October 2001
I have just bought a new VW Passat TDI 130, which I intend to keep for 4 or 5 years. Typically I do 30,000 miles per year. The manual recommends a 10,000 service interval, but I have read that I ought to change the oil & filter more often.
When should I have the first done ? and what you recommend in terms of regular servicing ? What brand or type of oil would you recommend ? Read more
Dear Honest John,
I bought a used Renault Megane 1.6e RT Sport with 30,000 miles on the clock, and I am about to put it though it's first service. I currently have trouble changing into first and second gear and on a number of ocassions have been stuck on roundabouts or at traffic lights desperately trying to change gear. The problem is intermittent and it's severity varied.
Do you have any advice as to what the problem is likely to be and if so how much do you think it'll set me back?.
Also, do you have any tips as to what other problems I should expect to see after 40,000 miles so I don't get any nasty surprises!
Many thanks
Kris Read more
Just a suggestion but it might be worth changing the gearbox oil, making sure you use the correct type/grade. I had the same symptoms as you on a 34000 mile AX and a gear oil change 3 months ago has completely cured the problem.
For the sake of a few pounds and a few minutes work, it's worth trying.
Keith
My 1985 Volvo 240 estate (auto) leaves a small deposit of engine oil
on the drive. This drip comes from the torque convertor area and I
believe that the rear crankshaft oil-seal is the culprit.
Well, taking out the auto box and replacing the oil-seal is the 'right
thing to do', but has anyone knowledge or experience of products like
Wynn's Engine Stop Leak and such like. I would appreciate any comment.
Many thanks
Doug Read more
Doug,
Bear with me on this one!
I work (on cars) in latex gloves all the time. Sometimes petrol, diesel or other fluids will make the fingers swell from tight to 30% oversize. The next stage is that they fall apart. I would say the "fluid" had ruined them.
Again for various car uses I have large horse syringes. Sometimes a fluid causes the seal in these to swell as Charles mentions. The rubber expands by 10-25% and feels much softer. In any case it ruins the syringe.
Now I'm sure the major companies have all sorts of claims for these stop-leak additives but at the end of the day they are just taking advantage of the chemical property that expands (damages?) the seal rubber.
Engine oil seals are normally quite hard and I would expect this softening to seriously shorten the remaining life, they may hold well for a while then let go in a big way.
But I'm afraid I have no actual experience of the product because I would never use them, not on my car or a customer's.
My highly opinionated verdict based on overall experience of similar products/devices is that they may be a "bodge to sell" method.
I would love to hear from anyone who has used them for over 12,000 miles though for a true report.
David
The time has come to replace the battery on my trusty Citroen Synergie. It has lasted nearly 6 years and 80K miles. It is the first car I have owned that has a coded radio, for which I have the code, and a factory-fitted keypad immobiliser. Should I just disconnect and do the swap and everything will be OK, or should I connect a spare battery or battery charger in parallel via e.g. the cigar lighter to support the electronics while the battery is out of the car?
I would naturally keep the positive terminal well out of the way while this was going on.
Thoughts, please? Read more
Thanks for your helpful comments and advice. I did think twice about posting for advice on changing a battery, but I thought Hey, it's the Back Room, anything goes;-)
I have just checked the comments regarding Toyota Avensis' on this site and was interested to read that many nearly new ones are ex-rental/lease.
My suspision was raised, which lead to cheaking the identity of the one previous owner - true enough it was an Avis outlet in South-West London, unknown to myself. The car has done 18,000 and is two years old. I very recently purchased it from my local Toyota Dealership and they are attending to a number of minor faults, including a missing spare wheel!
I have noticed that the lean-burn engine is frugal but it does affect dramatically the performance, the car appears to misfire on accelerating from around 3000 rpm. A sympton of the lean-burn so I am told by the dealership.
I am keen to hear views whether the lean-burn performance is normal, but also whether it is a particularly bad that it was ex-rental and this may affect its long term reliability (the main reason for purchasing a Toyota). Read more
Even if your pride and joy has been driven by 200 previous people only a couple or so are likely to have tried to abuse it.
They are also likely to have failed.
You CAN abuse a modern car,by not having it correctly serviced,changing oil,etc,but its a long time since I drove a car I could do much harm to in 2000 miles.
Also,consider the averages,all those drivers will have different styles of driving,which self cancel.
But if only one person had driven it,and,let us say,he delighted in clutchless gearchanges........
Hello all
I have a 97R Mondeo hatch and I noticed the other day that some bright spark who worked on the car before I got it used a standard trolley jack to lift up the car at the jacking points on the sills.
These are indicated by arrows stamped into the sill itself.
Whats happened is because they didnt use the right tool the sill edge has been bent twice into a sort of U shape,where the edges of the trolley jack head were.
Has anyone else experienced this? I know that garages use these as standard but surely the sills should be strong enough to support the car on the trolley jack? Or do I have to insist they use the manufacturer supplied jack when I get a puncture.
Also the car lost its front windscreen washers last week-I went back to the garage and they reattached the hose under the washer bottle for free.One of the guys I work with has a V reg zetec mondeo and this happened to him as well.Is this common for mondeos?(I did have a look at the car by car breakdown but couldnt find anything on it).
Thanks
John Read more
I use Hi Q tyres and they always seem to carefully check where they place the jack. They don't mind you entering the worsksop and watching either
Dear all,
I just find this out, ... This is unbelievable but TRUE!!! I am still very angry about it.
To made a long story short, I changed my insurance policy from AA-Churchill to Tesco in July. I purchased my policy via the Tesco website & paid the money (about £380, TFPP plus breakdown coverage) with my credit card. I received the policy document (with insurance certificate & others) shortly. I sign the document & sent them back right away ? I sent them the policy renewal notice from AA as the evidence of my NCB (the Tesco policy document stated that they will normally accepted the renewal notice as NCB document, etc. I received the letter from AA to state my NCB after sending out the document to Tesco). I assume that everything is OK (after all, I have not received anything from Tesco afterward).
I called Tesco this afternoon to enquire about the possible change of insurance premium, and to my horror, they told me my policy has been cancelled unilaterally. About some minutes of anxious waiting, the guy told me that I have not response with their 2 letters about my NCB (apparently, they want the AA letter, NOT JUST the renewal notification) sent to me on 21 Aug. & 10 Sep. so they just CANCELLED MY POLICY UNILATERALLY ? NO WARMING, but, I simply received nothing since July, ?
I asked: ?How come I have not received any warming about the cancellation?? ?If I still have not received the cancellation letter, what would happened if I have to made a claim?? (this is possible since I have not received their previous 2 letters & they have NOT send out their cancellation notice yet!!!) They get my e-mail, mobile phone numbers & yet I am not informed and assuming everything is fine naively. I paid all the money up front more than 2 months ago & they can just cancel my policy right away with NO FAULTS ON MY PART as far as I am concerned!!!! They eventually reinstated my policy ? I am not sure, since they only told me on the phone ? I have to get something in black & white.
The guy just told me this is their company?s procedure & I think this is ridiculous. I am going to complain ? but what else can I do????
Be warmed: all of you with Tesco policy and under similar circumstance, pls. ring them to ensure that everything is fine (for the sake of peace in mind). Read more
I, too, made the mistake of insuring one of our card through Tesco. They have made constant mistakes, they are appallingly difficult to contact on the phone and I found the only way to get any sense out of them was to send a recorded delivery letter to their chief executive, threatening to enlist the help of the insurance ombudsman. And even after that they have still fouled things up.
I wouuld counsel peope never to place business with this appalling outfit - they are truly dreadful...
One of my work-mates has a early 90's 1.6 Primera.
Last night, he removed the battery to charge it, but when it was re-fitted
this morning the car will not start. The engine is spinning over on the starter but will not fire, and yes there is petrol in it.
Any ideas anyone??? Read more
did he connect all the wires,he may have not connected the low amperage control cable .
Just discovered this forum, expect a lot from me!
I have an R reg Omega MV6, 35k miles, bought with 23k on. It is a wonderful drive, fast, comfortable etc etc but has one niggling bad habit which is that it finds ruts and lumps in the road and tries to drive along them, or leap around them. It is very pronounced and can be quite unnerving sometimes. People say"That'll be your low profile tyres". Are they right, or should I be checking something? My Vauxhall dealer changed a front wheel bearing at the last service, but I think they did this because I was expecting to spend some money...it made no difference.
It's almost due new tyres, it has Pirelli P7000s on at present (original?). Would a change of brand be likely to make a difference? And...are cheaper (I don't mean dirt cheap) tyres likely to be less effective/wear more?
Anyone got suggestions for a cheap source of tyres? (Berkshire) The first quote for the P7000s was £165 + balancing etc per tyre. I found somewhere that will do all four for £410 all in but it still seems a lot. Read more
The lower the profile of the tyre you use, the more suceptable to camber changes, and geometry misalignment the car will be. I would suggest you get a good garage or tyres specialist like Michledever tyres to do a full fourwheel alignment on you car.
I do not think it is fair to say that low profile tyres cause tramling. Tramlining is often a combinatin of many other factors. People dont complain Porsche 911's tramline and they have very low profile tyres. When boy racers fit oversize wheels to their car they experience problems for a number of reasons. For example many fit wheels with a differnt ofset and wider rims and tyres. The problem is not neccessarily the wheels or the tyres but the inability of the suspension to accurately track camber and castor etc over its travel. Touring cars only use such wide tyres because they are able to run them at very low pressure. Remember the size of the contact patch is related to the wieght of the vehicle over the tyre pressure. So wider tyres mean a shorter but wider contact patch, and therefore less feed back.
If you are lucky the problems may be due to the garage not correctly adjusting the camber after fitting the new wheel bearing. I woul dhave this checked first.
Ben
Hi people
I have Xenon lights (Omega MV6), how do I go about dipping them to the other side for foreign driving? Someone told me it might be as simple as a swicth somewhere but I can't find anything.
Thanks Read more
I have a new Espace with xenons (reg 1/1/2001). Have asked Renault UK this question and they did not know. They refered question to Renault France and they did not know. Renault France refered back to headlight manufacturer 6 months ago but claim not to have had a reply. Renault UK very embarrased. So if you want to drive in France don't buy a Renault.
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It's something to do with the cam operated (I think!) Pumpe-Duse (PD) Fuel Injectors.
David