My daughter's car is suffering severe problems in attempting to move away after starting. If it was an old car you could simply pull the choke out. It is just as if it is going to cut out when the accelerator is depressed and it only gets better when the engine is warm. An independent Rover mechanic has said he thinks the ECU needs reconfiguring or replacing. Does it sound like this is the problem or is there anything simpler to try first. Clearly the ECU is not telling the system to deliver a rich mixture when the engine is cold. Can these be reconfigured by a dealer who still has the old MG Rover equipment?

I can buy another ECU fron car breakers, complete with immobiliser unit and a key fob. Would they be a direct replacement and not need reconfiguring or programming.

Thanks anyone out there for any help. We keep throwing good money after bad with a HOME TUNE man £65 and the independent mechanic £30. He installed new plugs and cleaned the crankshaft sensor. P999BRY
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ok, got a 306 dturbo where the rear suspension creaks at one side. the axle has been apart and lowered and the trailing arms removed during this process. once reassembled there is a squeaking sound if you push down the rear on that side. i assume it's the bearings have been disturbed as it has new rear axle bushes and the rest of the setup was carefully cleaned and refitted.

is it possible to do the rear axle bearings diy i have a spare rear axle tube with old bearings? i assume they are pressed into the axle tube? if so what is the best way of removing the current bearings? also are there set markings for the positions or is it easier to mark them before removal?

if diy really is unviable how much are you looking at if you took the axel tube to a garage pre stripped?

chris Read more

I have recently Purchased a "VRCD500-SDU" cd/mp3 Player for my vauxhall corsa 1.0L 2003. I started to fit it but have no wiring guide for the wires at the back of the old Radio "Blaupunkt Car 2003" (standard tape machine with corsa's of this type).
I Just wondered if anyone had a guide as to which wire is which or if nayone knew and would let me know.

Any reply would be great, thanks very much,
Swifty Read more

This interesting article appeared in today's Telegraph BusinessClub (sorry article only available to registered members so I have copied it here).

If you live and work in London then you could park for free and legally avoid the congestion charge by buying a G-Wiz electric car. They cost £8,500 but you could save more than this in a year on these charges. Perhaps Lud should take note.

Are we a little green or just not switched on?

Keith Johnston bangs the drum for environmentally friendly electric cars, but he needs fellow travellers. David Sumner Smith reports.

The electric-powered G-Wiz is a far cry from the Porsche 911 cabriolet that Keith Johnston used to own. With its modest top speed of 45mph, 48-mile range and dumpy, babyish looks, the G-Wiz fan club is limited to just one person: London mayor Ken Livingstone.

The politician and the serial entrepreneur are both convinced that petrol and diesel-powered vehicles are nearing the end of the road. But while one wants to protect the environment, the other wants to build a profitable business. ?I?m not some doey-eyed eco-warrior,? says Mr Johnston, managing director of Southall-based GoinGreen. ?We are here to make money.?

With four previous successful start-ups to his name and a victory for GoinGreen in the 2004 Startup Awards, Mr Johnston has the credentials for success. So too do the company?s founders: Nick Hewson was co-founder and chairman of Grantchester and Steve Cain was chief executive of Carlton Communications.

The founders encountered a prototype of the Californian-designed electric car four years ago when travelling in India. Knowing electric vehicles would be exempt from the congestion charges about to be applied in London, they successfully bid for UK import rights and won first refusal on rights to sales in mainland Europe.

Having tested the safety of the G-Wiz and secured pan-European Type Approval, they head-hunted Mr Johnston, handed him ?the keys to the business? and retired into the background as non-executive directors. Initial plans to supply the G-Wiz to clients on lease terms were promptly shelved. Having initially agreed to provide grant support for leasing contracts, the Energy Savings Trust promptly ran out of funds.

The revised business model developed by Mr Johnston is as different from the motor retail norm as the G-Wiz is from his old Porsche. ?Low cost is imperative,? he says. ?We import directly from Reva cars in India and sell direct to customers without any dealers to add their margin.? There are no expensive showrooms either. The G-Wiz is marketed through the GoinGreen.co.uk website, where prospective customers can book a test drive.

?We don?t employ traditional car salesmen either,? explains Mr Johnston. ?The test drives are operated by environmental science graduates. They are very passionate about environmental protection and achieve very high conversion rates with sales prospects.? The website allows customers to order direct and pay by credit card.

Premises are basic and staff numbers minimal. Three staff work handle sales, three technicians prepare the cars for delivery and four engineers provide mobile servicing.

The strategy appears to be working. More than 550 examples of the G-Wiz are already on the road. Sales rose from £966,000 in the year ending June 2005 to £2.5m 12 months later and the firm is now approaching breakeven. But neither the founders nor investment firm Renewal Capital, who took a 20pc stake in the company in July, have yet seen any return on their investment. Many serious challenges still remain.

The sales proposition for the G-Wiz is attractive to Londoners. Councils in Westminster and the City exempt such cars from parking charges, saving their owners up to £6,000 each year.

It is also exempt from the £8 daily congestion charge and ranks in the lowest groups for insurance and company car tax, so the savings can recoup the £8,500 purchase price in just a year.

By the end of next year, however, old-tech lead-acid batteries will be overtaken by lithium-ion or other technology which has four times as much ?energy density?. This will enable electric powered vehicles to run at speeds of up to 75mph and travel 100 miles before re-charging is needed. But to some eyes, even more advanced electric powered vehicles will not wean motorists out of their fossil-fuel-powered cars.

So GoinGreen has to hedge its bets. As a stop-gap to satisfy customers who need greater range, it has started selling Smart cars powered by liquefied petroleum gas. It will soon offer modified versions of the Toyota Prius hybrid reportedly capable of up to 130mpg thanks to lithium-ion battery power.


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Roger
I read frequently, but only post when I have something useful to say.
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This idea is often trumpeted as an "alternative" way to pay for road use, implying that if adopted it would replace other forms of pricing, eg the road fund licence or fuel tax. On that basis, probably many people would support it.
But is that really how it will work? Are motorists in Norfolk for example now to be the subjects of a pilot scheme to be given exemption from road tax? How will that work if they drive outside the test area?
Or is the whole idea simply a way of raising even more money, without any intention of it being an alternative to conventional pricing? Read more