Datsuncog's Heaps: Sept 2023 - Another Year's T-Met Exemption Certificate...

[warninglight]

That'll just be snow causing the worrying noise, my xc70 has been doing exactly the same!

[The_Equalizer]

As it happens the chap next to me in the office pointed out yesterday that Naked Noodles are 60 pence in Tesco:

https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/search?query=naked%20noodles&icid=tescohp_sws-1_m-ft_in-naked%20noodles_ab-226-b_out-naked%20noodles

 

The garage offer still stands, obviously, and I might even stretch to a cup of coffee or tea!

I get the impression lots of shitters have lost their mojo. Perhaps it is the weather, perhaps it is age, perhaps it is both. Captain_70s' efforts do put those arguments to shame:

http://autoshite.com/topic/19442-rusty-triumphs-in-scotland-cold-tho-240119/page-46

 

I really cannot be bothered either and the CLK sounds like a jumbo on start up. I suspect I did not tighten the exhaust manifold up correctly despite using the official figure of 34lb/feet (which seems awfully low to me). My Jag really needs to be exhumed from my mother-in-law's garage. I even offered it up as a paid job to my brother-in-law, but he seems to have shied away from it. Oh, and the Land Rover needs its rocker shaft changing - it has been noisy for a while. All of this of course does not stop the Forrester from having a fit as you have not changed its fluids, but might make you feel just a little bit better for a very short while.

[C1am]

Prior to the gearbox oil change  (if it's the same as the later Impreza engine), you'll need a T70 star bit to undo the plug. Refilling is through the dipstick. With the rear diff make sure that you can undo the filler plug prior to undoing the drain plug.   

[Guest Hooli]

With the rear diff anything make sure that you can undo the filler plug prior to undoing the drain plug.   

 

FTFY.

 

Mr Cog,

 

I think there is a separate drain & fill for the transferbox & gearbox on these. So that'll be four drains & fills for the transmission & a fifth for the engine.

[Datsuncog]

On 1/24/2019 at 11:38 AM, warninglight said:

That'll just be snow causing the worrying noise, my xc70 has been doing exactly the same!

Phew, that's good to know... I hadn't noticed it before and (as you can probably guess) am a bit of a catastrophist. I didn't notice anything this morning so here's hoping...

 

On 1/24/2019 at 11:45 AM, The_Equalizer said:

As it happens the chap next to me in the office pointed out yesterday that Naked Noodles are 60 pence in Tesco:

https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/search?query=naked%20noodles&icid=tescohp_sws-1_m-ft_in-naked%20noodles_ab-226-b_out-naked%20noodles

The garage offer still stands, obviously, and I might even stretch to a cup of coffee or tea!

I get the impression lots of shitters have lost their mojo. Perhaps it is the weather, perhaps it is age, perhaps it is both. Captain_70s' efforts do put those arguments to shame:

http://autoshite.com/topic/19442-rusty-triumphs-in-scotland-cold-tho-240119/page-46

I really cannot be bothered either and the CLK sounds like a jumbo on start up. I suspect I did not tighten the exhaust manifold up correctly despite using the official figure of 34lb/feet (which seems awfully low to me). My Jag really needs to be exhumed from my mother-in-law's garage. I even offered it up as a paid job to my brother-in-law, but he seems to have shied away from it. Oh, and the Land Rover needs its rocker shaft changing - it has been noisy for a while. All of this of course does not stop the Forrester from having a fit as you have not changed its fluids, but might make you feel just a little bit better for a very short while.

60p for noodles? Luxury!

Afraid it's been 24p Koka noodles for me - although they're now all finished, so I've moved on to off-brand minestrone cup-soups paired with orange-stickered bread rolls... five days' worth of lunches for under a pound, total. Less than 20p per day.

Yum.

Plus I just received a text from the bank to advise "you are close to using your overdraft" (aka 'my last £50' notification, which helpfully lets me know that I don't even have enough in the current account to buy myself another car*...

* ^^^ The sort of car I paid £50 for)

No, it's not really that dire a situation - this has been a bit of an exercise to see if I could make my wages last for six weeks over Christmas without resorting to credit cards, overdrafts or robbing any of my assorted savings pots. It turns out the answer is yes, so long as I don't keep buying shonky diecast from market stalls.

Which, of course, I have.

I'll get the oils ordered and then see where I stand! A garage would be a handy thing (see upthread for December's Yaris oil change in a rainstorm for details), and I'd be happy to assist as best I can with any Land Rover/ Mercedes spannering which may be needed, in exchange.

 

On 1/24/2019 at 11:50 AM, C1am said:

Prior to the gearbox oil change  (if it's the same as the later Impreza engine), you'll need a T70 star bit to undo the plug. Refilling is through the dipstick. With the rear diff make sure that you can undo the filler plug prior to undoing the drain plug.   

That's good to know - I've a reasonable set of star bits, but I'll check to make sure I've a T70 in there, Cheers! And yes, it wouldn't be the first time I've done something dopey like drain something before I've worked out how to refill it - good advice.

 

On 1/24/2019 at 12:14 PM, Hooli said:

Mr Cog,

I think there is a separate drain & fill for the transferbox & gearbox on these. So that'll be four drains & fills for the transmission & a fifth for the engine.

Excellent stuff! I've been working on the naive assumption that it'll all be clear once I'm under the car, but as we all know, that ain't necessarily so...

[The_Equalizer]

Blimey, a man after my own economic heart. My wife does a lot of eye rolling when I calculate the cost of the dinner I have just made. Anyway, do not worry about labour exchange. If you are interested just let me know of a weekend you would want to have a go and we can rock'n'roll (read: skin knuckles, get covered in oil and swear). Saturdays are good as the wife takes the kids to music, swimming, ballet etc. The only ones out are this one (the wife's away, but not the kids) and one mid-February. Oh, and the luxury 60 pence noodles were not too bad - I just had a pot.

[Guest Hooli]

 

 

Excellent stuff! I've been working on the naive assumption that it'll all be clear once I'm under the car, but as we all know, that ain't necessarily so...

 

I think it was from laying under mine years ago doing a headgasket replacement in November on the side of a main road....

 

Just thought I'd mention it as if you've not had 4x4s before you might not think to look at the transferbox separately.

[Datsuncog]

Finally decided to do something the other night about the fearsome amount of birdshit clabbering the Forester...

It's tragic that giving this thing a wash counts as News.

Further analysis revealed that the two rear tyres which I had puncture-repaired in December are still losing a fair bit of air, while the front n/s clearly needs the tracking sorted as the outer edge of the Nankang is a lot more worn than the rest.

A local place can fit Yokohamas at £62 a corner, and at that price I'm quite tempted to just get a whole new set and be done with it for another while.

Ideally I'd get the wheels refurbished at the same time (dings/ground-in brake dust/heavy paint damage from previous owners), but that may have to wait a while longer.

I'm also tempted to ask the Mechanic of Choice for a price on a full fluid change (transaxles, gearbox, sump) as I simply have not had the time for any car stuff with all the house renovation work since November. A lack of garage, and nothing but somewhat flimsy Paddy Hopkirk ramps to support this two-ton lump also makes me a bit avoidant - plus buying specialist oils in small quantities is also stupid-pricey. Right about now I feel much more inclined to just raid the savings and pay to make a problem go away...

I may also bite the bullet and ask what sort of money he'd want to change the clutch, as it's now slipping noticeably under heavy acceleration and prone to feel a little grabby/jerky when moving off from cold.

Ah now...

Oh, and the twin cracks in the glass roof (presumed from storm debris) are now spreading impressively...

I'm not planning on opening it anytime soon.

[mrbenn]

52 minutes ago, Datsuncog said:

Oh, and the twin cracks in the glass roof (presumed from storm debris) are now spreading impressively...

I'm not planning on opening it anytime soon.

Washing it certainly counts in my world!

Could the sunroof be done on the glass bit of your insurance?

[Datsuncog]

So!

What do you do when you realise you still  haven't made a single bit of progress on the basic Subaru servicing you've been promising to carry out for MONTHS?

Get the finger out and order up the oils etc? (Which turn out to be pretty pricey for the transaxles etc.)

Book it into a garage and pay them to do the needful?

Make a detailed list of jobs, sort out a budget, and then tick the jobs off in order of importance, starting with a replacement clutch, then new tyres and adjusted tracking?

No!

You accept a free Honda NE50 Vision scooter from a fellow-shiter, which hasn't run since the Millennium Bug was officially a concern.

Well, obviously.

Dealer Plates!

Less than 10,000 miles on the clock!

Cat: "Are you fuckin' serious?"

I should probably point out that I have no experience with bikes or scooters beyond an unfortunate incident with a Honda monkey bike c.1990 - but I'm figuring that the motor on this isn't significantly more complicated than a lawn mower, and the blind optimist in me hopes that a new battery, spark plug and perhaps a snifter or two of Easy Start should see this fire up for the first time in two decades. The motor turns freely enough on the kickstart, and appears to have compression, so that seems a reasonable basis to start with.

Hopefully. Maybe.

Also on the list of necessities will be tyres, oil, mirrors, probably a drive belt, definitely brake cables and shoes, and doubtless sundry electrical parts and mechanical bits that I currently don't even know exist...

I've an HBoL on order, plus a Honda owner's manual that would have been supplied when new, so at least that may provide me with a starting point as to what should go where.

I fully intend to use this as a commuter hack to the station, by the way. The hitherto-unused AM category on my driving licence apparently permits me to ride a sub-50cc moped without passing a CBT or having to wear L-plates, so...

Fingers crossed.

 

 

[clayts450]

Old skool driving licence FTW. 

I was chatting to my mum about this last night and realised there are a fair few hitherto unexperienced categories of driving skill* I could deploy if  I were so inclined, a 50cc buzzmobile like this being one of them. 

I'm not so inclined at present, but will be following this story with  much interest.

[Datsuncog]

^^^ Yes, indeed... I missed out on being able to drive minibuses and road-rollers by a scant few months, but at least I do have the moped entitlement - which MrsDC's licence doesn't, to her chagrin. She's currently considering whether she likes the idea of this two-wheeled heap enough to go on a CBT course.

I'm hoping this should be a straightforward and reasonably fun little project, in an effort to reawaken my automotive mojo again...

...while trying to forget that's exactly what its previous owner thought, too.

[clayts450]

Pretty sure I've got minibuses and road rollers on mine. Mind you, that's the other thing isn't it. ? The writing on the back of the  new plastic licence is tiny. To me it's like the unreadable bottom line of the optometrist's wallchart before they do the Hallelujah moment with a plastic pince-nez of vision.

[motorpunk]

I love the thought of some poor bastard riding that thing all the way from Preston to Belfast. 

Good luck with fixings etc.

[Datsuncog]

3 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

I fully intend to use this as a commuter hack to the station, by the way. The hitherto-unused AM category on my driving licence apparently permits me to ride a sub-50cc moped without passing a CBT or having to wear L-plates, so...

I'm now not actually sure this is the case... because although I have licence classifications shown for AM, A, B1, B, and f,k,p and q, I passed my car test in March 1998, but I most certainly don't have a CBT cert. Hmmm. 

Becoming a moped rider

The minimum age to ride a moped is 16 years and you will need to:

• complete Compulsory Basic Training (CBT) for the relevant motorcycle category
• pass a theory test
• pass practical tests

Once you have passed your tests, your moped entitlement will be shown on the driving licence as:

• category AM
• category Q

If you pass a test for a car or any of the motorcycle categories, you will also receive entitlement to ride a moped. However, a valid CBT certificate will still be required to ride a moped on the road if a full motorcycle test category has not been awarded. This moped entitlement will be shown as above (categories AM and Q).

https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/articles/information-moped-riders

[Datsuncog]

Or perhaps the below terms apply in my case, as someone with 'existing moped entitlement' (i.e. Categories AM, p & q) listed on the licence. 

Existing driving licence holders with moped entitlement

Previously your entitlement was shown on your driving licence as category P and covered you to ride mopeds with:

• an engine size up to 50 cc (cylinder capacity)
• a maximum speed up to 50 kilometres per hour (km/h)

Category P entitlement is not lost from the licence but you will also be awarded categories AM and Q as detailed below.

Your entitlement is shown as:

• category AM - gives you entitlement to ride mopeds with a maximum design speed over 25 km/h but not more than 45 km/h, small three wheelers (up to 50 cc and below 4 Kilowatt (kW)), and light quadricycles (unladen weight less than 350 kilograms (kg) and up to 45 km/h)
• category P - extending the above to include two or three-wheeled mopeds with a higher maximum speed of up to 50 km/h (to retain your existing entitlement)
• category Q - extending the above to include two or three-wheeled mopeds with a maximum speed up to 25 km/h (to retain your existing entitlement)

It really isn't made all that terribly clear... (and I'm still unsure exactly what Category A relates to - seems NI driving licences are a bit different to the rest of the UK in terms of categories - so the DVLA site doesn't quite match up).

 

[Shep Shepherd]

Having passed my car driving test before 1997, I am entitled to drive all sorts of cool things. Not that I ever do, mind:

I plan to get my CE entitlement at some point within the next 12 months. Not planning to get my A1, A2, D or DE entitlements any time soon, although a 'full house' would be pretty cool 

[Datsuncog]

So this arrived yesterday:

It's tiny! Like, about A6 size - same as one of those old Matchbox Toys catalogues.

Still, I guess the scooter is also tiny, so... probably about right.

I always find it handy to have an original owner's manual for my assorted old nails - just to see what manufacturer recommendations are for tyre pressures, spark plugs etc... and so I can estimate how far I can deviate from this before something going terminally wrong. Parameter setting, you might call it.

Also useful so I know where everything's located...

Ah.

 

[Datsuncog]

Well well well... nearly two years without any updates to this thread, hey?

Mmm, you don't get away that easily.

So, what gives in these strange times, daddy-o?

Well, not much in the way of motoring, to be fair. 

Both the wub-wub-wub Forester Turbo and the increasingly scratty yet unkillable Mk1 Yaris have largely continued to just be an cars, in their usual disgustingly dependable early-2000s Japanese tradition.

Mostly.

Which means that, unlike my agonisingly-documented years of Rennering, nothing's really fallen off, blown up, or urgently needed to be bodged with White-Tac ten minutes before an MOT. Therefore, as predicted by the Autoshite sages upthread, I've merely missed out on a world of automotive pain - but you cats have missed out on further side-splitting* antics from the hapless DC and his ever-shifting roster of totally fucking fucked m8 sub-£300 Mk1 Lagunas.

But then, since both the Subaru and the Toyota have hardly been driven since midway through last March - to the extent that my insurer generously refunded me a whopping £10.08, since my average weekly mileage has dropped from 300 to less than 50 - and, with both of them running on Boris MOTs, I suppose they haven't had all that much opportunity to go wrong in a highly conspicuous and/or gratuitously expensive manner.

Until now, of course.

But with recent tales of @Tim_E's tribulations over his Passat, and @Dan_ZTT's relatable Vel Satis electronic funsies, I was moved to bang out a long-overdue update.

The Forester has proved itself a  thoroughly decent motor, and it came as a mild shock to realise I've been driving it for verging on three years now, making it my second-longest lived daily after KAZ.

I mean, it's had a bit of work here and there - I replaced the droopy rear springs with heavyweight Sachs jobs not long after acquiring it, and then rebuilt the brakes with new discs 'n' pads all round over the summer, as they were never quite right and had become really gritty through lack of use. I didn't do this work myself, of course; I've no doubt I would have managed to take my head off my shoulders using a spring clamp, and my rip-roaring success* with brakes can also be found documented a few pages back. But other than a healthy appetite for headlight bulbs, Subaru ownership has been largely uneventful. A dashboard bulb here and a sticky boot release there; nothing much to write about, really.

So I didn't. Obviously.

Well, cold weather ain't great for shite motors, that much we know.

But, having started, run and stopped pretty much on the button since I acquired it, I suppose I'd become somewhat complacent.

So, Christmas Eve 2020. I'd headed out early to pick up a few last-minute bits and bobs, for a greatly-reduced and socially distanced pandemic festive season. So far, so good. Christmas Day, we went nowhere - video calls to friends and family, and a dinner that mainly involved a gigantic bowl of prawn cocktail each.  Hey, we're all just trying to do it to get through it, and if 'it' happens to be a kilo of prawns, then I'll be doing my bit, for sure.

Then, on Boxing Day afternoon, I went out to retrieve some stuff from the boot and the central locking wouldn't unlock when I jabbed the keyfob. Nothing. Nada.

Now, I knew the fob was already a bit dicky, often requiring four or five increasingly irate pushes before it'd operate. I'd replaced the battery about a year before and given the contacts a good scrub with electrical cleaner, to no avail. 

Typically, the car only came with one key, and after the purchase I'd tried and failed to find anyone who could cut me a like-for-like spare. The weird one-button design of this particular fob doesn't match the one shown in the owner's manual, and seems nigh-on impossible to find; replacement two-button Subaru keys are widely available, but apparently not the one-button type.

Naturally, Subaru had decided to fit these fobs with a weird narrow-but-thick CR1632 button cell battery, which had given me all sorts of gyp while trying to track one down before; apparently, these aren't ones you can simply pick up from the battery section in Home Bargains or Tesco. Why I hadn't bought two of them last year is anyone's guess, but I ended up ordering one on Boxing Day Night from Amazon (yes, just the one - because, as you'll deduce after three consecutive Mk1 Lagunas, I never learn).

 

What with seasonal festivities, and New Year, and the country falling into a terrifying vortex of death and despair as COVID-19 fatalities went through the fucking roof again, it took a little while for the fob battery to turn up on the doorstep (and I genuinely am grateful for the postal delivery workers who have gone way above and beyond to keep things even slightly functioning in this past year; even though Jeff Bezos seems to have trouble finding his wallet when it comes to paying them a fair wage).

During this time, it had occurred to me that I might use the dead key to manually open the car through the driver's side lock and retrieve my festive delights from the boot, but I was dissuaded from this by fears that I would trigger the alarm via the interior sensors, and then be totally unable to switch the damn thing off, and end up having to rip out all the wires and cables with my bare hands just to stop the bastard sounding over and over and over and over, my ham-fistedness then causing something fatal to the needlessly complex Sigma alarm/immobiliser system.

And we certainly wouldn't want any of that happening, would we? Can you even imagine how much of a total fucking ball-ache it would be if that happened, boys and girls?

[Pregnant pause for dramatic eyebrow raising and heavy foreshadowing, in best storyteller tradition.]

Of course, the new fob battery made not a shred of difference. Still nothing doing, no matter how much I pushed, begged and pleaded.

So, reasoning that the microswitch had finally given up completely (after giving me scarcely a year's warning that it was failing - tut tut) and lacking any of the tools, parts or technical wherewithal to solder on a new one, for once I did the smart thing and went looking for a professional who could repair it properly.

Of course, no local locksmiths reckoned they could do the work, and what with a nationwide stay-at-home order in force, travelling further afield in the off-chance wasn't a realistic possibility. Luckily, eBay rode to the rescue with a postal key repair service; the specific mono-buttoned Forester fob was listed, with a same-day turnaround…

So although I had my misgivings about entrusting the only key to the car to the tender mercies of Royal Mail, I told myself I was merely being paranoid. But of course I selected a tracked and signed next day service, for total peace of mind.

Oh, you can see where this is going too, can't you?

I'll draw a veil over the ensuing postal shitshow, but suffice to say the grim details can be found on the Grumpy Thread.

I should clarify that my gnashing of teeth wasn't directed at those Royal Mail employees out doing the deliveries, again in very challenging and dangerous conditions, but the fact that their online retail arm was continuing to sell premium next-day services with no ability to actually provide the service paid for. If the website had simply said, 'look, we're flat-out here, we'll do our best but no promises, right now it's second -class mail only, tracked if you need it' then I would have been cool with that. 

So it was nearly a month before I saw my key again; all of it down to Royal Mail slinging my 'guaranteed next-day' parcel into a corner of a warehouse and then ignoring it for three and a bit weeks, and none of it down to the repair dude in Peterborough, who did indeed turn the repair round the same day it arrived, and had it back with me the next.

Problem solved, hey?

Sagging with relief, I pointed the key at the Forester and… nothing. Again.

Now, I could feel the new switch clicking ok, so clearly the work had been done. But the car remained stubbornly locked.

A quick peek inside revealed the clock was now blank… and after manually unlocking the door (with some trepidation) and popping the bonnet, a quick tickle with a battery tester tool confirmed that the battery was now totally flat.

Muttering assorted curses, I dragged the battery out (not as easy as it might have been, due to the crowded engine bay) and slung it on the charge overnight, first topping up the electrolyte which was looking unhelpfully low.

It seemed to take a charge ok, so I threw it back into the engine bay the following morning and connected it all up. Hopes were high, but still nada. The central locking did now operate from the keyfob and the clock came back on, but efforts to turn the engine over merely resulted in assorted relay clickings and dimming dashlights. No cranking.

Well, bollocks. A goosed battery.

A feeling of dim irritation scratched at my fingertips, as I twigged that this could have accounted for the sudden non-opening on Boxing Day, and perhaps I'd been a little too quick to ascribe it to the dodgy-looking keyfob. I've only once before had a battery totally fail on me without warning - and that time it left me stranded mid-way round the Great Ocean Road outside Melbourne, in a deserted national park with no mobile phone signal. So y'know, small mercies and all that.

I slammed the bonnet and invented a few new curse-words. It was early February, it was freezing, I had nowhere to go anyway so what was the point in prioritising expenditure on this bag o'misery right now? It had sat now for about five weeks, a few longer wouldn't kill it.

In best Cosmic Joker tradition, my bluff was called at around half past three the following morning.

Yes, a.m.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww.

Fuck. Is that...?

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww.

Ah, shit!!

I hammered down the stairs, clad in my cosy jim-jams, and began rummaging frantically in the key box while MrsDC smacked on the hall lights, temporarily blinding me.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww.

The Forester's alarm has done this before. It's a pain in the hoop, and Subaru forums the world over have any number of threads about problematic alarms. It seems that Subaru, keen to ensure that ne'er-do-wells don't get an easy time in pinching their esteemed products, have such ludicrously sensitive alarms and locks that damn near anything sets them off.

So I'm no stranger to this 3.30am alarm call (and neither are the other 400 households within earshot), usually triggered by a cat jumping on the roof, the dashcam sucker coming off the windscreen, a particularly lardy leaf brushing the doorhandle, or a blackbird looking at it funny.

But usually I just need to give the keyfob a squeeze and it shuts off. Most of the time I don't even need to open the front door; I can just press the button in the hall and silence blessed silence returns, allowing me to slink back upstairs again and pretend it was nothing to do with me.

But not this time.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww.

I jabbed away at the newly-repaired keyfob like a maniac, but to no avail.

Wrenching the front door open, I stood outside under the winter night's frosty void, pointing the key in fury at the flashing, squealing Forester, like a deranged Harry Potter in slippers.

Alarmus fucking negato. 

(Not actual game footage)

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww.

I knew that the alarm was meant to only sound for thirty seconds before automatically turning off, but this was a long thirty seconds. A very, very long thirty seconds.

Lights were starting to come on in some of the bedroom windows opposite. FFS.

I tried the Subaru's doors to find they were still locked despite all the fob-battering, and with the alarm still showing no sign of getting bored with its earsplitting nocturnal warblings, I scuttled round to the driver's door and manually unlocked it, before trying the button again from the inside - for reasons that are still unclear.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww.

Naturally, no improvement was forthcoming.

I tried the key in the ignition, in case this would magically silence it.

Nope.

I flailed around, jabbing on all the overhead lights as if that might help the situation; I even pulled everything out of the glove box in case there was a miracle device in there that would end this sonic torment for me and about two-thirds of the population of south-east Antrim, but in doing so simply managed to scatter a Belfast A-Z, the locking wheel nut socket and, oddly, a large block of marzipan onto the floor, but noooooo... the alarm decided to just keep on keepin' on.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww

Eventually, the voice of reason made itself known through the electronic tumult, in the form of a somewhat fed-up MrsDC.

"Can you not just disconnect the battery?"

Yes. Yes, I probably could. Or I could wait until a mob formed and tried to do something clever to my neck using a length of knotted towrope and next door's tree, but on speedy reflection I felt this was a reasonable course of action to explore further, without the encumbrance of a written business case.

I popped the bonnet lever, and scurried round to the front of the car. The Subaru's release catch is never quite where I expect it to be, so a further ten seconds of fumbling ensued while I swore and barked my knuckles repeatedly on the freezing metal. Eventually, I got the bonnet up.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww

Oh brilliant, now people across the Irish Sea in Dumfries could enjoy Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd's delightful contribution to the dawn chorus. How astute of Subaru's design team to realise that when a car's being tea-leafed in Belfast, it's important that people in Carlisle know about it.

It felt like I was being strobed with one of those sound cannons used to break up riots; the fluctuating pressure on my eardrums was unbelievable, as I grabbed and pawed at anything resembling a cable in my stunned stupor.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEE-

Suddenly, it all stopped.

Everything.

Was I dead? Had someone taken pity on my cack-handed endeavours and just knocked me out with a single .30 rifle round, fired from their bedroom window?

Hopefully. That would certainly seem a preferable outcome to having to deal with this fuckabout any longer.

But no; I'd managed to wrench off the clamp from the battery's negative terminal. A blessed peace descended once more upon the land.

I closed the bonnet and limped inside, my ears ringing and my knuckles grazed, and my bollocks frozen.

Fuck me ragged.  Cars, eh?

 

The next morning, looking suitably chastised, I dutifully toddled over in the Yaris to the Local Motor Factor a few streets over and, via a mixture of improvised mime and Makaton through masks from a distance of 2 metres across the Perspex till barrier, I managed to communicate that I needed a new car battery. The old one was tested and pronounced useless (dead cell); and I was relieved of seventy quid for an unfamiliarly named 'Napa' replacement with a 5yr warranty.

I sloped on home, and slotted the new one into the Forester's irritatingly small and inaccessible battery tray, which required the bending of various air con gubbins in a way that appears somewhat unwise, in order to get it in.

I also noted that this power cube boasted a rather beefier CCA rating of 510, rather than the 380 amps of the problematic Exide that had lived in there previously. Hmm.

Nipping everything up, it was time for the moment of truth... 

Oh yes!

It started! The old Subaru flat-4 caught and went whurble-whurble-whurble for the first time in about six weeks.

I left it to run, to get it up to temperature before doing anything more ambitious. A quick scoot-over with the battery tester device indicated no alternator issues, which had also concerned me, and I was greatly reassured that the transponder in the keyfob hadn't managed to lose all its data or something during the repair process. It lived!

I R MECKANICKING JEANIUS.

Feeling well chuffed - while trying to forget that there was plainly never anything much wrong with the keyfob in the first place so I could have saved myself all that expense and hassle in the first instance - I decided to take the car up to the filling station and reinflate the tyres, which had gone a bit saggy-looking in the intervening time.

But, as luck would have it, something elsewhere needed attending to first, and then summat else, and suddenly the car had been idling for half an hour and I had other tasks still incomplete so... still feeling pleased, I shut the engine off and locked up, intending to inflate the tyres and take it for a drive tomorrow.

But, as Ronan Keating posited so touchingly/mawkishly (delete as appropriate) - what if tomorrow never comes?

It was still dark when I was awoken from my slumbers once again.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww

GAAAAAAH!!

I flollopped down the stairs like a drunken sack of spuds, and was so insensible to all but the hideous electronic keening that I was out the door with the car keys before I realised that I wasn't wearing my slippers, or indeed any other form of footwear.

We have a gravel driveway. Actually, that's not quite true. We have a grit driveway. Because I am a cheap-ass mofo (who knew?),  I twigged that it was much, much cheaper to buy ton bags of horticultural grit than it was to buy yer actual driveway gravel. Because you really don't notice the difference - except if you happen to walk on it in bare feet because, here's the thing; gravel is biggish and rounded, and grit is small and sharp.

Damned sharp.

Suddenly, I became very much apprised of the opposing spatial properties of grit vs. gravel, but hadn't really the time to go into the subtleties of the argument since, like tending a squalling infant, my overriding instinct at that moment was directed solely at the Subaru's squealing and my heartfelt desire to MAKE IT STOP.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww.

Yeah, that.

As before, pressing the keyfob did nothing at all, so I scuttled round to the driver's side, manually unlocked the door, reached in and hauled at the bonnet release cable.

Some more messing with the catch earned me another faceful of decibels ( WEEEEEEEowwwww WEEEEEEEowwwww etc etc), and then I twisted and joggled at the negative battery clamp (which, it turned out, I'd done an absolutely first-rate job of nipping up really tightly) until, eventually, a shocked peace reverberated through the pre-dawn streets once more.

I'll admit it, I was close to tears this time. I'd bought it a new battery, I'd bought it a new microswitch, and in return I'd managed to piss off every man, woman and child in a mile radius on two consecutive nights - plus my bare feet were full of sharp grit.

I limped back inside, and spent the lonely hours before sun-up in the bathroom, removing said pieces of grit from my feet using tweezers and a bowl of TCP, all the while doing some hardcore rumination on my life choices to date - and would a Hyundai i20 on finance really be such a bad thing after all?

It's contemplative moments like these on ghost-grey February mornings that I believe can break a shiter. 

I'm sure as and when Martin Scorsese gets around to putting together a biopic of my assorted motoring non-adventures (hey, he's a busy guy, don't @ him) he'll probably add in some sort of flashback montage around this scene, involving such highlights as me tooling round in a Datsun Sunny with plastic sheeting instead of windows, having to ask MrsDC to hang off the end of a 5ft breaker bar to support the engine in a Polo while I removed one of the mounts, and setting my trousers on fire while trying to take the exhaust off a Viva HC with an angle grinder.

Probably with an appropriately melancholic soundtrack (emphatically not Ronan Keating, though).

Hey, he can fill in the details; I'm not gonna tell him how to do his job.

So, self-pity aside (and hey, I don't like to brag but I know how to throw one hell of a pity party), the following morning the Forester was still inert, and every time I took a step my feet felt like I'd stuffed my socks with steel swarf.

I was also delighted* to realise that I'd apparently broken the bonnet release in my haste to shut the thing up, as now the damn bonnet wouldn't close at all.

So I did what I always do in these situations; I ignored it.

I ignored the shit out of it. For about a month and a half.

Which was something of a challenge, since it's right outside the front door - but I have form in this kind of endurance test, so I was pretty confident I'd win.

Just ask any of the Renners. Two years? Easy.

Every weekend, MrsDC and I would stage a jolly pantomime over breakfast, where she'd very casually ask if I was planning on doing anything with the broken car, and I'd tell her I was going to fix it.

Then we'd both have a good laugh, and I wouldn't.

Life's a riot over at Casa Datsuncog.

But once again, I managed to draw on my deep reserves of personal character*. And so a heroic battle was waged over the course of a few weeks between my total apathetic laziness and my utter, shameless parsimony, which was incandescent that I'd stumped up three months' worth of road tax in 2021 (value: nearly £100) for a car that had not turned a wheel on the Queen's highway in all that time.

Thus, Parsimony demanded that Apathy ought to just crack on and SORN the fucker if it was going nowhere, and cut our damn losses while we worked out what to do with the ungrateful remains. Apathy protested that it was really all Motivation's fault for doing nothing beyond warily pushing at the bonnet every few days just to confirm it still wouldn't latch, while Motivation then shouted that Parsimony was really to blame for not calling out a mobile autospark back in January to confirm what the actual fucking problem was, rather than piss about playing fucking parts darts in the cold for weeks at a stretch.

You really don't want to live in my head, I tell you. You really don't.

So on Sunday past, I cracked. I did. It was a surprise to me just as much as you, let me say.

The first thing was the bonnet latch. Now, I have no special knowledge of bonnet latches, to be fair, but the principle of the thing is fairly simple - basically like a bike's cable brake, but attached to a spring to release a rotating chock and allow the bonnet to move up thanks to another spring. There had to be a limit to the complexity of this one, even by my rock-bottom skills.

Luckily*, the grille pretty much fell off in my hand, so I could quickly see what was going on behind. (Note to self: order more cable ties ASAP.)

Prodding at the mechanism with a screwdriver did nothing much, so the next challenge was - remove the latch without killing myself.

I was fairly sure the rather terrifyingly powerful spring was retained inside somehow, and wouldn't ping out and embed itself in my throat as soon as I began to slacken the bolts, but still...

Mmmm, that's looking pretty horrible.

Off with the braided cable, and I skipped back into the comparative warmth of the house to give the whole shebang a nice bath in some household petrol and a brisk scrub with a toothbrush [insert joke about 'reminder to rinse the missus' toothbrush before returning it to the bathroom', arf arf]

Yeah, that looks a brave bit better.

Thoughts of a quick win have been far from my mind of late, but I was genuinely amazed to find that when reattached, the bonnet now closed and opened correctly. So it really was just choked solid with manky old grease and glar.

Giddy with excitement at the unexpected success with Phase 1, I turned to the battery.

Gingerly, I reconnected the negative lead...

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww

Ah, bollocks.

MrsDC did all sorts of ingenious things with the key from the driver's seat while I whipped the terminal on and off. Some folks on the Subaru forums recommend the use of 'valet mode' to deal with a misbehaving alarm, involving pressing buttons a certain number of times with doors and ignitions in specific positions to deactivate the alarm.

However, my own Forester manual says nothing at all about this mode (maybe because valet parking ain't really a thing here in Blighty?) and my efforts to follow their step-by-step instructions ran into bother. 

The advice given was to open the car as normal, get in while leaving the door open, then press and hold the 'unlock' button for two seconds to activate valet mode, which would cause the immobiliser light on the dash to double-flash to show it  was activated .

Sadly, as mentioned, this particular fob doesn't possess a dedicated 'unlock' button - only the single dual-function lock/unlock button. -So all that happened was that the car attempted to lock itself again as soon as the button was pressed, but then couldn't because the door was open.

And all the while going WEEEEEEEowwwww WEEEEEEEowwwww WEEEEEEEowwwww WEEEEEEEowwwww WEEEEEEEowwwww WEEEEEEEowwwww. Yup, plenty of that.

With patience running thin, I tried to work out logically what the problem might be.

Were the keyfob and immobiliser system no longer on speaking terms, since the microswitch was replaced?

No, because it had run when the new battery was fitted.

Were the immobiliser and alarm banjaxed due to being left with no battery connected?

Possibly. I've heard of otherwise sound cars being bridged as they've ended up with a recurring alarm fault that just can't be traced or fixed following a battery problem. And at first the car was ok when the battery was connected - but now the alarm was sounding as soon as the terminal made contact with the cable.

I glared at the new battery. Maybe... maybe it was dodgy? It's far from unknown; back in my Halfords days, there was probably a 10% return rate on new batteries (what can I say, they were made by Lucas back then...). I went in and found my multimeter, which indicated 11.34v across the terminals. Not, like, flat - but not really great.

So I pulled the battery again, and hooked it up to the old Linwood charger overnight. Maybe it was faulty, maybe it was just low after being left to sit unconnected for several weeks. Maybe there was an electrical drain somewhere? I'd spent a happy* few weeks trying to solve the riddle of the Amazing Disappearing Charge on my flatmate's Metro back in Brighton many years ago, and never did get to the bottom of the issue.

Just as I was looking at the Linwood's needle trembling  around the charge gauge's halfway mark, there came a familiar sound from outside.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww.

WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK??

For a second, I thought I was actually losing my mind. The battery was sitting there in front of me on the kitchen worktop, yet the Forester's alarm was unmistakable.

Was there a SECONDARY battery?

Was there a BACKUP independent alarm system?

Were we deep into the same twilight realm of @Jim Bell's Zafira alarm woes, and the immortal "I did a bad fright"?

My brain splintering into fragments, I rushed to the front door and pulled it open.

WEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwwwWEEEEEEEowwwww.

You have no idea how glad I was to realise that it was next door's son's Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X spitting its dummy out on this occasion. Interesting that it must use the same Sigma alarm siren as the Subaru. I'm pretty well attuned to that particular sound these days, believe it or not.

 

By Monday morning, the battery was showing a healthier 12.38v across the poles, although after disconnection this dropped after a few hours to 12.24v. I left it out on the worktop, checking on it every now and then like a worried old lady whose cat's gone off its food.

On Tuesday evening, with 3 tons of topsoil due for delivery the next morning (plus another ton of grit to top up the driveway, because as we know I never learn), I realised it was essential to get the Forester mobile and out of the drive, or risk imprisoning it behind all the dumpy bags for another couple of months. So, having prevaricated mightily all day and with the scanty spring evening light now going, I bit the bullet and slotted the battery back in. And reattached the retaining bar. It was now or never.

Positive clamp to positive terminal. Okay.

As I touched the negative clamp to the negative terminal, the alarm gave a brief squawk and, as a reflex, I pulled it back off again. FFS. Was this really going to fight me every step of the way?

Screwing down my courage to the sticking point, I jammed the clamp firmly onto the terminal.

Nothing. No alarm. Silence.

I lowered the bonnet.

I pressed the key fob.

Klung-ki-ki-klik.

The car locked. The indicators flashed.

I pressed it again.

Klung-ki-klik.

It opened.

Feeling like this was more of a job for the bomb squad, I opened the driver's door. Silence. Nothing.

Just the 'immobiliser disarmed' light glowing red on the clock cubby.

Key in. Engage.

BANG! It fired up!

That familiar roar through the stainless back box, and the throb of the flat-4. It worked.

I sat back in the seat, in relief.

And then I noticed the glow from the overhead lights. I possibly wouldn't have noticed if it had been earlier in the day, but as I said, the daylight was going.

Ah.

You may recall that way back, on the occasion of the Forester's first performance of solo nocturnes, I'd knocked all the interior lights on to see what was what?

And then pulled the battery lead?

And then fitted a brand new battery on a sunny spring morning, which ran absolutely fine?

But then the alarm went off again, about 18 hours later?

 

You're all way, way ahead of me here, aren't you?

 

Yeah. I'd drained the brand new battery with the still-switched-on interior lights that I didn't notice were on, causing the alarm to flip out when the voltage dropped below 12 volts.

That was the problem the whole time.

I was giving serious thought about selling it as a non-runner, or even scrapping it altogether. When it turns out the the only problem is that I'm as dumb as a bag of rocks.

Well well well.

And you know what the best bit is?

I did exactly the same fucking thing with one of the Lagunas four years ago.

 

Nope, it's true. I never learn.

DC out.

[Tigerfox]

Absolutley brilliant post, had me laughing out loud much to mrs tigerfox's displeasure as she does not like me enjoying myself

[Tickman]

Epic.

[Fumbler]

Jesus H. T. Christ! What an epic oracle. Much gaffawage was had while reading this excellent bit of writing.

[bunglebus]

Ah don't you just love it when the penny drops that it was YOUR OWN STUPID FAULT the whole time? I feel your pain with the alarm fault, FIL's A-class got the right hump after the battery went flat, and with a new one fitted I had a christmas tree of warning lights, no central locking and a siren that would NOT shut up. After disconnecting the siren and removing the fuse for the indicators, it was about to go for scrap, but having driven it a few miles home, the warning lights went out and the central locking returned to normal function. I tentatively re-fitted the fuse and all was normal again. Still left the bloody siren disconnected though! I'm told there's a battery in the siren to thwart thieves who disconnect it, and if that fails the system has a strop - don't know if yours is the same but I'd look into it.

[Cord Fourteener]

Same as above. Took me all afternoon what with kids and wife and whatnot. Worth it, what a fantastic post.

But hey, I bet it felt good at the end. 

You mentioned my Passat trouble. Talk about pity party,  I think I just basically shat my knickers and ran around screaming 'don't panic' and 'we're doomed' and such, until my friend plugged his proper machine in and we discovered that it was what I had suspected all along and it was literally just a broken wire rather than a broken sensor.

But when it's your work car and it just decides to break the moment you get it then, well screaming chickens, it's stressful. 

But nice one, plus eleventy for the comedy post, the actual gremlin trouble you had and the fix. Simple though it was. Sometimes the simple ones are the best in the end. 

[320touring]

Old cars and cold nights do not good bedfellows make. Mainly as the cold befuddles the brain of the owner.

 

Glad the resolution was simple, though arduous to effect.

 

There's a reason NONE of the 6.5 cars in fleet here have their interior lights set to anything but off 

[SiC]

This is why on every car I can, I disconnect the alarm or at the very least the alarm siren. Renaults are much easier than Porsches! The Porsche siren is disconnected so should stay quiet, but the German overloads realised this and it uses the horns as a backup if it can't see the siren. Alternatively disconnecting the interior sensors, or the magic combination to disable them is a compromise that usually fixes them. Hopefully now I've said that, no one really knows where I live 🤣

Does the Forester have the little keypad where you can reprogram the cars systems like the alarm?

[Cord Fourteener]

1 minute ago, 320touring said:

Old cars and cold nights do not good bedfellows make. Mainly as the cold befuddles the brain of the owner.

 

Glad the resolution was simple, though arduous to effect.

 

There's a reason NONE of the 6.5 cars in fleet here have their interior lights set to anything but off 

It's not just the interior lights...

Ask Wife's ex-Polo. 

One thing I'm waiting to happen is the Passat lights being left on. It turns out that, unlike sensible cars that cut the headlights when the keys are not in the ignition unless you set the indicator to leave a parking light on, the vagshite let you leave the lights on when you're away with the keys in hand. Fortunately they give you a chime when you open the driver's door, then cunningly engineer the door- open sensor to fail. 

[chaseracer]

What sayeth Sam Pepys of the clamorous conveyance, forsooth?

[hairnet]

DMF

oh wait it doesnt have one of those does it

we all been there i think

 

[Dave_Q]

Great update, I personally find it quite satisfying to discover that it was just me being a clot rather than the car being broken in some unsolvable way.

RE: 2019 moped musings, if you passed your test before sometime in 2001 and have category AM on your licence you can ride a 50 with no CBT or L plates and even carry a pillion. 

I mean you can't carry a pillion on that thing but anyway.

A CBT is probably still a worthwhile investment even if you don't actually need one, £100 or so they are but an actually useful day spent getting you up to semi-independent wobbling status.