Steviewevie

If Stav's car can pass its MoT with no precats at all, it doesn't sound right that a car can fail the MoT because of the condition of the precats.

I just thought, it probably *is* alcohol in the coolant bottle, isn't it ?

That shouldn't be a problem at all. The only thing that I can think of to be wary of is actually totally running out of fuel, in which case you *might* get some unburnt fuel through the cat, which could in theory damage it.

Still no date yet on the JAE forums. Some people seem to be getting a bit shirty with the organiser, which I think is unfortunate, because I imagine that no-one is more frustrated than he at not being able to announce the date yet ! Fingers crossed it is all sorted very soon now.

Yeah a hammer would be very useful ! I was really embarrassed to ask, but I was glad I did, because I could hear the parts guy at the other end struggling exactly like I did, assuming it was a simple push-down-and-twist job. It took one of his colleagues to show him the bash-it-hard-on-the-floor approach !

Maybe the Altezza is totally different !

Very easy I would say. The needle goes down to the middle of the "E" before it is really empty.

Quite a lot. I think there's about 10L left when the low fuel light comes on, on the IS200.

Upgraded ARBs are an awesome mod ! :D

No, not alcohol, Toyota coolant ! I bought a 1L top-up bottle of Toyota (red) coolant, but try as I might, I couldn't get the lid off. Feeling rather embarrassed I phoned up the Toyota parts dept where I'd got it from to ask what the secret was, and they tried with their own bottle and struggled too. I started to feeling not quite so bad, especially when they said that they got a lot of calls about these bottles ! The instructions make it look like you have to press down and twist, but that just didn't seem to work, no matter how hard I tried. At the other end of the phone, one of the Toyota guys took the bottle and bashed it top-down into the floor. Apparently this worked, I tried it on mine and it cracked the problem for me too. Looks like there's a seal or something that's difficult to break, I think the diagrams on the top of the lid are showing that you need to hit the lid, not just press it down. Anyway, just thought I'd share my experience here in case others come across this. My coolant expansion tank was empty, so I've topped it up now and will keep an eye on it.

That seems to be a copy/replica, i.e. TRD "style". The actual TRD real spoiler is shown here

It's a popular video format for films that get downloaded (under dubious conditions ) from the Internet.

Yeah my guess was that it's either there to reduce noise through its resonance, or perhaps to improve the way the air flows in through the air intake. Or maybe both ? As I said though, I'm sure someone else will know better than I do.

It's part of the air intake. It's labelled as a "Resonator" in this diagram. I'm guessing it's there to reduce the noise of the induction, or something like that. I'm sure someone else will know better than me though.

As well as asking on here, I'd suggest asking on the Detailing World forums, since there are loads and loads of guys there who use machine polishers.

More memory should help, since all the stuff starting up will want lots of memory. Vista runs a lot better with 2GB, and memory is pretty cheap these days.

This diagram shows the "self-powered" siren. However, I'm not sure from this diagram whether it's in the boot on the driver's side or on the front passenger's side. I'm guessing it's the boot but the diagram is not 100% clear to me.

Just to confirm, I picked up part 55618-53041 today and it fits my 1999 model perfectly :D

Detailing World is a great site to check out. You will get tons of useful advice there. You will also find lots of professional detailers whose work you can see in photos, and who you can get in contact with if you want to use their services. Not sure about buying the stuff and just doing it yourself, sure, the cleaning bit is easy but removing swirl marks I would say is something that needs practice rather than just taking the polisher straight to your car. I don't doubt that you're good at this Ian, but I just know that if I tried it myself for the first time I'd make a real mess. I know that some of the Detailing World guys recommend getting a painted panel from a breakers to be able to practice on.

I've got that same reader, it works great. To the original poster - no, there isn't a service light, if the engine check light comes on then that needs checking out and isn't connected with whether the car needs servicing.

Are you sure it's for an Altezza ? I can't see any HID kits listed on TRD's website for the Altezza, and they show discontinued parts as well as currently available one. It does look a bit odd/complicated to me for just a simple swap job for halogens.

The TRD unit is from Japan, isn't it ? So shouldn't the gauges point right, if anything ? Has the carbon one been made for the US market to point left ? Or am I missing something ?

Is your car auto or manual ? Is this a new noise that has suddenly started happening ? Yes, it's possible to remove the cover over the cam belt if you just want to check it visually. I got a Lexus dealer to do this for free for me a while back.

IE 7 doesn't start a new process for each tab, don't know about version 8. Lots of processes hanging around could be from previous browser crashes where the process doesn't terminate properly.

I've never liked that TRD rear lip personally, but with the middle section painted black it looks a lot better IMHO.