The new news 24 thread

[richardmorris]

7 minutes ago, Sunny Jim said:

Discovered a surprise visitor at work this morning.

Gave me quite a fright when I switched the lights on and it flew overhead. Is it a tawny?

I’d agree.

[FiatPhil]

Some pictures from this Sundays Chearsley car show:

[vulgalour]

That's quite the tidemark on that A40 Sports.

[AnnoyingPentium]

Stumbled across these on my almost weekly walk around the grounds of Dumfries House. These pictures were taken with the Mavica potatocam.

[Rust Collector]

My fiancé’s Clio was due an MOT so I took it in today.

Boo!

Yay!

Surprised about the tyre as they looked alright when they went back on this Summer. It will be going onto winters soon so not really an issue, plus I’ve got 4 spare Summer tyres for it in the garage as I’m a hoarder well prepared. Either way, she’s happy to get another year’s motoring for £35.

My Insight goes in for a ticket tomorrow (what fucking idiot managed to time it that both daily drivers have their MOT at the same time?! Oh…) and if it fails then I’m definitely justified in buying another BX that actually works plus a Trabant that doesn’t because reasons.

[wuvvum]

Yesterday was not a good day.  I got up bright and early (by my standards) and went out to have a crack at doing some more jobs on the Maxus.  After spending some time trying, and once again failing, to persuade either the bottom ball joint or the track rod end to come free, I decided to go underneath and have a go at cleaning up the inner sill where it needs welding.  I then noticed a small hole in the very back of the inner sill on the edge of the wheelarch.  I poked at it and it quickly became a bigger hole.  Big enough in fact to stretch part way behind the outrigger.  So it's now going to need two bits of welding rather than just the one, and the "new" bit I've found is on a curve so it's going to be more complicated to do.

I couldn't do a lot about that so I decided to have a crack at the brake pipe.  This did not go well.  The union where the pipe goes into the flexi was rusted solid, and just rounded off when I tried to undo it.  It didn't help that access is spectacularly shit - the metal pipes go up between two crossmembers and then loop back downwards to join to the flexi, so it's impossible to get any decent sized tools in there.  Stupid bit of design.

At one point during my efforts to get the union to undo I noticed brake fluid dripping out.  Initially I thought I'd managed to loosen the union but actually it was the brake pipe that had snapped and was pissing fluid out.  So I then had to run around like a twat undoing the brake pipe at the front of the van (which fortunately came apart relatively easily) and plugging the pipe so the master cylinder didn't empty itself of fluid.

I was getting extremely pissed off with the van by then, so I brought the newly acquired C5 round to the house and gave it a good hoover out and wipe down.  I then drove it to Norwich, and on the way back I got a phone call from my mate who I'd swapped the Dodge Caliber with for the Citroën, telling me that the Dodge was fucked.  So I went round there, we swapped back and I headed for home in the Caliber.  He wasn't wrong.  There was no boost whatsoever, the turbo was making a strange rattling noise, and after about a mile it was chucking out so much white smoke that I couldn't see the road behind me.  Fortunately the roads were fairly quiet being Sunday night, but the few cars I did encounter coming the other way all had to brake as they got past me because they couldn't see where they were going.  The car would just about manage 50 on the flat, eventually. 

My mate had added some oil as it was below the minimum on the dipstick, and I chucked another half a litre or so in to bring it up to where it should be - in the 12-mile journey home, it had used all that and most of the rest of what was in the sump, and the oil pressure light started coming on a couple of miles from home.  It got me back, by some miracle, but the back of the car is now covered in oil droplets and there's a puddle of oil under the exhaust where it's dripped out.

Removemycar are going to give me £385 for it as scrap, which is quite a lot less than it owes me but there you go.  I'm officially done with modern* diesels.

Today went slightly better - I managed to persuade the brake pipe union on the van to come apart, and I also found another union which I hadn't spotted before halfway down a crossmember, which means I only have to replace 4' of pipe rather than the full 16' I'd initially thought.  In fact as luck would have it I had an offcut of copper brake pipe exactly the right length, so I'm going to make it up and fit it tomorrow and the van should at least then be mobile again...

[High Jetter]

26 minutes ago, Rust Collector said:

My fiancé’s Clio was due an MOT so I took it in today.

3 hours ago, FiatPhil said:

Some pictures from this Sundays Chearsley car show:

 

What's that?

[bigfella2]

Wuvvum I would deffo Invest in a half decent proper brake spanner for this kind of work, using a regular spanner as you've seen just rounds stuff off most of the time.

But as you've found if the pipe and the union are seized you just can't win. No posh spanner will fix that.

[wuvvum]

11 minutes ago, bigfella2 said:

Wuvvum I would deffo Invest in a half decent proper brake spanner for this kind of work, using a regular spanner as you've seen just rounds stuff off most of the time.

But as you've found if the pipe and the union are seized you just can't win. No posh spanner will fix that.

I have a brake pipe spanner.  It wouldn't go over the nut  - there was so much rust on it that what should have been a 10mm hex was more like 10.5mm.  I'd hammered the 10mm open spanner onto it to try and knock the rust off so I could fit the brake pipe spanner on.  (It didn't work.)

[RoverFolkUs]

On 9/30/2022 at 11:13 PM, High Jetter said:

25 miles for brekkie? Nah, I'll brave the kitchen.

I know someone that drove 100 miles for a milkshake!

[RoverFolkUs]

On 10/2/2022 at 9:43 PM, HillmanImp said:

At Angmering today apparently. 

 

No idea how accurate this is. 

 

Nothing surprises me about that place any more.. they must be closing down permanently soon, at least I thought they were supposed to be

[wuvvum]

58 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

What's that?

Jensen 541.

[JakeT]

My daily rattler (2005 330i touring) went for test this morning. Fortunately…

 

 

Winter tyres are going on in a few weeks, so these ones will go come spring time. Looks like I need to get the wire wheel and Vactan out, though. 13,000 miles this year is okay considering I’ve not been commuting this year either. Hopefully 200,000 next year.

[Rust Collector]

The Insight has been dropped at the MOT station. Results should be in around lunchtime. When collecting the Clio yesterday I discovered that the workshop manager worked at the same garage as me and left just before I joined, but as a result we have some mates in common - small world.

If the Insight fails on anything finicky then I will hit the nuclear purchase button on something as we will be at non-functional car numbers that have not been seen since the last time the fleet got up to about 18 cars of varying treachery.

[goosey]

New wheels arrived for my sons Suzuki Jimny, as we have converted the rear brakes to discs the original wheels wouldn’t fit 

[Rust Collector]

Bollocks!!!

That's 2 years it's passed with a rear fog lamp that doesn't work 😅 Now how am I going to justify more purchases?!

 

[Bren]

Had a trip to Asda. Needed some bits - saw some decent alloy wheel cleaner for £7.

However I then thought about when I would get chance to use it - it is passing down here.

I put the wheel cleaner back and bought three bottles of lager instead.

[camryv6]

6 minutes ago, Bren said:

Had a trip to Asda. Needed some bits - saw some decent alloy wheel cleaner for £7.

However I then thought about when I would get chance to use it - it is passing down here.

I put the wheel cleaner back and bought three bottles of lager instead.

Did that clean the wheels ?

[bunglebus]

I often find amusing things like this at my mum's 

[beko1987]

Rules 4, 5 and 7 are a bit defunct now 😂😢

(Thame branch closed a while ago) 

[Sunny Jim]

22 hours ago, Sunny Jim said:

Discovered a surprise visitor at work this morning.

Gave me quite a fright when I switched the lights on and it flew overhead. Is it a tawny?

Look who's back. I've been told it's a young male tawny likely looking for a home. Plan is to work out where he's getting in, put up a nesting box and try and encourage him to use it. Any tips gratefully received!

[stuboy]

Splashed out on some ht leads for the v6 as forum suggest to try this ..

[stuboy]

19 hours ago, RoverFolkUs said:

I know someone that drove 100 miles for a milkshake!

#autoalex #carthrottle

 

alex's love for..

[RoverFolkUs]

1 hour ago, stuboy said:

Splashed out on some ht leads for the v6 as forum suggest to try this ..

A coil wouldn't go amiss for a hesitation issue. And the set of plugs if they haven't been done for a while. 

Depends how far you want to go with parts darts though 

[stuboy]

14 minutes ago, RoverFolkUs said:

A coil wouldn't go amiss for a hesitation issue. And the set of plugs if they haven't been done for a while. 

Depends how far you want to go with parts darts though

done them...

[trigger]

The Volvo went tonight 

So last week I got it back from my welder and used my time of work striking wisely by priming the patches, seam sealing and undersealing them all (the inner sill had a small hole as did the spare wheel well) I then painted the sill Rover Hurricane Grey as that was a good match and waxoyled it all. 

I put the car on ebay Sunday evening and by Monday morning I had over a 1000 views and 105 watches! I ended up getting £3300 for it from a chap in Somerset on the promise I'd put a years mot on it today, which I did. 

Thankfully it was a clean pass so I spent a hour heading the 5 miles home in the grit locked traffic, I did see a 340 in the traffic mind

This now leaves me a little more space and some spare cash to get the Capri finished off, hopefully that will be done soon too. 

[SiC]

45 minutes ago, trigger said:

little more space 

I wish my garage was that empty. Where do you store your tools?!

[gm]

a panicked phone call from mother gm this evening "the car won't start, it stalled as I was parking and it's now stuck blocking someone else in"

I grabbed some tools and jumped in the mazda

on previous occasions, the problem has been that I had been driving the car and moved the seat back, she forgot to move it forward so wasn't pressing the clutch down far enough which is required for the engine to start (all vauxhalls are shite etc)

however this time this was not the problem - a quick check showed a feeble 11.9v, lucky I brought the jump leads. 

reversing the mx5 into position (both cars have the battery in the boot, quite handy as her car was nose in) and a boost was applied - fired up first time  

so a suspect battery then.

I followed her home and checked the voltage again, still only 12.0v 

the car is coming up for it's 6th birthday and is on the original battery so not unreasonable

I take it this is a type 012 ? (sticking the reg into ecp gives 012, 063 or 096 as options)

I see it is still showing a green indicator - are they to be trusted ? I'll get her a new one anyway, she is 76 so can do without the worry

 

 

[trigger]

48 minutes ago, SiC said:

I wish my garage was that empty. Where do you store your tools?!

Ah there all the other side! 

If anyone is interested the Capri is plodding along, it's now running with a new Weber carb fitted, the brakes are currently being gone though, rebuilt the calipers, fitted new pads etc, had a mare with thr new hoses as they are a different thread to the originals and managed to strip the thread whilst doing up the nut 🤦‍♂️

Also bashed the bumpers straight again and repainted them today, quite pleased with how good they came out

Still not looking forwards to sorting that shit strut plate out

A friend came good with a pair of headrests for £20

Because priorities I got a dealer sticker of DMB on the back and have a new front plate on order from Retro Plates

So finish brakes, fit bumpers, paint alloys, fit new tyres and it should be close to the road again! 

[Ghosty]

Type R's getting a set of Pilot Sport 4S tomorrow after work. 

I've also ordered new front dampers, top mounts/bearings, spark plugs, and a washer pump for it, and popped out to Halfords for new Bosch AeroTwins (they were cheapest for them) which were fitted in pretty much seconds. 

That was the best part of £1000.