September 2001
When buying a secondhand car its fairly easy to check for break pad wear.
Breaks are much cheaper to replace than a clutch.
Is there any way to tell how much life is left in the clutch - do any models have an inspection window to see the clutch plate?
David Read more
Does anyone remember the Sparkrite SX2000 Electronic Ignition System from about 10/20 years ago?
(They were one of the first D-I-Y Electronc Ignition Systems for cars )
Anyone know the name and address of the manufacturer? .
Has anyone seen one for sale lately?
Any information gratefully received. Read more
Many thanks for all the information and offers.
I will contact the offers directly via Email
Thanks again
chas
The AX was due an oil & filter service today, so I asked Madame if anything needed looking at. She said the brakes were making a strange noise. Sure enough the nearside front was making a whoosh whoosh noise as the car came to a standstill. Ever since we sold her Citroen CX, she has criticised the brakes on any car we have ever had; she got on well with the on/off hydraulics of the CX.
Anyway, resisting the temptation to say yeah, yeah and ignore her, I took the wheel off. Half an inch of pad material either side of the disk. On dismantling there was a clearly visible crack in the pad material from the anti-squeal cut to the edge of the pad, parallel to the back plate. On trying to get a better look, half the pad detached itself and fell on the floor! Yuk!
Obviously the car is now "grounded" awaiting new pads, but has anyone else come across the friction material disintegrating like this? The pads have done approx 35K miles.
Me, ignore the missus? Never! Read more
Last year, the pad wear indicator on my ex-Cavalier (a '95 SRi 16V hatch) came on. On first inspection, the pads appeared to be fine, still plenty of friction material.
It was onlt when I took one of the calipers off to replace the sensor that I discovered the reason. On one pad, the entire lump of friction material had come apart from the backing plate.
Andy
Well, not overheating exactly but still a problem.
I have an old Peugeot 405 1.6 GR manual that runs at its usual temperature when on the move but when stopped or at low speed (at the traffic lights, in a jam etc), the temperature gauge rises much more rapidly than normal. Within a minute or two, the fan cuts in and continues to do so constantly until the car is moving again, when it quickly returns to its normal temperature. This may not sound disastrous but is not standard behaviour for this car. I have changed the radiator (this cured a similar problem a number of years back, and it was a bit rotten), checked the thermostat and flushed the cooling system but the problem remains. The oil and water levels remain fairly constant and don?t appear to have mixed. I have now exhausted my limited mechanical abilities and would appreciate any suggestions before the problem gets worse.
Regards,
David O Read more
David, et al, my money's on the resistor!!
I have seen many cars towing caravans with sagging rear suspension, the tow bar height is therefore lower than it should be.
When a caravan is towed, the weight of the van lowers the suspension even more and so the tow bar is even lower - hence more weight is applied to the tow bar.
I am thinking of a caravan next year.
The suspensionon on my Volvo 940 estate, when unloded, is a good 2 inches lower at the rear than it is at the front.
Will this be a problem when towing a caravan {70 kgs down force}, should I up rate the suspension, can I fit stiffer / longer rear shocks / springs.
Should the rear suspension, not be a good 2 inches higher on the rear, than the front, on an unloaded tow car, so that the suspension is level front and rear with the caravan fitted.
Any suggestions please Read more
I like caravanners a lot of them are sensible enough to drive large vehicles that can actually tow there caravans safely and a few of them have realised that diesel power is not great. so to these I say thankyou keep gassing your cars holding up the locals and paying my wages
Came across this site, which may be of use/interest, especially when buying a car. You key in a VIN number and it gives you details of make, model and when and where the vehicle was built:
www.autobaza.pl/
It's in Polish, but you'll get the hang of it! Read more
Oh well...call that one a near miss then! Glad it's been of use to some though. It was spot-on for my car, even down to the fact that it was part-built in one plant and finished in another.
At the beginning of this year my wife's 1.0 Yaris developed a short rattle, lasting no more than 1-2 seconds when the car was first started in the morning. During its 2nd year / 20,000 mile service, she asked for the noise to be investigated. The garage diagnosed a faulty timing chain tensioner and said that this was a known fault, they said that they would order the necessary parts.
Three weeks ago they fitted the parts on a Monday, we got the car back on the Wednesday. Thursday morning it started OK (no rattle), Friday morning OK, Friday afternoon at 4000rpm on the overrun the timing chain snapped and scrambled the engine.
Since then the garage have been, 'obtaining Toyota's permission to rebuild the engine'. They now have a new 'short' engine and are swapping serviceable parts from the old to the new motor.
The garage says that they are completely mystified as to why the chain should snap and that the damage is so great that there is no way of telling what caused the breakage. They deny that it could have been due to their work in replacing the defective tensioner parts.
The Yaris is a new design with a new (VVTi) engine; my wife's car is just over two years old. If the VVTi engine has a tendency to break timing chains then Toyota have a real problem on their hands. Has anyone else experienced, or heard of problems with the timing chain?
Mike Read more
David
Apart fom the unlikely event of a faulty chain then it just has to be the workmanship of the repair. After all how amny engines do you know that have soldiered on for years with rattly timing chains? This has to be a catstrophic failure to cause such a sudden break up.
regards
John
Some 20 odd years ago I was in a Prison reception when we had a professional car thief bought in.
Included in his property was a large bunch of car keys. After being processed we were chatting to him regarding his occupation.
He was given an order once sometimes twice a week by someone in the South what car was required, detailed down to colour etc.
He always targetted a cinema car park and when the correct model came in which could take several nights he would follow the occupants into the cinema to ensure they went in. The object of this was the time he knew he had to clear the county as he believed the police did not extend an all cars "look out" beyond county borders. He demonstrated how he would know within a few keys which one would open the door. These were held between several fingers and took seconds to operate. This was in the days when keys had numbers. He had a remarkable memory for them and asked what car model we had and what month/year. he could then give us the number to within a few on our keys.
He said he was caught because he was very tired having stolen one or two that week and he had gone into a layby to sleep in the dark thinking he was out of the county. He wasn't and was woken abruptly by the door being opened and dragged out. He had a three year sentence. I suppose today he would get a good telling off or perhaps counselling. I recall on release there was argument as to whether the keys were his property and whether we could retain them but don't remember the outcome.
Alvin Read more
Presumably they only charged him with take and drive away so they could not also charge with going equiped for theft, in which case order would have been made to forfiet the keys.
Another weird bit of law when we all know TDA is nothing but out and out theft and they get away with it as they claim they had no intention of permanently depriving the owner.
It's no consolation but if bad guy want your motor he is going to have it so make his task as difficult as you can. Think crime %-[
Wondered if there is any site that shows how many cars of particular registration year survive. Nothing found on DVLC site.
Fascinating to see in Which Car 2001 that the Landrover was the most unreliable of newest models and Skoda better than Ford. Daihatsu got the top rating. Read more
Ireland (before the scrappage subsidy) used to be the place to see which cars would go for longest with no maintenance at all. In the mid-eighties I seem to remember seeing lots of very battered, rust and smoky Peugeots and Fords.
Chris
Can anyone advise what are the advantages of Xenon headlights are? Are they worth the 700 pounds or so when buying a new car?
Thanks
Mike Holland Read more
Mike
The xenons are not blue and nor are the Philips bulbs I fitted to my Golf. I know they do some "Blue Vision" bulbs too. The Powerbulbs website does say "A unique blue filter creates the distinctive blue colour" and "EC37 approved for use in Europe" although personally I think they look a bit tacky and Max Power'ish.
True xenons only emit blue light at the fringe which is what you see.
In Germany Audi have them as a £350 option on models where it isn't standard, not the £700 UK dealers seem happy to charge.
Colin
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David, the point to consider about clutch plates is the thickness of the lining material when new compared to brake pads. A typical brake pad, when new, has a thickness of around 10mm (some slightly more, some slightly less). You would replace them when they wear to a point of 2-3mm. The pads have a life expectancy of between 20-40000miles, depending on driving conditions. A clutch plate starts its life with a lining of around 3mm. Depending on driving conditions, it can last well over 100,000 miles or as little as 10,000 miles. The only way of determing in its condition is to test it for slip and judder. If its ok, you should be able to maintain it in that condition for a considerable amount of time, although you cannot rule out component failure at any time, even if it was new when you bought it.
With regard to the slip test that Andy described above, I have always tested the car with the handbrake on and top gear engaged (not first). Try to pull away at 3-4000rpm in top gear. The car should stall immediately. An engine which keeps running at 3000rpm with the car stationary and in top gear with the handbrake on is slipping - badly. The same test in first gear will move the car forward - with the handbrake locking the rear wheels, unless the clutch is completely shot.
Final thing to consider when testing the clutch is whether it is adjusted correctly. A cable clutch may need periodic adjustment, if not, it may not bite until the last moment. A hydraulic clutch will not require adjustment, but could have faulty hydraulics causing problems when engaging gears.