eec564

It's extremely common to do that on farms. A regular car tire will generally bead up easily, and a truck tire may take some wiggling, but a tractor tire that has a 2" gap around the bead will never set up. Normally an air bomb gets used to dump a lot of air into the tire quickly, but for big stuff, something flammable is the only real way. Mostly happens on old tires that haven't been on a rim for a while. One of these http://www.equipmentlocator.com/photos/equip/186936-1.jpg had been giving me trouble for about half an hour, I'd even tried rope around it to get it to bulge. Finally ran down to the hardware store and got some starting fluid. Damn thing jumped about three feet off the ground when it was lit. Stupid thing was it was the second time I'd taken the tire off the rim. First time was to change it, and discovered a leak. Took it off, patched it, and it wouldn't bead back up. I'd always wondered a little if with these things out in the sun in the summer the air left in them (I always have to add air to bring them up to pressure) and any un-burned gas left might go up. Never happened, never heard of it happening, so I'm not too worried, but I've always wondered. -Eric

So after emailing the guy twice from two different email accounts, he sent me a few pictures. He's asking 180. What do you think?

I've found that if you're bidding on something nice, the odds of someone else using a computer to bid for them many times at the very last second is very high. For much of the good stuff, bidding on ebay is unless you've set a ridiculously high bid.

P.S. Sorry for threadjacking you Phil.

You're right, my bad. It is late. I was thinking of 81 CASs from another ad I was reading a bit ago, I swear I'm a bit batty. -Eric (The crazy one)

That's what I was thinking, around 150, depending. Without the wiring harness and CAS/bracket, the 81 ECU & AFM aren't good for much. The valve cover is nice, but cosmetic. If the intake is bare it's nothing special. So the ex manifold, turbo, j-pipe, lines, etc are the only real goodies. I sent him an email asking about condition of the turbo, if the intake manifold had any accessories, and if the turbo had the downpipe. We'll see! Of course, installation of this requires a new clutch, as mine slips a little bit when shifting hard at red line, even with my all-original NA engine, a turbo would kill it in quick order. And I'm sure while-I'm-at-it syndrome will strike again! A rebuild isn't that far away in my future anyways, just a question of if it'll be my current engine, or a spare then swap them.

So what should I offer the guy? I'll assume a turbo rebuild is needed, the exhaust manifold may need to be decked, and the intake manifold is bare. What does a turbo rebuild run these days? -Eric

I'm feeling worse. I missed a 500$ 82' ZXT. It was an auto and a 2+2. No use for the former, but I like the latter. A guy I know was selling it, and needed cash ASAP. Alas, I have absolutely NO plate to physically put another car. I was calling around, seeing if I had any friends who could store it for a while when it sold. I'm gonna kick myself for a while on that one. -Eric Edit: Think I should buy this? http://sfbay.craigslist.org/pen/pts/989125118.html

A Search on HBZ http://forums.hybridz.org/showthread.php?t=114798&highlight=ARB+Air+Locker Also see product listings (PDF) on www.arbusa.com. Odd URL, but from ARB's website http://dedq15.mindfly.com/uploads/PDF/onlineManualsGuides/airLockerAppsUSA.pdf On page 8 there is a listing for an R200, 29 spline, listed as for a front diff for a 4x4 pathfinder, xterra, D21/hardbody, etc. ARB p/n RD107. Go install one and let us all know how it works. -Eric

naviatham: So true! My house has lath and plaster in the walls and ceilings, with a chicken wire frame. That chicken wire disrupts radio signal to no end. Wireless, cell phones, FM radio, doesn't seem to do much to AM. AK-Z: MIMO is the use of several antennas in a wireless device so that the antenna with the best connection is used, or the signal is spread across several. It has nothing to do with B vs G, although there is a component of it in Draft-N. Blocking ports will either stop something from working or have no effect it at all. Congestion issues occur due to a lack of resources. Either too many connections, or connections requiring too much bandwidth. Hence the recommendation to use throttling and prioritize packets.

I highly doubt there is a B card floating around on that network, especially with nerdy roommates. You will still see speeds other than 54mbs (including 48mbs, 36mbs, 11mbs, 5.5mbs and 1mbs) depending on signal quality. The slower speeds are more forgiving of an imperfect wireless connection, either from signal strength of interference. Sitting directly next to my router I frequently see 48mbs and 54mbs back and forth. This is partially due to my having aimed the antennas to serve difficult to reach parts of the house better, and partly because the signal strength is too high, causing saturation and degradation of signal quality, or signal to noise ratio. My wireless adapter actually normally runs at 25% transmit power. Changing it to full power when too near the base results in frequent drops to 11mbs data rate. Having a B card on the network won't actually cause all the other wireless connections to drop their speed, but will change the way the G cards take turns transmitting. Also, blocking the ports used by your roommates would just piss them off. A far better solution is to assign a higher priority to web traffic (both yours and theirs) than torrent or p2p traffic. Let the downloads take a back seat to web browsing. That should be a good way to keep the peace and won't affect them when you aren't online. You really may be in need of a faster connection if your nerdy roommates talk to each other about having a slow connection when one of them is downloading. -Eric

That 11mbs you're seeing is the wireless connection speed between your computer and the wireless router, not your internet connection's speed. 11mbs is WAY faster than any internet connection available to the average consumer. Also keep in mind that your wireless connection speed is measured in megabytes per second. Your internet connection is measured in megaBITS per second, just to make it sound bigger. That's an 8:1 ratio in how things are referred to. So if you have a 1,500k internet connection, that means you'll likely only ever see 150Kbytes download per second. It ends up being closer to 10:1 after a bunch of protocol overhead, and the math at 10:1 is easy too. The only way you'll see a faster connection is if your computer has more internet bandwidth allocated to it. That means you'll have to do one of several things. Get a faster internet connection: expensive, and your roommates may just suck up any faster speed you get. Get your roommates to download slower: They can install throttling software that limits their download speed. But they won't do that, despite the software being free. Use a router that supports load balancing: Your existing router may do that, or it may not. The cheap ones that do only support it on an application basis by port. So things like VOIP always get through. That may work for you if your roommates are using torrents that connect through a specific port range. No good if they're all using HTTP traffic. The good routers can assign equal bandwidth to each computer after the maximum possible has been reached. Use it all, and don't let anyone get left out. Ask your roommates for help. You also could be trying to use websites that are slow or are using the net during peak periods or over a crowded network. Cable internet connections are highly susceptible to slowdowns during peak periods. See if other sites such as google are slow. I've seen significant slowdowns across the entire internet due to congestion, even when accessing from a root trunk. Check out your computer too. Or ask your roommates to. You'd be amazed how much crap gets installed that you don't want on there. See if their computers are as slow as yours going to the same websites you use. -Eric

Yes, we do like wrench candy. Yum! What TBI setup is that?

I've done that before, started a car that was just barely out of gas or tried to start a car that was out and had been under the knife for a while. Makes you just crazy! Especially if your gas gauge doesn't work.

I love it! It really is the joy rides with friends that make owning a Z car special. Merry Christmas friends.

That really IS a nice scope, 50Mhz one-shot-capture is quite good. I'd certainly quality it as a fully portable scope. Anything easily carried with one hand and small enough to rest on a car seat/roof/hood/etc is plenty portable. Even the nice new digital scopes are about the same size, just not as deep, since they don't need a CRT. If you were referring to the hand-held scopes when you talked about 'portable' then yea, I find those too easy to knock over, breaking them is a worry. I'd recommend getting a good set of 100Mhz or better probes, in a couple of different styles. The light weight kind with a little extending hook on the end that lets you grab the leg of a resistor or an IC on a circuit board is quite useful, if a little delicate. Also, be careful with ground loops, I know a couple people who have blown things up (including scopes) because of bad grounds in equipment. They now either use power cords with the ground lead cut off or 3 to 2 prong adapters.

What's the model number? That looks like a really nice scope. Menu driven, with triggering options out the wazoo. My dual-trace 20Mhz will do anything megasquirt or any car could ever need, but the ones with auto-ranging and single-event capture make life a lot easier.

Lose the test light. Get a good (or cheap) digital multimeter. Check Harbor Freight, 6$ will set you up. Not all of your fuseable links may be working, check for power at the ignition switch and fuse box. When nothing works, it should be easy to track down, as it'll be in a main line. Why did you swap dash harnesses if everything is the same as before? -Eric

Turn on the head lights, leave the key in the ignition (off), and open the driver's door. It should say "Lights are on", except in Japanese. That's the only thing it'll say when it's not moving. The FSM has a cool section on how it works and what it says when.

You never did tell me if the Bitching Betty works in Japanese.

This sounds like a really great way to get to know Z people. The HybridZ logo "Engineered to be Feared" and a bit saying PM me, EEC562, at http://www.HybridZ.org then with a space to write a little hand written message or something. There are a few places online that offer free business cards, but put their logo on the back. As far as I know their limited to plain text, no pictures or custom layouts. I've made my own cards for years with cheap Avery templates that tear apart. As long as you get them centered (practice on plain paper and hold up to light) and use the right settings on your laser printer (heavy card stock mode, puts down more toner with higher heat, don't even bother with an ink jet unless it's a seriously high quality one) they look great.

Bosch likes to call them LSU4.2 type sensors, with a long part number of 0 258 007 057. That's a nice number that get flaunted, but doesn't cross often. The nice and easy Bosch USA part number is 17014. It even has that really long number printed on the body of the sensor. If I get a chance I'll see if I can use the books at work to see which other sensors are identical except for the wire length.

Also check out your inner and outer tie rod ends. You mention alignment, does it pull when it's shaking? If so, definitely check the inner tie rod ends for play. With enough wear they can pull out, then BAM. Your steering rack is no longer controlling the direction one of your tires is pointing. In any case, with cars these old, it's a good idea to replace many suspension parts. Some bushings may or may-not be needed, depending on how many miles and where the car lived, but ball joints and tie rods (or sometimes just ends) are nearly always on the list.

They still use wood for the nose cones on military aircraft too. It houses the radar array and doesn't interfere with the signal. I was very surprised to learn a mach 2+ aircraft can have a nose cone made of 3/8 plywood. I guess the beautifully formed curves adds quite a bit of strength, and there are ribs running throughout. Still, this reminds me of technology that will exist for a long time before we see anything out of it. Reminds me of transparent aluminum (a form of aluminum oxide), and kevlar that's ultra-light and woven into fabric - fully bulletproof without the heavy back plates.