rabbitstew

Hey, im no longer the new guy! yey!

Sorry to hear about your work situation, not good. But, at least you are getting plenty of notice. In the past when ive been made reduntant ive only had a few weeks notice! Personally id wait until you get laid off. You will get a few months salary as pay off depending on how long you have been there which in my case was 3 months pay - which easily lasted me about 8 months as I cut all my spending down big time. Changing jobs or retraining is a hard one. I work in IT and have been into IT since I was 10 and my primary school got a BBC Model B computer. Noone else at my school, incl the teachers understood it, but within weeks I was programming games. Had a natural "geek" ability with computers so followed that through uni and into my jobs. But then people started thinking there was money in IT and every man, dog, builder, plumber, carpender etc. all did IT courses and jumped on the band wagen. I knew someone who was a receptionist at the local dole office on about £12k a year - she did a 3 day course in software testing and within 12 months was getting £45k a year. So, the IT market became flooded, people like myself who had been in IT all their life were made redundant and due to competition salarys plumeted. Now all those people who jumped on the band wagen are jumping off and going back to their old trades. The builders, plumbers and sparkys I know are all earning a small fortune - certainly loads more than me who is stupid enough to stay in IT because I enjoy it. If I was to retrain I think id seriously look at becoming a plumber or builder. The builder 3 doors away from me drives a brand new Porsche GT3 (or 4... not sure which it is). I had a quote to fit a new boiler the other week and the plumbers wanted about £4k labour to fit it if I bought the boiler. In the end I got a mate to do it for a fraction of that and it only took him 2 days. £4000 for 2 days work isnt bad going and the guy was fully booked for about 2 months!!!!!

I get this all the time with my VW Golf. If i leave it more than 1 day then the pads seem to stick to the discs. In fact last winter when i left my car for 7 days whilst I was on holiday, as i drove off the pads were so stuck to the discs that it actually pulled the pads clean off the back plates!!! Okay, so they were due for replacement anyway having been on the car for 4 years and 80k miles, but even id never had that happen before!

Id drive carefully until you know exactly what the problem is. With my other halves car the engine warning light was on for about 8 months and didnt cause any problems - in that case id already done a full OBD scan and established that the problem was simply the cat converter on the way out.

Excellent... knew you guys would come up with option D. I`ll give that a go and see what the DVLA say. Cheers.

Not sure, as surely if they did that everyone would be just doing this all the time and getting "free" insurance?

After waking up at 4:40am as im unable to sleep through thinking of this, and spending several hours searching online ive found an option c. Option C: Get new 1 years insurance policy (wont be able to use my 18 years ncb as that can only be used on one vehicle), so cheapest quote is £500ish. Then cancel this after 1 week, which means I should get a full refund minus 1 weeks insurance cost + their "admin" fees.

The guy above is right, it goes P1, P2, P1, P3 and repeats. I believe there are "optional" bits on the services like fluids replaced etc which you pay extra for if you require them. Im not aware of a "big" service at the 6 year mark. Those prices dont seem too bad, but id still shop around and get several quotes. Even different main dealers vary their prices.

Well, thanks to the new "continuous insurance" law that the government has introduced this year I am in a bit of a pickle. Just bought my 350z and got free 7 days insurance via Aviva in order for the dealer to tax it and let me drive it home. Now, I need to sell my old car. I was planning to just leave the 350z on the driveway, un-insured but taxed and use my old car over the next week until its sold. Then simply transfer my current insurance over to the 350z and use that instead. Nice, simple and easy. The government will already make money out of me as both cars are fully taxed and MOT`d even though I will only be using one. But now I find out that because both cars are taxed they both will need to be insured. So, I need to insure both cars even though I will only be using one. Either that or cancel the road tax on one of them. So option A. Cancel road tax on 350z - I have already lost 2 weeks tax on it because when you get road tax out, it goes from the beginning of the month. On the other hand, when you cancel the tax you "loose" the money for the month you are on. Then in 1 weeks time renew the road tax, again having to pay for the whole month. This will cost me about £60 extra in road tax just to cancel / reapply. Option B. Try to get some sort of short term insurance for 1 week to enable me to drive both cars. Now this seems like a sensible and cheap option. Ive 18 years NCB, am nearly 40 and not had any claims or accidents. And, if i am driving my old cheap banger of a car instead of a high risk 350z the risk to the insurance company is a lot lower. So, I would have thought insurance companies would be very keen to encourage me to drive my low risk car rather than the 350z. But no. Premium for 12 months on my old banger car comes in at 250quid, but the cheapest "short term" quote ive had is for £160 for just 21days insurance. Multi car policies are even worse. My 350z is costing 750quid a year to insure, and yet if I tell the insurance company I want to drive an 11 year old golf diesel 50% of the time in order to reduce my running costs and lower the risk of anything happening to the 350z by 50%, they jack this premium up to £1200 !!!! When really id have thought they would reduce it!!! So its looking more like option a is the only way forwards... I really dont understand why insurance cant be based upon the driver and not a specific car. They should look at the drivers experience and history. Then look at the highest risk vehicle they will be driving and base the insurance quote on that. If the driver then wants to drive any lower risk vehicles they should welcome this free of charge (and encourage it) as if an accident happens they will be paying loads less out. Argh!

I noticed the same thing on mine. When i looked under the back i was shocked at how rusty some bits looked, esp for a car which had done 20k miles odd. In fact it looked rustier than my 175k mile old work hack i drive. So, sounds like its all "normal" !

I certainly did. I was actually quite surprised as ive never bought from a main dealer before and am only used to getting next to no warranty from car dealers. That clutch thing tho.. got me worrying now, as mine mates a whirring noise when its in neutral which goes as soon as you put the clutch pedal down. Its sounds a lot like the noise you get from a worn thrust bearing on some of my other cars. Is that a "normal" sound for a 350z?

I hate selling cars which is one reason why I end up keeping them for so long. Last car I sold I had no end of time wasters. People offering silly money without seeing the car. Then others turning up testing it out, agreeing it was the best by far they had seen and then not even making an offer. Im hoping when I come to sell my zed I will find that enthusiast who loves the car as much as I do and wont mess me about.

My mate emailed me this yesterday and I spent ages cracking up. That guys description and answers to the questions are inspired!

Welcome first off Had to laugh at the luggage part of the video You can fit a bag in the S2K but where do you put the roof when out and about Pop it behind a hedge somewhere? Just remember to go back for it Yeah I thought that was quite funny. They dump the roof against the side of the building behind them and drive off. Just spoke to my missus and your right, it was a 3 owner car, and I remember now questioning that with the sales guy. Its a 2008 model according to the sales guy, so thats a bit of a high turn around. But, it had full history on it. Wouldnt fancy your chances on a decent part ex price, the guy offered me about 1/3rd of what I can get for my old car just by bunging it on ebay.

Yep, thats the one. Looks quite nice in that pic. Its also the same car here: http://www.parkers.co.uk/cars/reviews/n ... -2005.aspx Thats a press photo of it with its original number plate on. Sorry you missed out on it. I think, as you mentioned in one of your other posts, it might have been because of the part-ex you had. In my case it was a cash sale and I walked in with the cash in my pocket which must have been very tempting for them. Is this place too far from you? http://www.thrapstongarage.com/used-car ... mptonshire They have a mint 57 plate roadster in, which I test drove a couple of weeks back. It really felt brand new. I made them an offer on it but they had only just got the car in and were reluctant to do a deal. Ive noticed they have since dropped £1000 off the price so really they should have taken my offer. Its got the GT pack, sat nav, reversing sensors, low mileage, 2 previous owners I think it had, new tyres. Its the dark midnight blue colour. Only thing I could fault was a very small scuff on the rear drivers side wheel arch which they said they would fix before selling. Cheers.

Hey! Im in the Cambridge area most days, so i`ll have to keep a look out for you! Ive got an 07 plate grey roadster. Mod wise... theres loads you can do.... but dont get carried away! Im really struggling to keep my wallet in my trousers atm. The last car I started modding ended up as a track day special and I had to buy another car for work! lol.

love those wheels!!!!

Hey! Talk about a small world!! I did wonder, when i read your post in "wanted" when you said your`d just missed out on a car which sounded suspiciously like the one ive just bought. Its strange, they didnt mention anything to me about anyone else interested, when normally sales people always mention that hoping that you will pay more etc.. Did you take it for a spin? The car is awesome, ive done 300 miles in it already and only had it 3 days. Only things I can fault atm is that the front brake discs / pads are on the limit, the back discs are very very badly scored - so time for a brake change all round I think. (Do they all wear out at only 20k?!?!) And on last years MOT (even though garage didnt give me it, i found it online) it had an advisory for leaking shocks - which havent been replaced. Also as you prob noticed if you checked the car out, the interior seems a lot more worn than 20k would suggest - probably as a result of being a press car, but nothing I cant fix. All in all a cracking car.

Cheers mate. Are they really that much! eeek! Will have to save my pennies up.

lol!!!! glad im not the only person who has found that in a car before! why do people think twisting wires and sellotape is going to work i dont know!

This thread makes me a feel a bit better then. I was quoted 480quid for an E46 M3, then decided to get the 350z roadster instead. Cheapest quote ive had is £750 and thats with 18 years NCB. All the "specialist" insurerer who claim to offer forum / owners club discounts all came in at around the £1300 mark!!!!

I`ll have the exhaust. PM you.

Anyone got one lying around? Mines badly worn and dont fancy paying the dealer prices for a replacement. I know I could go for an alloy one off ebay, but really want to keep the OEM orange one. Thanks

Yeah, not a massive choice, but certainly a steady flow of them. Just missed out on a cracking 07 plate, 22k on clock, 1 owner, main dealer supplied car up at £13,999; we were in 'discussion' about the trade-in price of my Beemer and it was sold from under my nose - wasn't overly impressed. That said, I've come to the conclusion, to really make the change as effective as possible I really need to sell my car privately and not trade-in (fairly obvious really). Another one appeared today at the same price only 3 miles from my home but as I've still got my car I'll get spanked again on trade-in. The search continues... Should point out, there are some 07 plates around too!! Where was the 07 one you missed out on? The built in Sat Nav does look good in the car, and whilst you cant do a Postcode search and it doesnt have speed camera updates, it does look nice. But if the price is right, id just go for one without and fit an aftermarket big screen one in the same space.

Is the exhaust on the 313 the same as on the previous 350z`s? i.e. use the same mounts etc?