The new news 24 thread

[artdjones]

6 hours ago, wuvvum said:

Had a crack at the accelerator cable on the Trafic this weekend.  It was actually pretty easy to unclip and unthread from the engine, and I then laid it up the A pillar and squirted a liberal dose of GT85 down between the cable and the sheath.  The result is that the throttle now snaps back closed when I come off the accelerator - so no more anticipating gear changes or holding the van back on the brakes in Tesco car park.  The pedal feels slightly "notchier" than it did before but I'm going to live with that because it's still a massive improvement overall.

I extricated the Spacy from the garage and fitted the new battery I bought for it.  It's actually slightly larger than the one that was on there before - probably a good thing as the Spacy doesn't have a kick start and being a CVT auto it can't be bump started.  It didn't want to fire up today though - the fuel tap appears to still be working fine so I'm probably going to have to whip the carb off again and give it another clean (and refit the diaphragm I forgot to put back in last time, if I can find where I put it).

I bought a vacuum brake bleeder a few weeks back and today I got it out to have a go at the rear brakes on the Volvo.  No dice, frustratingly - the offside bleed nipple is sucking a load of air through but no fluid, whereas the nearside isn't pulling through anything at all.  I assume the nearside has a blockage somewhere, but the offside has puzzled me somewhat - there's plenty of fluid in the master cylinder, so the only way it can be pulling air through is if there is a hole in the pipe somewhere between the cylinder and the caliper - but then I would expect such a hole to cause a fluid leak, and the fluid is still at the level it was when I last looked at the brakes 6 months ago, so there ain't no leak.  Anyone got any bright ideas?  I really do want to get the brakes working so I can get the old crate mobile - especially given that it fired up first turn of the key after being untouched and covered up since October.

Is there a load sensing valve on it?

[artdjones]

I spent a few hours on the Berlingo yesterday. A previous idiot owner had drilled 8 holes in the roof to bolt down a roof rack that wasn't made for the van, including cutting holes in the headlining. Also the frame behind the driver's seat that protects against being crushed by the load had been replaced by a flimsy piece of ply, and someone had stolen the jack and wheelbrace. I'd noticed two Berlingos parked outside an agricultural contractor's yard that hadn't moved for ages, so I headed on over on Saturday to see if I could get some bits.

It turns out that one of the vans, which is 2006, is going back on the road, but there are two other one inside the yard as well. So I got a jack, wheelbrace a headlining and protection frame. In fact I got two of the frames, as the holes are the to fit one on the left as well. I paid only €20 for that lot. One of the donors was a 97 van with an XUD in it.

I spent yesterday afternoon fitting all that to my van. I enlarged the roof holes slightly with a step drill, put little steel circles in, welded them around and ground back with seam sealer on top. Then out with the old headliner, in with the new, and bolted the two A frames behind the seats.

[DVee8]

11 hours ago, Yoss said:

I went for my first covid jab yesterday. In the Triumph. As I approached the health centre there were three people in HVs milling about at the entrance on the pavement, i.e. the nearside. One of them flagged me down so I pulled up and he bent down to my passenger side window. I made a bit of a gesture of winding down my drivers window and made him walk round. Was I the first person to turn up without electric windows? 

Admittedly it's a small enough car to reach across to the passenger side so I was being a bit of an arse but I feel he should be addressing people on the correct side anyway. 

Anyway I feel fine. The nurse asked me if I drove and if so to wait in my car for 15 minutes in case of any adverse reaction. My friend had his earlier in the week and said he felt like he had a hangover for two days but I've had no reaction at all. So far. 

I had mine Friday afternoon,Saturday lunchtime the headache started just a dull thud. Still there all day Sunday.

Then Sunday afternoon I'm a freezing shivvering mess. 2.5 hours sleep on the couch, I just looked at my tea, watched TG, slept through line of duty. Went to bed and woke up in a pool of sweat.

But this morning I feel fine...

[Leyland Worldmaster]

https://www.topgear.com/car-news/retro/mitsubishi-auctioning-its-entire-heritage-fleet

 

Might be of interest to some! 👍 👍 👍 😎 😎 😎 

[Tadhg Tiogar]

1 hour ago, Leyland Worldmaster said:

https://www.topgear.com/car-news/retro/mitsubishi-auctioning-its-entire-heritage-fleet

 

Might be of interest to some! 👍 👍 👍 😎 😎 😎 

Anyone wanting to place a bet on how many of those will be in a neglected state five years later?

[clayts450]

While I was away being 5g-ed the 420 failed its MOT, then passed a few mins later - brake light out.

Happy days, my fave car is road legal again.

[New POD]

On 19/03/2021 at 21:50, Tim_E said:

If it's in the cellar all you need now is a big fuck-off wine rack...

I do. 

[SiC]

3 hours ago, Tadhg Tiogar said:

Anyone wanting to place a bet on how many of those will be in a neglected state five years later?

I reckon quite low as many of those vehicles are worth a decent amount now. 

[clayts450]

As noted earlier I got the vaccine today, but now have da fear about side effects. Conundrum is, do I dare risk quoting on a job for tomorrow morning, being wary that I may feel totally poo ? I think I'll have to give it a miss, just to be safe.

I've decided to give myself the rest of the day off today, so will give some lurve to the van (get funky with the bumper and trim gel to smarten up the plastic tat)

[Kiltox]

26 minutes ago, clayts450 said:

As noted earlier I got the vaccine today, but now have da fear about side effects. Conundrum is, do I dare risk quoting on a job for tomorrow morning, being wary that I may feel totally poo ? I think I'll have to give it a miss, just to be safe.

I've decided to give myself the rest of the day off today, so will give some lurve to the van (get funky with the bumper and trim gel to smarten up the plastic tat)

You know if you take the job you’ll be fucked and if you don’t you’ll be fresh as a daisy. Sod’s law. 

[Zelandeth]

I do love this car, but the fuel economy never ceases to make me wince!

Cruising on the level at 50 for instance, which is about the best you expect to see...23mpg shown on the instantaneous readout...

Do I really care though?  Not really!

[Ghosty]

23 on the instant isn't bad for a V12, that's the same I got from my S3 XJ6. 

[wuvvum]

I got 19mpg out of mine on the run back from Buckinghamshire when I bought it - I didn't think that was too bad, although I was driving sensibly.

My use of it after that was either nipping to Tesco or going for a hoon up the local B-roads so I gave up calculating the fuel consumption.

[HMC]

Red sky at night...

And I’ve got a bulb out. 

 

[Zelandeth]

1 hour ago, wuvvum said:

I got 19mpg out of mine on the run back from Buckinghamshire when I bought it - I didn't think that was too bad, although I was driving sensibly.

My use of it after that was either nipping to Tesco or going for a hoon up the local B-roads so I gave up calculating the fuel consumption.

That figure quoted was on level (or slightly downhill) at 50 on the cruise control.

Even breathe on the throttle at any speed and the instantaneous reading plummets into single digits.

My calculated average during ownership (~4500 miles so far) is 12.9mpg if memory serves.

Could be worse...could be an XJ12 on carbs!

I reckon based on the behaviour I'd probably be seeing mid teens as an average anywhere other than here...90% of my driving is in Milton Keynes, which is murder on economy in any car...but especially one like this!

Roundabouts every 0.9 miles and 1700kg of 5.3 litre V12 car with a 3-speef auto = inevitably poor economy.

[Yoss]

23 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

tis a shame you dont have the Routemaster anymore, can you imagine the fun if you turned up in that

 as a side note through a chain of association, I wonder do blue badges have vehicle limits? if you have a blue badge and a bus, could you apply it to your bus, then park on double yellow lines somewhere entirely inappropriate but that your blue badge technically allows you to LOL

Didn't really need a blue badge, you could just park on a bus stop, or near a bus stop or anywhere else really. Several times I took Mrs Yoss into town with it and parked on the bus stands in the city centre. Though that does seem like a lot of time, cost and effort just to save £2.50 on parking. 

[Tadhg Tiogar]

The CTEK has been reconnected to the old test battery for 2 days now on the "Recond" programme. Currently sitting at "Float" stage, bubbling away merrily like a cauldron. All it needs is to have three wizened oul hags around it, muttering incantations. Another 8 days of this to go....

[Zelandeth]

4 hours ago, HarmonicCheeseburger said:

Can you get it to show 0mpg though?

Likely!  1 is easily possible with any vaguely liberal amount of right foot from slow or a standing start.  2-4 basically means "throttle pedal in use."

[bunglebus]

I asked on another thread about getting a bayonet fitting put on the capped gas pipe in our kitchen. It's been a long drawn out story involving our useless housing association not knowing their arse from their elbow.

Found a guy to come and do the job, couldn't fault him as he had to do a lot more than expected, the pipe was too low for regs so put an elbow on and extended it. 

The cooker was free off Facebook and appeared to be almost unused, and the gas side of it works fine. Unfortunately when plugged in it would trip the breaker after a short time. Fitter went out of his way checking the sockets etc but we concluded it was a fault inside the oven. Not the end of the world but I lost all the hair on the back of my hand lighting the grille a few times.

There's not too much electrical wizardry inside a gas cooker, just a clock/timer and the ignition system. Knew it couldn't be a dead short as it didn't trip the RCD immediately, so after a chat with my electronics engineer dad, we narrowed it down to the interference suppressor which is just a few capacitors across the mains. Whipped the back off the cooker and disconnected it, fault cured. Happy days, it's safe without it (I have ordered a replacement).

Last night I had a pasta bake cooking and the timer set, watching TV when suddenly all the electric goes off and we're plunged into darkness. Bloody cooker! Checked the fusebox but everything's on - took a minute before it dawned on me to look outside where all the street lights were off and all the other houses were black. Power cut, had to laugh...

[Floatylight]

One out! Buyer arriving imminently...

 

 

[Cord Fourteener]

Tried to change the offside track rod end on the Passat, failed. I watched how-tos and everything but I could not get the thing to come off no matter how hard I hit various bolts and pins. Going to have to book it in. 

At least I was able to go round and torque each wheel nut on each wheel to 120nm so I know they are all good. 

[bunglebus]

I usually undo the top nut until it's flush with the thread and hit it with a soft faced mallet (having undone the pinch bolt of course).

Does it drop at all or is it stuck in the taper?

Oh and try and source a genuine track rod end, the pattern ones don't have a rubber insert and transmit a load of vibration through the steering 

[Cord Fourteener]

6 minutes ago, bunglebus said:

I usually undo the top nut until it's flush with the thread and hit it with a soft faced mallet (having undone the pinch bolt of course).

Does it drop at all or is it stuck in the taper?

Oh and try and source a genuine track rod end, the pattern ones don't have a rubber insert and transmit a load of vibration through the steering 

I tried tapping, whacking, battering, etc. The top nut started to move but only so far.  The pin would not budge,no matter how much force I dared hit it with. 

[barefoot]

You know how sometimes in older cars, the hooter sometimes does a little comedy honk when you turn the steering wheel?  Our little old German motor car is fitted with a pair of incredibly loud and intentionally dischordant, autobahn-storming HORNS.

This morning as usual, we set off to walk the dog at 06:15. I fired up the Scirocco on the drive, it was parked backed in against the side wall with a nice couple of armfulls of lock. PAPPERTY PAP & indeed PAPEROO! Off up along the street we went, turning PARP left & then left PARP again. We turned into the lovely village of Hemington with a BLARE of the horns & then turned off towards the sleepy hamlet of Lockington where there's a really tight & high walled Z bend, (which we negotiated amongst an absolute fucking riotous fanfare of horns) between the church & the vicarage. 

I am as blind as a fucking bat up close in the half light of dawn, but the fair wife managed to read the words on the fuse box index, I counted from right to left, pulled out a 15a bluey and silence was restored.

[bunglebus]

1 hour ago, Tim_E said:

I tried tapping, whacking, battering, etc. The top nut started to move but only so far.  The pin would not budge,no matter how much force I dared hit it with. 

If by the pin you mean the thread behind the pinch bolt - it doesn't come out. You just loosen it and undo the top nut. They can be a little bitch, can you get a wedge of some sort in the split in the hub (on your left as you look at the offside)? Might help open it up a bit 

[bunglebus]

1 hour ago, barefoot said:

You know how sometimes in older cars, the hooter sometimes does a little comedy honk when you turn the steering wheel?  Our little old German motor car is fitted with a pair of incredibly loud and intentionally dischordant, autobahn-storming HORNS.

This morning as usual, we set off to walk the dog at 06:15. I fired up the Scirocco on the drive, it was parked backed in against the side wall with a nice couple of armfulls of lock. PAPPERTY PAP & indeed PAPEROO! Off up along the street we went, turning PARP left & then left PARP again. We turned into the lovely village of Hemington with a BLARE of the horns & then turned off towards the sleepy hamlet of Lockington where there's a really tight & high walled Z bend, (which we negotiated amongst an absolute fucking riotous fanfare of horns) between the church & the vicarage. 

I am as blind as a fucking bat up close in the half light of dawn, but the fair wife managed to read the words on the fuse box index, I counted from right to left, pulled out a 15a bluey and silence was restored.

Slip ring thingamijig behind the steering wheel?

[Sh'Eds]

A quick 10 minutes of tinkering today whilst taking a quick break from work. New pinion seal turned up yesterday (on the left in the picture below) and is thankfully the correct one so got it installed. 

 

 

Next up is wrestling the diff back onto the car, which is a job for another day.

 

 

[Stanky]

My brother-in-law's Fiesta Zetec S (2006) catastrophically failed its MOT yesterday which is a shame, but one of the MOT major defects was a little puzzling

• Front Tyre(s) with different structures are fitted across the same axle (5.2.3 (c))

Initially I thought this meant the tyres were different widths (e.g. 195/50r17 and 205/45r17) but thats not it at all. I'm fairly sure he's not running a crossply on one of them! This is a very long way away from the worst major defect on the list so is a fairly moot point but wondered if anyone can shed any light on what the issue is in laymans terms?

MOT garage is the same one I take all my cars to and they are entirely fair, I wasn't surprised by the fail (though he was). I suspect they weren't overly impressed by the knee-deep litter, wet clothes from early 2020 and roving mould on all the upholstery, and this may have made them a little stricter than normal. I'd just not seen this actual defect before?

 

 

[Sh'Eds]

54 minutes ago, Stanky said:

My brother-in-law's Fiesta Zetec S (2006) catastrophically failed its MOT yesterday which is a shame, but one of the MOT major defects was a little puzzling

• Front Tyre(s) with different structures are fitted across the same axle (5.2.3 (c))

Initially I thought this meant the tyres were different widths (e.g. 195/50r17 and 205/45r17) but thats not it at all. I'm fairly sure he's not running a crossply on one of them! This is a very long way away from the worst major defect on the list so is a fairly moot point but wondered if anyone can shed any light on what the issue is in laymans terms?

MOT garage is the same one I take all my cars to and they are entirely fair, I wasn't surprised by the fail (though he was). I suspect they weren't overly impressed by the knee-deep litter, wet clothes from early 2020 and roving mould on all the upholstery, and this may have made them a little stricter than normal. I'd just not seen this actual defect before?

 

 

Is one a winter tyre and one a summer?

[richardmorris]

as I was going to post mail at work today saw a superficiality nice 2002  jag 4 litre v8 at fairoaks airport for sale. Blue, cream leather, new mot and 74000miles. ££4950 I think. Forgot to get the reg so will look again tomorrow for the mot history. Bonnet needed a polish or paint though.