cletus

Have a look in the CCM it specifies what size bolt etc they need to be Be aware if you are making your own, the welding doesnt agree with a high tensile bolt Also threaded link bars often come loose with articulation, a solution is to use a heim joint /rose joint/spherical bearing at one end for movement and a bush at the other to reduce harshness

Is the 20v head frowned upon in 4age circles? I haven't had much to do with them apart from a local bogan I went to school with had one in a ratty DX corolla and it went quite hard for what it was. I think it ran high 13s or something? And could do burnouts in 3rd gear which is the true measurement of hp

or perhaps adding an extra intake valve? 5 per cylinder for a total of 20 valves

I should be clear, "inverted" in this discussion is relating to leaf springs with a curve going the wrong way, not flipped, ie upside down, that is 100% not legal

Also the spring design plays a big part in how something rides, especially when someone resets them Ie a lot of commercial van or ute type vehicles have a dual rate leaf pack where there is 2 or 3 thinner springs, and 1 or two thicker springs like the van ones earlier in the thread. Unloaded, the suspension is just using the softer thinner leafs, then when you load it up, they sit down on top of the thicker "overload" leafs If you reset them and the main soft springs are then sitting on the overload springs, that makes it really stiff , same if they are reset higher and the overload leafs are sitting against the main leaf Most car springs just have a pack of the same thickness leafs

It's one of those things that "works", but is not ideal. A normal leaf spring gets longer as it compresses which pushes the shackle away from the leaf, and the spring eye at the shackle end gets closer to the chassis. When a spring is inverted, as it compresses, it gets shorter, which pulls the shackle straighter, which wants to push the spring eye back down away from the chassis, opposite to where the spring wants to go I dont know how much actual difference this makes to how a car drives or whether you can feel the difference, I guess you would need to do some proper back to back testing to ever know. But I doubt anyone would ever bother because someone who is happy to run a leaf spring inverted , is probably only concerned with how they can get a vehicle low, as easily as possible, not make it handle well No factory vehicle , performance or otherwise, has leaf springs that are inverted as far as I know

Funnily, theres nothing in the rules that say they cant be inverted. but it's not ideal, the spring and shackle start working against each other. usually if someone wants to go past 'flat' then you get the eyes reversed instead of making the spring go the wrong way And as @Bling said add a leaf to make up for the reduced travel Yes on the 40mm droop requirements, same rules apply

Everything. Front, back, both sides, interior, engine bay and any visible mods under the car is the requirements for photos the certifier has to supply with the paperwork

I was going to suggest a hairdryer or something to warm up the rubber to hopefully let it relax into it's new position. But then I thought nah nah poor old sheepers has had terrible glazing related luck with this car and that will probably melt his side windows or make them turn purple or shatter or something. So dont listen to me. Then I saw your wheels again and thought they might look good with these on to break up the blackness?

Yeah the biggest issue /most asked question I get is wheels- if a car is certed on 15x8 wheels then under the old plate deal it was a free for all as long as the wheels were 15x8 then you were sweet Now there will be pics of the wheels on the cert, I've had dozens of people having a moan that they wont be able to swap wheels. I dont think the intention with the old plate system was to allow any wheel of that size to be ok but it has become that way, I rang LVVTA and asked what the deal was with different wheels of the same size on the new tag system and the answer was "should be ok" So I guess we will have to see what happens. I personally dont think it should be a free for all if just the size matches, as there are many situations where changing wheels even with the same size causes issues, had a chev truck come through the other day with same size wheels as cert, but the load rating was way less than the GVM Stud length, wheel nut/seat type, and offset differences causing tyre rub are other potential problems I had a guy with a low rider with tiny tyres and cheap knock off rims which failed on a few issues cert his car on 14x7 alloys with some adaptors so that the cert appeared to be for the wheels he wanted, which didnt comply

I got charged $2800 to blast underneath and engine bay, paint the underside black and prime the engine bay. Then I spent another $250 at the painters for them to fix the primer overspray all over the black underneath Then I had to paint the parts underneath that they missed And fix the ripped hoodlining. Autoblast in glenfield should be avoided at all costs

I wouldn't cert them. Other certifiers might, I dont know. What sort of car have you got? A set of aliexpress shocks seems to average $700 by the time they are here A set of BC retails on average $1700 , but I have heard of them being a bit cheaper A cert is going to cost around $650 regardless of what brand So you might save a grand if you can find someone to certify them, but you are likely going to need another set when they spring a leak in 6 months time, or the lower bushes give out, or the piston falls off the end of the shaft or the car handles like shit or whatever. Then if you get sick of buying replacement maxspeedingrods and put some BC's in it then you have to pay for another cert because they wont match the photos on the cert

I dunno, I guess if the certifier missed something and there was an accident due to that then they would be held responsible as well as being injured

Yeah that has been a consideration, one of the reasons for setting up my own workshop was to avoid issues around working at other peoples shops, we have to be careful on what we road test as well, if we find a fault that could possibly cause an issue then we cant test drive the vehicle or complete the road testing until its sorted out Stuff like that, and all the small procedural steps all adds time and dramas though, people get annoyed because we might get a car that for some reason cant be driven for a perceived small reason (ie a broken brake light switch) so they repair it and bring it back and then it fails the brake test so they have to bring it back again, meanwhile costs are starting to stack up because the speed limits in Auckland changed and it takes an hour to do a road test so before you know it, a cert that used to cost $400 10 years ago now might be $1000 and "it's just a 308 in a commodore, some came factory like that, why is it so hard " and so on Rant over, haha.

Yes there is the technical advisory committee that meets once a month to look at design approvals, people wanting do do different stuff that isn't covered by the rules or is outside of what the rules say, things like that

Yes, there are Lvv standards The car construction manual Info sheets Certifier email updates Newsletters Usually training twice a year NZTA sends a reviewer every two years to be present while a vehicle is certified, and the certifier has to show all their paperwork and recording systems to prove they are doing things properly Random jobs are desktop audited when they go through LVVTA for processing as well. So the shit/not shit assessment is like that adjustable spanner in your toolbox, you dont use it often because there are better tools available most of the time As for coverage, we have to have insurance policies for public liability and professional indemnity as part of our operating requirements

Depends on the certifier I guess, and their level of experience with japanese parts. I cant speak for other certifiers but you can usually tell just from looking at something whether its shit or not , or at least if you need to investigate further I cant remember ever failing any Japanese brands on quality issues, lots of worn out problems though. Especially when 20+year old imports from japan got popular

That link is to a page run by a disgruntled ex certifier who got sued by lvvta for defamation so I wouldn't put too much emphasis on what's on there I wouldn't certify a no name brand coilover, I dunno about other certifiers but in my opinion it's not worth the risk to say some cheap crap is all good when I have no idea what the insides are made like I have seen a set of china coilovers that the piston fell off the end of the shaft and it all flopped around and destroyed itself

There is a head restraint standard https://lvvta.org.nz/documents/standards/LVVTA_STD_Head_Restraints.pdf As an example, from memory a d21 datsun ute has bolt on head rests, you may be able to use something like that and make mounts to attach to the roll bar

A head rest doesnt have to be part of the seat, it could be attached to something else, it is reasonably common for hot rods to have them attached to things like the roll bar or to the body

Have you got long term plans for a different engine?

Looks like a pretty solid car!

Cpp stuff is usually ok, the main concern with aftermarket spindles is what they are made of and what the spindle pin is made of, the fact that kit uses a bolt on wheel bearing kit gets rid of the spindle pin issue

Repair cert= for unregistered vehicles or ones that have been written off If the vehicle is registered, then it wont need a repair cert to pass wof

Panhard bar works fine in a car with minimal travel if it's set up correctly Watts link is obviously technically better, but adds complexity You what now?