The new news 24 thread

[HMC]

Fleet news-

 

The Range Rover has had it's decomposing headlining pinned up. Repaired the gearbox oil cooler with a jubilee clip and some Merc w123 heater hose. Im telling myself these are tempory " fixes" before I find more time/ money.

 

Alfa 155- over cooling sorted with a replacement thermostat, sits bang on at 90 rather than never passing 70; whilst I was messing about with the cooling system I flushed and replaced it, rusty water out and the good stuff back in.

 

Also another member of the Italianjob clan appears to have a liking for ageing Alfa Romeos.....

[RobT]

Fixed the Mondeo that was refusing to start yesterday. It doesn't appear to like damp conditions so i broke out my can of Damp Start and walloped it everywhere. Seems fine now. I thought about cleaning it for tomorrow's shite meet but couldn't be arsed, so went indoors for tea and cake instead.

[stuboy]

Reverse lights are pants on the mondeo so bought some

[saucedoctor]

Jaaaag can haz MoT. Neville the Welding Elf did a good job (I asked the tester what he thought of the welding: "That's well done, that.")

 

Wee bit of water in one of the rear lamps, I must investigate a new seal for it.

[Jazoli]

Reverse lights are pants on the mondeo so bought some

Going to do that to the focus too, tempted to wire a switch to get revenge on foglight and HID twats.

[dollywobbler]

The caliper for the XM arrived on Friday, so I hoped to have be able to quickly fit it this morning. Quick wasn't the word though, as the caliper came complete with carrier, and the slider's allen recess had rounded. I had a quick go at wrenching it off with molegrips but no dice. So, I just smacked the slider through the caliper and pondered how annoying it is to pay postage for a lump of scrap metal. The carrier is no use at all.

 

I then had the fun* job of carefully removing the seals from the caliper on the car, to swap to the new caliper. I didn't bother swapping the copper bushes over so I hope it doesn't all go horribly wrong because of that. Lashings of the correct grease were applied and I could fit the new caliper.

 

Only the piston wouldn't wind back. Gah! So, I connected the brake line to the new caliper and used the XM's brake pressure to push the piston out. Couldn't see much wrong to be honest, but I gave the piston and bore a good clean and shoved the piston back in. Thankfully, it was now happy to wind back. With the caliper in place, I could then bleed the brakes, adjust up the handbrake, douse everything in electrical contact cleaner because I'm out of brake cleaner (it's rubbish to be honest) and go for a test drive. Took a while for the brake to clean up, so it was pulling to one side a bit, but a spirited drive had things working nicely, and I can even bring the car to a halt with the parking brake! Amazing. 

 

Sadly, I had to concede that the XM no longer feels like the fantastic hoon-mobile I thought it was. That sodding Honda is a pain in the arse. The XM feels like you have to turn the wheel at least 90 degrees before anything happens. It felt marvellous before the Prelude came along!

 

Speaking of which, after yesterday's filthy shenanigans, the Prelude got its second wash in a week. I've covered almost 500 miles in it since Tuesday.

 

[Skizzer]

Sadly, I had to concede that the XM no longer feels like the fantastic hoon-mobile I thought it was.

 

Number 23 please.

[twosmoke300]

Your lucky to still have a face in one piece - never test the resistance of an airbag . The 9v batt in the meter is usually enough to deploy it .

[twosmoke300]

Didn't someone post up an airbag post on a seat a minute ago ?

[cobblers]

I did, but I accidentally clicked post before I uploaded any of the images.

 

Ever since I had the steering wheel off the daily Ibiza I've had the airbag light on. I've been putting off fixing it cos getting the fucking airbag off is an absolute pain in the arse. There's two holes in the back of the steering wheel what you're supposed to poke a screwdriver into to release some spring clips. It looks dead easy but on my particular wheel it's like an hours work just fumbling round til the thing comes off.

Anyway I plugged it into FADGECOM and it said "Drivers airbag resistance too low" so I thought I might have trapped a wire or something.

Everything seemed OK. I took the airbag itself off and measured 0.0 ohms across the terminals.

I cursed at the sky cos this is a Cupra so the steering wheel is "rare" and I'd have to go to the dealers for a new airbag at £thousand

Then I thought I'd just take the airbag apart, maybe see what was wrong - perhaps the ignitor is a standard part I could get out of any old VW/Seat.

Dragged it inside and started tearing into it - yes, the ignitor is separate and a standard part:

But what do these little prongs in the socket do?

Oh that's right, they short the 2 pins out until the little back part of the plug is driven home. I presume to keep the terminals shorted until it's installed so you don't get them buggers being set off by static charges or something. Sneaky bastards.

Obviously I'd not pushed this in properly last time I put in.

Put the fucker back together properly this time, cleared the faults and LOOK MAW! NO LIGHT!

Feel like a bit of a plonker really, I like to consider myself fairly well versed in auto-electronics -I've got a bloody degree in it and work in the field, but in my defence buses don't have airbags.

[Sigmund Fraud]

That sodding Honda is a pain in the arse. The XM feels like you have to turn the wheel at least 90 degrees before anything happens. It felt marvellous before the Prelude came along!

 

The Honda Prelude... Designed exclusively* for bearded, eccentric motoring journalists :

 

 

[Lacquer Peel]

Setright advocated automatic transmissions too.

[Ghosty]

DW: welcome to the wonderful world of fully independent suspension.

[phil_lihp]

I can only say it handled better than my Volvo 940, but then again so do most things. Good fun to push around roundabouts but sadly I never got to take it round any decent A roads after the tyres were changed.

[Bobthebeard]

Have volunteered to do some electrical work in Hangar 42 at Blackpool airport. Home of the Lytham Spitfire team. This morning I was mostly gazing in awe at this lot:

 

 

Even got the chance to get inside the cockpit. To think that these were flown in battle by 18 year old lads was a humbling experience. Tiny cockpit with extremely limited forward vision on the ground. Amazing.

[dollywobbler]

DW: welcome to the wonderful world of fully independent suspension.

 

Eh? Every car I own has fully independent suspension! 

 

Speaking of which, here's another update. Got some time for Dyane tinkering at last! I have fitted one new barrel and piston. First time I've ever done it.

 

An essential tool for this job is a small screwdriver-type-thing that ends in a point. I think it came from a Christmas cracker. PERFECT for removing the circlip for the gudgeon pin. Amazing. 

 

I've had to stop now though. My mate Pete kindly honed the bores and then fitted the pistons. He has many tools I don't, including a ring compressor. You can just about expose enough piston to fit to the engine and keep the piston in the barrel. Worked one side, but while trying to fit the offside one, the sneaky piston crept out - just enough for the oil control ring to burst free. ARSE. 

 

Lacking a ring compressor or a suitably large jubilee clip, I'm a bit stuck for now. Shame, as I was toying with the idea of actually having that engine running today. 

[Lacquer Peel]

Does the Nippa have IRS? I'm surprised, though Japanese manufacturers used to put a lot of engineering into their cars, even small ones.

[dollywobbler]

Does the Nippa have IRS? I'm surprised, though Japanese manufacturers used to put a lot of engineering into their cars, even small ones.

 

Yup. Semi-trailing arm with coils I think. They've carefully engineered this ideal suspension system to feel exactly like a rubber-sprung Mini.

[Richard]

More "it's the same car for fuck's sake, why is it not made of the same bits?" tomfoolery today. The heater fan on the V70 is similar to the 850's but not similar enough to fit. Also sticking your hand down the heater intake while the fan is running is not smart.

[dollywobbler]

Huzzah! My mate who owns a Jeffery kit car (http://www.jeffreykitcar.co.uk/) and an Austin 3-Litre loaned me a ring compressor. ACHIEVEMENT!

 

Here's the amazing Christmas cracker tool. Something actually useful!

 

And here's my world of chaos. Hopefully I'll get chance next week to lap the cylinder heads and get them refitted (with new pushrod tube seals). Then it's a case of refitting the cowling, connecting everything up and hoping for the best.

[andy18s]

Rain kept off for today so managed to get a few jobs done

Fitted a Genuine Landrover dog guard into the D3,went in easily and is a substantial piece of kit.

The Rover had a wake up call as it's not been run since I brought it home New Years Eve.Started with no drama,and has been completely watertight in all the rain we've had

P38 has been having a few moments when starting on a few coldish mornings.Felt like a glow plug was a bit weak,causing a missfire for the 1st couple of seconds or so.

Turned out 1 of the injector leakback pipes had a split in it,allowing air to get in overnight

Replaced them all and things are back to normal.

Dragged the bike out and ran it up to temp.Not something I usually do but I had to move it in order to get the compressor out and top up various tyres

 

Not a bad day all in all,Iveco is the next thing to start on properly..

[The Moog]

Missus moog asked me to look at her civic today

 

1) exhaust is now blowing again. Suspect back box

 

2) burning smell - traced to rear right caliper.

 

3) lost power the other day - fuck knows, asked mystic Meg and she said same.

[BavarianRetro]

I DO like to see a tidy well organised work area. Makes me feel so much better about my chaos.

[dollywobbler]

It's a bloody disgrace. When the Dyane is finished, I really am going to have a proper clear out and tidy up. No, really. It's getting beyond ridiculous.

[Noel Tidybeard]

The Honda Prelude... Designed exclusively* for bearded, eccentric motoring journalists :

 

ljk_prelude.jpg

 

so thats what he looks like without his hat!

[wuvvum]

Went to the classic auction at Kings Lynn yesterday.  I ended up taking the Perodua - it acquitted itself remarkably well on the dual carriageway, although anything above about 75 it started to get blown around rather a lot by the wind / passing trucks etc.  As usual there was lots of hideously expensive stuff at the auction.  I fell in love with the little 360cc Daihatsu thing (Max?), but its estimate was about 5 times what I would have wanted to pay for it.  To be fair, although it was tatty as feck on the outside, it had only done 300 miles from new and the interior was immaculate.

 

Attempted a bit of fettling today.  I refitted the repaired intake pipe to the Golf.  I like to think it's improved the idling situation a bit - it's still uneven when the engine starts to warm up, but it didn't cut out.  There's a vacuum pipe running from the plastic intake pipe into the manifold which looks a bit knackered - I thought it was completely fecked but when I pulled it off the engine immediately died so it must be doing something.  I might try replacing it with a new bit of pipe (if I can find some the right diameter) and see if that helps any.  I also tried out the electric hood for the first time - it works fine, although I had a moment of panic when it didn't seem to want to come back up again - turns out the ignition lock just hadn't quite registered that the key was in, pushing the lock in slightly brought the hood mechanism to life.

 

The second job on the list was to free off the handbrake on the LDV - this was a fail.  I quite quickly isolated the source of the problem as being the pivot where the cable from the handbrake lever joins onto the rod that runs down to the back of the van.  Unfortunately, despite spraying everything copiously with grease and twatting the pivot arm back and forth with a hammer for fugging ages, it didn't seem to want to free up at all.  I ended up removing the assembly altogether and I've now got it soaking in diesel in the shed.

 

I had a quick bash at repairing the return pipe on the CX - by the time I got round to this I was already starting to lose the light.  I pulled the pipe out of the gaiter and blew into it, and it was clear.  So I put a dab of glue on it followed by a ring of Hylomar and reinserted it into its hole - I left the car up on the jack so the wheel didn't sink and start pushing fluid through before the glue / Hylomar had had a chance to set.  I have no idea if this'll work or not - I've parked the car back up with the drip tray underneath, and I'll have a look tomorrow evening and see how much has leaked out.  The Citroën gave me another moment of panic when it didn't seem to want to rise up after being let down off the jack - a bit of fiddling with the height adjuster eventually got the pump to kick in, I think having one wheel up in the air might have confused it a bit.

 

I went out this evening and decided to risk it and take the 200 VI.  Did 40 miles in it with no sign of misbehaviour - the temp gauge stayed rock steady and it didn't use any coolant - so it appears the K-seal is doing its job.  (Now I've said that, next time I go out in it it'll boil up and piss its coolant all over the road in true V6 Laguna style.)

[vulgalour]

I have three cars and can't use any of them.  Well done me.  I'm trying to be super motivated this week and crack on with as much as I can but it's difficult.  I can do nothing with the Renault until the parts arrive and working on the Princess is awkward because it's in the dark and slightly cramped end of the workshop, with the weather not being great for doing filler paintwork still.  I'll get there, I know I'm making progress every week, allbeit slowly.  Fairly certain that shortly after it's MoT'd I'm going to have to sell the Renault anyway, I doubt I can afford to keep all three on the road even though the Renault will be tax exempt soon and insurance is buttons.

 

I do feel like I only want the Rover and the Princess more and more.  The Rover is too good as a daily and the Princess is too much mine to want to part with them but it does rather get in the way of trying out new cars.  I'd still like another BX at some point, I want to try out a GS/A, I'd like a Volvo 240 again, I'd love a small 50s car with fins, I'd quite like a Datsun... it's so awkward being an enthusiast and having so much choice on offer, much of it for buttons.

[JohnK]

Keep the Rover as main car and 'reliable backup' for when one of the cars you buy to try inevitably fails to proceed?

 

It could occupy the Renault's space when not in use and you just swap the insurance over ?

[Skizzer]

If it makes you feel any better Vulg, I was down to one usable car out of ten yesterday.  The Audi is fine but out on loan, the Jeep has two flat tyres, the Discovery's immobiliser has shat itself, the XJ-S isn't taxed or insured and the others are all out of MOT and awaiting springtime (or Armageddon or something).

 

Crisis being the mother of action, I gave up trying to get RH on the phone and insured the XJ-S online with Footman James.  It cost a squidge over £100, which doesn't sound bad for a V12 super GT.  And now I've taxed it, so I shall be driving round in it this week.

[captain_70s]

One out of three here.

 

Progress is progress. I've done nowt to the Doloshites since the Civic came along, a grim state of affairs. Hope better weather and more funds appear soon...