Hawkeye Nosedive!

And just when you thought your insurance company was looking after your stacked STi. No wonder Scooby premiums are so high! At least this might bump your claim up.

10,000 visits!! Thanks and Season's Greetings everyone!

Firstly I'd like to wish a big Merry Christmas, or whatever non denominational festive greeting, to all ScoobyLab visitors and Subaru enthusiasts across the globe!

It's not been a very productive year in the Lab, having spent most of it with no Scooby and a host of new projects mean it doesn't look like I'll be budgeting for another one this year either, but I have been helping out with some mate's Imprezas and the trickle of stuff onto the blog has still been and will continue to be an ongoing process, persevering to keep classic Scoobys alive and well!

Despite the slowing of new information, the blog has gone from strength to strength through 2011 and this week has just rolled over to 10,000 visits!

Thankyou to all those who surfed over to ScoobyLab.co.cc this year! We hope the blog has helped keep some of the world's Imprezas on the road, given insight into running and restoring these awesome affordable super-cars or just entertained some Scooby fans and will continue to do so into its third yeard year!

Merry festivities and a happy new year 2012 to all!!

GT5: Cars Thread

Cars from old GTs they should port forward:

Gran Turismo:

Nissan R33 Skyline LM

Mitsubishi GTO LM

Gran Turismo 2:

Suzuki Cultus Pikes Peak

Nissan TOMICA Skyline R30 Silhouette Foumula

SALEEN Mustang Wide Body

Audi A4 BTCC Touring Car

Nissan HKS 180SX Drager

Nissan HKS R33 Drager

GT5: Tyres Thread

This thread is just a bunch of musings and observations about tyres, mainly in endurance races.

What do rain tyres actually do??

I went out first with R : Hard tyres for the 1000km of Sukuba, which poured down for the whole 6 hours, so I quickly came back to the pits and threw on Racing : Rain. Handling wasn't much improved, the car still broke away easily on corners front and back, I was using the 4WD Skyline R33 Touring Car, and I couldn't catch the front runners. I quickly came in and pitted again, this time trying out the Racing : Intermediate tyres I've not used for a long time, or at all in GT5. These totally transformed the car. It wasn't slightly wet, it was really wet, but still the Intermediates lasted longer and handled ten times better than Rains. So what are rain tyres actually for?

I'll be trying out Rain and Inters during my 24 Hrs. Le Mans, also raining cats and dogs.

Do all Racing tyres have same wear rate??

Do hard / med / soft Racing tyres have the same wear rate?? They never used to. In GT3/4 - "SuperSoft" or Racing : Soft we're clearly grippier than Racing : Hard tyres, but lasted nowhere near as long and Medium was a noticeable compromise between them. Choose between faster lap times or less pit stops. In GT5 it doesn't seem so clear cut, as R : Soft tyres don't seem to hold the road that much better than Hards, but do increase lap times a bit, whereas the difference in wear-rate between them is barely noticeable at all. This kind of negates the point of R : Hard tyres. R : Soft do still make lap times a few seconds quicker, so why even use the less grippy Hard if they have no wear advantage?!

In the case of my 9 Hrs. of Tsukuba endurance race, running a 4WD Amuse Carbon R '04, I have even found that R : Soft tyres were outlasting R : Hard! I first ran R:Hard and found they wouldn't even last 10 laps. After my third pit I ran fast to make up time and managed to destroy the R:Hard tyres in 5 laps! Assuming that all Racing tyres had been nerfed for this race [although I don't see why as the opponent cars are all running R:hard go figure], I switched over to Sports : Soft to see if they lasted longer, which would make sense if PD were to force a handicap on Racing tyres in the advanced races and encourage the use of realistic tyres [I still don't agree that R:Hard aren't like realistic slick tyres]. Sports Soft lasted nearly 20 laps though, but I lost pace so after a couple more stops I threw on a set of Racing Soft to catch up and was flabbergasted when they lasted about 20 laps too. Back to R:Hard and they were burned in 10 laps. How can this be? I assumed it to be all in my mind, went back and checked again with the same result. Maybe because of the heat of the track, or because the surface is greasy the harder compound tyres lose grip more and spin their tread away in corners, but I don't really see the real world physics of this. Seems to me that they're confused with the tyre setups in GT5. Has their quest for realism in the updates introduced more continuity errors or is it simply a glitch on this Tsukuba? I'd love to know if this has always been the case before the updates. It's certainly never happened in previous GTs.

Do Sports tyres last longer than racing ones during endurance races? It would certainly seem the case in some. Are Racing tyres, which most people describe as having an unrealistically high rate of wear in GT5, designed like this to give a handicap against the less grippy tyres? I suppose this would be the case in real life where slicker and softer tyres are designed to sacrifice their rubber to the road to aid grip, but the expensive compounds used and higher op-temperatures might still allow them to last longer being thrashed round a track as they are than semi-racing "sports" road tyres, which might start to fail much quicker from this sort of treatment.

GT5 : Endurance Race Thread

This thread contains a load of warble about my Endurance races:

Why do some Endurance Races have pit-crews and some don't? How come suspending the race and coming back in fixes any aerodynamic or mechanical defects with the car? It wouldn't be hard to save the damage status and seems a bit of a needless loss of realism.

Finally finished my cash/cars grinding mission so I'm moving onto finishing the Endurance Race series. Before the save capability I'd only done the first one.

200 Miles of Laguna Seca

Wedsport Lexus IS300 Race Car

Daytona 500

Sauber Mercedes

Suzuka 1000km

Skyline R32 Touring Car

4 Hrs. of Nurburgring

Audi A4 Touring Car

9 Hrs. of Tsukuba

Amuse Carbon R '04

There are a lot of fast cars here and the damage physics is getting higher. My first attempts were with the new RX-7 Touring Car and after an hour I was losing to a tuned Honda S2000 both times, probably the Amuse GT1 Turbo, but it seems even more imbalanced than usual. I took the lead quickly, but after a while the S2000 was forever on my tail. After my first pit-stop, with minimum fuel, it had shot ahead and although my time was gaining slightly, I just couldn't close any gap before my second pit. I soldiered on hoping that the Honda would make a long pit and I could catch up, but he was still a lap ahead as my tyres hit half tread so I threw in the towel.

For my final attempt I've used the Amuse Carbon R Skyline, with the big turbo, and yes it's imbalanced. The Honda is now nowhere to be seen, but I am being given similar grief by the HPA Motorsport R32 Golf, which I know not to be particularly fast but never comes in for tyres. He finally did after 65 laps, as I was already beginning to think about my third stop, but before pulling in I was over a lap ahead, meaning I took only 30 litres of fuel and got back on the track still 27 secs. ahead. A couple of pit-stops further on and I am now permanently a lap ahead, 2 hours in. Ok so it hasn't made for a pretty race, but this is not one I intend to sit through again and I don't want to lose.

GT5: New DLC - A total waste of time??

Got round to buying the new DLC and yes, I am quite a bit disappointed. Firstly Polyphony Digital have reportedly made tens of millions from the DLC release already and as GT is their only investment you would expect that for a quarter of the game price, they could deliver something akin to a quarter of the game. I guess £10 for 14 cars and 2 tracks (forget the gimmicky Paints / Outfits) isn't bad value when compared to something like CM DIRT3's shameless integration of dozens of paid downloads into the story line itself, but for a game as big as GT5, which has a huge design team, hundreds of endorsements and a wealth of old material that can be and is quickly ported forward... well, I just expected more. Some sort of expansion to the game was called for, not just some add ons that can only be used online. I would be much happier to pay £25 for an expansion roughly the size of GT5 Prologue. If we've another year to wait for DLC of a similar nature then I'm not looking forward too much.

I'll start with the 14 new cars. 3 of them are karts. Well OK I guess this fraction of the game does need some variety, but 2 new classes and no new karting events? As for the mostly non-real "Touring Car" collection, jeez, who didn't see those coming. Some die hards are saying the last thing GT5 needs is more new cars, but it needs exactly that; more new cars. Not just these constant rehashes of the same old JDM crew, headed up by no less than four more Skylines! I have been wanting a wide-body R32 for a long time now, but three more with similar specs in a pack this small is desperately close to filler material. Let's not forget this is on top of the new car added to the Dealerships with the 2.0 patch, the Schulze N24 GTR, and the new car awarded with the most recent Time Trial event, another Spec V GTR... OK PD, we get that Nissan let you help design the GT-R and we respect that. Skyline is king of Gran Turismo and we love them, but too much of a good thing, eh, when there are so many other brilliant new cars on the market since GT5's release. As for the Eunos, RX-7, EVO and Impreza TCs, all nice, but again too familiar and they don't perform great either next to existing versions, so lack application [I've only raced the Eunos in the 4-Hr Endurance just to make use of one]. I will give some credit to the Dodge Challenger Touring Car though. It's unlike any tuned American car I've seen on GT before and looks like a good tool for any USA Class racing, but I still haven't tried it. I guess the most original and exciting cars of the DLC pack have to be the two hybrids oddly enough. The Prius and CR-Z TCs are fresh looking and an all-hybrid race series is an interesting prospect, but alas thats all these cars are good for. You would expect them to be secret weapons for Endurance races with performance and crazy fuel economy, but I have found they're just not competitive at all against full blooded cars, even in the same PP band. With the 12+ months of development this DLC has had would it have been too much to ask for a properly special car, like one of the new Ferraris or Lamborghinis, to have made its way in - something that even GT5P got eventually for free. Updated NASCARs for free, but no Ferrari F11 even with DLC?! That might just be a personal thing. All in all, with the continued profits PD will make as players filter back off MW3 and co., a bigger, brighter car list would not have gone amiss.

However, the real disappointment to me was the two new tracks. Don't get me wrong they're both great circuits, but it struck me that they can only be used in Arcade, Practice and Online PvP. The latter is useful, but outside the Lounge they haven't been integrated into the game whatsoever and this, for me, is the biggest let down of all. No new events, no new specials, no DLC-only Online Seasonal events, no level-cap or completion percentage increase, no extra special licence, no new trophies?? No integration into the game at all - this is more like 1.2 than 2.0. They aren't even grindable, which for me is where I take time to learn a track. Given the several year lifespan of the game, I feel a proper overhaul could have been achieved by now, even if it cost us more than £10. I know Japan has had more to contend with lately than making video games, but less focus on the Academy and stuff and more on the actual GT please.

Oh, and I forget to mention the Red Bull X2011.

GT5: Elusive Cars Update

Thanks to the new B-Spec online event I've quickly generated enough money to get the Miura, Ford Mk.IV and F2007 to complete my big money collection, but there's still a few cars I just can;t seem to get on the UCD:

Audi R8 Race Car '01

BMW V12 LMR Race Car '99

Honda LOCTITE MUGEN NSX '01

Mitsubishi CZ-3 Tarmac '01

Nissan R89C Race Car '89

Pescarolo-Courage - Judd GV5 Race Car '04

Spoon S2000 Race Car '00

Message me if you have any of these to trade!

[all links to mygranturismo.net car pages]

GT5 Update : B-Spec Money Grinding in 2.0

As you probably know, the prize money system for GT5 Seasonal Online Events has been reset in the run up to 2.0 and all the ridiculously high rewards for short single-player events are a thing of the past, having been replaced by a consecutive daily login bonus. At the full 200% bonus, some prize amounts are back in the region they were before and some aren't [Tokyo Bay Kart - Compact Car Cup down from cr. 389,000 to **], so I'm still figuring out which A-Spec race is the best credits per minute.

B-SPEC PRIZES AT LAST!

B-Spec is better for grinding obviously because you don't have to do anything, even issue instruction commands with the right car and driver, but with double the number of laps and low rewards its not a very efficient process. It's high time PD brought some proper B-Spec into the big money Seasonal Events and the one that's come with 2.0 is no disappointment. They've included a mere 5 lap race of the short Rome track, ideal for grinding, and it's possible to imbalance your car more than in the other two races.

It's not a great imbalance though and the AI in these Online races is pretty tough and even right on the 500PP limit there will still be one or two cars in the pack that will give your driver a run for their money. Using a detuned racing car will give an advantage, but I've found that drivers still place 2nd and 3rd and it's more about finding the right race car thats close enough to the PP limit so it only needs a little power drop and won't lose its drivability. I'm compiling an ongoing list at the bottom of cars I've found that just seem to be faster here.

My level 35 driver completes the race in about 7 mins. 20 and will have passed pretty much any rival car by the last lap, but with an easy grid, basically one without a really high-power car like the Esprit V8 / Nür Spec Skyline / NSX Type R, and I have had repeat wins with my drivers down to level 28, still with no instructions given.

340,000cr. / 7 mins. 20 = ~50,000 cr. per minute!

cr. 340,000 @ 200%
cr. 255,000 @ 150%
cr. 170,000 @ 100%

At 50k per minute it would take about 6 and a half hours to make the full 20 million cr. needed for the classic Le Mans cars... not hard to rack up while sitting off doing other things. By far the easiest money grind solution yet!

Car List:

Alfa Romeo 8C Competizione - Only needs detuning slightly to make the 500PP @4 bhp. Lev. 30+ drivers will win without trying.

Acura NSX RM - Add a chip and racing exhaust, then detune it slightly to make the 500PP @ ~305bhp - very fast car. [Best time: 7 : 11 : 588]

Nissan GT-R SpecV (GT Acadamy SPECIAL)

Subaru Impreza Rally Car '03 - Power limited to 307bhp [324 standard] and the downforce turned down considerably front and back to get down to the 500PP limit. The weight stays low so the lack of downforce in corners shouldn't matter and top speed is increased for the Rome straight.

Ford Escort Rally Car - Reduce downforce to 6F/8R, lower it 40mm, add a Stage 1 Turbo and detune it the 2 PPs to make the 500PP limit @ ~340bhp. [Best Time: 7 : 15 : 165]

** Tokyo Bay Kart Track for Compact Car Cup

This was the best cash grind by miles before the update. With a car at the 450PP limit the race is over in 3 and a half minutes and the reward was 389k, so about 110,000 cr. per minute! It's no longer the best cr. p/m, but it is still the shortest A-Spec race at present and still worthwhile.

Yeah yeah, game-guides suggest well matched cars to make the competition amusing and where's the fun in winning by imbalance, but the whole point of grinding is to get it done quickly and I've been constantly trying to better my time and get on to the next race. I've raced it so much now that I reckon I've got some decent times, so I'll be posting a shortlist of cars / setups soon.

Homemade PS3 Racing Cockpit so far!

Using a Thrustmaster Ferrari GT wheel for now.

Sub/Lower Front Suspension + Engine Mount Diagram

Diagram provided on request of the front suspension/steering sub-assembly, showing the main gearbox-mount [3], anti-roll bar [14] and drop-links [24], as well as the trailing-arm and its bush-mount [7+9], which I believe are at fault.

[click for bigger]

SCOOBY SOLD!!!! - End of an era!

Put the car on eBay for £1500 buy it now and there were people watching it within the first 5 minutes, so I left it an hour and came back to find it sold already! The buyer was, predictably, a Scooby breakers called subaru_uk, but I'd given my phone number on the listing and had two texts from others offering £1200 cash.

The buyer arranged to meet the following evening and wasn't bothered about viewing it in the dark, but we gave the car a good clean anyway. I took the subs out along with the Autoleads wiring kit that came with the car - they are so expensive in Halfords these days, £50+, but I left in that lovely carpeted boot install I made - it's a shame about the boot leak, the wood is probably going damp. I did give them the Kenwood DVD player setup that I also got with the cart though - I just couldn't ever figure the complexity of the wiring out, but maybe the buyer will have more luck. I also threw in the spare black front-bumper and a few other bits.

The buyer kept texting saying they were held up and eventually at 11pm two young lads from Rochdale turned up. I knew they we're familiar with Scooby's and they started with the questions straight away, mainly about the engine overheating, so I assured them it did not, but kept the coolant leak quiet - I'd just topped the system up with neat coolant so they've got ages. I drove one lad round the block in it and I couldn't hide the steering-whine, which they guessed was the PAS-pump - I didn't mention that the pump was new and hadn't got rid of the whine - and they spotted a few other flaws.

In the end we agreed on £1350 and at exactly midnight the car left my ownership. Considering the car's age and the faults that have developed I'm overjoyed, seeing as slightly newer, nicer condition Scoobs with less miles were selling for that price. I only paid £800 for it last year, so it's nice to know I've made some money on a car for once [my 3 Series M3 replica went for £200 in the end]. I know I've sunk a whopping £2000 into modifying and servicing this car over the last 12 months, so technically I've made my biggest ever loss @ -£1450, but it was worth every penny just for the smile on my face of having owned the gas-guzzling, 4-wheel drive, flame spitting turbo car I've always wanted. I'm sure you'll agree though, fuel prices now are a bad joke, so I'm finally jumping onto the diesel train...

P.S The lads from Rochdale also mentioned that they weren't after the car for parts, but were in fact looking for one suitable for racing. They wouldn't give any more details about the racing, so the less said the better probably lol, I just hope that tired rally beast goes down in a blaze of glory and not rotting away in a Police impound somehwere...

Selling the Scoob!

There's so much stuff I still want to do with the car - relocate the aerial to the roof and fit a shark-fin, bigger brakes, STi intercooler etc, + finish my damn carbon wind-diffuser - but the running problems that have started to develop, as well as the general running costs, have led me to the decision of selling the one and only Scoob. :(

I've been looking at diesel BMWs for a while now and eventually bought a W-reg 530d, which I'm now mainly using. Although I could afford to keep the Impreza if I took it off the road, I'm worried that if I keep it garaged somewhere the project will fall by the wayside and there just isn't space at home. My work doesn't help either - they've got me doing 6 days a week now and I'm struggling to fit everything into Sunday alone. The final straw came with fitting the PAS-pump, when family arrived and I spent the entirety of their visit fiddling with the Scoob. I know this level of commitment is required in a proper project, but I don't feel like I'm moving forward with the car any more. The last few frugal months have still been spent on repairing the car's faults, not saving for the next big mod and it seems this is set to continue until summer when it's MOT time - and who knows what else they might find wrong with her. All my modding inspiration is being postponed indefinitely and to be honest this has killed my enthusiasm.

To summarise the faults:

The £65 PAS-pump did not cure the steering whine so thats obviously the rack itself which are £100 for the cheapest used one and hellish to fit. It also didn't fix the ticking noise so that could now be anything - the water-pump, oil-pump, alternator, cam-belt or cam-pulleys etc...

The engine is still losing coolant after fitting the new radiator. It needs topping up every few weeks by a litre or two, although it's never since overheated.

The boot leaks. I've tightened the LED-lights in as much as possible and taped up around various places, but there is still water getting in, which pools in the spare-wheel well after a rainy few days. During the day the condensation from it fills the rear windscreen and windows. Worst of all, my amp and subs are often running with condensation and the carpet was full of ice over Xmas. Limp.

There's a knock from the front suspension, maybe a trailing arm, which can be heard when cornering over a bump at low speed or up a slope.

There is a squeaking noise coming from the n/s rear wheel. I would hope its just a sticky brake, but it could be a wheel bearing. :(

So the car is going on eBay. I've written a nice spiel for the advert [which leans mainly to the cars positives I'll be honest] and I'm starting the bidding at £1000, with a buyout price of £1500. Not bad I reckon just for the value of the parts on her, but the average 100k Scoob isn't going for much more than a grand and mine has just rolled onto 141k so we'll see how it sells.

Couple of pics for eBay

Steering whine and ticking noise - not fixed!

The power-steering has always had a loud whine when turning at low-speeds, but it's safe to say this has worsened over the summer, where I could hear it while turning at higher speeds - roundabouts and stuff - and the after the snowy weather the whine can be heard turning in either direction most of the time. A ticking noise has also developed under the bonnet that seems to be coming from the front of the engine.

After much deliberation we decided it must be the power-steering pump on its way out with the ticking coming from its pulley. My friends had even begun to comment on the noises so I went ahead and bought the pump along with a new auxiliary-belt and spent a Sunday fitting them. The used pump I bought was definitely newer and in far better condition than mine, but if anything this made the problem worse. As soon as I fired her up the ticking noise was back and the whine could now be heard on tickover. I revved the engine and the whine went with it like a supercharger.

I can now only guess that the whining noise is coming from the steering-rack itself, which are expensive new. I can find used ones for about £100, but they are hellishly complex to fit. The ticking noise is worse, as it could be anything - the alternator-pulley, crank-pulley, oil-pump, water-pump, even the timing belt or cam-pulleys. Unless I book the car in with a pricey specialist I may never find the culprit - and I can't replace every part on the engine.

On top of this, I'm still having to top the engine up with coolant. It's such a shame that its still losing some over several weeks and there are still no signs of a blown head-gasket, so that may very well be the water-pump too. The coolant could be ending up in the boot however, but I suspect its probably just a leak. I have taped up around the rear-lights and tightened them as far as they will go into their recess over the last few months, but it seems they are determined to keep on letting in water. My subs and amp are often running with condensation and the carpet on the sub-box had ice all over it round xmas.

To top this little lot, I neglected to finish off painting the rear wheel-arches so rust has begun to creep back on both of them and they need redoing. It strikes me that as the weather gets nicer again, the forthcoming six months are going to have to be spent on a load more repair work, rather than getting back on the mods like I desperately want to. I was hoping to get the front TEINs on, fit bigger brakes, an STi intercooler to safely up power and then concentrate on the repairs come MOT time in June, but these problems won't wait and there could be a ton more on the test.

Its a crying shame, but I've decided to quit while Im ahead and move the car on to someone who will spend time on taking it to the next level, or just wrap my pride and joy round the nearest tree. I'll be listing the car on eBay shortly and we'll see what it makes. There is also a new BMW in the pipeline...

Replacing the PAS-Pump

I wouldn't say this was a very advanced job, but it does get fiddly working in the confined spaces so the instructions are quite detailed. Also be prepared to contort your arms into horrible positions and make sure you have a socket-set with at least 5 inches of extra reach AS WELL as a 12mm and 14mm open-ended spanner, with as low a profile as possible.

PROCESS:

1. Slide the finger-clip down the rubber-hose that enters the top of the PAS-pump. Slide the hose off the metal-pipe on the pump and plug the end of the hose.

2. Remove the two bolts holding the pulley-cover in place using a 10mm wrench, then loosen the bolt on the right-side alternator bracket using a 12mm wrench a couple of turns so the pulley-cover can be slid out. Turn the pulley-cover over and push the plastic-stud that holds the throttle-cable clip out of its hole.

3. Using a 12mm open-ended spanner, loosen the far nut on the throttle-cable where it sits in the bracket as far as it will go so the cable can be pushed back and lifted out of the bracket. Swivel the cable so it clears the PAS-pump area and fasten it with a cable-tie.

4. Using a 14mm open-ended spanner, loosen the union-bolt that attaches the metal-pipe to the port on the left side of the PAS-pump. Only crack the bolt off a couple of turns so no fluid spills, but the bolt can be removed easily once the pump is no longer fixed in position.

5. Remove the bolt that is threaded through the long adjusting-bolt that moves the alternator up and down. There is no need to slacken the adjusting-bolt - once the holding-bolt is out, the alternator should drop down fully anyway.

6. Lower the alternator until the belt becomes loose enough to be slid off the pulleys.

7. Remove the 3 bolts holding the PAS-pump in place using a 12mm wrench. There are 2 bolts to the front of the pump, beneath the pulley, which are easy to find, but there isn't a lot of room to turn them. The third, to the rear-right of the pump can be accessed from above, but you'll need at least 5" of reach on your ratchet.

8. Now the PAS-pump is free, remove the union-bolt from the pipe on the left side and lift the pump out. It's best to wrap a cloth around the union-bolt when removing the pump to catch any PAS-fluid dropping into the engine, although the pump shouldn't spill a lot anyway. **Plug the end of the metal-pipe.

9. Install the new PAS-pump, replace the pipe/union-bolt and insert the 3 bolts holding it in place.

10. Slide the new belt into position on the 3 pulleys. Lift the alternator until the belt is tense and replace the bolt that holds the adjusting-bolt in place. Now tighten the adjusting belt to the torque mentioned in the Workshop Manual [here] or just until the top stretch of the belt can be moved about 5mm up or down.

11. Replace the rubber return-hose and finger-clip to the top of the PAS-pump.

12. Snip off the cable-tie, swivel the throttle-cable back into its natural position in the bracket and retighten the 12mm nut on the far side.

13. Add PAS-fluid to the pump and allow it drain into the system and air to come out until the fluid reaches the measuring-scale on the cap.

Homemade Decals 1st Attempt - AUTOBACS

I got a load of vinyl off the lads who come in to sign-write our vans at work, so I've been planning, in true ScoobyLab styler, to have a go at making my own graphics and decals for the car - when I get round to it. Couldn't wait to make a test piece though, so I spent an hour of my bank-holiday bashing up this little Autobacs number...

Ok, so under a microscope you can see they're a bit rough around the edges, but for glancers they look the part. They weren't hard to make either. I got the logo and reversed the image horizontally. This way I can stick it onto the back of the vinyl so I can see what I'm cutting then, when the stickers are applied, the letters show up the right way round on the shiny side. As for the cutting I just used sharp scissors and a Stanley-knife.

Who are AUTOBACS? Well, they're basically just the Japanese Halford's. The Japs are crazy over their cars though, so they revere these stores like gods and proudly show off Autobacs decals, so I thought it'd be a good talking point for discerning modders, although anyone who's switched on enough to mention it would probably ask why I'd made my own stickers.

Check out the awesome AUTOBACS site - http://www.autobacs.com/world/

Here's a great vid from an ancient Top Gear with [a young and funny] Clarkson browsing round the Autobacs flagship store in Tokyo.

New Halogen Spotlamp Bulb - wrong type.

Well, happy new year everyone and as I'm so desperate to get back working on the car I've kicked off 2001 by buying another high-power halogen bulb to make my old O/S spotlamp match the one I bought recently. Problem is I made a hasty choice and bought the wrong kind. Even after describing the multi-coloured type to the guy in Halfords and re-checking the colour of the bulb itself it still turned out to just be a white glow, with a little bit of blue in the middle and looks more like the one it replaced. £8.99 in the gutter. Ah well, I guess I'll have to keep looking, or just change the coloured one for the original white one I took out today.

FITTING:

Changing the fog/spotlamp bulbs only takes a minute, but its more fiddly than I expected so heres the process.

1. Remove the 3 bolts holding the spotlamp in place using a 10mm wrench.

2. Unclip the plug on the spotlamp wire and slide it free of the wiring-harness in the bumper.

3. Turn the grey seal-plug anti-clockwise until it can be lifted out of the seal. Be careful not to pull too hard on the wiring.

4. Slide the earth-wire, with the light-blue rubber-sheath, up off its mount on the spotlamp chassis.

5. Slide the end of the live wire, coming off the base of the bulb, out of its socket in the seal-plug. The socket sits in a mount and can be lifted out to make it easier.

6. Push down the metal-wire clip behind the bulb at the side nearest the gray-plastic adjustment-bracket and move the wire-clip out of its mount and rotate it out of the way.

7. Replace the bulb with the new one and reverse the process.

Relocating the Stock-Aerial Part 1

I know Scooby's aren't designed with aesthetic perfection in mind, but its a shame they follow the utilitarian Japanese convention of bolting a tacky plastic thing on afterwards with an 80's pull-out style aerial in, usually on the driver's A-pillar. Even the 60-reg Toyota Hilux coming in at work, which are pricey trucks, still have these things and, while I'm sure they function superbly, they don't half look crap.

I've been planning to re-locate the aerial onto the roof of the Scoob for a while now and change it from a tacky telescopic metal one to a BMW-style 'shark-fin', but you could fit a rally-style mast-aerial, a bee-sting or a GPS-box lookalike in the same way. Its not a difficult job at all, but a brave enough one for me to struggle to get round to it. Doesn't look like it'll be any time soon, with all the other jobs mounting up [power-steering is gonna need looking at first I think], but I reckon its a sound idea so I'll write it up anyway.

Removing the Stock Aerial:

Unclip and remove the plastic cover on the driver's A-pillar inside the car and cut the wires going to the aerial-mount.

Remove the two screws holding the aerial-mount with a flat-head screwdriver and prize the plastic-mount away from the a-pillar.

Bridge the holes in the a-pillar with metal-filler, or just stick about 5 layers of black-tape over the back of them, then fill the outer layer with P38 body-filler. Its only a tiny area so shouldn't be hard to sand, prime and paint-match.

Installing the New Aerial:

Inside the car, unclip and pull down the roof-lining. I'm still unclear on how to do this so, for now, refer to the Body section of the workshop manual here - http://www.scoobylab.co.cc/2010/12/manuals.html.

Find a suitable spot and drill a hole wide enough for the new-aerial's mounting-stud. Drill from the outside in and it's easy to dent the roof so drill slowly, use plenty of oil on the bit and it might be worth starting with a small pilot-hole to make sure the location is accurate.

Place the mounting-stud of the new-aerial through the hole and stick the base down onto the roof. Tighten the nut onto the mounting-stud inside the car.

Extend the cut-off wires at the a-pillar, if necessary, across the inside of the roof to meet the cable on the new-aerial and tape it into place. It's likely the new unit will have a male FM-aerial connector on it [same as the one in the dash that plugs in to the head-unit], so you could cut it off and hard-wire it, but for a nicer job I'd recommend getting a female FM-aerial socket from Halford's for a couple of quid and crimping it to the a-pillar wire. That way the aerial can be un-plugged easily if some idiot decides to nick your new bee-sting and you have to a quick replacement.

Clip the roof-lining back up into place and replace the plastic-cover to the inside of the a-pillar.