leonardo

hey, you drive an ae100 right? you may have felt the same if you did a good tune up, changed plugs, filters etc i doubt there would be a noticeable difference between doing those basics right and using k & N.

I'd go for the new Civic. 1.8 litre puts out 140 bhp which is more than enough for sri lankan roads, and it looks good. Decent fuel economy too. I'm not a fan of the new lancer, has too much of a "tall boy" look to it which makes the wheels look tiny. Don't know how she handles but the 1.5 litre model has drums at the rear which isn't too cool! Corolla 141 is going to be waaayyy too common and not fun to drive, although it will have good second hand value. Mazda3 is nice, but a bit underpowered even though it handles really well and everyone has plenty to say about the agents. I wouldn't even consider the allion and Tiida. Not a fan of the way they look.

this may be a long shot but i remember a beautiful yellow mazda3 for sale at a car sale in kalubowila quite recently. it was a singapore spec 4 door sedan, with bodykit and 17" alloys. i think it was dammika motors, don't know if its still available but you may be able to check with the car sales people if they can tell you who the new owner is.

they'll probably patch her up and ship her to SL, and some poor SOB here will pay over 30 mil for it and think he's driving a brand new car!

I may be wrong, having read this article a few years ago on why they separated GTR from Skyline. The old skylines were only sold in Japan and Nissan weren't making big money off them. They wanted to make skyline a global car and turned it into more luxury oriented sports sedans and coupes and re-badged it as the Infinity G series so as to compete with BMW, Mercedes, Lexus etc. Obviously you can't compete with these brands using the "Nissan" name and charging a premium, hence they called it Infinity. This appealed to a wider audience than the outgoing car. They combined the platform with 350z, Gloria and Cedric. The "skyline" name is only used in japan. I believe it worked, especially in the states. i hear the cars are really popular there and is a genuine alternative to the 3 series in particular. They wanted the GTR to have its own platform, so as to make it an out and out sports car.

can't be. even the stock tp12 puts out 150bhp. Hp12 204 bhp. i like the p12's, look quite luxurious and very comfortable. from the outside i think the GT's look like the normal version apart from the 17" rims and the smoked headlamps and a different grille.

What a nice ride. With crazy car prices these days it makes a lot of sense going for a good used buy like this especially if its so well maintained.

mate, i had something similar happen to me and I too had a P11. the engine was fine, but the rev counter dropped to zero while I was driving and I thaught there was something wrong with the dashboard. By the end of the day, the car refused to start. Cam shaft sensor had gone and had to be replaced. Agents charged me 14,000 bucks for it. Just double check to make sure.

ok so i havn't ever been to europe so i don't know how the car market is there. but i have been to many parts of asia, and australia and dubai, and we are conservative in comparision. in australia they go around in holdens and commadores but you also get plenty of sports cars and european cars. funnily enough its the sri lankans living there who go for the toyota corollas and camrys so much so that they are referred to as "curry cars!" by aussies! so it seems like we take this conservative mentality when it comes to cars with us wherever we go! and you do see plenty of stunning cars whenever you go to dubai, singapore, malaysia and HK. and XXX you can count the number of X5's, cayenne's and range rovers we have in sl with one hand! and this topic simply is about sri lankan car buyers being too conservative. i would say yes, compared to lots of places. and yes, IMHO most sri lankans do have bad taste in fashion too, but that's another story!

if you're referring to the one at the car sale in nugegoda with the MPS stickers, its been sitting there for almost a year! don't know why no one has purchased it, but the side skirtings are extremely low so its not very practical for our roads.

what i meant was that a majority of sri lankans look for practicality rather than trying to create an impression with the car they own. i did read somewhere that in the UK for instance, BMW' s brand image has taken a bit of a beating cos BMW owners are perceived to be reckless and boorish drivers. Which is apparantly one of the reasons that audi has done so well there recently. its got nothing to do with bimmers being bad cars! but you'd be hard presssed to find sri lankans who are worried about owning an N16 just because they are used as cabs in colombo hotels. which is why i said they are not interested in expressing themselves with the car they own and go the conservative route. i bet if you gave most people 3.5 million bucks and said, choose between a say an unregistered IST and a brand new grande punto, they'd go for the IST. i would think punto is value for money because its brand new, comes with lots of features, has a full warranty and looks great etc. IST is used and older, who knows what the real milleage is, everyone has one, options are limited, driving experience isn't great etc. as for D*mos selling all their models, well it just so happens that they are perceived as being the best agents here and mercedes in particular has always had tremendous brand equity sl. thus if you have a bit of cash, a merc would be possibly be top of mind on your luxury car list. also politicians (and we have way too many of them) give d*mos enough of business. leave aside wanting an european brand. hell most are reluctant touch japanese brands apart from toyota and basic nissans.

agreed with everything mazdaspeed says here. the additional issue is the non availability of spare parts for some of these brands and most agents are rubbish which means you wouldnt want to take the risk of owning a car that's can't be maintained. also most people don't look at image as a factor when it comes to car brands. they don't care that they may look "cooler" driving a b4 as opposed to an allion. or that owning a 156 or punto is a way of expressing themselves and distuinguishing them from the N16/121 crowd. who cares about driving pleasure when the roads are so sh*t! a car is used to get from A to B, so you might as well be conservative!

it was foolish of them to promote this as the future on wheels and show us mazda3', cefiros etc.. atleast they should have pushed it as a normal car show instead of getting people's expectations up over the last 6 months by publicising about it being the greatest show ever. having said that the golf GTI is so neat. would love to have one of them as a daily driver. range rover sport if i could pick any SUV.

or you could just switch to a better brand like castrol or mobil.

i've got auto lights and they just switch on low beams. the parking lights come on if its still relatively bright. high beams can only be swtiched on manually.

i can vouch for this. replaced my standard headlamps with "miracle white" higher output halagen's on my old car. the result within a few months my headlamp holder was completely burnt out and I had to end up replacing the wire harness as well. lucklily i managed to find an electician who rigged up a new holder but that was after much looking around. all the electicians i went to couldn't seem to be too bothered to fix the problem.

sometimes i just wonder, could nilantha and weed be the same person? because they both are just so hilarious in similar ways!

No expert but are you the first owner of the car? If you are and have never replaced your shocks I think its safe to assume your shocks need replacing considering the YOM. What's the mileage? You can also do things the old fashioned way and press down on the car to see if there is too much "flex" and if it bounces around. For me the best indication that shocks are bad are if the car bounces around too much when driving over a bad road or over a railway track crossing. You may want to consider replacing just the rear shocks to see if it sorts out your problem.

thanks. much appreciated.

My original fibreglass mud flaps and lower bumpers are looking quite battered and ripped up after many years of being dragged around our bad roads. don't want to replace the original flaps with those horrible aftermarket rubber ones. can anyone recommend a good fibreglass repair place I could get these fixed up?

there must have been quite a bit of traffic cos I dont' see how an N16 could keep up with a V35 otherwise! but i agree, that's the sad situ of the roads here. where are those great highways we have been hearing about for donkey's years? oops, getting into politics again! anyway in SL you would buy a fast car just for the sake of knowing you have one. as far as driving it relatively fast in colombo is concerned, there's small joy in doing 80-100 on late weeknight evenings when there are no cops around!

there must have been quite a bit of traffic cos I dont' see how an N16 could keep up with a V35 otherwise! but i agree, that's the sad situ of the roads here. where are those great highways we have been hearing about for donkey's years? oops, getting into politics again! anyway in SL you would buy a fast car just for the sake of knowing you have one. as far as driving it relatively fast in colombo is concerned, there's small joy in doing 80-100 on late weeknight evenings when there are no cops around!

Is it against the forum rules to ask how we can get in touch with him? My car desparately needs a tuneup and I'm sick of the agents charging me the earth for everything.

why shouldn't it? all depends on how you drive and how you look after your car. prices of the spare parts for nissan's may be more because they are newer models and especially if you go through the agents. but these cars are so common i'm sure you can get good deals in panchi and get most issues fixed at a normal garage.

Well it all depends on the car you get. I know loads of people who have used fb15's and n16's for several years and have had no issues. Of course these cars are not meant for a driving enthusiast but using it for getting from A to B quite comfortably is fine. I've heard the N16 is more comfortable than the FB15. Not sure about the resell market. The complaints I've heard are that the automatic FB 15's are supposed to be quite poor on fuel so search for a manual. Air flow sensors have also packed up and some have also reported suspension noises after a few years of hard running. As far as maintanence is concerned, it should not be any more difficult or costly in maintaining a Nissan to maintaining a toyota. You're talking about a sunny here not a skyline or primera!