The new news 24 thread

[IronStar]

10 minutes ago, LightBulbFun said:

im afraid not, there might "off road only" high wattage versions you could get, but the rectangular sealed beam was produced purely because of fickle car designers and consumers, optically speaking a round reflector/lens is most efficient, so for serious performance applications thats all you will see, so theres no silly Aircraft landing lamp you can put in the place of a US rectangular sealed beam

 

honestly thats one of the things I find most perplexing about LED headlights, as I have demonstrated, theres no reason, one cannot have stupid bright incandescent/halogen head lamps, if you wanted to, but the reason we dont, is for practical safety reasons, the reason H4 bulbs are what they are is a trade off between performance for the person behind the wheel, vs not glaring everyone else coming the other way off the road

 

so I have genuinely been quite perplexed as to why modern LED head lights have been allowed to be so bad in that regard, theres no reason they *have* to be that bad, and yet here we are...

 

Well, whilst you can run stupidly powerful incandescent lights, they are rated for XXX W per bulb, which requires both much thicker wiring, much more powerful alternators and results in tons of heat. Modern LED lights are 15-20W, even for the super modern super bright matrix lights and associated electronics. I would also argue that optical construction of lights themselves evolved. I’m old enough to remember just how much better the lights became with the advent of projectors vs standard reflective headlights. 
There’s a very uncomfortable bit of automotive history, where we switched to these ultrabrights, but the technology not to blind other road users wasn’t there yet. Switching to matrix realistically alleviates this issue through electronic wizardry. I really wouldn’t like to be one owning these after a minor bump that takes out the 4 digit priced light cluster, or in 15 years when electronic gubbins start failing. 

[JakeT]

1 hour ago, LightBulbFun said:

if you look at the specifications you will see they are no brighter (1000/1600 lumens stated) then a regular H4 bulb and they are a worse 6000K

this is where old sealed beam head lights get a leg up here, those are themselves a standardised size/form-factor, the 7 inch sealed beam in Proper lightbulb terms is PAR56 and so with a small* electrical system upgrade, @IronStar could for "experimental purposes" fit a pair of these 4541 450W Aircraft landing light lamps to his mini with no body modifications needed at all  

Thank you for out bulbing me, and actually reading the data sheet. I was thinking about buying a pair of H7s next time I am in Germany but won’t now. Also not helping myself because I fit whatever shit H7 I have to hand anyway when I need bulbs!

[EyesWeldedShut]

9 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

so I have genuinely been quite perplexed as to why modern LED head lights have been allowed to be so bad in that regard, theres no reason they *have* to be that bad, and yet here we are...

Came back through rural Wales in the dark last night with my white stick (double H7s each side) coping just fine in the wet - bugger me though, stuff coming the other way (especially with auto-dip) was truly dazzling.
Whoever tested/approved some of those maybe just did it an urban setting? Some are really dire.
Quite nice when you see the 'yellow' tinge of halogens coming towards you and know that, even on main beam, they're less blinding that some mahoosive LED'd SUV on dipped.

[Fat_Pirate]

12 hours ago, Snake Charmer said:

You OK though? 

I'm fine thanks, I'm made of a pliable meat-style material which largely protects me from my regular shenanigans.  And if it ever doesn't, I reckon I'd cook up lovely on a BBQ.

[Momentary Lapse Of Reason]

19 hours ago, grogee said:

there's a physical flap that cuts the beam

 

16 hours ago, grogee said:

the light source is a) shuttered for dip beam and

I was somewhat surprised to see that the solenoid operated headlamp dipping system has made a return.

Back in the early 1930s the headlamp reflector was moved by a solenoid to dip the beam of the single element lamp.

[grogee]

2 hours ago, Momentary Lapse Of Reason said:

 

I was somewhat surprised to see that the solenoid operated headlamp dipping system has made a return.

Back in the early 1930s the headlamp reflector was moved by a solenoid to dip the beam of the single element lamp.

Aww, olden days. 

[chadders]

2 hours ago, Momentary Lapse Of Reason said:

 

I was somewhat surprised to see that the solenoid operated headlamp dipping system has made a return.

Back in the early 1930s the headlamp reflector was moved by a solenoid to dip the beam of the single element lamp.

I bet the cost of fixing or replacing it was a lot less than £4k or so, even allowing for inflation, and no coding would be needed.

[comfortablynumb]

Engage satnav

Disengage brain.

Who the hell would try to drive down the Broomway? 🤦

[Split_Pin]

Y0 @SRi05 your old Saab lives on!

 

[SRi05]

18 minutes ago, Split_Pin said:

Y0 @SRi05 your old Saab lives on!

 

 

Interesting! 

Looks like it sat without an MOT for a few months, just went through one a few days ago. Curious to see how he gets on with it. 

[C3C3]

 

Yeahhhhhh there was indeed quit a bit of swiss in the wheel wells. But now the scooby rat is rot free!

[Snake Charmer]

 

[beko1987]

I knew I kept my old battery for a reason* 

*Haven't been to the tip yet\might come in handy one day

Battery in a mates car died the other night on his wife as she tried to come home from work, which wasn't ideal. 

Grabbed my old battery out of the porch cupboard, stuck it on charge for a day and we fitted it after work tonight 

Car fired right up, was some old looking Exide that hadn't been off in a long while. Will do him until payday and maybe beyond, his car doesn't have a cold start issue that this battery just can't fight but I told him I'd not trust it for long.

Luckily a brand new Exide is 50 quid from tayna and that's probably what it'll get.

Also fired some brake cleaner into their astra:s front drivers seat belt buckle. Its not registering the seatbelt plugged in and bonging constantly (2017 flavour). Dunno if it's worked or not as we couldn't be arsed to go for a drive and check

[vulgalour]

It finally stopped raining for a day and the floor wasn't soaked from the rain of the days previous.  Got out and used up the last of my welding gas, made some progress on the Princess.

Still managing to find historic bodge after all these years.  Car has been on axle stands since June last year, this job and life in general has been pretty monstrous.  Keeping a positive outlook to survive, running out of welding gas isn't a problem, it's a sign of progress and achievement today and gets me a step closer to finishing this job.  I am undefeated, I shall persist, despite everything.

[Dyslexic Viking]

It's full winter here and it's starting to become a problem to find space to put the snow.

 

The large snow pile behind the barn where I have moved snow to with a wheel loader, it is about 1.5+ meters high and goes 10+ meters into the forest at that height all the way.

[Leyland Worldmaster]

2 hours ago, Dyslexic Viking said:

It's full winter here and it's starting to become a problem to find space to put the snow.

 

The large snow pile behind the barn where I have moved snow to with a wheel loader, it is about 1.5+ meters high and goes 10+ meters into the forest at that height all the way.

Do you make you tube videos? If not the building and scenery looks rather similar to one where a VW van was running in seriously low temperatures...

[alcyonecorporation]

not enough snow 

[Dyslexic Viking]

8 hours ago, Leyland Worldmaster said:

Do you make you tube videos? If not the building and scenery looks rather similar to one where a VW van was running in seriously low temperatures...

No I don't.

But white house with red barn is really common here. Same with the scenery.

[auntiemaryscanary]

4 hours ago, Dyslexic Viking said:

But white house with red barn is really common here. Same with the scenery

It's not common for the UK. I'm not saying become a full time YouTuber but I'd be interested, and I reckon others on here would too, on a video of the snow, property exteriors, tractors running etc even if it was just some footage from your phone. Wouldn't even need need a spoken commentary - a soundtrack of tractors running at -20°c would be perfect.

 

[Royale80]

Sorting out the spares for my Rover 75 and remembered I put three of these in the garage rafters 25 years ago. 

[Somerset Suffolk]

 Epic MOT failure ... at 198761  (just a broken rear spring ) should have spotted it prior to MOT test but hey ...

 

MOT cat 

 

easy to do but pissing down at the moment (still ) in Somerset, so job for tomorrow 

[Leyland Worldmaster]

Alison passed her MOT with no advisory notes, innit.😎

Edit: with almost 295,000 miles on, innit! 

[Somerset Suffolk]

4 minutes ago, Leyland Worldmaster said:

Alison passed her MOT with no advisory notes, innit.😎

Get you with your MOT pass ! did your test centre have a cat though  ? ! 😊😆

[Leyland Worldmaster]

1 hour ago, Somerset Suffolk said:

Get you with your MOT pass ! did your test centre have a cat though  ? ! 😊😆

No it lacks pusscats... 🤣🤣🤣

[RayMK]

My 2017 Mitsubishi Mirage Juro CVT, 56K miles, also passed today with just an advisory on cracking of the original Yokohamas on the rear and front discs worn/corroded but  not affecting strength or function.  I was planning to replace the rear tyres in the next week or two, so asked them to fit new Nexens to match the recentish front tyres. 

[Snake Charmer]

,00

These can fuck off into obsturity and scrap yards quick as with their Nanny aids. Cunting thing.

[HairySteve]

The wall art in my Amsterdam hotel is Autoshite themed.

[Momentary Lapse Of Reason]

8 hours ago, auntiemaryscanary said:

It's not common for the UK. I'm not saying become a full time YouTuber but I'd be interested, and I reckon others on here would too, on a video of the snow, property exteriors, tractors running etc even if it was just some footage from your phone. Wouldn't even need need a spoken commentary - a soundtrack of tractors running at -20°c would be perfect.

 

Try King of Obsolete on YouTube for snow, property exteriors and various diverse machinery running!

Even does Grumpy Old Git to a high standard  😀

https://www.youtube.com/@kingofobsolete4789/videos

[Joey spud]

 

Monthly Jam night in The Chequers and for added win on the big screen Arsenal bottled it against lowly Wolves to add to the happy atmosphere.

Also the bloke on the drums had just passed this audition to join the Counterfeit Beatles and the bass player was left handed and playing a Hofner violin bass. Spooky or what.

[wuvvum]

The Rover has failed the MOT on the handbrake again, as it does nearly every year, although I did try it out the other day and it seemed to be working OK but evidently the brake rollers decreed otherwise.  This year only one side is bad so I'm hoping I can get away with tweaking the adjuster on the shoes - keeping my fingers crossed for some dry weather this weekend so I can give it a go.  

Everything else was fine, and it still hasn't needed any welding, which for a 23-year-old Rover with nearly 200K on the clock is pretty decent going I reckon.