as tall compared to normal snaps.

Good idea. But I have a Fuel Safe cell already for many years. I bought that after the first accident in 2003. In the meantime I got the rear skin back on and polished. It was not a real difficult job, just needed a bit of patience. I used ratchet straps to draw the roughly pre-cut sheet (40 mil 5052 alloy) roughly in shape, then cut all edges using an air nibbler with a spacer on the chassis tubes as guides, banged the edges around the tubes and riveted in place. The only place I had to cheat was the main inner curves. I had to miter the sheet on the inside or it would wrinkle.

That Backoff XP module looks good, I ordered one. Thanks Martin, I like the concept. This is the way to go if you have the freedom of your own design. For my car it would be a major change and I will stay with the modest improvement that I put on.

Sorry for not answering, but I thought it was more of a rhetorical question. But for that matter, honestly I don't know enough about that case. Media reports are notoriously scarce of detail and are sometimes incorrect. With the Internet opinion frenzy is has gotten worse. People jump immediately to conclusion based on some preconceived mindset. I was only thinking out loud that there are complaints of unfair treatment of this family because of some indication of mental issues. On the other hand the hard core gun right folks refuse any gun restrictions saying it is not the guns but we need to track the mentally ill. So what are we going to do? No gun bans and when it comes to limiting gun access for people with questionable mental health, we can not do that either. I don't have a solution for that. I am not strictly against guns, after all my son has a collection of antique military rifles in our home (100 years ago they were assault rifles) and I hope he is not going to shoot us by accident sometimes or because I drank the last beer in the fridge. But I would support a full registration and license requirement as well as very strict storage rules. At least then there would be some minimal accountability. But I know that is not going to happen anytime soon. As for fighting the government, I just see this as naive. If they become bad enough to fight (what is actually the criteria for that?) at that point they will have an army of willing supporters assure conformity. But you know what? In many cases when authoritarian regimes took over during the last 100 years, they were rather from the conservative political spectrum, quite often as a military coup. If that ever happens here, you may lose your guns but at least they are conservative.

Sure. When they come for you you are going to show them. It is a while ago but how did that work for the Confederates? Don't tell me the military is not going to shoot at fellow citizens when ordered.

Now that is radical. Reminds me of the Fred Flintstone car. You can even save the reverse gear and push the car back with your feet.

That would be great! We would love to have company for that long boring slog up Glacier National Park :driving: Actually, east of the To the Sun Highway we were planning to take the Chief Mountain highway north to Pincher Creek.

I just removed the mats that came with the car. What are they good for, anyway? Gravel collects under them and they are dead weight. There is a perfectly suitable aluminum floor.