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Monkey Boy 1

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Posts posted by Monkey Boy 1

  1. my 1996 UK ST202 is in fairly standard spec except for exhaust system. Standard it should be 168 BHP at the crank. My one and only dyne test showed it produced nearly 173BHP.

    If a car is regularly serviced then a power drop is less than if a car is not serviced. With mine I was expecting around 155 to 160 due to it's age and mileage 110 k at the time of testing, so very happy with the result.

    Some cars use inferior materials. so suffer from cam wear, bore wear, Piston wear etc. All this causes a loss in power.

    Fuel makes a difference too. supermarket pump fuel with a lower RON figure can give less 'bangs for your buck' too

  2. Looking at your rear discs they look a very similar set up the the Gen 6. I am not too genned up on the Gen 7 so forgive me if this info is totally wrong for the 7. Anyway when I was getting a clonking noise from my Gen 6 from the rear it turned out to be the handbrake shoes. one of the mushroom clips which hold the shoe in place had come adrift and the retaining washer inside the drum was catching in the drum / shoe. The noise went when you slightly applied the handbrake while on the move, but came back when you took the pressure off the cable as the shoes would not sit concentric to the drum so started knocking.

    I had to replace the shoes and the mushroom shoe retainer clips, as one which has a 'U' bend in it was pretty straight.

  3. That was my initial thoughts too Iain. But as with a lot of things we do, a few HP here or there either plus or minus would not be noticeable on power, but fuel economy on a run can be affected by a whole host of things.

    'Real world' fuel economy is very different to manufacturers figures. For a start the manufacturer does all it's tests in a test cell, not on the open road where things like weather, tyre compound & tread, tyre pressure, wind, Driver & passenger weight, baggage weight, atmospheric pressure, altitude, road surface, age of the car, mileage, service items, driving style etc etc. all have an effect on engines performance & fuel economy.

    Basically, heavy foot = more fun but less mpg

    Light foot = boring drive but better mpg

  4. hmm so hot air in means less fuel put in too = better fuel economy?

    Basically Yes, but at a loss of power.

    I found this which may explain a bit better

    You might have noticed, driving through the summer months, that you're filling up the car a little less often than you would over winter.

    It's not your mind playing tricks on you, but a fairly common occurrence for all drivers. Cars simply get better gas mileage during warm weather than they do when it's cold.

    There are several reasons for that, and we've picked the most relevant ones below.

    Warm air

    There's a scientific explanation for why you use less fuel in warmer weather, and it's to do with air temperature.

    As you may know, your engine uses air, as well as gas, in order to generate energy. In fact, it uses huge amounts of the stuff, though only the oxygen is used in combustion. These oxygen molecules combine with carbon in the fuel during combustion, to form--you guessed it, carbon dioxide.

    Anyway, one property of air, like many substances, is that it expands when it warms. This makes it less dense--molecules of the various gases are spread further apart. This means that every gulp of air your car is taking during combustion has less oxygen in it at warmer temperatures, and if there's less oxygen, the engine compensates by using less fuel.

    This is bad from a power perspective, but good for economy. The engine is combusting less fuel due to the warm air, improving fuel economy. During winter, the reverse is true--denser air encourages the engine to chuck in more fuel, boosting performance and harming economy.

  5. From memory I think Air con takes around 5hp - 8hp from an engine when running. On a 100hp car that is quite a hit, on a 200hp engine then it is a small effect. 300hp it would hardly be noticeable.

    If you are travelling around at 2000 - 3000 RPM, then your engine is probably only producing about 1/3 the max HP. so a 5 - 8 hp drop would be quite noticeable.

    Fuel economy would probably be hit a little, but no where near as much as driving, say at 50pmh with the windows down.

    Air temp & altitude also can greatly effect the power of an engine. The latter we don't need to worry about too much in the UK, but the former will cause issues, hence many 'switched on' modifiers strive to get decent cold air feeds for their engines intake rather than just fitting a 'trick looking' cone filter but still pulling in air from a rather hot engine bay.

    Basically, our hot summers which would effect engine performance last about a couple of days, so not something to really worry about.

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  6. That is the problem when you become attached to a car. They can be an absolute money pit and you would never in a million years get back what you put into it, but Hey.... It's a Celica, and the gen 6 is one of the beat looking 1990's sports cars around that doesn't look dated.

    I too have spent a fortune on mine in my nearly 6 years of ownership. It's not just the GT4 guys that Faff, we all do to a certain extent. Had it been a Ford or Vauxhall it would have been scrapped or sold on many years ago, but it still brings a smile to my face every time I drive it.

    Keep the faith, take a deep breath, take a step back and methodically go through what you have done to trace back to any problem.

  7. I contacted Camskill yesterday and asked about the warranty on Apex springs. They said that Apex only brought in this extended warranty a couple of years ago, so are not sure if they would back date the warranty to 2011 and I would have to contact Apex in Holland directly.

    Will have to wait & see what the outcome will be when I get their contact details.

    2015-04-24 13.44.29.jpg

  8. Spent quite a few hours cleaning, polishing & detailing the car yesterday and reasonably happy with the results but then last night it rained. No real problems with that, but looking at the car this morning ot looks like someone has chucked a bag of fine sand over the car.

    Apparently due to the recent air pollution and change of wind direction, the rain droplets were loaded with dust from the Sahara.

    Great

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