August 2003
Can anyone help?
Pug 406 1.8 16v. No spark to injector, tested with pulse light. Could it be the ecu? Read more
Has anyone any mental tricks or strategies for keeping the old blood pressure down when faced with the everyday hurly burly on the roads? While there are sensible physical things one can do to be a defensive driver in the face of idiocy (after all the object is to get from A to B intact), I'm interested rather in the everyday mental side of driving and coping strategies. For instance, I read a Bill Bryson book some time ago in which he said he never got annoyed when someone drove along with an erroneous indicator on. Rather he took it as good fortune that here was somebody advertising the fact that they "were not entirely on top of the job in hand".
Similarly, when you know somebody is going to do something stupid, rather than get mad when it happens congratulate yourself on your ability to predict the future. You could try thinking: "Hey! people make mistakes - that's why they put rubbers on the end of pencils." Do you see what I mean?
And why is it when you've left plenty of time to complete a journey you never get held up but when you're in a rush every possible obstruction seems to be deployed against you? Could it be that it's how you view things that's important?
8 ball Read more
>>I find the best cause of action is to raise a hand in an apology.
Fine as long as they don't mistake the apologetic raised hand for another sort of raised hand signal ;)
I have a 2002 Mondeo Estate that i wish to take abroad. Does anyone know the procedure other than referring to a Ford dealer to change the headlights over for continental use?
Regards
BikeBoy
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>have to confess that I was somewhat taken aback by the area of headlamp they were suggesting to black out
Yes I blacked out my neighbours mondeo. Its a strip from the middle of the light UP to the top. Most wierd
Hi
Need a new car, first time buyer. Don't want a second hand banger, etc.
The Toyota Yaris looks the best buy for me. A broker site has various models for sale.
Which one is best T2 1.0 to T3 1.3 ? or the diesel.
The 1.0 T2 seems a bargain at £6500 + free insurance?? (Saving around £500 premium)
Is it better to spend £6500 on the T2 than £7500 on the T3 1.3. All three doors versions BTW?
Anyone have a Yaris and care to comment on whether they are a good first car and suitable for a tall drivers, 6ft +.
Which model should I choose.
I am expecting the Yaris to be cheap to run, free and then low insurance, good mpg, reliable and hold on to a lot of it's value. I would rather have a good car that loses a few grand in three years than buy a banger that loses all it's value and costs £100's to repair and insure etc.
Cheers. Read more
Lets try and keep the responses something like sensible and differentiate between the Backroom and a Chatroom, at least to some degree.
It was, after all, a sensible question.
Picking up on a strand from the skidpan thread, I thought it would be interesting to hear people's experiences/recommendations of track days and driving experiences, which can be a valuable way of both learning about your abilities and how best to apply them (never mind the opportunity to let off a bit of steam far from the madding crowd).
I had a track day at Mallory Park a few years back which was great fund in saloons and a swift lesson in why-most-of-us-aren't-Michael Schumacher in Formula Fords. More recently I've had even more fun down at Prodrive's proving ground and tech centre finding out what an Impreza can really do (and why I'll never find the limit of it!).
But the most useful experience was courtesy of some contacts with the police, who took me on a watered-down road course (including pursuit) and gave me sometime in an old Scorpio on a skidpan. That taught me just how far I'd got to go in being a good road driver. The instructor's progress at speed was phenomenal and totally safe. Read more
Track days are fantastic. Most recent for me was at Jonathan Palmer's Bedford Autodrome. (Advertised in Autocar). Brilliant track with excellent tarmac surface, good variety of bends with plenty of run-off. You get 3 hours and it rained heavily half an hour before the end which was an interesting challenge.
Previously done the Porsche Experience, old concrete, wet and greasy, 911 was a challenge even in a straight line and I spun the Exige. The Lotus day at Hethel was great, lots of tuition and exercises building up to laps on the full circuit, spun there too! And worth remembering this is a test track Senna drove on.
Test days at Millbrook are worthwhile. Don't be tempted to drive too many cars. Concentrate on the interesting ones and pinch extra laps if you can. I liked the X-Type 3.0 Sport.
Go and enjoy.
Douglas
I recently had new rear brake pads on my clk230 and from the start they have made a noise on braking. I have now travelled about 800 miles and the brakes still make a loud squeak, I was told by the MB garage that I should allow 1000 miles for them to bed in and then was told that I was using the brakes too gently! This is a new one on me, but I was told that I should hard brake as this will clear the shine off the discs and stop the noise. Well I have tried this and it has not made any difference at all.
I look forward to taking the car back to MB and let them sort it out at their expense but are they correct??
Thanks.
Steve Read more
They are correct to an extent...rear brakes of todays cars don't do much whilst unladen so bedding in can take some time. Heavy applications of the brake can often help here, so they are not wrong in offering that advice.
To the point, they shouldn't squeal after 800 miles IMO.
Return to workshop!
this may have come up before,but i was just wondering what kind of milages people are getting out of their 306 diesel clutches in particular.(and i don\'t mean getting heavy due to the cable being routed next to the exhaust). What would a reasonable price be for a clutch replacement on one of these? I have been told £300
Duffy Read more
Release bearing failures are the main cause of clutch replacements in my experience. 406 HDi is a prime example.
Hello everyone,
My Herald 13/60 has developed an occassional stutter or misfire.
I suspect electrics and am replacing leads, contact breakers, plugs, distributor cap, and ... rotor arm.
However, the rotor arm will not budge. I think it is just a push fit.
Any tips? Do I need to do some thing brutal like grab it with a pair of big pliers? I am worried about damaging the distributor shaft.
Thank you for your help. Read more
Managed to get it off by lots of wiggling...
Cleaned and gapped points and plugs. Replaced condensor, rotor arm, plug leads, and distributor cap.
Now runs very smoothly. No sign of the misfire on a short test run.
Thanks for the responses.
Sat here waiting for the phone to ring announcing Polo's fate, thought I'd ask another question...
New Seat Ibizas come with a years free insurance for people aged 25-80. I'm 23 next month so don't qualify. Insurance to me though is worth about £700, so would I be being cheeky to ask for that much as a discount in addition to anything else I'd managed to get??
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The best prices on the new Ibiza are from www.tins.co.uk btw
Thanks for that. I've done a bit of research into the Ibiza, as by all accounts the 1.2 is a fab little car. Would you beleive it would be less for me to insure a brand new 1.2 than it would be to insure my polo again for another year (like £150 less!)?!
Now if I could just find another £5000 :)
There has been much discussion about the site advertisments and pop-ups.
To summarise our position;
This is a \"free to use\" site which makes no charge for use of its resources. We strive to make the Backroom, which is only one part of the site, as useful and enjoyable as possible.
The greater part of the site holds a lot of useful and valuable information around motoring - whether this is things such as the Car by Car breakdown, Buying/Selling Cars and Road Tests and much more or things such as the useful website list. If you haven\'t explored the rest of the site, then I encourage you to do so.
This all takes a great deal of people\'s time, in particular HJ\'s. It also takes a fair amount of money.
There are people who either do their work for free or at greatly reduced rates. People such as Stephen, Dave, Me and HJ himself.
Adverts and pop-ups provide a source of revenue. There is no profit at this time, and every piece of revenue keeps this site alive and functioning.
We need the adverts to survive. Not to make money, merely to survive. We remain as impartial as possible, partly for the good of the site and partly to protect HJ\'s name - which, as I am sure you will realise, is valuable both to him and to the site.
Consequently, if you have a technical problem caused by one of the adverts, then advise me ASAP and we\'ll look into it.
However, if you simply don\'t like the advert, get over it and don\'t bother mentioning it in here. If you feel you have something to say about the advert which needs saying then you have the following e-mail addresses;
mailto:moderators@honestjohn.co.uk
mailto:letters@honestjohn.co.uk
In e-mail we\'ll listen and take on-board your comments.
Everytime you click on an advert revenue, albeit very small, is generated. That revenue does not, at this time, cover the full costs of running this site.
You have a free and, in my opinion, very worthwhile site. Adverts seem a very small price to pay.
Conversely, we do appreciate that we are amazingly lucky in the \"quality\" of participant we have. Without you, who are knowledgeable on so many different subjects and willing to put significant effort into sharing that knowledge, the Backroom would not be what it is, and we all are both appreciative and proud of that fact.
And that, I feel, is enough conversation on the subject.
Please don\'t try and have further conversation on this, whether it is supportive or not. We all know the position and there really isn\'t much more to say.
In order to remain even-handed, then I shall delete *all* discussion on the subject of advertising and associated topics, whatever standpoint it takes. I will weed out notes, comments and/or threads which I find not to be supportive or are possibly hindering our progress, or even those that are potentially so.
But I do assure you that we all, HJ, Stephen, Dave and myself, read *all* e-mail we receive and any comments you wish to make in that forum will be listened to.
I have not write-locked this thread, trusting that it is not neccessary and that you will read this note in the spirit I intend it.
I hope that covers it,
Regards,
Mark. Read more
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It may seem unrelated, but try checking the earths at the rear tail lights.