Working on your own vehicle - Advice & Tales of Woe

[High Voltage]

. . . watched a few YouTube videos and it doesn't look that difficult...

Quoted for the LOLs

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Quoted for the LOLs

Oh yes. There's nothing like the enthusiasm that a new cheap socket set brings.

I full expect to end up caked in gunk wondering why the dam thing won't work.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

So I didn't do it in the end, because it's stopped smoking. Either all those fuel additives I poured in or just doing lots of miles. I still fully intend to do it. Just maybe at a time that if I fuck it up my local garage is actually open...

However in a strange twist my OH's van has been losing power and the engine management light is on. I plugged in the cheap OBD reader I bought fired up torque and got this. Does anyone know if it's likely that simply cleaning the EGR may sort it or is likely it's fucked and needs a new one. If it in needs a new one is it a case of simply bolting it on? It's a Transit Mk 7...

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Oh FFS. Definitely not working on this. Currently on the road side, think my spring/shocks have broken. Sounded bad anyway.

Awaiting recovery. Except they will only recover the car and not me or the dog. Luckily I'm a million miles away so my poor OH is going to have to leave work and come get us.

 

[A380]

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Not actually for me directly but can anyone recommend a product to paint on the small patches of rust on my partners transit? I know they can be notorious for it, but if we can squeeze more life out of it before she has to pay someone that would be awesome.

 

[nick]

Hammerite. If you don't care much about matching colours

 

[dessiato]

Not actually for me directly but can anyone recommend a product to paint on the small patches of rust on my partners transit? I know they can be notorious for it, but if we can squeeze more life out of it before she has to pay someone that would be awesome.

Go to Halfords. You can buy rust treatment paint, then use a rattle can to colour match. With care it can look really good. It’s quick and easy to do too.

 

[DownwardDog]

Not actually for me directly but can anyone recommend a product to paint on the small patches of rust on my partners transit? I know they can be notorious for it, but if we can squeeze more life out of it before she has to pay someone that would be awesome.

Any spray on rust treatment is going to be a very short term measure - possibly only weeks.

The only process that's not a waster of time and money is sand it back to bare metal, body filler, primer and paint.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Any spray on rust treatment is going to be a very short term measure - possibly only weeks.

The only process that's not a waster of time and money is sand it back to bare metal, body filler, primer and paint.

Ah bugger. We went for Jenolite which is a paint on job. Hopefully slow it down somewhat.

 

[DownwardDog]

Bought a Toyota 86 in Ferrari Retail Red. LHS head gasket's gone.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

I think I'm fucking cursed. Trying to escape this painful circle of bangers I went to the bank and borrowed 6.5k and bought something a fair bit shinier that I'm used to. Went to a guy I trust who got my an Insignia at auction and serviced it for me.

Less then 500 miles later it over heated and all the coolent has gone. I stopped pretty quick so hopefully nothing to serious. Except its 3 hours away to where I got it, I don't finish work till Thursday night and was hoping to go away in it for a long weekend Friday night. We might be taking her rather old Transit instead. And I've still got to decide if I'm carefully driving it back or doing a recovery.

 

[weltweit]

UnderAnOpenSky just to say, you seem to have a very unlucky period with your vehicles.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

UnderAnOpenSky just to say, you seem to have a very unlucky period with your vehicles.

It's literally the story of my motoring life.

 

[weltweit]

It's literally the story of my motoring life.

I am sorry to hear that.

I have been relatively lucky. My very first car, an Allegro was awful and always breaking down and costing me money, but since then I have been lucky (touch wood).

 

[dessiato]

I think I'm fucking cursed. Trying to escape this painful circle of bangers I went to the bank and borrowed 6.5k and bought something a fair bit shinier that I'm used to. Went to a guy I trust who got my an Insignia at auction and serviced it for me.

Less then 500 miles later it over heated and all the coolent has gone. I stopped pretty quick so hopefully nothing to serious. Except its 3 hours away to where I got it, I don't finish work till Thursday night and was hoping to go away in it for a long weekend Friday night. We might be taking her rather old Transit instead. And I've still got to decide if I'm carefully driving it back or doing a recovery.

Do you know what caused the overheating? If it’s just a hose you might be able to patch it with some hose tape from Halfords, at least long enough to get you home. But if you’ve a roadside breakdown cover why not get them to take a look?

 

[keybored]

Does anyone know if it's likely that simply cleaning the EGR may sort it or is likely it's fucked and needs a new one. If it in needs a new one is it a case of simply bolting it on? It's a Transit Mk 7...

Blank and delete.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Do you know what caused the overheating? If it’s just a hose you might be able to patch it with some hose tape from Halfords, at least long enough to get you home. But if you’ve a roadside breakdown cover why not get them to take a look?

Thinking on it over night this is what I'll do this morning. Going to chance my arm. Its topped up with water so will drive the few miles to work and call them there. Ideally they'll take a few hours back to where I got it who can do any work and I'll get a train down on Friday.

Booked a caravan for a long weekend near Scarborough this weekend. I'm hoping we don't have to take her transit, but don't want to risk doing damage to the car until its been properly looked at.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Blank and delete.

Yeah I suggested that, but she didn't seem keen on the idea when I told her what it was for.

 

[dessiato]

Thinking on it over night this is what I'll do this morning. Going to chance my arm. Its topped up with water so will drive the few miles to work and call them there. Ideally they'll take a few hours back to where I got it who can do any work and I'll get a train down on Friday.

Booked a caravan for a long weekend near Scarborough this weekend. I'm hoping we don't have to take her transit, but don't want to risk doing damage to the car until its been properly looked at.

If you put in water don't leave it in for longer than you're forced to. Water will damage the engine over time.

Can you get premixed coolant? That would be better than water.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

If you put in water don't leave it in for longer than you're forced to. Water will damage the engine over time.

Can you get premixed coolant? That would be better than water.

Yeah temp fix. It's going to the garage to find out why it lost it all in the first place.

 

[platinumsage]

Yeah temp fix. It's going to the garage to find out why it lost it all in the first place.

You shouldn't mix different coolant types so be careful chucking random coolant in.

 

[souljacker]

UnderAnOpenSky have a root around the rad and see if you can find where the coolant is escaping from. If it's a small leak you can patch it with that coolant stop stuff.

One of my fans once detached itself from is housing and cut a big hole in the rad. That was a massive leak and a bottle of coolant would go through to the floor in about ten mins of driving. How long does yours take to drain? That should give you an idea of how bad the hole is

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Well that went wrong. Breakdown ran it for 30 mins and couldn't find anything, said it would be ok till I could get it into where I bought it. Set off on the motorway, it went from normal to screaming at me in the blink of an eye. Pulled over and all the water was still there. Let it cool a bit and went to restart so I could get off the hard shoulder. It wouldn't. Breakdown called again and it started fine and went on to the truck. Apparently garage ran it for 4 hours and shed loads of checks, has given up and called an auto electrician. Pretty gutted and hoping I havn't bought a lemon, but at the same time maybe its best it happens now....

 

[UnderOpenSky]

I really did buy a lemon with that one. Touch wood the 15 plate Passat I've currently got will fair better. Had it a bit over a year and nothing major has gone wrong. Yet. I'm not doing crazy high mileage in ancient cars which probably helps.

Anyway ordered some tyres from Halfords to be done outside the house whilst I worked from home. Guy knocks on the door and tells me he can't get the locking wheel nut off, it's to tight. Which is odd as I changed it at the roadside with the shitty supplied tool when I got a flat. So I called Halfords to take in and it's miles from me and they want me to leave it there. So thought I'd have a go myself. Bit of GT-80 and waited two mins and it came straight off.

Quick question. Is it possible to tell from this photo if the discs and pads need doing soon. I'm assuming there's some kind of light to tell me when they die as it's half modern, but would good to be prepared.

 

[Ax^]

not from the picture as cannie see if the disk is wrapped in anyways I say it's more than likely ok

as for the pads stick you finger been the disk and the edge of the pad and see if their any meat left in them should be about a quarter of an inch or more
if not change them

 

[UnderOpenSky]

not from the picture as cannie see if the disk is wrapped in anyways I say it's more than likely ok

as for the pads stick you finger been the disk and the edge of the pad and see if their any meat left in them should be about a quarter of an inch or more
if not change them

Thanks. Not done anything for ages but my colleague was complaining how much he's had to pay recently just for pads, so I should prepare myself.

At least I've got a drive now to work on

 

[UnderOpenSky]

So I realized when I got in last night that my tire was leaking air. Hadn't deflated much, but obviously it's flat this morning. They're pretty new. I think it's leaking from round the valve? Could this be incompetence when fitting? I had a bit of a nightmare when they were fitted as he said he couldn't get one off. When I realized what a nightmare it would be to take it to their place, I did it myself and it wasn't that hard.

 

[MrCurry]

How long should a battery last? My car was made in Aug 2007, had a new one in Feb 2013 and then again in Jan 2018, so they‘ve lasted about five years on average and on that basis, due for replacement soon. Seems fairly low lifespan to me, but what do I know?

Recently the car is slow to turn over and I’m not sure if the battery is too old, or if it’s just the strain placed on it from low temps and lack of regular driving. I suppose the thing to do is get an optimate charger hooked up to it overnight and see how long it works for after that.

I’ve read that lead acid batteries can be revived by “equalisation“ where you charge them to a higher voltage than they receive from the car alternator, so if my battery is getting weak, perhaps I should take it out and try that before spending £££ on a new one. It’s a 100Ah 820CCA battery, so not cheap.

 

[MickiQ]

I bought my 8 year old Audi, 5 years ago and I have never replaced the battery on it, I can't know for sure whether the battery was replaced prior to that but I doubt it since I have the maintenance records.
We bought Mrs Q's 2007 Micra in 2009 and we have replaced the battery once in 2016