Ekona

+millionty In all fairness to JC, some of what he said was absolutely spot-on (the waggling of the cubby-hole cover springs to mind) but then some of what he called flaws, I would more describe as personality and is why I fell in love with the Zed. Each to their own, it'd be boring if we all liked the same things.

Vinyl wrap then, basically. There's loads of companies that make it in patterns as well, can be more effective than chucking stickers on a car but it's a shame it costs as much (sometimes more) than a re-spray. I once (before a JAE where I was hoping for a good result in the concours and had plastered the car in some seriously decent wax) drove a good 2 hours with clingfilm stuck to the front and wings. No flies, no dirt, and just whipped it off when I got there!

You have the difference in stagger to account for the slight differences in what the tyres do. It's more important that they heat up the same and grip the same on the edge more than anything. Or that, basically. A car with more predictable feel via the tyres will be more controllable. You can certainly get used to mismatched tyres, there's no question about that as you'll start to account for the unpredictable nature of the tyres and kerb your enthusiasm to take note of it, but for someone just getting used to a very powerful heavy-nosed RWD car, it's not such a good idea.

You could flog the other two either on here or on eBay, get some money back that way? By your own admission you're not used to the car yet, which is totally understandable (hell, I'm only 6mths into ownership myself and I'm still getting used to it), I just worry you're tempting fate for the sake of a couple of hundred quid. Summer's just as bad for accidents as winter really as you get the sudden downpours that bring all the oil to the top of the road surface again, making things especially treacherous.

Stick on always

I love the way people justify running on different tyres as an 'saving for an upgrade', bearing in mind they're the only thing keeping you on the road Honestly mate, you've already had a lucky escape on the same compound of tyre, you're really pushing your luck mixing them. I'm not trying to be funny or anything, I'd just hate to see a fellow owner post up a week later saying you put your car into a ditch. Even a short-term credit card loan to buy the matching front tyres will get you the secure handling you deserve on the Zed

It's a turbo. It needs exhaust gas to spool the turbo. It takes rpm to achieve the required exhaust gases to spool the turbo. You have lag. With the right turbo choices (I'm going to assume that for such a huge figure you must have one small and one bloody great turbo!) then you can reduce lag, and it will certainly be less noticeable on a large capacity engine, but it'll always be there. Without cheating via anti-lag, using an sc as well a la VW et al, it's mechanically impossible to build a turbo system with no lag. That said, I'd very interested in the details of your system, is there a thread on here or anything that contains all the details? As sad as it is, I love reading about engineering challenges of the turbo kind

£10-15 a corner? Also if you think it was twitchy before, it'll be 10x worse now you're mixing tyres front and back... Time to drive like a granny until you wear the fronts down (or even better, put Toyos on all round).

They certainly could. Hell, if you change the gearknob and don't tell them they still could! Tell them everything you've ever done and you'll never have to worry about it.

True. Most of the TT setups for the Zed I've seen appear to use the same size turbo anyway, although that's going from sight rather than looking at specific serial numbers on the turbo itself. Tbh if you expect to get no lag from a turbo engine at all you're misleading yourself seriously. The only way to get FI + no lag = supercharger, but you will then sacrifice top end power. Given that the engine is limited to 400bhp-ish before you need to start playing with internals anyway, it's the one reason I'd never consider going turbo on these cars. That said, the thump in the back of a good turbo is seriously addictive.

It's a turbo system, there'll always be some lag regardless of engine size. The only way to reduce it is to have smaller turbos but running higher boost. Well, that's not the only way as you could well go the anti-lag route, but it's going to be horrifically noisy and reduce the longevity of the turbos themselves. Flirt, have you got any kind of boost control on there at all? On previous cars I've used the GReddy Profec E-01 to great effect, as you can set it to keep the wastegate closed until a set pressure level is reached (usually 1-2psi below what you're aiming for) which does reduce the lag somewhat as the wastegate isn't letting the exhaust gas by so early.

I use AutoGlym Tyre Shine spray. Just spray liberally onto anything black and leave to dry for a gloss finish, or wipe clean for a matte one. Lasts for months, and is so easy to do.

On previous cars I've just used a good stiff steel brush and some Wynns brake cleaner. Never had a problem with that combo, and that was using cheapo Halfrauds paint too.

They're stuck, just pull like f*ck

Maybe someone should give Lotus their number before the Evora is actually finished and released?

Brake fluid level okay?

That's fantastic. If they can make it drive well, and be available in something other than grey, silver or black (yellow would be nice), then I think I may have found my next car after the Zed.

It is nice, but I'd rather have the N400 behind it

But you don't get a chance to adjust to the feeling, as the different compounds will shrink and expand at very different rates, and as such you always have an element of uncertainty with those small patches of rubber keeping you on the road. Yes, you can work round it to some extent, but it's not something I'd ever be willing to risk my car and life on. I'd rather put a set of ditchfinders on all round and know that they're crap and adjust my driving style to suit than risk the unknown. The point isn't getting used to a differing grip level, it's the uncertainty you add in to the equation.

There was a case a few years ago now about the gy who was waving at drivers to warn them of a speed trap, and they tried to do him for perverting the course of justice. He got off though as they couldn't prove that the people he was waving to had any intention of breaking the law in the first place. So basically, as long as you're not doing anything dangerous you can warn how you like.

If you can live with the lack of MMS (which I've learnt to) and the basic camera (again, quite easy to do) the the iPhone is by far the best phone I've ever used. Everything is so simple to operate on it, and the introduction of the App Store has simply put it another level above anything I can find out there. I'm on the £35 plan which, even as a business + personal phone, does me fine and the free minutes and texts are more than enough. Try before you buy in case you really don't like it, but I can almost guarantee that you will.

So what happens when the road gets really hot and you're really going for it and then suddenly you get a brief summer downpour? That sense of balance you're used to will disappear as the two axles will have varying rates of grip depending on temperature and surface conditions. In short, you'll lose all sense of progressiveness and consistency between the front and back ends, and that's only ever going to end in tears at some point. You may drive like a granny for all I know in which case this may apply less to you, but what happens when some idiot pulls out in front of you and you need to make an emergency manoeuvre? You simply won't know how the car is going to react on different compounds, and having 1.5tons of metal, plastic and rubber not under control is very scary. Not particularly having a go at you mate, just more stating the reasoning why mixed tyres front and back is a bad idea waiting to happen.

Really not worth the risk IMHO, as that little bit of rubber is the only thing keeping you in contact with the road and that's not something I'd personally be willing to muck around with. I'm in much the same situation as you myself Stan, so I can appreciate how you feel.

That for me is the best bit: Screw all the H&S bollocks we've had stuffed down our throats for the last few years and let people decide for themselves what's safe and what's not. Watching Lewis light the rears on the hill no more than 10m away from me whilst everyone cheered him on was a proper spine-tingler for me. Bit disappointing how the supercars never gave it full whack going up the hill, you had to wait for them to come back down if you really wanted the fun as that's when they started playing silly buggers... The C63 AMG must've easy lost 3mm off it's tyres! Really good weekend, but I get the feeling it's something to do every other year rather than every year. That said, I could drool over the 8C convertible for hours...

3 golden rules of modifying for performance... First make it STOP Then make it HANDLE Then make it GO!