halz

Yep, I'm north of the river too... the Swan that is... are you talking about the Brisbane River?

whitegoods: washing machines, refrigerators, dishwashers, microwave ovens, clothes driers etc. In other words, mass produced utility goods with a fixed life expectancy that we all have just to add a little convenience to our lives. So you can see: Daewoo, Hyundai, Mitsubishi, Daihatsu...etc... producers of 4-wheeled whitegoods that clutter the roads!

I don't feel bad. As they say, the only dumb question is the one you don't ask... I've been playing quite a guessing game with the locations people give on this site. 'socal' The county of southern california? This would be equivalent to me saying I'm from W.A. or Vic and expecting everyone to know that these are states in Australia. I'm learning...

OK.. here's a dumb question from a non-American: what do you mean by 'Bay Area'? This world of our has a lot of coastline with a lot of concave portions (bays) and lots of those have cities on them. Do you mean San Francisco Bay? (I'm guessing but there seem to be lot of Californian members). Enlighten us...

They're not cars, they're whitegoods.

actually I've got to agree with you Alfa. They've taken a fairly bland shopping trolley and made it look like a fun weekend toy!

I thought it was on a mondeo platform... or was that some Jag afficionado mouthing off about 'real' vs 'new' Jaguars..?!

Looks like Jag to me too. As for the Taurus... the most horrible thing to do to them was to let them sit a bit too long in front of the fireplace - how else can you explain that droopy yucko styling!

I'd love a set too (1973): hayden.long@bhpbilliton.com Thanks!

So after all that you forgot the most important part: how good is your braking now?!?

Quite a stable you have there! ( some people seem to have all the cars while the rest of us are left to scour the papers and build our networks - I'm becoming convinced that the Z I buy will be a word of mouth job and not one that is advertised to the public...) Does your son's car still have its original engine? If so and he ever changes his mind and wants to sell, let me know :classic:

whoops, sorry for miss-spelling your name, Graeme

Graham, I just finished flipping throught your pictures. I thought the colour of the roadster was nice... and then I saw that the interior of one of the doorsand it was red. Was red the original colour of the car.. or was it the green? Depending on your plans for the restoration (ie, putting it back to original cond. vs customised ), I hope it was green! I like that colour. Also, you seem to be running drastically short on garage space! What is the red Z in the background? Is it a 240 or 260 (or a 2+2?).. can't tell from the pics. Have fun with those cars!

If they are seperate pieces of paper you could have them laminated (not sure what the term is in the U.S.) Basically, most photo shops can take a paper print, run them through a machine which ads a clear plastic coat - rather like a driver license card. I think that would certainly lock in the remaining ink and prevent the volatile components from fading off the paper.

I have friends who are Ford/Holden nuts who always get excited every time a 'new' release comes out. Usually the new release is just a styling update on the same old platform. Early in its history, Holden was bought out by GM to become GM-H...supposedley a local builder but with a bit of backing from a big parent in the U.S. Ford also construct locally and try to give a 'home grown' feel to their product. In the Late '60s there was a horsepower war between GM-H and Ford which spawed a series of muscle cars which are now collectors pieces in Australia. These are namley the Holden Monaro and the Ford Falcon. The top spec Monaro in 1968 was the GTS powered by a (guess what) Chev 327 with a Saginaw 4-speed. Three were also a lot of cooking models with smaller 6 cylinder engines, auto transmissions and also a smaller V8, the 307. 1969 saw the introduction of the 350 GTS Monaro and this engine was continued into the subsequent 1970, 71 and 72 (?) models (I think the HQ had a 350 option??). Interestingly in 1969-70, Holden introduced a locally designed V8, the 308 which stayed in production until recently (the late '90s) when our GM overlords canned it in favour of a GM-designed 5 litre V8. The 308 was locally designed, that is, with the blessing of GM who made sure the engine didn't evolve into anything that sported too much modern technology - fuel injection was about as far as it went I'm less clear on the Ford story although their top car was the Falcon GT-HO with a 351 V8 and 4 speed. That engine and a smaller 302 were availble at least into the '80s when the 351 was dropped. Now all of these motors were basically the same: pushrod OHV jobs and still are! With the exception of Ford who has had OHC 6 cylinder engines in recent times, both GM-H and Ford have largely been lagging a long way behind the automative mainstrem in engine technology. Where are the twin cams? Only 2 valves per cylinder? (how does the exhaust get out?!?). Ford have recently taken a few paces ahead with the release of twin cam sixes, variable cam timing and (shock!) turbo charging... now we're getting somewhere. The reintroduction of the 'Monaro' by Holden has ben largely welcomed in Australia. However if you look closely you will find a few familliar U.S. inspired features... namely high displacement engines with OHV technology. So, when my Holden/Ford afficionado mates say "gee whiz, look at the latest Falcodore (thanks for the term Alfadog), my reply for the last 15 years or so has been, has it got overhead cams yet? How about 4 valves per cylinder? The answer until recently has been a grumpy silence. Yes the new Monaro will be sold in the US as a Pontiac GTO. But don't complain about the crappy engine/driveline it might have, you guys gave us that a long time ago!

Aaaargh! Sorry, this question was just answered by HS30-H in another post (earlier this week). The S20, as I understand it, is a 2.0 litre six, predominantly a Japanese home market issue only. I remember reading about the Jap Govt's very prohibitive tax regime on cars with over 2.0 litre capacities. As with most short sighted policies, this spawned the ineviteable evolution of high performance engines in the upto 2.0 class...hence the 432 series (?Alan?).

Smoke on startup sounds like worn valve guides to me. This is job for machine shop so while the head is off you should consider anything else you might want to do to it... port and polish, skim, cc'ing etc.

write The Book, Alan, write THE book!

That should be spelt QANTAS - its and Australian domestic/international airline. And no, there should not be a 'U' after the Q because the name is an abbreviation of "Queensland And Northern Territory Air Service".

Yeh, still managing to depress myself! I made an offer on a 240 in Sydney but the cost of transporting it to the west plus the work required to fix a broken diff mount and dodgy rust repairs meant that the offer was borderline insulting! I'll try again in a month or two and see if he's sold it. There was another one for sale in Dianella a few months ago...not sure if it ot sold - it was certainly overpriced at $12.5K. What papers do you look in for 240/260s apart from the Quokka, the West and the Sunday times?

Lee, you mentioned that you have several 240Zs. Where did you find them? I've been after one for ages but they're very thin on the ground in W.A. Any clues greatly appreciated... You can email me at hayden.long@bhpbilliton.com

Lee240zperth, I've just sent you a personal email...

Rule of thumb: ALL spiders are poisonous untill stepped on.

Uughh ack gaarggghh! twitch, flinch... I'm appalled, yet I can't look away - I'll just have to pray that Mike's disks crash again to break this awful spell..!

Probably more widely known outside Australia is our Redback spider. These are quite small, about 2cm max, and the red stripe can vary from Red, Orange, Grey, White or be absent altogether. In Western Autralia is you see spider and guess "Redback" you will be right 90% of the time. They are not fatal (except perhaps to small children) but all the same, don't go getting bitten!