mikevernontalktalk.net

To clarify the rules a little, the vehicle has to transport an egg over the maximum horizontal distance, without time limits. The event is held in a sports hall and the record over the past 12 years is 3 lengths of the sports hall! Energy should be stored by elastic, spring, weight etc. Batteries, fuel and rocket power are outlawed, so compressed air is presumably not allowed. Also it must be self propelled (no external launching device). And before anybody asks, traction control and movable aerodynamic aids should be ok. Any ideas where to source a wind-up clockwork motor?

It has to use stored mechanical energy, so no batteries or fuel allowed unfortunately.

My son has to design and build a vehicle for a school "egg race" project, the objective being to travel the maximum distance. A clockwork motor seems like the most convenient form of stored energy device, so can anybody suggest where to get hold of something suitable? The only ones I've spotted so far are old Meccano motors on eBay. Do these come in different sizes? Are there any more powerful motors available? Any suggestions gratefully received.

Edited by - mikevernon@talktalk.net on 5 Mar 2007 13:29:21

This issue has always worried me too. All but one of the Caterhams I've owned have had the shorter studs, and wheel nuts which only engage by 4 or 5 threads just don't feel right. It will be interesting to hear the official CC line on this. I've never actually had a stripped thread or a nut fall off. Does anybody know of any such failures? And what do the regular racers do? Surely this must be a known issue?

Matt Yes, they are still available.

Castrol. All my wheels are 6". I bought 2 sets off a guy on here with a Blackbird which were advertised as 7" but turned out to be 6". And I drove all the way to Brighton for them! Graham. Yes, I have 032s in both 185x13 and 205x13. I'll be in touch when I've sorted them out.

Set of 4 6"x14" Minators, de Dion fitting. Good straight wheels with no kerbing damage and good appearance, but there are some signs of paint bubbling in places. Tyres are 185/60 x 14 Yokohama 032. Road legal but only just, so more suitable for track day use. £190 ? NOWSOLD Also a few sets of 13" Minators, CR500 tyres, CR322 tyres and Yoko 032 tyres available as soon as I get around to sorting out the garage. Edited by - mikevernon@talktalk.net on 2 Mar 2007 11:34:12

Tony Clutch must be the prime suspect. Have you tried putting it in 1st or reverse before starting the engine? If you do that and the car moves even though your foot is fully depressing the clutch pedal, then the clutch isn't fully disengaging and the first thing to look at is the cable or hydraulics.

David Yes, the 5 email adresses are the 5 provided by Talktalk (dreadful company, incidentally, can't even begin to say how much I dislike them). I'm not worried by OE being slow to respond, but a couple of times recently it hasn't received any mail for more than 12 hours, then suddenly a big batch of them arrives all at once. Does that sound more like a server fault?

David David. Thanks for your reply. Coincidentally, about 5 minutes after I posted on here my emails arrived -all 114 of them! There weren't any large attachments among them. Yes, OE behaves normally apart from not receiving messages. When I click on the little triangle it gives me the choice of sending/receiving mail from each of my 5 email addresses in turn. My default address seems to be the culprit because that was the one which wasn't responding when the mail wouldn't arrive. Now it takes a few seconds to tell me that there's no new mail, whereas the other 4 address take no more than half a second to tell me. Is that significant?

My Outlook Express has stopped receiving emails since yesterday although it will still send them and I know that a few have been sent to me. The last time this happened it was because I had been sent an email containing a very large file attachment and my server always timed out before it could be received. Is there anything I can do apart from contacting the server?

Most local motor factors who supply number plates will also make them with the smaller motorbike sized digits, although they sometimes need a little persuasion to supply them for a car. Much cheaper than Fancy Plates!

Edited by - mikevernon@talktalk.net on 3 Feb 2007 18:38:19

Stuart I have an EU3 alternator if you're interested. Has covered 3,000 miles so still looks pretty much like new.

I've now admitted defeat and given the pc to somebody who knows what they're doing. He's going to save the important stuff then wipe everything and start again. Thanks to everyone for their advice and especially to Farmer T for taking the trouble to send those instructions. The DOS approach did appeal to me but I couldn't find the DOS boot option when I pressed F8 during start up, and by then I had already organised the professional help.

Hi KAP I've just spoken to Caterham and discovered that my new wing stays are the race variety (part no 76102 Superlight or VX Race) which means that they are slightly lower than the standard ones. Fine if you are running 185/60 x 13 tyres, but you might struggle with a taller profile tyre. My computer has gone down so I won't receive email until Saturday, but I'll Blatmail you my phone number. Give me a call if you still want the wingstays. Mike

I did eventually manage to download the Prevx thing (it took over a hour!) but the instant it started to run the computer shut down and wouldn't restart even in Safe Mode. The only way I could get it to restart was using System Restore to choose the last configuration which allowed the restart. So now I'm back to scanning with AVG, but every time it finds a virus it instantly restarts the computer. I've tried it in Safe Mode and according the Task Manager the nordsys.exe file isn't running, but when I run the scan I get the same result - the system shuts down and restarts.

Thanks Tom and Bozz. I did try running AVG in Safe Mode a couple of days ago but it didn't help. It even shuts itself down in Safe Mode eventually! The Prevx thing does look as though it might be the answer to getting rid of this nordsys.exe but the problem is that with the virus occupying 99% of my CPU usage, it's really struggling to download and run the program. I'm tempted to just close down the nordsys file from the Task Manager in the hope that it will speed things up enough to download Prevx. But I've read warnings that there's a risk of deleting vital system files. What should I do next?

Urgent advice needed! My pc is driving me crazy at the moment. For the past few days it has been shutting itself down at irregular intervals, often after about 10 minutes but sometimes it runs for longer and sometimes it does it within seconds of booting up. It often seems to freeze or run very slowly. I run Windows XP and have AVG Anti Virus (Free edition) and AVG Anti Spyware. Running either of those finds a selection of nasties - a few Trojan Horses, I-Worm Generic AJK, and two viruses called Win32 PEPatch and Downloader Tibs. I'm not sure if AVG fails to remove these things or whether the computer just gets immediately re-infected. Most of the time it fails to complete the scan because the system shuts down first. I've just tried running the Task Manager and under the Processes heading there are about 40 things listed (0 Applications running). I haven't a clue what any of those things mean but just one of them, something called nordsys.exe is occupying around 99% of the memory so it looks like that is part of the problem. Should I just close this down or try to remove it, and is it safe to do so? How do I remove it altogether?

KAP, I'm sure the suggestion of using Micra door strips was meant as a joke! If you don't want to repaint the sides, why not just fill the holes with stainless button headed screws or cover some of them with an emblem of some sort such as a Caterham wheel centre badge or a Union Jack? If you don't want to wait for Caterham to re-stock the wing supports, I have a new pair still in the wrappers. Also a new pair of yellow wings. Email me if you're interested.

What causes this problem? My engine turns over fast enough on the starter motor but will not fire. As soon as I let go of the key it tries to fire as the engine slows down. It seems as though all the current from the battery is being used in turning the starter motor and that the plugs aren't firing while the battery is supplying all its power to the starter. The car is a 911 so it isn't too easy to pull out a plug and check for a spark.

Prangerman I've heard nothing from Tom so I assume that he no longer wants the hood bag. Are you still interested?

Andrew. The cockpit brace is on its way. Prangerman. The hood bag is standard but I had better wait a few more days in case Tom still wants it.

Tom Do you still want the hood bag?