Grogee's spannering (Maestro , Corsa & Avensis). VEL SATIS FACILITATION

21,762 · May 26

2 hours ago, Sunny Jim said:

Liked not for the rust but the Sisters of Mercy reference. Never had you down as a goth mate.

I've been playing Lucretia My Reflection a bit recently after a longish soujourn from The Sisters.

@grogee I keep on meaning to say, hope things are manageable for you. I read about your other things going on - at least the motors can provide a distraction in the meantime.

16,182 · May 27

9 hours ago, Dick Longbridge said:

I've been playing Lucretia My Reflection a bit recently after a longish soujourn from The Sisters.

@grogee I keep on meaning to say, hope things are manageable for you. I read about your other things going on - at least the motors can provide a distraction in the meantime.

Thanks Dick

The tinkering is a nice distraction. While we are still 'friends' we are staying out if each others' way where possible.

It's not intolerable but I'm already sick of sleeping in a single bed.

We have accepted an offer on our house so the slow stopwatch has started on the sales process. After that? Renting maybe or busking at folks house for a bit.

16,182 · June 1

Pre-MoT for the Maestro this weekend. The handbrake took a few too many clicks for my liking, so I went underneath to fiddle with the adjuster.

As usual the Haynes promises a feather light, easy to access knob. Reality is a stiff plastic thing hidden behind a brake flexi hose. Slip joint pliers were the tool of choice to take out the slack. Still a bit too much play for my liking but I had it turned so the offside drum was just about to catch on the shoes, so it's probably a case of TADTS. I don't think I've ever owned a British car with an effective handbrake.

Checked the lights, nearly a full suite but the osr fog light needed a tickle to restore operation. The rear lights are a really shit design, a pressed steel conductor in a crappy plastic housing, which corrodes then you get lamp issues.

NSR wheel bearing has a tiny bit of play. I'm not sure what constitutes a fail, does anyone know? In my head I'm thinking of a figure of 1/8" (3mm) play at wheel rim edge, is that right? Think I'm within that.

Also the steering wheel has a bit of play. Again, I don't know what the acceptable margin is. I think there is a nylon bush at the top of the column that needs changing. Hopefully he'll turn a blind eye.

Had a look at the exhaust tail pipe because as @Noel Tidybeard noticed, my s/s exhaust is actually a cut-down Montego item. Consequently the tailpipe sits at an odd angle and fouls the rear bumper.

I've got some exhaust bend sections from a previous project so I've ordered some clamps and a reducer to sit behind the rear silencer and give a straight - ish exit.

7,039 · June 1

16,182 · June 2

Not MoT related but I've been following the various 'use this snake oil' detailing threads and boiled linseed oil came out top trumps for doing black plastic trim.

I'm sure it's pretty harmless but it's also a bit stinky so I wore rubber gloves to give the aerodynamic* aids a rub-down.

First pic shows 'in progress', left side treated and right side untouched. Weirdly the pics don't do it justice, there was a noticeable improvement in blackness and shininess.

It kind of just 'sinks in', no elbow grease needed really. The hardest part is removing the excess from windows and paint.

There's a local show on Thurs so I'll probably take it there and meet @Cluffy for a shandy. Hopefully this fine weather continues.

When it cools down a bit ill go back outside and tackle the phone kit and dash cam install. Not complicated but the sun is beating down on the drive at present and I don't want to get all sweaty.

June 2

4 minutes ago, grogee said:

Not MoT related but I've been following the various 'use this snake oil' detailing threads and boiled linseed oil came out top trumps for doing black plastic trim.

I'm sure it's pretty harmless but it's also a bit stinky so I wore rubber gloves to give the aerodynamic* aids a rub-down.

First pic shows 'in progress', left side treated and right side untouched. Weirdly the pics don't do it justice, there was a noticeable improvement in blackness and shininess.

It kind of just 'sinks in', no elbow grease needed really. The hardest part is removing the excess from windows and paint.

There's a local show on Thurs so I'll probably take it there and meet @Cluffy for a shandy. Hopefully this fine weather continues.

When it cools down a bit ill go back outside and tackle the phone kit and dash cam install. Not complicated but the sun is beating down on the drive at present and I don't want to get all sweaty.

Looking incredible!!! I need to do the same on the Corrado and Golf plastics it would seem!!

3,618 · June 3

On 01/06/2024 at 20:25, grogee said:

NSR wheel bearing has a tiny bit of play. I'm not sure what constitutes a fail, does anyone know? In my head I'm thinking of a figure of 1/8" (3mm) play at wheel rim edge, is that right? Think I'm within that.

Had a look at the exhaust tail pipe because as @Noel Tidybeard noticed, my s/s exhaust is actually a cut-down Montego item. Consequently the tailpipe sits at an odd angle and fouls the rear bumper.

My better halfs car has the advisory for play in wheel bearings every year, i even decided to replace the worst of the two, put on a new stub axle and old stock bearing kit (The rears for hatchbacks seem hard to find now, the vans there are plenty of for some reason)

Anyway, even after the new bits, it still had play (about the same as it had before, maybe just slightly less) but about 1.5-2mm at wheel edge. Guy in the local garage said he's never seen a Maestro without that kind of play, doesnt seem to make any difference to how it drives, so decided meh! Its really the least of that cars worries.

As for the exhaust, i feel your pain, the misses car being a 2.0LX Diesel has an exhaust made up of 1.3/1.6petrol and diesel maestro parts cut/bent/welded to kind of fit, seems to work fine though

16,182 · June 3

10 minutes ago, Stinkwheel said:

My better halfs car has the advisory for play in wheel bearings every year, i even decided to replace the worst of the two, put on a new stub axle and old stock bearing kit (The rears for hatchbacks seem hard to find now, the vans there are plenty of for some reason)

Anyway, even after the new bits, it still had play (about the same as it had before, maybe just slightly less) but about 1.5-2mm at wheel edge. Guy in the local garage said he's never seen a Maestro without that kind of play, doesnt seem to make any difference to how it drives, so decided meh! Its really the least of that cars worries.

As for the exhaust, i feel your pain, the misses car being a 2.0LX Diesel has an exhaust made up of 1.3/1.6petrol and diesel maestro parts cut/bent/welded to kind of fit, seems to work fine though

I bought all the non-van rear bearing stock I could find yesterday (except the overpriced chancer parts) with a view to changing it at some point.

I'm more worried about the steering wheel play to be honest. You can wobble it a few mm if you grab the rim and waggle.

Anyway I'm sure the tester will find something new and interesting to fail it on, so I'll be F5'ing the MoT website this afternoon.

My exhaust is a stainless item (though still manages to be quite crusty) and is too loud but I don't want to have to change it again so it's staying. I have pondered putting in a different centre box.

16,182 · June 3

5,791 · June 3

Hurray! Pleased for you. 👍

June 3

Great news.

10,147 · June 3

Congratulations

10,200 · June 3

Excellent 👍

16,182 · June 4

Sometimes you're the fucker, and sometimes you're the fuckee.

Things going well (for once) this week, and I've just got the Avensis back with functioning air conditioning. This is important to me for reasons described above but somehow the magic of cool air being blown at my fat sweaty body never loses its appeal.

On the minus side, the whole endeavour was a little spendy:

Condenser £50ish

Compressor £270ish with the bloody import duty

Regas m9 £65

So £385 all in.

Man-maths justifies this because the cost of paying Someone Else to do it, and the mark up they'd add to the parts (I would never have got a new, branded £50 condenser) would have put the price closer to £700 I expect, after the "dreaded" VAT.

I may attempt to put a new clutch onto the old compressor I removed, I refuse to believe it's completely borked. It's Denso for christ's sake, they don't make stuff that breaks!

Ah well, just imagine how smug I'm going to be with this imminent heatwave*, with temperatures rocketing into the mid-teens!

16,182 · June 5

Been changing the stereo in the Maestro, for no reason whatsoever.

Well, this one is more period correct than the Blaupunkt multicoloured swap shop. Also I think my Dad had a soft spot for Pioneer, I remember him having a nice Pioneer separates system.

It's so olden days it only has two speaker outputs (why would anyone want more than two?) but there is an amp output that's supposed to go to a proprietary amp.

Using the power of Old Manuals and a bit of perseverence I was able to create an 8-pin DIN to RCA output so it can be used by 'normal' amps. So the rear shelf speakers now work.

The setup is suitably Heath Robinson: a (hidden) DAB receiver that outputs through the antenna feed to the radio. This also gives the AUX facility so I can plug in my ipod or a Bluetooth receiver.

There's also a dashcam wired in and positioned behind the rear view mirror, and an old Parrot Bluetooth phone kit just in case someone phones while I'm driving. Nobody ever phones me though, and the exhaust volume ensures that I won't be able to hear them anyway.

On the subject of pointless stereo ventures, I've also sent my high-end Clarion radio/cassette away to have its security code reset. Unfortunately there are no clues how to actually input the new code, and nothing available on the web to help me. So I'm a bit stuck on that one.

1,176 · June 6

Apologies if you've mentioned it already, but does the hidden DAB receiver physically connect to the antenna of your period radio or is it one of the FM transmitter types?

Have you got a link? It sounds like the ideal upgrade for most of my relics.

16,182 · June 6

1 hour ago, Surface Rust said:

Apologies if you've mentioned it already, but does the hidden DAB receiver physically connect to the antenna of your period radio or is it one of the FM transmitter types?

Have you got a link? It sounds like the ideal upgrade for most of my relics.

Yes it connects directly via the antenna connector. It can function as a FM transmitter as well but I use it in 'direct connect' mode. You can choose what frequency it transmits on so it doesn't interfere with existing FM broadcasts.

It is called a Kinetic Digitizor but unfortunately is NLA. The only company I found selling them went bust (DAB on wheels). I have found them on the bay and bumtree before though.

The difficulty with using with an older radio is that it relies on the FM station signal text to relay information. If you have an older radio like mine you'll need a newer one to set it up and get your presets done, then you can swap back to an olde worlde one.

You'll need an antenna of course and a switched 12v feed. Be warned, almost all dashcams completely obliterate DAB reception.

7,039 · June 6

try the clarion/nissan method

When turned on, the radio will display CODE IN.
Press button 1, and then CODE 0000 will appear, allowing you to enter the code.
Repeatedly press button 1 until the correct first digit of the code is displayed.
Repeatedly press button 2 until the correct second digit of the code is displayed.
Repeatedly press button 3 until the correct third digit of the code is displayed.
Repeatedly press button 4 until the correct fourth digit of the code is displayed.
Once entered, press the TUNE SEARCH button, and CODE OK will appear, prompting your radio to come on.

13,000 · June 6

6 hours ago, Noel Tidybeard said:

Once entered, press the TUNE SEARCH button, and CODE OK will appear, prompting your radio to come on Eileen...

EFA

16,182 · June 8

Thanks @Noel Tidybeard. Although those instructions say it'll display CODE IN which it doesn't, it says noPAC.

Nay bother anyway, I'm pretty sure this Clarion unit requires at least one separate amp (possibly two if I want to drive the fronts as well). It has no speaker outputs... Obviously a high end thing from back in the day. There is a DIN output and a CD changer port (that I'm hoping to hack for an AUX in).

I've filed that job away for Winter Tinker.

Having moved mountains to get the Pioneer working, I found several reasons to completely undo all my hard work:

1) I'd mixed up my front and rear speaker inputs. The 80s harness thing isn't an ISO and it has four identical connectors for each speaker so it's possible to mix them up. BL had yet to learn about 'poke yoke'.

2) I'd got my polarity arse about face on my dashcam wiring. This isn't great because I think it was shorting inside the dashcam itself. I'm hoping it has a diode to protect it but it did get a little warm...

3) My super duper DIN to phono cable didn't work. Not a sausage. No idea why. Couldn't measure any meaningful output from any of the terminals.

4) My phone kit would cut the front speakers but (if they'd been working) the rears would have carried on blasting out. Not ideal.

So I've reluctantly gone back to the 90s technicolour dreamcoat Blaupunkt. I do like it, it's chunky and well made, a high end cassette unit. But probably mid to late 90s so arguably not period correct for an '88 car.

However some proper electrical detective work has fixed a few issues with the install - I wasn't getting any bass from the sub, and I got a loud POP on startup. Fixed a dodgy RCA connector and added a ground loop isolator for good measure. Got full bass from the sub and everything's working as it should - the Blaupunkt is modern enough that it has a mute input which cuts the music during a call.

I even went to the trouble of removing the passenger seat, because the wiring behind the stereo was a complete rats nest of adapters and cables. With the seat out, I was able to get my arms and head down to floor level to try and create some order to the wiring, and prevent it from launching itself under the brake pedal.

Fantastische.

16,182 · June 11

I'd spotted some OEM rear brake pads for the Avensis, and when I serviced it early this year I noticed they were a bit thin. So I splashed out a whole £14 for pads in a Toyota box, mainly because I'd found the right part number and knew they'd fit.

Not a tough job. Rather than just throwing on new pads, I cleaned up the caliper carrier and got rid of the rust that makes them stick. The pads came with new springy shims which was nice, so they've gone on the freshly cleaned carrier and I gave the sliders a bit of a grease up too.

Can't be too careful with Jap rear calipers, they're a favourite to seize up.

If the car was worth anything I'd probably have put some new rear discs on as well, but... Naah. They'll be fine. I don't use the brakes much and the rear ones don't do anything anyway. Other excuses are available.

16,182 · June 15

Not much to report.

Today I'm driving to Lincs in the Maestro, an 85mi trip... I've packed an emergency toolbox, fluids and some key spare parts. No doubt the car will break down and require something I haven't packed.

The Avensis turned over to 90k this week, not very impressive in AS terms but it's been winging me up and down the M40 very nicely and returning 53mpg.

When I started it up the other day there was a puff of blue smoke. My theory is that after a long journey, the (second hand) turbo gets hot and oozes a little oil into the turbo ducting, which then gets ingested by the engine on cold startup. Otherwise the engine is running absolutely AOK, no issues.

7,039 · June 15

16,182 · June 15

In related news, the Maestro and Montego Owners Club magazine has just dropped through the letterbox, packed* full of useful* info like a list of shows that happened last month.

16,182 · June 15

It made it! I was initially concerned about a knocking noise until I realised it was someone in the crowd banging a drum at Switzerland v Hungary, which we were listening to on the radio.

No faults to report. But I do need some fuel. Refuelling run to be combined with fish & chip reconnaissance this evening.

16,182 · June 15

Chips got. E5 got.

According to my maths, it's been averaging 33.3mpg which, while shit, is probably about right for an 80s brick with an O-series.

10,200 · June 15

54 minutes ago, grogee said:

Chips got. E5 got.

According to my maths, it's been averaging 33.3mpg which, while shit, is probably about right for an 80s brick with an O-series.

I take it it was a drama free run out then? Looks well in the photos. Glad your finally getting some fun out of it 👍

7,197 · June 15

55 minutes ago, grogee said:

According to my maths, it's been averaging 33.3mpg which, while shit, is probably about right for an 80s brick with an O-series.

Never got anywhere near that with my 90s brick Ovlov without an O-series - count your blessings :-) - I take it the wipers work well then?

16,182 · June 15

25 minutes ago, EyesWeldedShut said:

Never got anywhere near that with my 90s brick Ovlov without an O-series - count your blessings - I take it the wipers work well then?

The wipers are shit. Or rather, the mechanism/motor is shit. The rubber on screen bit is fine/new, but the action is quite jerky.

I had promised myself I'd get in there and give the linkage and motor a good spruce/grease, but I didn't BECAUSE IT'S FUCKING JUNE.

10,200 · June 15

31 minutes ago, grogee said:

BECAUSE IT'S FUCKING JUNE.

I was saying that at 9 o'clock this morning as I mopped rain water out of the interior of my old car using a hand towel taken from my hotel room. Fucking June. 🤣

Grogee's spannering (Maestro , Corsa & Avensis). VEL SATIS FACILITATION

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