Lauren

Pity none of those links is that helpful as most don't really give any feedback apart from the mighty car mods one which favours the TEINs. There's loads of us that have TEINs and many of us have run them for years. They are reliable and work well with the car. I've had mine on for over 90K miles now. I've sprinted for four years and done quite a few trackdays and I drive my car every day which is why I have 108K miles on the clock! It's easy to get them serviced in the UK. Whilst I appreciate this is Lucas's thread and he's selling the Cusco, I guess you'll have to search elsewhere for any feedback as apart from Lucas I don't know anybody that runs them and Lucas doesn't run coilovers his are a Cusco strut replacement with Cusco dampers and aftermarket springs. These ones advertised don't look to have adjustable damping which surprises me slightly at the price. I don't know how much you can compare other cars, it's a difficult one. A lot comes down to the spring rates and UK roads, well tend to favour spring rates a bit lower than elsewhere. I helped TEIN work on the spring rates when they launched the Flex and this was carried over to the Flex A and Z. All said and done I'm sure the Cusco ones are great quality, but it's a pity we don't know anybody in the UK that has tried them. You could be the first?

Although realistically a single hard emergency stop is going to be okay. I wouldn't advise using the handbrake on an FR car, though on a mid engined car the rear brakes do a lot more. I remember this happening to me on the touge in Japan in a GT86 hire car, I set the brakes on fire and the pedal went very wooden. But I just left it ten minutes to cool down and it was then fine after that.

It's just a resonator, not really a silencer as such. It may do something, but not a lot! I could ship it, but obviously you'd have to pay for that. Given I'm only an hour and a half way, I'd drive over and pick it up if I was you. It's an awkward thing to post, but I guess it can be done.

I ran Project Mu HC800 for my last set of pads. Better than stock on track, they have really good feel. They can squeal a fair bit on the road. They create huge amounts of brake dust. Two trackdays, five sprints and around 15K miles saw off the front set. Rears need replacing imminently. I've ultimately ended up going for AP four pots on the front as I still found I ran out of brakes on track even with the Projet Mu's. They are okay when cold, but not amazing. They imprrove considerably once you have stopped a few times with some pressure. So not as good as stock pads are. If I still had stock brakes I would go for the PFC fronts and EBC yellow rears. I admit I haven't tried them though.

They come back pretty quickly though, so not a big issue.

Take the battery out, make life easier for yourself.

Lose the second cat. It still won't be that loud with a resonated system, but it will increase the volume a bit. I used to run a Milltek non-res and lost the second cat, it was louder but nothing that bad. I actually have a Milltek cat delete pipe in my shed. Your's for a £100 if you want it. If you really want to up the ante get a manifold and lose the primary cat.

They wouldn't necessarily take your wheels off for servicing unless they were doing something on the brakes.

Aha so you are local to me then. I'm in Heald Green. Richard at RRG Macclesfield gets a good deal on the Yokos so it's worth speaking to him about that. £80 a tyre including VAT makes them good value.

I did this and like Jeff said you do get some improvement, but nothing like the improvement you'll get by fitting the manifold as well. So it cost me two remaps. In hindsight I'd have been better doing it all in one go.

Who's Jack? No, I never bother booking a garage, it's a rip off really. I just go and ask someone who has one to put my jerry can and helmet bag in. There weren't any spare garages last time I was there, so that is unlikely.

Just thought it worth mentioning that winter tyres won't improve things unless it's 2C or less IME and will make things worse when the temperature is anywhere near double figures. Depends where you live of course. If you're up in the hills I can see where they'd be a benefit, but in a mild place like Manchester where I am on the Cheshire Plains, winter tyres are more of a liability more of the time. Decent tyres with a good tread depth are a better option I have found after running winters for two years. Jeff reckons the Nokians work better in higher temperatures. Not tried them myself.

Difficult one, the Project Mu pads are good, but more like £276 when last bought a full set. What most people are going for are PFC pads on the front (which are actually really cheap) and EBC Yellow pads on the rear. That should be well within budget. The Carbotechs are apparently very good but squeal like an absolute bastard. So, PFC fronts and EBC yellow rears seem like the best bet. It's what Kev and a few others run. Good luck with keeping me in sight. I've just had a major brake upgrade.

Thanks that's useful to know now mine is way out of warranty. Although knowing me, I'll probably just leave it rusting, adds character and all that.

Added a price for you. May want to add what the spring rates are. Pretty sure all are 6/6kg rather than the older ones with 7/7kg. Or 5/6kg if you spec'd it.

Cool. Which one?

Just to add, make sure you get a resonated system if you're going catless to quieten it a bit. I've done this with a full TD manifold, decat pipe and resonated system and it's fine. Not massively quiet of course, but no problem with noise limits on the track which is the measure of whether it's okay or not.

Worth getting all that checked out. It's frustrating when dealers or people fit odd budget tyres to a car just before selling and a shame really. Hope you get it sorted so you can enjoy it fully. Richard at RRG Macc can do a good deal on Yoko V105's if you fancy trying them. It's a very popular tyre for the car and I like them a lot having had four or five sets now.

Mine are cut into the top of the door panel, just ahead of the door handle. It's a better position than on top of the dash. Untitled by Lauren Blighton, on Flickr

Congrats, nice drive back from Scotland before the snow I hope!

Go catless and find a friendly MOT tester, much easeir than messing about with putting cats in and the like.

There is for higher end speakers. I have Focal 3's and was told not to give them too hard a time for the first week or so.

Induction kits are about induction noise, that's the reason for getting one. I quite like how my now rusty Injen one sounds. Also just to point out (another annoying Americanism), is that there is absolutely no such thing as a 'cold' air intake, it can only ever be ambient temperature, i.e., whatever the air temperature happens to be.

I guess it's much the same for me as I can't get 6 Music on FM anyway. Fortunately the DAB quality is very good, but I suspect that BBC National DAB fares better than some other stations.

Change your exhaust, decat, manifold and put a better sound system in. You really won't notice any noise from the Whiteline gearbox void bush then!