The new news 24 thread

[Momentary Lapse Of Reason]

19 hours ago, wuvvum said:

Bloody hell, that thing must have some serious ballast in the yellow bit...

That is where the 7' bloke is kept.

[barefoot]

On 18/10/2024 at 13:00, barefoot said:

^ pah

Here's a better looking car 

And some new, news!

And there's more - I took this to a different garage for MOT back in June & forgot all about it!

I'd better nip down & collect it on Monday.

[Lord Sterling]

Vectra was treated to a new tyre and picked up some bits for it that it might need at some point:

Got this haul for £40, dropped it off at my garage in Telford.

[ruffgeezer]

Said goodbye, at last, to the Berkley BNFL Berlingo.

It had stayed a bit longer than originally intended, but was a lovely little van.  It's gone off to my Wife's sister who is going to use it as a covert camper.  Makes the extra work worthwhile, knowing thst it isn't going to be ragged mercilessly on the evri round.

In also is a Volvo XC60 that looked a bargain at £2000 for a 2009 with only 98k, some new ABS sensors and a service later and Katy my wife, has claimed it as her own to replace 'Olaf' the ex- @straightSix Alfa Giulietta which although she loves the styling of, just hasnt gelled with.

The XC60 almost immediately blotted it's copybook after the MOT by gaining a misfire/ diesel knock all through the rev range and accompanying black smoke. FUCK!  I'm glad it was me it misbehaved for. Oddly it had stored no codes during this misbehaviour, so it was a good look at the injector looms, one of which wanted a new gland on the plug but were otherwise OK.

Then a suspect bit of wiring to one of the two fuel rail pressure sensors - you know when the insulation just doesn't look right. 

Well inside that bundle was a particularly poor soldered joint, but the cause of the drama was a split in the insulation right up almost as far as the multiplug for the rail sensor. I had the engine running as I manipulated the loom and could make the engine stutter at will.  I cut out the damaged wire and solded in a fresh bit, re-wrapped it and it's been fine since. Thank fuck.

This means the Giulietta will soon be looking for a new home, but not before the private plate comes off and it has a wash.

Lastly I've adopted a very scruffy endangered species locally, it goes for an MOT on Monday after a light fettle ready to be re-homed later this month, fingers crossed. 

 

[stuboy]

Doing few bits on the galaxy and the bloody screws that hold the top of the air box down decided to be not philips fitment to pointy round bits... really need to find some replacements but decided car park modified was quicker... out comes the battery cutter.. chop chop and now kinda flathead fitment 🤪🤪🤪🤪🤪

[Stinkwheel]

30 minutes ago, stuboy said:

Doing few bits on the galaxy and the bloody screws that hold the top of the air box down decided to be not philips fitment to pointy round bits... really need to find some replacements but decided car park modified was quicker... out comes the battery cutter.. chop chop and now kinda flathead fitment 🤪🤪🤪🤪🤪

Sometimes, you just gotta do what you gotta do 👍

[EightMegs]

Car park at work last week was very choddy.

[Popsicle]

6 hours ago, stuboy said:

Doing few bits on the galaxy and the bloody screws that hold the top of the air box down decided to be not philips fitment to pointy round bits... really need to find some replacements but decided car park modified was quicker... out comes the battery cutter.. chop chop and now kinda flathead fitment 🤪🤪🤪🤪🤪

Thanks for the timely reminder, most of my vans air filter box screws are chewed up and rusty and I need a selection of 4 different tools to remove them, so 10, yes 10 new ones just ordered for under a fiver.

[Lord Sterling]

Spotted this on Facebook, apparently someone has imported a Triumph Acclaim to America, it's wearing Washington plates.

Richard Truett of Sterling Fixer fame has imported and now registered a Rover 75 2.5 V6 Connoisseur into America after storing it in Canada for a bit until the 75 became eligible to import and register in the US.

[JJ0063]

Don’t mind me tending* to the herb garden by head torch a few mins ago. 
 

*ripping all the fennel out as it kept blowing in the wind and setting the motion detector off on the doorbell.

[High Jetter]

2 hours ago, JJ0063 said:

Don’t mind me tending* to the herb garden by head torch a few mins ago. 
 

*ripping all the fennel out as it kept blowing in the wind and setting the motion detector off on the doorbell.

Alright Bob, don't make a song out of it 😀

[wuvvum]

Not exactly ideal weather for fettling this weekend, but I did get the new NSF ABS sensor fitted to the Z4 during a lull in the rain yesterday - actually turned out to be a 10-minute job, a lot easier than the rear one I replaced earlier in the year.  Probably helped by the fact that there was no bolt holding it in, it was just shoved in the hole - I found a suitably sized M6 bolt to hold the replacement in.  Backed out of the drive and headed down the road and after about 20 yards it beeped and all the warning lights went out, so I'm calling that a fix.

I'd run the Merc to the jet wash on Friday to give the underside and the inner arches a good blast in preparation for rustproofing to happen, but I only got as far as doing the brake pipes before the weather went tae shite again.  So I decided to take the stereo out and try fitting the DVD drive from the original head unit (which won't power up at all) to see if that restored the unit's ability to read DVDs.  It didn't - in fact when I plugged the head unit back into the car it nommed the DVD and refused to eject it.  So that was a waste of time.  It's probably going to end up getting a modern Android radio, but that's not a priority at the moment, especially given that the shite kitty is completely empty until I manage to sell something.

[alcyonecorporation]

I recently flattened the battery in the SVX by leaving a door ajar (cue Bill Hicks joke). 
The smart charger wouldn't bring it back; I revived it by boosting from the Leon for 20 minutes. That did enough to get an initial charge into the plates, and for a spare CTEK I had to take the matter seriously. 
Ally Koyorad still looks smart, as it should for the bloody wedge it stung me for (and it was bloody second hand!)

I never really went into the minor nightmare than erupted over the battery - it's a a recent Yuasa that has the posts on the correct side of the battery, as opposed to the old dogshit Lion that was about the right size and CCA but had the posts on the other side, meaning that the cables were stretched to hell and straining on the clamp.
It didn't help that *so many* parts books have the wrong battery listed for an SVX (see also: rear brake discs); to make doubly sure, I checked with a Japanese Yuasa catalogue, cross referenced the number it gave, and ordered the correct unit from Tayna. It wasn't even that expensive. People online were still telling me that it was wrong, and wouldn't accept that their database was at fault. 

My Impreza also needs another wash - after two months of Fenland dust coated it (again). 
JDM bonnet prop (pictured) on the SVX also doubles as a start stick. Both parts are on order, though I'm up to my 6th wrong starter: recon places keep sending me starters for either 1.8 Imprezas or 2.2 Legacys. 
It did a racism the other night: I ordered a Chinese meal with @TheXUDfiles and it refused to start ahead of collection. The start stick persuaded it, however. 

It got through another test, too, though there's a growing list of parts I need, some of which are having to come from Australia. A couple of US SVX NATION members are also, shall we say, taking the piss with certain NOS parts and their supply. UK stock is all over the place, particularly where gaskets are concerned. I did a bulk buy for future use. 



Bonus pic from when I went to the tip. I don't even live in Northamptonshire, lol. It's since had a slightly less fucked steering wheel fitted. 
I lost a load of images recently when my phone finally died. I'll have to take it to my usual place when I'm back up north to retrieve the numbers, recordings and photos I took. 

[sdkrc]

My trampoline made it through the storm last night, holy fuck there were some tense moments. I slapped everything including my trolley jack and iron ramps on it to keep it pinned. 

[richardmorris]

[Split_Pin]

3 hours ago, sdkrc said:

My trampoline made it through the storm last night, holy fuck there were some tense moments. I slapped everything including my trolley jack and iron ramps on it to keep it pinned. 

My back garden looked like a branch of Kwik Fit yesterday, such was the abundance of tyres and car batteries weighing everything down. It worked though!

[vulgalour]

Got my blood test results.  Everything is fine.

I've still got a few more days until my GP appointment to discuss what other things it might be.  My current diagnosis is Stress, and yeah that's a fair assessment of my life in general and usually I just cope with it and the fact that life is permanent stress.  I want them to find something more tangible wrong with me to explain all this bullshit I've been through the past couple of months.  Stress doesn't feel like enough to explain it, as a diagnosis it feels glib, especially since the mental health side of the support decided they couldn't help me as it was determined to be a physical issue.

I guess I'm just frustrated now.  I've got the clarity of mind to have the drive to return to work now and whenever I try to do anything I just end up physically exhausted and frail like I've aged fifty years in half an hour.  That in turn is definitely making me stressed because, on the face of things, I feel like the medical community are telling me there's nothing wrong with me (I know, they said I have Stress, but you get the sentiment here) when there very clearly is.  Just want to get back to work and back to my version of normal.

[richardmorris]

[dollywobbler]

We did a 24 hour livestream where five teams drove as far as possible in 24 hours as well. Raised a goodly amount for charity but more is always welcome. I'm entirely broken now and I didn't even drive!

 

[Soundwave]

5 minutes ago, dollywobbler said:

We did a 24 hour livestream where five teams drove as far as possible in 24 hours as well. Raised a goodly amount for charity but more is always welcome. I'm entirely broken now and I didn't even drive!

 

Was a great effort all round, I popped onto the stream for the graveyard shift. You all seemed to be holding up relatively well!

[ruffgeezer]

18 hours ago, alcyonecorporation said:

I recently flattened the battery in the SVX by leaving a door ajar (cue Bill Hicks joke). 
The smart charger wouldn't bring it back; I revived it by boosting from the Leon for 20 minutes. That did enough to get an initial charge into the plates, and for a spare CTEK I had to take the matter seriously. 
Ally Koyorad still looks smart, as it should for the bloody wedge it stung me for (and it was bloody second hand!)

I never really went into the minor nightmare than erupted over the battery - it's a a recent Yuasa that has the posts on the correct side of the battery, as opposed to the old dogshit Lion that was about the right size and CCA but had the posts on the other side, meaning that the cables were stretched to hell and straining on the clamp.
It didn't help that *so many* parts books have the wrong battery listed for an SVX (see also: rear brake discs); to make doubly sure, I checked with a Japanese Yuasa catalogue, cross referenced the number it gave, and ordered the correct unit from Tayna. It wasn't even that expensive. People online were still telling me that it was wrong, and wouldn't accept that their database was at fault. 

My Impreza also needs another wash - after two months of Fenland dust coated it (again). 
JDM bonnet prop (pictured) on the SVX also doubles as a start stick. Both parts are on order, though I'm up to my 6th wrong starter: recon places keep sending me starters for either 1.8 Imprezas or 2.2 Legacys. 
It did a racism the other night: I ordered a Chinese meal with @TheXUDfiles and it refused to start so that we could collect it. The start stick persuaded it, however. 

It got through another test, too, though there's a growing list of parts I need, some of which are having to come from Australia. A couple of US SVX NATION members are also, shall we say, taking the piss with certain NOS parts and their supply. UK stock is all over the place, particularly where gaskets are concerned. I did a bulk buy for future use. 



Bonus pic from when I went to the tip. I don't even live in Northamptonshire, lol. It's since had a slightly less fucked steering wheel fitted. 
I lost a load of images recently when my phone finally died. I'll have to take it to my usual place when I'm back up north to retrieve the numbers, recordings and photos I took. 

If you want, you could send the starter up to me and I'll have the local refurbishment fella look at it for you?  He does work for the local Porsche specialist and has done a starter and alternator for me in the past.

[Split_Pin]

I had always assumed that my E46 was ULEZ compliant, being petrol and 2003, plus the gov.uk checker showed it as so.

However it doesn't cover Scotland and when I checked using the Scottish Government checker, it's definitely not compliant. 

As my son has moved up to the next age group in his basketball team earlier than expected, he's now playing in a league which means , as much as I hate doing this, I'll regularly have to drive in cities when he has an away game. I had planned to use the E46 for that but now that I know it's not ULEZ compliant with the more stringent Scottish regulations, I need to make a decision. Obviously I've burst my arse and spent a small fortune on the BMW so that's not going anywhere.

The 2 Audis are too damn competent all rounders and need very little doing and the BMW is also a great fun car.

The 75 though, much as I love that car and it goes so well, needs some bodywork tidying and has just the start of a knock from the OSF suspension, so I'm thinking I'm gonna cut my losses, sell it as it is and replace it with a ULEZ compliant car, perhaps a petrol Saab 93 (I know for sure that will be compliant, having had two!)

[alcyonecorporation]

1 hour ago, ruffgeezer said:

If you want, you could send the starter up to me and I'll have the local refurbishment fella look at it for you?  He does work for the local Porsche specialist and has done a starter and alternator for me in the past.

Thank you but it has to be able to move in some way or form - even if said form is twatting the starter with a block of wood. 

I'd get another to have him rebuild but the last bloke who had one 'just couldn't come to a price' when asked, thinking that because some chong in Eastern Europe had one up for £400, that's what he'd want. 
The gatekeeping and hoarding of parts is beginning to annoy me. 

[somewhatfoolish]

41 minutes ago, alcyonecorporation said:

Thank you but it has to be able to move in some way or form - even if said form is twatting the starter with a block of wood. 

I'd get another to have him rebuild but the last bloke who had one 'just couldn't come to a price' when asked, thinking that because some chong in Eastern Europe had one up for £400, that's what he'd want. 
The gatekeeping and hoarding of parts is beginning to annoy me. 

Have you tried buying from Yahoo Japan auctions?

[Stanky]

1 minute ago, somewhatfoolish said:

Have you tried buying from Yahoo Japan auctions?

You have to go through an intermediary, I'm not sure of the exact ins-and-outs but basically they won't ship anything on there abroad any more, so you have to use (and pay for) a domestic handler who takes receipt of your goods then hands it off to DHL/Fedex/etc which adds cost and time. Not awful, but something to be aware of.

Should you have pockets deep enough, Amayama list them:

https://www.amayama.com/en/genuine-catalogs/epc/subaru-europe/svx/c11/508/engine/093

and also all the tiny components, for a more reasonable price in case you knew specifically what is up with yours and fancied rebuilding it yourself?

[alcyonecorporation]

9 minutes ago, somewhatfoolish said:

Have you tried buying from Yahoo Japan auctions?

Great idea

I have a middle man who can buy from any of the big auction sites and I've not ruled them out if I really can't get anything here. I got my mega curry mats from them and keep looking out for some antimaccassars. 

In the gap between posts I found a specialist in Bristol that a friend knows who 'has a few' and can get them refurbed locally. 
Apparently it's the carbon brushes that fail; Amayama spordically has stock and I can get them from the Australian specialist if I need to. 

He was over recently and we stripped that white car in Windley's bare

[ruffgeezer]

Did that shit one in Windley's still have it's engine?

[Stanky]

1 minute ago, alcyonecorporation said:

Great idea

I have a middle man who can buy from any of the big auction sites and I've not ruled them out if I really can't get anything here. I got my mega curry mats from them and keep looking out for some antimaccassars. 

In the gap between posts I found a specialist in Bristol that a friend knows who 'has a few' and can get them refurbed locally. 
 

Forgot to add, but Amayama parts diagrams are handy for getting the OEM part numbers in case you wanted to cross-check, e.g. the EG33D one is OEM part number 23300AA300 which does turn up results on ebay (whether you trust them is another matter) but this:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/146107868857

Claims to be the same part number and is a snip at just £70. I'm not sure what engine your SVX has though, so it might not be this exact one, but might be useful?

[alcyonecorporation]

8 minutes ago, ruffgeezer said:

Did that shit one in Windley's still have it's engine?

LOL, no, the engine was out of it years ago. 

Stupidly, whoever scrapped it took the VIN but forgot that the VIN is also stamped in massive letters on the bulkhead. 
Someone else then twigged, and put a punch through the generic numbers rather than the actual digits specific to the car. 
Do you know its story? I don't. 



You handing me that unobtanium sleeve lock regulator after a two second glance was hilarious, like that Red Dwarf episode with the luck virus. 

 

[alcyonecorporation]

6 minutes ago, Stanky said:

Forgot to add, but Amayama parts diagrams are handy for getting the OEM part numbers in case you wanted to cross-check, e.g. the EG33D one is OEM part number 23300AA300 which does turn up results on ebay (whether you trust them is another matter) but this:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/146107868857

Claims to be the same part number and is a snip at just £70. I'm not sure what engine your SVX has though, so it might not be this exact one, but might be useful?

Amayama's a great reference, saves mithering the local dealer (they love* me).