July 2003
Have just acquired a P reg. Peugeot 406 2.1 TD. The previous owner had occasional trouble with the engine revs cycling and engine slow to rev down when foot off throttle. The local agent ran a diagnostic check which reported no faults but he did clean contacts on the ecu (quote). This cured it 'til the next time. Back to the agent same result with disappearance of fault.
It has now happened to me. Pulled up, into neutral, foot off, engine did 3 or 4 cycles between (approx.) 1500 and 2500 rpm then settled down and now seems ok. The car has done 63,000 and has shown this tendency for some time but at very long intervals (months) and was ignored but now appears to be becoming more frequent. I was aware of this history and have no axe to grind with the prev. owner, we are both interested in getting to the bottom of it.
Any ideas? Read more
Hi all
I own a R plate (1997) Mk4 Fiesta Flight with a Zetec-SE engine. When I purchased the car there was a slight knocking noise from the nearside front suspension when I drove a little too enthusiastically over speed bumps - bit like a "clank". This has since got worse, and occurs when driving over un-even road surfaces. It is most prevalent during slower (0-30mph) speeds, hardly noticable at speeds greater than 50mph.
Am I right in saying this is a common Fiesta problem? Is it linked to the metal arms that join the suspension to the anti-roll bar?
Thanks for any advice,
Moby. Read more
Most likley be the suspension arm bushes, and most likely the bush which connects to the anti-roll bar. You can get them both done for about £40, or you'll need a special tool to remove them yourself. A mechanic will quickly find which ones need doing.
My '93 L reg BMW 518 has just been serviced by a local specialist who advised me that the down pipe leading into the catalytic convertor has split, is blowing slightly and therefore needs replacing. They are quoting £550 + Vat BMW or £350 + Vat 'pattern part' does anyone know if I can get this welded instead and if not what should I go for as I intend to keep the car another 5 years? Read more
Peter - many thanks for your suggestion - I'll have a look at the site
hi is this normal to have a whine from the turbo but only at low revs pulling away? Read more
Very unlikey that you will get any turbo whine as you set off, unless you do it at 2,500 rpm plus, as the turbo is hardly spinning. If you get a 'squeal' just as you let the clutch up and put the power on it's more than likely the clutch release bearing. Will go on like that for a long time, probably (my BX TD went like that for about 30,000 miles, and was still going when I sold it at 136,000).
RichardW
Is it illogical? It must be Citroen....
After all the talk of the Stig and it being Perry McCarthy, I thought it kind of ironic that in this week's Auto Express they have the new car honours.
This was held at a festive night with lots of guests from motorsport including "Audi Test Driver" Perry McCarthy.
Wonder if he told Auto Express who he worked for in his part time job.... Read more
can anyone tell me what temperature the fan should switch on, on a peugeot 406 1.9td Read more
I can conclusively say that i now know exactly when the fan cuts in on a 306TD, as my radiator emptied itself on the M40 last night and the fan came on at one of the seemingly random markings on the temp gauge, about 95degC. It had never come on before with me driving, but managed to hold 95 til id limped home to watford, where it cooled to 90 before switching itself off.
Does anyone have any experiences of this car, good or bad as a friend is interested in buying a 3litre SE varient and i know little about them. In particular reliability,performance etc. Read more
A friend of mine has one
it suffered from warped disks
extreme tyre wear (tracking has been checked)
lots of envy damage (although he does leave in carparks in manchester and liverpool in the evenings at weekends.
killer petrol consumption
he likes it though
Regards
Jonathan
Whats the worst car you've ever driven?
This is only for cars that are Post 1990!!.
My was a Suzuki Vitara 1991 with the Fat Boy kit. Horrific.
Running it a close second was the 1997 Astra Convertible. Horrible. Read more
"In their day Riley was a quality vehicle with superb handling, and engineering integrity. To compare the name of Riley with some of the dross mentioned on this thread is an absolute insult to one of the greatest names in British motoring heritage and I would love to get my hands on one today!!!!"
It was awful to drive: and Riley you may call a "great name", but I also remember Riley 1.5/2.5s with awful canvas roofs etc.
Frankly any one who designed a car with the fuel tank mounted above the passenger's feet over the engine was a witless moron even in the 1920s and to call that "engineering integrity" makes a mockery of the words.. imo..
absolute carp car:-)
madf
Hi,
Just got a brand new company car - vauxhal astra with a CDR 500 cd player that I'm dying to properly connect my mobile phone to. I have a cradle, that I've connected to the power, and I've ran the microphone around the trim so it's as close as I can get it to my big mouth, hehe....but I can't work out how to connect the audio to the CD player so that I can hear it through the car speakers when answering the call. The cradle in question is only a cheapo £6 thing, the sort that plugs into the lighter socket - however, it's been lobotomised and bolted to the edge of part of the trim and now looks as professionally installed as I can get it - it will save me £250 if I can get it to work, and Vauhall dealers don't want to know unless I pay them to install one of their own cradles....pffft!! Apparently the CDR 500 needs a switched 12v supply to swap between radio/cd and the phone, and the cheapo cradle also conveniently comes with a switch...does anybody have the pin connections/diagram for the switched supply and audio in connections to this stereo so that it'll save me a fortune ???
Any help would be greatly appreciated, cheers. Karl.
Read more
Sussed it if anyone's interested. Thanks for all your info, had to use a bit of trial and error, but everyone's input helped - appreciated guys.
How I Did It - Look at the Radio from the rear, audio input goes into top row, third pin from left (marked 'TIP' on top of the radio) and second row down, 5th pin from left. (labelled as earth). This is a line input, so source will have to be amplified to get a decent volume, or you need the transformer (connected to same two pins) as discussed above. I got around this by using the speaker output from a cheapo self-contained car kit - about a tenner from ebay.
Next, to mute the radio and to get input from telephone to go through car speakers, you need to ground 5th row down, 2nd pin from left (labelled 'TEL' on top of radio). The cheapo unit I bought from ebay has a double pole switch which is used to turn the charger on, and I just adapted this.
You'll probably find the pins are missing for these positions in the car audio plug, but you can buy the same plugs from Halfords and take out some of the pins to swop over - I soldered the wires straight to the radio and pulled the wires through the back of the connector after taking out the glove box to get at them easily.
That's it, I now have a fully working car kit - saved me £250 that a vauxhall dealer wanted to do the same job, all I have to do is press the button to swop over the radio to phone.
I always thought Road Tax was meant to be the way to pay for our road systems. It seems that now we will have to pay for their building and upkeep AND to drive on them as well. Combine this with high fuel tax and I believe it adds up to a very unfair system
I have this suggestion for our transport minister.
Abolish road tax and lower fuel taxes. If we have the technology they say we have then track all car journeys and have us pay for what we actually drive adjusting those fees up or down according to busy areas and peak periods.
The final bill could be reduced by percentages according to vehicle size and fuel type.
Wouldn't that be much fairer all round?
And far mor proportionate.
At the moment someone who drives a small car 20 miles a day in a rural area is subsidising the owner of a limo or 4WD gas guzzler driving round a city
Read more
www.cclondon.com
Living in London, I actually have no idea how to pay the charge other than by going online. I imagine that you can pay it in various newsagents, etc., but I've never actually tried.
Browse
By chance I am currently doing a mileage check on my 2.1 406
On a recent 350 mile m/way trip it managed 55mpg (70mph+), and over the last 1700 miles, mainly town use & towing (only a couple of long trips) it has returned 46mpg.
As yet I am unable to get a direct comparison with the a/c in operation.
Mapsimus