September 2002
How many of you know that, far from running out of oil and gas, there are some who are now saying that oil wells which had thought to be nearly pumped dry have been refilling........from below!
Feature here. people.cornell.edu/pages/tg21/recharging/ Read more
I'm missing the owners manual and the service book for a Citroen Xsara I bought at auction (BcaTewkesbury) yesterday. After over 3 months out of work the auction seemed to be the cheapest place to get a car to take me from Hereford to Leeds every week and although I'm pleased with £1900 for a 1998 1.4i Xsara (plenty of parking dings) it came with no accompanying documentation. The car came from Reg Vardy Banbury so I guess a phonecall to them might help with the service history but what's best way of getting some sensible documentation on it?
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Presumably somebody somewhere stocks 'parts' for 12 year old Audis and a manual is a 'part'. They must exist somewhere, even if only in a dusty store room in Ingoldstadt! Maybe someone would lend you theirs to photocopy as a stopgap. Good luck!
A colleague at work has a y-reg Vectra tdi, into which he pours 1 litre of oil/1000 miles !!
There are no visible leaks. Is this a known problem - or is it, as the manufacturers are wont to say, "a feature" ??
I told him that at least he's running on mainly fresh oil all the time !! Read more
If it is the GM 2.2 Tdi, SAAB have just issued very specific instructions on how and when to read the engine oil level. A 'Search' in the archive will revela all - it is tricky!
I was interested to see in the news that the Berlingo is getting a facelift, particularly as I'd just reading Jeremy Clarkson's 'Backfire' in this month's Top Gear Magazine' where he describes the Berlingo as 'by some considerable margin, the best family car money can buy. For £8,000, nothing even gets close'.
Do you think we can expect a surge in Berlingo ownership? Read more
Sorry, TGIF, I have studied this from all the literature I can find on the web, and am filled with an overwhelming sense that the Ford Popular has reappeared in a new incarnation and the Berlingo is crying out to be chopped and channeled and have fat tyres and a 377 cu.in V-8 installed.
I believe the 1.3 toyota and diahatsu have the same engine and that popular opinion is that 'it's a good 'un'. Is the same true of the 1.0 engines? Are they the same and 'a good 'un' too?
Any comment on the 1.0l YRV? I am thinking of buying one to use as a wheel barrow and to take kids to and from footie matches- I might even take it for a leisurly potter through France next year. I don't need a great car but just something that gets reliably from a to b with economy if little 'style'. Read more
Thanks for the tech. spec. David. 80 plus m.p.g seems too good to be true. I wish they would give a 0 - 60 as I have a 'feel' for 15 seconds but I have not a clue what 88.3 N m would do to 875kg.
Vehicle : R plate '98 Passat 93k miles. Paid for service @ non franchise specialist, and asked him to do rear disc and pads at the same time, as main agent had told me they needed doing. He told me fronts were also now due. Last week brake warning light starts to come on, accompanied by three musical chimes. Ah, thinks I ; indicator for pads. Purchase set to change. Does it have a wear indicator? say suppliers Must have, say I, theyr'e telling me its time to change. Remove old pads. No wear indicator wires. Oh. Fit new ones (genuine parts, too!) which fit exactly, once I've removed the wires. Drive 350 miles to collect family from airport (which is why I changed pads.) Following day, wife drives her mother 120 miles, light starts flashing, tone starts chiming. RTFM! I say (and look underneath at the back for fluid leaks) yup! it's damp under the rear wheel car to local garage who diagnose loose bleed nipple on rear wheel.
Moral? I should have read the manual.
Mea Maxima Culpa.
(and I probably ought to at least tell the non-franchise specialist that they didn't finish the job properly, as I doubt bleed nipples (will that get censored, I wonder) have a habit of loosening themselves.....) Read more
Hi Tim,
Interesting tale... I got RTFM ground into me at an early age, but still manage to forget sometimes...
Last time I changed our A80 pads, it was cheaper to buy the ones with the wires in and cut the wires off.
El Dingo (Martin).
** Moved from the end of "Halfords oil offers" **
Since I am coming up to my next service on my 1991 Audi Coupe, I am starting to think about choice of oil. As I've had the car for a year, I obviously don't know what oil was used before I bought it. In my last service (a 20000 mile rather than a 10000 mile) I had a semi-synthetic (brand unknown) oil put in by the mechanic. Since then, I have topped up with Magantec 1040.
So, my questions are
1) What, if any benefit would I get from switching to Mobil 1?
2) If I shouldn't bother with Mobil 1, am I using the best choice of oil at the moment?
3) Should I insist that the mechanic uses a specific oil in the change?
Thanks in advance...
Stuart Read more
I have just started getting a grating noise (like metal rubbing on metal) when I press the brake. The brakes are working fine and it is only when I press the brake pedal that I get this sound. What is it liely to be and is it going to cost me a fortune to repair?!! Read more
Thank you to everyone for your help. I have now replaced my brake pads (well an engineer friend of mine has replaced my brake pads!) and the car is running fine.
Until next time, thanks!!!
A14 (2 lane dual carriageway) North of Cambridge yesterday afternoon. Free flowing traffic at 70mph. Suddenly everything gets clogged up - HGVs frantically switching to the outside lane, brake lights on all over the place etc. Even though I was keeping a decent gap ahead I had to brake hard - fortuantely the guy behind was alert too so I didn't collect him in the boot. When I got to the head of the problem, it turned out to be a hearse and three other vehicles in convoy at 40mph. By no means the first time I've seen this. Presumably they regard potentially causing (albeit indirectly) a multi-vehicle pile up as a good way to generate business.
GJD Read more
Just as the M11 northbound turns into the A14 and bears to the west at Cambridge, the left hand lane (of 3) becomes the slip road for the Cambridge Crematorium...!
This would explain the hearse and mourners cars you saw.
I went to a funeral there on thursday and you have to slow almost to a standstill while still on the main carriageway, as the entrance to the complex is by way of a 90degree left turn off the nearside lane.
Of course anybody following a hearse into the site is likely to have their mind elsewhere, and certainly not on making sure they have pulled over safely out of the way of the passing traffic.
This road is the main signposted route bringing cross-channel traffic up from Dover to the north of england, next time you are driving on the M25 from dartford tunnel towards A1 you will see the sign that says "The NORTH via M11/A14/A1"
It also carries freight from the east coast ports of Harwich and Felixstowe to the West and North of the UK. So most of the passing traffic consists of lorry drivers on "auto-pilot"...
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002...l
A post office clerk who led a lavish life by stealing £40,000 through benefits books has been jailed for six months.
Agnes Graham, 57, began to attract attention when she began arriving for her one-day-a-week job in a leased £32,000 Jaguar.
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Reminds me of my crazy friend. Often he would get one of the girls in the office to take the weekends takings to the bank after a computer show, which included cash and cheques. Anyway thinking it was funny he wrote in pencil on the back of one of the cheques "This is a stick up". Fortunately the cashier didn't take it to seriously and handed it back to her, needless to say she went beserk on returning to the office!
Simon
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Motoring. Motoring. Motoring.
How many times do I have to say this.
Motoring. Motoring.
It doesn't even have to be a strong link to Motoring, but *some* kind of link please.