The new news 24 thread

[vulgalour]

I know when the Polo was on tow when I broke down and my battery ran flat so none of my lights worked in the rain through the middle of Sheffield at rush hour nobody seemed to know what it meant when I stuck my right arm out the window to signal right, so I dread to think what chaos I would've caused if I'd been using other signals for slowing down and encouraging people to pass me and whatnot. That was the day we found that my friend's new 3 cylinder deisel Polo was a great little tow car, but that my friend was crap at towing. To be fair, he'd never towed a car and I'd never been towed before, so it was a learning experience for all involved.

[M'coli]

Stick your right arm out for a right turn, wave it up and down to stop (like in cycling proficiency, which I didn't do) and whirl it anti-clockwise for turning left.

 

My dad fried the electrics of the stop-gap* Renault 12 in Glasgow one night and I drove it home the next day using hand signals.

 

 

*I'd written off his Cortina Crusader estate at 2mph because the coil was shagged and arced to earth, stalling the engine as I tried to pull out from a blind junction as some twat came steaming around the corner...

[Albert Ross]

Helped a good friend out to day, his Ex has been using his car to ferry the kids about, but rang him the other day to say it wasn't driving... Turns out she's fooked the clutch. He rang me. He has a 2 post ramp at his engineering firm (He owns it with his brother, but they're not too mechanical, just engineers.....) Well it's a Vectra V6 3.0 Diesel. The clutch, flywheel and slave cylinder cost him around £650!!! I got there this morning around 9:30, we unbolted the ramp from the floor and repositioned it for a better place to work, and I got home around 9pm. It's a heavy box alright, and bloody awkward to get to the ancillary bits that need to come off. But he recompensed me nicely, and I would work for him any day..... Still. I'm now sat at home with beer.

[barrett]

Just got back from a fairly full-on (12 hour round trip) tat collection mission with Mr. G. Cox of this parish. A full thread will follow in due course, but here's a little teaser shot of the new purchase in action. It's very cool

Vanity mirror? by barrogance, on Flickr

[Cavcraft]

The Corsa (spazbox one) has departed Cavcraft this very eventide. I shall miss that little car for a number of reasons, none of them bad.

 

Next to go (hopefully) will be the Honda and Aldi. I'm trying to be sensible by having one modern, reliable* and economical car (lad's Corsa C 1.0) something interesting (TR7) and then something irrational, probably a stupid last minute bid on something on eBay just because it seems cheap.

[The Moog]

Swapped the Camper van for 420 pictures of the queen. Makes me very happy.

 

Bloke and wife came to see it. She was obviously trying to play spot the fault to knock some wonga off. Wasnt having any of it, and I think once she realised that she relaxed and was smiling when she left.

 

Sad to see it gone but glad got the right amount of dosh for it.

[cort16]

I got the new door fitted to the SD1 today. Was a bit of a pain getting it all to line up plus the central locking actuator and window regulator had to be transplanted from the old door so it took me a couple of hours. Well worth it though as the old door was a bit of a bodge. I spoke to the painter tonight and it should hopefully see paint in the next couple of weeks then I can maybe get the bloody thing back on the road!

[wuvvum]

This afternoon I decided to swap the tyres over front to rear on the Rover of Doom - it has become quite annoying to drive in the wet as any kind of attempt to use the throttle enthusiastically results in nowt but a load of wheelspin. Putting all that torque down onto a damp road through 175x14s that are almost on the wear markers is asking a bit much. Hopefully having more tread will help, although having slightly wider tyres of a make I've actually heard of would probably help even more, so I might have to fork out for some part-worns at some point soon.

 

Then I took the Innocenti down to my garage - I've decided it's going to stay there until I can find a headlight and some wheel studs - two of the studs on the NSF snapped off and I've "fixed" it by removing the spacer behind the wheel, thus giving about 5mm of thread - not ideal, and I wouldn't trust it long distance. The studs are clamped behind a disc that bolts onto the hub - the four 14mm bolts holding the thing together came out easily enough, but the disc is obviously rusted solid onto the hub, so I've soaked it in WD40 and will go back down there with a mallet tomorrow to see if I can persuade it to come off.

 

While I was at the garage I took the Alfa 75 to the jet wash and then took a few more photos of it for the advert. Then I drove home in the Renault 6, which had been sat in the garage since October. That car always amazes me - obviously it needed a jump start (although there was life left in the battery, just not enough to start it), but everything was free and the tyres were all inflated, so I just poured in a gallon of petrol and drove it the 15 miles home (via the jet wash). Unfortunately the bird shite that's been sat on the bonnet since the winter appears to have left a permanent mark on the paint, but then the car was never immaculate anyway so it's not the end of the world. As always, the car felt like a dragster after driving the Innocenti. I really do need to get the exhaust sorted though.

[cms206]

Leaving my mate's this evening the Senator developed an interesting new trick in suddenly allowing free movement of the adjustable steering which had been buggered since I picked the car up. Once I had come to a halt and cocked about I have no only managed to get the column to lock again, I've even managed to get the adjustment working again.

 

 

I had a cake to celebrate when I got home. It was delicious.

[cort16]

Well I stuck the 740i on ebay for a BIN of £400 and it sold. No e-mail from ebay though, which is weird and no contact from the buyer so we'll see what happens.

I'm hoping I don't get a "Sorry M8 my parrot pecked the buy it now button" type message later.

[cobblers]

I wired a leisure* battery up in my t25 the other day. It's not an actual leisure battery, it's just the battery out of the golf I broke for the engine, but it fits under the passenger seat nicely.

 

I want to run the stereo, interior lights, water pump and a couple of other bits off it, and cos I don't want the van going up in flames they all need fusing on their own circuits. Most people use loads of inline fuseholders which looks a complete bollocks, and with them all floating round you end up pulling the wires out of the crimp terminals and stuff over time. Plus, they are about £1.50 a piece and I need 6 circuits!

Instead I got a little 6 way fusebox thing, which looks a lot neater and was only £3 off ebay. Unfortunately it smells quite strongly of ammonia or something, but I'm hoping the smell goes away or is covered up by my overnight farts.

I was feeling mega OCD so I dug out a matching set of fuses from the big bag of fuses and relays I've pocketed from scrapyards over the last decade or so.

 

It turned out quite neat, and now I can just leave the lights in the van and the stereo on for as long as I want, and the van will deffo start fine in the morning (well, any not starting issue won't have been due to me flattening the battery)

 

 

 

I used a cheapo eBay automatic split charge relay since I didn't fancy splicing a wiring into the alternator light feed and doing things that way, You can also use a normal ignition feed instead, but again it's not ideal. These auto things detect when the voltage goes above 13.5v ish on the main battery to know when the vehicle is running before closing the relay to connect them together and charge the second battery.

 

They're a bit weedy and often blow the 25A fuses when fitted in a camper van and not in a car with a caravan like they're really designed for - with the caravan they have a 400 yard length of trailer cable and a couple of damp and rusty 6n connectors between the two batteries which adds a bit of resistance and keeps the charge current a bit lower. I've got about 3 feet of proper 12AWG cable between the two batteries, and with a full main battery and a flat leisure battery the majority of the alternators power will go into the leisure battery, which is probably 65/70A or something, so it's a miracle they work at all in a van really. Probing around the relay I noticed it had a second switched circuit for a fridge, which I just used in parallel to the charge circuit, so I've got two 25A feeds which should be OK. In true shite fashion I used some wire and inline fuse holders that I robbed from the golf as well, so the whole affair cost about £19.

 

I forgot to buy any kind of switch to turn the lights on and off though so until I order one, you just have to slide the seat forward and pull the fuse out which I reckon could kill the mood if I manage to trick some bird into the back of the van for a wriggle so I'll get that sorted cos I need all the help I can get.

[cort16]

I forgot to buy any kind of switch to turn the lights on and off though so until I order one, you just have to slide the seat forward and pull the fuse out which I reckon could kill the mood if I manage to trick some bird into the back of the van for a wriggle so I'll get that sorted cos I need all the help I can get.

 

You wanna come into my van and pull my fuse love?

 

[ashmicro]

MOT for the Rover tomorrow, so I treated him to some new number plates as the dealer originals were scratched to bejaysus

 

[worldofceri]

Spent some quality time this afternoon removing the horrible transparent rubberised coating from the knobs and buttons of TV2's heater control panel with methylated spirit. It now looks the best it has done during my ownership of the car:

 

 

Quite why Volvo decided to coat every switch, knob and button inside the series 1 C/S/V70 with said transparent rubberised coating is beyond me, as it doesn't enhance the look of said switches, knobs and buttons, is easily marked by fingernails, etc. and is impossible to clean when it gets dirty. The dashboard switches are next

 

Nice tip. I'll try that on my S40. One day. Probably.

[wuvvum]

I had a fiddle with the Talbot this afternoon - since sitting virtually unused all winter it was refusing to idle or run on a light throttle - it was a little odd, as the first 25% or so of the pedal's travel would do nothing at all, but get beyond that point and suddenly it would pick up and run fine from there to full throttle. I had a feeling something was blocked in the primary choke so the engine was only getting fuel through when the secondary choke opened up, but from what little I could see looking down into the bowels of the carb both throttles appeared to be moving more or less simultaneously, so I couldn't tell which side was which. So I whipped out both main jets, blew through them and gave them a wipe down, then put everything back together, and miraculously (and touch wood) it appears to have worked. It's still not perfect as the idle is rather lumpy, but at least it will now idle and I can drive it at town speeds without kangarooing.

 

I also got #1 Spacy running today. It appears that the fuel taps on all three bikes are b0rked - one the outlet pipe has snapped off, another is blocked solid and the third will only allow petrol to flow back up through it to the tank, and not from the tank to the carb. So I rigged up a temporary "tank" using a plastic funnel shoved into the fuel pipe, connected the jump leads and hit the starter button, and it fired pretty much straight away - Hondas are usually good like that. It sounded healthy enough, drive appears to be present and according to the voltmeter it seems to be charging, so all I need to do now is solve the fuel delivery problem and buy a battery and it should be ready to rumble. Which is a relief, as I had no idea whether the only carb of the three which wasn't seized to buggery was going to be entirely gunged up with stale petrol, and I couldn't take it to bits to find out as the screws holding it all together were fecked.

 

Also found a NOS rear silencer for the Renault 6 on the Bay, which is good as the one on there really is beyond repair.

[Skizzer]

Did bugger all on the cars today as it's peeing down, in tradional bank holiday fashion. Yesterday, though, I extracted the starter motor out of the Rover and ordered a solenoid repair kit, so that should get sorted next weekend if the rain stops. Downside is that, having disconnected the battery for obvious reasons, I hope I can find the radio code or I'll be condemned to wafting in silence. That would be a shame, as the (standard) sound system is really rather fine.

 

Ran the Golf yesterday too, since I hadn't started it for many weeks: fired first time and ran pretty smoothly. Good old Golf. Did some cleaning up and freeze-and-releasing on the front hubs but ran out of time before finishing the brake disc/pad replacement: also on the slate for next weekend.

[skattrd]

B-I-L just returned the car he borrowed for the weekend and we had a chat about the Mitsubishi, fingers crossed it'll be back on the road by the end of the week. I do like the fact that Mitsubishi use a decent parts bin and even though the car is quite rare most of the mechanical bits are easy to find. I wish parts for my Alfa/Renault were as easy to get hold of.

[RoadworkUK]

Enjoyed helping* my Dad to fit a new serpentine belt to his 540i. Not the hardest job in the world, though, and I can see myself taking the car on in a few years when he decides to be a sensible little old man and get something foolproof and economical....

[skattrd]

Bolliocks, I spoke too soon. My mechanic (aka BIL) has informed me he cannot get hold of a head gasket set for the Mitsubishi, everywhere says they're on back order with no eta

Does anyone know a good Mitusbishi dealer which has a large stock of bits I could try?

 

Last resort is a 4g63 head gasket from an evo type thing ... apparently they're quite similar to the 4g64 found in my Sapporo

[dollywobbler]

BX 'Safari' now has MOT! An advisory for corrosion at the back but otherwise fine. Happy!

[cobblers]

Bugger me, plus gas is really good shit!

 

I'd got an exhaust to remove from my old t25 engine and the studs etc looked pretty corroded. I was about 80% sure I'd end up snapping at least 3 or 4 off. I wazzed some halfords "penetrating spray" over them a few days ago, came to them this morning and they didn't really want to move at all. I really didn't want to snap any studs off in the block cos a bloke is coming to buy the engine tonight (for strong money) so I didn't really swing on them too much.

 

I had a dig round and found a 25 year old tin of plus gas, so I dribbled a bit all over my nuts. Once I was done with that, I put some plus gas on the exhaust fasteners (ho ho ho). Left it 20 minutes to do something, and when I got a spanner on, they all absolutely flew off. They weren't even tight all way down the crusty thread on the studs like usual, just wound off with my fingers. Great success!

 

I'm going to buy a big great bottle of it and put it on every fastener I go near in future. It even smells nice.

 

I guess this is where someone tells me they reformulated it ten years ago cos the EU made harvesting kippers tears illegal, and now it's rubbish.

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

Doing a few little jobs to tidy up the Herald before its MOT. Spent a day dicking about with the bonnet to reduce the panel gaps from 21mm to about 10mm.

 

Let me just remind you that the Herald's magnificent accessibility isn't limited to the engine and gearbox - the suspension and brakes are pretty easy to get to as well.

 

[ashmicro]

Six out of Six!! Rover just passed the MOT this evening. The tester said "That's like a new car, sir. Lovely condition"

 

 

This hateful little green shitbox was in front of me going in:

 

 

Failed on 3 broken springs and a tyre at least (that's all I overheard). SCRAP IT!

[Shep Shepherd]

Just had TV2's aircon re-gassed at my local Formula 1 Autocentre, as although the system was in working order, it hadn't been as cold as I'd liked for a couple of months.

 

Now it's super-cool.

 

Best £45 I've spent in a long time

[barefoot]

Renewed RAC for another year today.

 

Yes Sir, can you just CONFIRM your membership number?

Yep, go ahead

Can you just CONFIRM your address?

Yep, hit me

 

Five times I was asked to confirm something that she wouldn't tell me.

 

I actually said that I didn't understand what she wanted me to do or say.

Then I asked if English was her first language as I'd never heard it spoken like that before.

 

I'm getting a bit fed up with this & don't start me on 'train station'

 

Anyone have an approach that works?

[dollywobbler]

We were meant to head up to Snowdonia today to meet a load of 2CVers who are visiting all five capitals of Britain and Ireland. They've only got Cardiff to go now!

 

However, we got 8 miles down the road and this happened.

 

The silver Focus (just visible the other side of the tree) took the impact on its bonnet. Momentum carried it through and it's a credit to modern A pillars that the occupants escaped entirely unharmed. The car's wrecked. We got drenched clearing the road, using a disc cutter and that Land Rover as well as muscle power. We'd almost got it clear by the time the Police arrived. Kudos to those who helped. Piss off to those who just sat in their cars and looked impatient!

 

It's seriously nasty out - had to use high mode on the suspension to get through some flooding and all the rivers are very high.

[Cavcraft]

Photo fail there Ian, think the end bracket is missing...

 

[Cavcraft]

I don't know if bikes count but here's my latest toy (not my actual bike but you get the picture, arf arf) that I can't sodding ride at the moment due to a knackered back.

 

 

Cannot believe how light these things are, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if the two wheels/tyres alone on my mountain bike weigh more than the total of this thing. Itching to get out on it and give it some welly, reckon it'll be SRSLY KWK plus I'm going to need to get used to the whacky gearchange and don't think it's going to be easy.

[tonedepear]

Oooh. Priddy.

[Cheggers]

Nice

 

You'll be amazed how quickly the gear changes become second nature (even if I am a Campag man )