Well lets see, my spray schedule THIS year went like this according to my records: Kocide 2000 @ just prior to pre-bud swell @ 9 lb rate + dormant oil. Since I could not find and procure Immunox until full bloom, that's when it first was applied. I should have started prior to tight cluster. Five days later was the next Immunox app.. This was done in only 5 days as a "catch up" according to some university recommendations that I can't site currently. Being a group 3 fungicide with resistance problems, I wanted to use it early and the 3336 later if needed. Also, 3336 is a group 1 fungicide, resistance development will be lessened using it following the Immunox. Idealy it is best to mix a protectant fungicide with the Immunox (it's a systemic) according to literature that I've read. Fourteen days later, started with a 3336 + captan mix on all trees. Seven days later, applied Mancozeb to my non-bearing trees as we had alot of rain with more forecasted. Mancozeb has a 77 day harvest interval and is cheaper and supposedly effective for scab. My other tree has good resistance to CAR and scab so it was left out. Seven days later, as several trees had a little bit of scab, and because I was concerned about it spreading (more rain forecasted) I sprayed one more round of the 3336 + captan mix. Then the rains finally stopped and so did my spraying. Maybe that was smart, maybe not. I have no summer disease problems YET, and the CAR and scab are non-existant. Immunox is for the scab and CAR where I am and the 3336 is for CAR and summer diseases (black rot, flyspeck, etc.). I haven't had any PM problems at all ever. Maybe next year! My basic approach as far as fungicide selection goes is 1) use a systemic mixed with a protectant especially up thru 1st cover and then evaluate from there. 2) avoid resistance by both tank mixing a protectant and systemic of different groups, and not using the Immunox more than 2 sprays in a row and no more than 3 times in a season. If you do that you'll quickly find that your options are very limited. 3) hopefully, decrease rates and/or intervals as environmental and disease conditions permit. 4) Learn as much as possible as soon as possible and be very, very observant. 5) Keep good records. Mine last year were horrible, but then, I didn't do much and it showed. This year was far better, time will tell if it shows, so far all is well.

The active ingredient in Bayer Advanced Disease Control is tebuconazole. Even though tebuconazole is a German product, the European Union has banned tebuconazole as of 2018. "Most of the pesticides concerned are produced by German chemical industry giants Bayer or BASF, and include Amitrol, Ioxynil, Tepraloxydim, Epoxiconazole, Iprodion, Metconazole, Tebuconazole and Thiacloprid." http://digitaljournal.com/article/265134 ---------------------------------- Apparently the reason for the ban is: "Due to the potential for endocrine disrupting effects, tebuconazole was assessed by the Swedish Chemicals Agency [3] as being potentially removed from the market by EU regulation 1107/2009.[4]" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tebuconazole --------------------------- Title: Combined exposure to endocrine disrupting pesticides impairs parturition, causes pup mortality and affects sexual differentiation in rats. Authors: Jacobsen PR, Christiansen S, Boberg J, Nellemann C, Hass U. Authors affiliation: Department of Toxicology and Risk Assessment, National Food Institute, Technical University of Denmark, Søborg, Denmark. Published in: Int J Androl. 2010 Apr;33(2):pages 434-42. Abstract: "Risk assessment is currently based on the no observed adverse effect levels (NOAELs) for single compounds. Humans are exposed to a mixture of chemicals and recent studies in our laboratory have shown that combined exposure to endocrine disrupters can cause adverse effects on male sexual development, even though the doses of the single compounds are below their individual NOAELs for anti-androgenic effects. Consequently, we have initiated a large project where the purpose is to study mixture effects of endocrine disrupting pesticides at low doses. In the initial range-finding mixture studies, rats were gavaged during gestation and lactation with five doses of a mixture of the fungicides procymidone, mancozeb, epoxyconazole, tebuconazole and prochloraz. The mixture ratio was chosen according to the doses of each individual pesticide that produced no observable effects on pregnancy length and pup survival in our laboratory and the dose levels used ranged from 25 to 100% of this mixture. All dose levels caused increased gestation length and dose levels above 25% caused impaired parturition leading to markedly decreased number of live born offspring and high pup perinatal mortality. The sexual differentiation of the pups was affected at 25% and higher as anogenital distance was affected in both male and female offspring at birth and the male offspring exhibited malformations of the genital tubercle, increased nipple retention, and decreased prostate and epididymis weights at pup day 13. The results show that doses of endocrine disrupting pesticides, which appear to induce no effects on gestation length, parturition and pup mortality when judged on their own, induced marked adverse effects on these endpoints in concert with other pesticides. In addition, the sexual differentiation of the offspring was affected. This as well as the predictability of the combination effects based on dose-additivity modelling will be studied further in a large dose-response study." http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20487043 ------------------------------------- A full 2007 reviewed scientific paper: "Endocrine-Disrupting Activities In Vivo of the Fungicides Tebuconazole and Epoxiconazole" http://toxsci.oxfordjournals.org/content/100/2/464.full?sid=89cbb2cc-b636-4c33-bc06-81ecb01b63b5 Here is a link that might be useful: The European Union has banned tebuconazole

Christopherh - Thanks but you found my son's (Burnz086) post. He's trying to figure out a way to salvage this. The parts aren't so expensive, but the labor is the dealbreaker. He is trying to find someone who will do the body work cheaper. One mechanic suggested just doing a patch job on the driver's side and replacing the rockers. Gary - You are right on the odometer issue. The police told us that the seller was not required to put the mileage on the bill of sale. They were not interested in the fact that he did and that it was fraudulant. Our attorney says this will support the fraud claim. Not disclosing that the odometer was broken will also hurt him but he will claim that it was working when he sold it to us and must have broken when my son drove it home. The plot thickens...

Cars depreciate so fast that they really shouldn't be considered positive equity unless you paid cash for brand-new. So I wouldn't have bought the GAP ins, UNLESS $1K might be difficult financially for you in an emergency. In that case, you're paying $150/yr for $1K/yr protection. Not a bad deal, but perhaps not essential. I have the Cilajet brand of clear coating on our Edge, and one issue with this particular product is that you can't just rinse the car off, the way I was accustomed to. If you do, you have to dry it immediately, preferably with microfiber towels (not cheap) because water spots on the Cilajet. I don't know if your brand might be easier to care for than that. We park our car outside and keep them a long time, so I wanted to keep the paint/interior from fading. You need to read the instructions for your particular coating and follow them faithfully; the warranty can be voided by use of improper products. If you like to keep your car looking good, then who's to say paying the $$ for the coating was a bad idea? One thing I have noticed is the exterior seems to get a lot less dirty than our previous (uncoated) cars! An extended warranty can be useful in these days of computerized features. We had a Hyundai Santa Fe and the only problem we ever did have was with some of the computer sensors. The extended warranty was useful for minor things as well, so we never regretted getting it. Had it been a Honda I wouldn't have bothered with an extended warranty, however. Hondas are extremely reliable (my family all own various models). Toyota is also very reliable so it's probably 50/50 whether it was a good idea to buy the EW or not. But it is very true newer cars have A LOT of computers. We were told the Edge has over 23 of them! Be aware that all those whiz-bangs eat up battery life. Try not to leave your car more than a week without running it long enough to recharge the battery (such as leaving on a trip and parking in the long-term lots). If the battery is allowed to go completely dead a simple jump won't work. I'm going to post separately here, excerpts from an article today in the WSJournal about the battery issue. Or, talk to the dealer service dept. once you feel comfortable about the quality of their advice - we bought our Ford specifically because the service dept. we go to, is one of the very few I've ever trusted of ANY mfg.