Can an ignition module be replaced without the need to recode the ignition module, the ecu, key, etc

Edited to remove the SHOUTING Read more

The central locking now frequently fails so the door will not unlock manually either from the inside or outside. I think some mechanical bit must be sticking as I can hear the electromechanical bit trying to unlock it. Sometimes it succeeds. Trouble is, I can't see how to get the impregnable trim off. All I have managed to do is find a tiny hole under the arm rest/door pull enabling the window switch to be removed, but that doesn't reveal any allen/torc screws either. And the small phillips screws at the top ends of the trim are only accessible with the door open!
Can anyone please advise on how to prise off which bit of trim without wrecking it? Read more

Hi all I recently took my toyota yaris 2, in for the scheduled 80k service and discussed with the toyota/citreon main dealer , garage manager about the car's general reliabilty. He seems to think that Toyota are living off past reliabilty reputation and suggested I buy a Citreon next time. His garage have kept the service franchise for toyotas but now only sell toyotas! What do you think everyone , are toyotas not what they used to be?

thanks, Sheldon 2 Read more

HI my mate has the above car and it makes the most terible noise from the front end as we drive along. it squeaks and knocks at the least bump or when going slow, have tried turning the radio up, but we can still hear it. looked underneath, nothing broken. cant find any grease nipples like on the old cars so cant lube it all up? neather sound is constant, just very anoing, what can we do to shut it all up? thanks. Read more

Watching Top Gear the other night, an oft repeated bit of "wisdom" was trotted out which reinforces a significant misunderstanding of how cars work. I can see why people believe it; on a superficial level, it makes sense; however, it's quite bogus.

The "wisdom" is;

On a front wheel drive car, the front wheels do more work because they are both steering and driving

This is, despite being so deeply ingrained as received wisdom, utter nonsense.

To expose this as the bunkum it is, consider a car with a 50 / 50 weight distribution going round a corner at reasonable speed, and with neutral throttle. To simplify matters, imagine the the height of the centre of gravity is so low that weight transfer to the outside is negligible.

How much side force is generated by the front wheels compared with how much is generated by the rear?

If you believe in Clarkson's maxim, you'll have to say that the front, steered, wheels are doing more work, producing more force. However, if this were the case, there would be an unbalanced moment acting on the car, tending to make it spin (front end into the centre of the corner, back end out!).

Of course, what actually must happen for equilibrium is that front and rear wheels must produce the same amount of side force. This would remain true if the car had four wheel steering, or even rear wheel steering.

To say this bluntly;

Just because a wheel may be turned relative to the car's body does not mean it is producing more or less sideforce than the wheels which remain inline.


Now, having got that off my chest, it's possible to talk a bit more about what really affects how much work tyres have to do. The thing which really dominates here is weight distribution. Had I dealt with an example of a car with a 70 / 30 weight distribution, then, yes, the front wheels will be producing more sideforce than the rear, surprise surprise, in the ratio 70 / 30!!

IF we temporarily begin to think about the 50 / 50 car and consider what happens if you add drive or brake forces, you'll see there's no black magic here either. The brake or drive forces act at approximately right angles to the sideforce, and together form a resultant force, so as the sideforces were equal front to rear, if you now clumsily add some drive force to the front wheels, the resultant force will now be larger than that of the rear axle, and you'll begin to get more slip from the front tyres - a power on understeer effect. If you do this to the rear wheels, you get some power on oversteer effect. Again, none of this has anything to do with which wheels are turned relative to the car body.

As an antedote to obtaining vehicle dynamics misinformation from messrs Clarkson, Hammond and May, I would like (again!) to recommend "Fundamentals of Vehicle Dynamics" by Gillespie. It's an expensive book, so, perhaps best to ask your library to get it in for you. Read more