Ask a Shiter

[The Moog]

Are the 90% brighter bulbs in halfors worth the extra dosh? 

 

One of pumas headlights has gone and it is either £5 for normal bulb or £12 for extra bright one. 

 

The headlights rival the xantias for pointlessness normally so wondered if it would help 

[Kiltox]

Are the 90% brighter bulbs in halfors worth the extra dosh?

 

One of pumas headlights has gone and it is either £5 for normal bulb or £12 for extra bright one.

 

The headlights rival the xantias for pointlessness normally so wondered if it would help

£5 seems a bit pricey for a standard headlight bulb - do you have a trade card?

[The Moog]

£5 seems a bit pricey for a standard headlight bulb - do you have a trade card?

£12 normally - £5 with trade card.

 

They are HB3 bulbs. 

[Kiltox]

Ah fair enough, weird looking things. Haven’t seen those before

[MorrisItalSLX]

I just found this in my Nan's shed:

 

 

 

 

Anyone have some more information about it, possibly something to do with my late grandfathers interest in 1950s British motorcycles.

[Guest Hooli]

Are the 90% brighter bulbs in halfors worth the extra dosh? 

 

One of pumas headlights has gone and it is either £5 for normal bulb or £12 for extra bright one. 

 

The headlights rival the xantias for pointlessness normally so wondered if it would help 

 

My experience of them is they are no brighter & sometimes duller than normal bulbs.

[steveo3002]

osram nightbreakers work as advertised , but dont last as long as a standard bulb, cheapest on ebay

[egg]

I'm using Osram silverstars, seem ok.

[Talbot]

V12 Jag....they know it won't be driven far

Someone I taught to drive was going to do this.  I think he got an insurance quote for cheaper than anything small and hatchback and usual for young drivers.  No idea if he ever did it, but it would have been epic.

[somewhatfoolish]

I just found this in my Nan's shed:

 

 

 

 

Anyone have some more information about it, possibly something to do with my late grandfathers interest in 1950s British motorcycles.

Magneto, old fashioned means of sparkling spark plugs which works without a battery which is useful for

 

1) cars that were built before lead acid batteries became robust enough to be bounced around

2) motorbikes built before batteries became compact enough to fit on somewhere

3) assorted machinery that might exist without a battery, generators etc. or need battery-independent sparking for safety, like aircraft.

 

Google suggests it's a Lucas SR2 of some description.

[Mally]

Magneto, old fashioned means of sparkling spark plugs which works without a battery which is useful for

 

1) cars that were built before lead acid batteries became robust enough to be bounced around

2) motorbikes built before batteries became compact enough to fit on somewhere

3) assorted machinery that might exist without a battery, generators etc. or need battery-independent sparking for safety, like aircraft.

 

And giving yourself a shock if you hold the lead and give it a spin.

[loserone]

Is it worth leaving ebay feedback like "LR58WNP EML P2089" or something similar?

[Rod/b]

Have Cazana started charging for everything now? Every search come up with something about buying a check to see a “timeline event”

[clayts450]

Seems that way - the timeline events are usually sales or maybe private reg changes as they've stopped including how many owners there's been in the summary.

 

The only thing it's useful for now is identifying the spec of the vehicle, something the DVLA site doesn't do.

 

Any good alternatives ?

[SiC]

Total Car Check gives you a fair bit of information for free. Nothing about owners change though - but then I found Carzana to often not show the latest info from a couple of months on that anyway.

[scaryoldcortina]

Is it worth leaving ebay feedback like "LR58WNP EML P2089" or something similar?

 

Too cryptic for most sellers, try "BROKEN ALREADY. SELLER BAD MAN, VERY SAD."

 

Personally I'm expecting a call soon about a subaru with an AVCS fault. It's probably a stuck solenoid...

[cros]

I need a pair of headlight units for my Bedford van. They're circular and look nearly like a normal 7 incher, but they're only 6 and a half. This is not a common size; some Honda motorbikes had them in the 70's but the pair of aftermarket ones I sourced from China, though cheap, are awful. My question is, does anyone know of any other mainstream vehicle fitted with this size of lamp? There were odd British bikes so equipped, but I've drawn a blank trying to find the units

[Ghosty]

Putting yourself on as an additional driver on the kid's policy can help too.

 

Any car that's not cool for kids tends to be cheap, so no small hatchbacks.

 

Both parents if possible, but no other relatives. Times have changed and fully comp is cheapest now.

 

Off the bat with a fresh license, premiums will be hellishly bad on everything no matter what you do. As little sense as it makes, the biggest thing that lowers premiums for young people starting driving is how many years you've held the license - this is even before you've owned a car - for some reason even if there's nothing to suggest you've ever driven a car since you left the test centre for the last time, merely holding a licence lowers initial premiums. I had to wait three years for a quote on anything at all to fall to a remotely affordable level before I bought insurance, now I've got four years "experience" and more importantly a year's no claims, the arse has fallen out of my premiums.

The cheapest cars to insure are either brand new or uncool/overlooked.

Naturally, go cheap.

When I was looking for my first car, I found the cheapest things to go for were Mazda Demios, Kia Prides, and other tiny obscure-ish Asian cars. If you need a bit more space, then '90s Rovers are also a good call as they're only very slightly more expensive to insure.

I really wouldn't hold out though, you're probably looking at £2k for anything and quite possibly getting lumped with a telematics box.

[Stanky]

 

Anyone have some more information about it, possibly something to do with my late grandfathers interest in 1950s British motorcycles.

 

From my dabbling with stationary engines, a Lucas SR magneto could quite easily have come from one of those. Worth £50 or so if it works.

[beko1987]

£13 splaffed on a bottle of Forte diesel treatment! How do I use it? Full bottle to half a tank and glf?

[adw1977]

Shame that Cazana is less useful now. I use surething.co.uk to get the date of the last keeper change.

[Pillock]

Insurance question.

 

I know, I know...... YAWN. That's why it's in here.

 

It's seemingly two years since I sold my Saab to njgleeds and the insurance lapsed. If I remember rightly, it was Feb time I sold it but I took the car off the policy and left the policy to run out in April without a car on it (effectively insuring thin air) as it was cheaper than cancelling.

 

So I think I need to insure another car before April so I can keep my NCB - it's 2 years normally you can pause it isn't it?

 

My question is, do I need to insure something all year? I've got 10 years NCB right now, if I insured a car for 1 month and then cancelled (knowing I'll take a hit on the cancellation fee) will I then have 10 years NCB paused for another two years? Or do I need to add another year to it for it to keep running?

[Mally]

Dunno sorry, but the question made my head ache.

[Guest Hooli]

Dunno either, it's a good question though.

[Dave_Q]

I imagine it varies from one insurer to another how long you can pause for, but I think you'll need to take out a policy and keep it.

 

Find a tame shiter with something like a classic mini or some 60s or 70s shite parked up somewhere and insure that, should be less than £100 for a year I would have thought?

[Guest Hooli]

Talking of which, if you insure anything classic ask them to lodge your NCD. It doesn't work on the policy but keeps it live.

[beko1987]

I imagine it varies from one insurer to another how long you can pause for, but I think you'll need to take out a policy and keep it.

 

Find a tame shiter with something like a classic mini or some 60s or 70s shite parked up somewhere and insure that, should be less than £100 for a year I would have thought?

Just ask six_cylinder if you can insure one of the permanent features in the field of dreams? Or dollywobblers spares invacar?

[Kiltox]

Don’t think Autoaid will cover my van - anyone know a cheap provider that will?

[twosmoke300]

Green flag seemed to be the only ones that would cover my l3h2 Ducato

[Mally]

AA will, not cheap, but they recovered our tranny.