lmao, i'm young, dumb and love a heavy bassline thump, so you've shot me down there, lol.

Hmm, yesterday I got the bilstein shocks in and tried it out with the Sabre springs that came with it.. Didn't turn out as well as I had planned..

Once I took the modded Pedders low's out and compared them to the Sabre springs, the Sabre's had more coils of thinner diameter and were much longer (at least 40mm!) as well as compressing a bit easier by pushing down on them compared to the modded Pedders low's I had - didn't like the look of this at all and I immediately had doubts lol, but decided to give them a try and see what height they were anyway. First impression: its no way near superlow height!! Instantly sat around XR/Low height as soon as I dropped the car back down on it's wheels, about 15-20mm higher than what it was before in the rear with the pedders low's minus half a coil. Good thing is the shocks are definitely a much shorter stroke than the pedders GSR's I had, there is a noticeable reduced hang when the diff is dropped so proper superlow springs or lower should be trapped no problems. Not really fussed about the Sabre springs though, never really intended on keeping them as they are 2nd hand, an unknown brand to me and above all, I will be using brand new set of Dobinson superlows all round once I'm cashed up enough to get new springs all round and struts for the front.

Took it for a good drive and although it handled much better than before, it felt really weird having driving the Fairmont with such a firm rear end (lol) compared to the soft slight rolly feeling I had before whilst taking bends at speed - definitely because of some way over worn Pedders shocks. I can just manage to bounce the car if i push all my 100+kg weight down on the boot, its that firm! Felt real bouncy driving over smooth-ish average roads at first, yet it handled medium-larger bumps with no problems. The shocks have definitely firmed up the rear a great deal, no sloppiness at all when it takes a decent bump, just hits it and rides on like normal unlike the GSR's that would usually have a bumpiness to it after hitting a bump, but the bounciness it has just cruising is going to take a bit of getting used to. The sabre springs were not gonna cut the mustard so today they got pulled out, and I chucked the pedders back in, but not before taking off another half coil to see how much lower I could get it sitting in the rear before running into issues. Springs are still trapped at full drop so no worries there.



Bolted everything back in, and it sat much better. Took it for a quick spin, doesn't seem as bouncy but it is still there, even the old man was commenting on how firm the ride was. Probably a bit too firm for your average street car but I like the feeling it has, makes it feel somewhat sporty which is definitely not what you get in an e-series ford lol. Handling seemed even better this time too, most likely due to being at least 30mm lower than it was with the sabre's. Got home and the rear tyres are sitting almost inline with the guards - beautiful!! Its probably at the exact height I want it right now and it'll be staying that way for good. But now the front needs to be dropped about 15mm lol so new springs and struts up front are high on the list of things to buy..




And what do you know, it's f**k raining again! So much for the audio plans

nice man, ill have to get a pic of my car side on and chuck it on here, it sits at a good height with the dobi super lows in it. im due for some new shocks too, going to buy some brand new shortened ones, not going to waste my time with standard, these pedders you speak of worth it ah? and those discs, where you get those, they look good!

Cheers dude. Throw up a pic of yours if you get the chance, would be good to see what height the dobi superlows drop the car down to. From what I've seen they sit nice and level which is what I want.

Pedders gear is pretty decent stuff, I rate it highly. I bought the car with the suspension already upgraded from near new by the first owner according to the log books, was fitted with Pedders sports ryder struts (lower mounted spring seats) and rear shocks, plus pedders low's all round and a 27mm front swaybar. I bought the car with 220,000kms on the clock and the suspension was still going strong even if it was a little worn. Was a really comfy ride, but it was just the rear that felt quite soft at times and had a slight roll to it taking a bend or corner at speed.

Pedders is pretty much unheard of over here really, I think there is only one Pedders workshop in the whole of NZ lol. If I can track down a new set of pedders sports ryder struts for much less than what I can get the bilstein's for, I'll jump on it, they are an awesome unit. Too bad they are a sealed unit though, therefore not rebuild-able .

Not sure if there is any other short stroke shocks off the shelf in NZ to be honest, apart from the Monroe GT sports. They might be the go?

Yeah will do man as soon as it stops raining, and i put the 17s back on the rear, had 15s on for the night and left my tires out in the country

Yeah was looking at the munroes, can order shorter ones apparently, jam the dobis in them and should make for a good setup. Well thats the plan anyway.

Lol, the rain isn't helping at all. Everyone is out drifting all over the show today, I'm guilty of it too, had to test out how well it handled on some closed back roads not far from where I work, it hangs the a** real well I must say hahaha, seemed really happy to skate and get sideways off the line which is weird. I swear my single spinner has locked itself magically today. I think I better do something about this diff before it magically just breaks.

Oh and about the slotted rotors.. They were bought from a dude on Trade Me, who has since gone missing all of a sudden, need a pair for the front but he's no longer active on TM

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- Boot Install

To add to the misery, I roughly worked out that the boot install isn't going to work out how I wanted to with regards to the amp mounting in current form. The combined length of both E-Audio amps next to each other with enough space either side and between to allow for wiring is too long for the passenger side wall with the sub box/rear wall cutting it off . I haven't taken precise measurements yet, but it seems to be shaping up this way. I'm hoping I can somehow make an adjustment so I can fit both amps side by side on the passenger side as that's the only way I want them mounted, leaving me with the drivers side wall free to be taken out in preparation of the battery relocation. See pic below: (my MS paint skills are epic, ha)



The 2x 12" subs look like they may just fit into the same box I have at the moment which would be handy. Just need to somehow remove the front baffle without too much fuss and make a new one the same size but with 2 woofer cutouts this time round, take a few measurements, make up a dividing wall to separate the 2 subs into individual enclosures (which should be about 1cu ft gross volume a piece) screw it all together and it should be all good. That's if things go to plan obviously..

Way too wet out at the moment and it's already pitch black at 6:30pm, so it'll be left for another weekend. That sounds familiar

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lol, you do know there is a tool for adding text in MS paint?

It's weird how suspension stuff can be so hit and miss with regards to ride height. The springs in both my XE Turbo and EF V8 have all been reset to get the ride heights sorted.

Well, after driving around for about a week, I'm still yet to get used to how stiff the rear end is! Handles like its on rails though which is an awesome, pretty cool being able to punt the car through long bends and have next to no body roll whatsoever. Front suspension feels like a boat compared to the rear lol. Still quite bouncy though and it's definitely no where near as comfortable as it once was whilst cruising - may have to get the shocks taken back later on down the track and get them valved to be a bit more street friendly.

Had a crack at getting some audio work done yesterday and today, weather is utter crap yet again, very windy and short bursts of rain now and then.... Having a few dramas with the woofers fouling on the door cards which luckily hasn't damaged the surrounds on the woofers. Took the drivers side door trim off today and noticed the outer mounting ring had a decent sized indent left in it from where the grill mounting tabs on the door trim were rubbing against them. Just as well I never got them in and running in that state because the grill tabs sure as hell would have worn straight through the rubber surround upon excursion after a while of use. Also found that I can't angle the tweeters exactly how I want for good imaging using the Hertz tweeter cups in the mirror sails. I really CBF getting them installed right now due to the small amount of f**k around that's required, so I'm leaving them out for now lol - CBF factor is high obviously...

However, before pulling them out I decided to quickly wire up the drivers side as it was already mounted and trial them anyway. Only ran them one side off the head unit, high passed at 63hz and was absolutely blown away by how great a set of components they really are overall!! The woofers are awesome, great midbass kick, rattled the s**t of the door and window lol. The midbass was very detailed, I seemed to have noticed some midbass notes in songs that I have never really heard emphasized before, pretty enjoyable to listen too really. The tweeters were dead set gold though, easily one of the better sounding tweets I've heard. So smooth and accurate, had them set attentuated at 0db and they were great, not overly bright at all and had perfect imaging with it angled out from the sail towards the opposite headrest. Quite disappointed that I can't be stuffed getting them in and running at present, but I need something to listen to up front so I'm in the process of chucking the old Response set back in for now.

Worked out that the amps won't work as planned for the boot install, so the 1000d will be mounted by itself on the passenger side wall and the 280ab will just go under the drivers seat, it has a fairly tiny footprint so clearance shouldn't be an issue, still sucks to not have it out on display though. Still haven't had enough time to dismantle the sub box, but I'm already considering building a completely new box for the IDQ's, maybe see if I can squeeze a bit more volume out of what room I have available by extending the box depth a few more cm's and angling the back face in line with the back of the rear seat to gain the extra space that's unused. If I can manage to get 1.25cuft minimum per enclosure, I'll be going ported

sounding good, i'm finally starting to get the ball rolling too, as far as my funds let me, picked up some new rotors and pads for the warped front, it's god like now compared to how it was.
also travelling down the path to decent audio quality, wiring up an amp to power some new pioneer splits im pickin up this week, will be placing under passenger seat though.
i'll see how it goes and probs post a couple pics up if i get it done before you.
looking and sounding very thorough though, which is always good.

were you in the tornado area?

Sort of but not really if that makes sense lol. There was a smaller one that hit a storage facility in my suburb a week or so ago, took the roof's off a few storage sheds etc. I'm not too far away from where it hit today though, thankfully it ran out of steam as it started heading closer towards my area of auckland (manukau) as it was a fair bit bigger. Bit of a shock though, we had some pretty severe winds the last few days, whereas today it just died off so it must have all passed over towards the North Shore. Pretty lucky to have very few casualties (2 dead last time I heard).

I was cracking up when they were interviewing people at the scene and they spoke to this guy who had got swept up by the gusts from the tornado and thrown about 20 metres - he descibred the experience as being "different"

I really miss Heritage Green every time I look at your car. The ride height looks the goods.

What else you thinking of doing?

was real lucky, yea i saw the dude on the news lol

Cheers man Still can't believe you let your NF go, was an awesome looking car

Just got a few little things lined up for it at the moment. I've got the door trims off at the moment, so I'm getting them cleaned up a bit, decided to do the arm rests in satin black to clean up the ugly discoloured cappa crap. Starting to put some money aside for more sound deadening for the front doors and the parcel shelf, and a few areas of the boot to eliminate the worst of the rattles left. Bought an old style whiteline 30mm front swaybar yesterday so once that arrives in the mail, I'll get it cleaned up and respray it in silver as its a gay looking light blue from what I've seen lol. I'll grab some new bushes and mounts to suit and fit that in place of the current 27mm Pedders one on there now. At the moment I just want to finish off the audio gear so I can leave it at that and then get the main things sorted out, primarily brakes and suspension, before I go any further with any other mods e.g. forced induction etc. Suspension is slowly getting there, brakes definitely need attention/upgrading and by the looks of it, I'll be up for a new set of tyres sooner rather than later lol. Everything comes at once

Sounds good, when are the new splits going in though? Can't just trim the back of the trims and grilles?

I've just acquired another Lane too. I was having withdrawal symptoms

Its an NL Concorde, Navy Blue. Lots of little extra bits in the Concordes. Might throw some pics up at some stage.

Swaybar sounds good, must be starting to really handle nice now.