1998 Continental R - one year on - Running costs

[matt5791]

Following up - as the thrust of this thread is about running costs -

I have had a very impressively laid out, easy to understand and transparent, quote from RR&B garages for my brakes. They have detailed every element of the work separately, with individual costing for each element in detail with parts and labour broken down. So I can pick off elements of the work and leave less important issues for another time. They certainly inspire confidence. This is how the quote works out, abbreviated -

- Replace both hydraulic Accumulator spheres: 1.5 hours + parts = £271 +vat

- Replace front disks and pads & remake all front brake pipes & replace all flexible hoses: 7.25 hours + parts £1050 +vat

- Disconnect rear drive shafts and skim rear disks and fit new pads: 4 hours + parts £373 +vat

- Fit new rear trailing arm flexible hoses: 2 hours + parts = £259 +vat

- Remove Rat Trap, clean and bleed system: 2 hours + parts = £144 +vat

- Parking brake, replace cables, pads, re-set and unseize: 4 hours + parts = £557 +vat


I'm going to leave the parking brake for the time being as I can probably improve it myself for now (i've already unseized it once, although the current cables, one is incorrect, it can be made to work well enough for an MOT), and get it done properly at a later date.


Bearing in mind the brakes on my car a pretty bad, I don't think these prices are unreasonable. I will post when the work is complete, how it all pans out.

[Johnnie G]

Interesting stuff. Matt I think the quote for your brakes looks right to me. You were asking for a break down of the work to my car and frankly I can't type it all up - the bill was 11 pages long and fully detailed. The expensive mechanical bits were:

1. Full service – that’s everything – 53 separate operations 11.5 hours
2. Brakes. Badly fitted, pads on the wrong way round. Brake pipe rubbing on steering lock. Rear callipers useless. Rusty discs, Non working sensors Refacing all pads. Replace accumulator valve bodies. Its actually amazing the car stopped before! 10 hrs
3. Gearbox sump drainplug damaged
4. Complete front suspension rebuild - 12 hrs
5. Complete rear suspension rebuild – rusty spring cups 14 hrs
6. Wheel alignment post full suspension rebuild 5 hrs
7. Broken parking brake 2 hrs
8. New rear engine mounts 2 hrs
9. Bent gearbox actuator rod 1hr
10. New temperature transmitter and gauge 3 hrs
11. Broken hood cable 4 hrs
Obviously that last one is Azure specific. And clearly there's loads of other stuff that is detail work for example they spent 8 hours putting right all the trim in the boot. I think Contimaz (or somebody) might have said the sensible thing is to get Phantom to do the real specialist stuff and get a cheaper garage to do more simple bits. To be honest I just through money at this particular problem.

In terms of cost - yes of course the bill was astounding, but now I do have a truly awesome car. You can't really get Champagne at brown ale prices! These cars are jaw droppingly beautiful and will go up in value. The investment is well worth it - at least I didn't buy it new!!

best wishes to you all

[matt5791]

Many thanks for that - I think a lot of these cars have not been properly looked after and on many occasions appear to have reams of history, but the condition of the vehicle doesn't show it.

I can imagine your car must be absolutely transformed and the driving experience barely recognisable when compared to before!

[Contimaz]

Good grief . . . this is becoming a very enlightening thread indeed. Actually a Godsend for anyone contemplating buying one of these amazing classics. What is staggering is the degradation that occurs. Even on low mileage examples there appears to be the most ghastly mess underneath.

If your rear spring-cups were rusted and needed replacing - that must be an essential check before purchase. Mine were so knackered that I was lucky not to have adopted kangaroo mode with a spring hitting the ground.

Many of the prices being quoted seem very sensible, having done a great deal of this myself, I know that each straightforward task turns into a longwinded exercise due to the incredible detail of the engineering in every item.Brake discs at the front are always understandable due to the massive weight being stopped and skimming the rears is very sensible.

A complete front end re-build is a wonderful investment to eliminate annoying recurrence of problems and effectively starts from scratch but the cost is eye watering and only because I intend to keep my car 'for ever' do I continue to throw money at it to slowly make it perfect.

I would be interested to know if the Azure is now totally smooth and vibration free at 80-90mph - or is there still small scuttle vibration or steering wheel vibration ?

The only cost ( and in the context of the rest small beer ) that jumps out is the time/cost to do the front wheel alignment - 5 hours on 2 wheels with only 2 possible adjustments each side - hmmm.

[Contimaz]

Matt - are your brake discs the standard size discs or the large discs on later chassis numbers - ? I went to huge trouble machining a mandrel to take the large front discs in order to skim them, having found that no-one wanted to entertain the job due to their size, so I am very interested if you have found someone who will do this work.

[matt5791]

Hi - my brakes are the standard size. Whilst we are replacing the front ones (which are totally beyond any repair - corroded, and below minimum thickness) the rears are above minimum thickness, but are warped. I believe RR&B have their own machine to enable skimming the disks in situ - which is very helpful because of the labour involved in removing the rear disks.

But they don't seem to have any issues with skimming the fronts if needed so this is either something they would do in situ, I guess, or send to an engineering company.

Edited by matt5791 on Friday 30th October 07:43

[Johnnie G]

Hi, just coming back on Contimaz's question regarding vibration/scuttle shake at 80/90 mph. Answer is not much, but yes there is some. The steering doesn't vibrate going along but a bump in the road at 80 mph will cause some scuttle shake. I've owned lots of convertibles and the Azure probably has less scuttle shake than almost any other. For example its much better than my XJS soft-top.

So I guess that a Continental R would be superb and totally vibration free (although I've never driven one) - the Azure is about as good as a soft-top can be - but I can't say its shake free. cheers for now, Johnnie

[Contimaz]

Interesting Thank you Johnnie.

I would love to see a picture if you have one to post. Although, we are pretty much in hibernation season now, so I assume Azure is safely under its dust-sheet, connected to the trickle charger, awaiting the odd clear day for some exercise until next Spring.

My Conti R is in the coachbuilders having the awful roof mobile phone aerial fitting removed and made invisible, requiring complete roof re-paint but then into hibernation mode. You don't have to worry about such body issues but I always wonder how reliable the hood mechanism is on an Azure for info when I can aspire to own one.

Keep us posted on any activity, quirks or tips - always good to read.

[matt5791]

matt5791 said:

Following up - as the thrust of this thread is about running costs -

I have had a very impressively laid out, easy to understand and transparent, quote from RR&B garages for my brakes. They have detailed every element of the work separately, with individual costing for each element in detail with parts and labour broken down. So I can pick off elements of the work and leave less important issues for another time. They certainly inspire confidence. This is how the quote works out, abbreviated -

- Replace both hydraulic Accumulator spheres: 1.5 hours + parts = £271 +vat

- Replace front disks and pads & remake all front brake pipes & replace all flexible hoses: 7.25 hours + parts £1050 +vat

- Disconnect rear drive shafts and skim rear disks and fit new pads: 4 hours + parts £373 +vat

- Fit new rear trailing arm flexible hoses: 2 hours + parts = £259 +vat

- Remove Rat Trap, clean and bleed system: 2 hours + parts = £144 +vat

- Parking brake, replace cables, pads, re-set and unseize: 4 hours + parts = £557 +vat


I'm going to leave the parking brake for the time being as I can probably improve it myself for now (i've already unseized it once, although the current cables, one is incorrect, it can be made to work well enough for an MOT), and get it done properly at a later date.


Bearing in mind the brakes on my car a pretty bad, I don't think these prices are unreasonable. I will post when the work is complete, how it all pans out.

Just updating on this as promised.

So, all the brake work has been completed at RR&B Garages. I went and had a look as the work was being finalised with the car still on the ramp. I thought the work was very tidy, to factory spec. Also, I noticed that whoever had been doing the work had gone around and done little extra things like greasing up the auto gear shift linkage etc. at no charge - not that it would cost much if there was a charge, but I thought a nice touch.

The end costs panned out as follows:

- Replace both hydraulic Accumulator spheres: 1.5 hours + parts = Quoted: £271 +vat. Actual Invoice amount £251.36 +vat

- Replace front disks and pads & remake all front brake pipes & replace all flexible hoses: 7.25 hours + parts Quoted: £1050 +vat. Actual invoice amount £1020.99 +vat

- Disconnect rear drive shafts and skim rear disks and fit new pads: 4 hours + parts quoted: £373 +vat. Actual Invoice amount £499 +vat

- Fit new rear trailing arm flexible hoses: 2 hours + parts = quoted: £259 +vat. Actual invoice amount £259 +vat

- Remove Rat Trap, clean and bleed system: 2 hours + parts = quoted: £144 +vat. Actual invoice amount £144 +vat

- Parking brake, replace cables, pads, re-set and unseize: 4 hours + parts = £557 +vat. Actual invoice amount £206.41


In the end I thought it was reasonably priced and I have been very impressed with the knowledge and attention to detail they have at RR&B - also, they seem like really nice people to do business with who have a respect for the customer's budget.

They are now quoting me on sorting out the suspension - once this is tackled, I should have a car that drives as close as possible to factory spec in the handling department.

[Contimaz]

Great heads up thank you Matt - I am becoming very envious now - new brake lines is a job that few of us embark upon unless there is a leak but what a sensible precaution. I am now going to show my total ignorance, even after having dismantled and sodded around with many parts of my Conti - what is a rat trap ? I am now worried that I need to check my rat trap but have no idea where it might be. Should I be looking for a small rat sized hole ?

We need some pictures , please post something to satisfy our curiosity

[matt5791]

Contimaz said:

Great heads up thank you Matt - I am becoming very envious now - new brake lines is a job that few of us embark upon unless there is a leak but what a sensible precaution. I am now going to show my total ignorance, even after having dismantled and sodded around with many parts of my Conti - what is a rat trap ? I am now worried that I need to check my rat trap but have no idea where it might be. Should I be looking for a small rat sized hole ?

We need some pictures , please post something to satisfy our curiosity

Yes, that was exactly my question - apparently it's RR jargon from years ago - it even featured in an old advert for the Silver Shadow, I believe (I just found a link to this, see below). Basically it's spaghetti of pipework and levers below the driver's floor pan. If you look under the car you'll see a cover that is bolted to protect it. As you'll know, the RR / bentley brakes on on the SY and SZ family of cars is famously complex and unconventional (and superb at the same time)

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8007/7125914875_91e2...

Sadly, in my view, modern day Bentley cars have very conventional braking systems with top hung rather than floor mounted pedal - probably because the old system was incredibly expensive to make! But I just love the floor mounted pedal - it's much more anatomical - and classic RR two fingers to convention and following everyone else "this is the best way, even if it costs more"

Edited by matt5791 on Tuesday 19th January 23:32

[Contimaz]

Have been dusting the Conti R down for a trip to Avignon and S of France in June. I machine polished the paintwork from end to end and the results are very good ( three grades down to finest then followed by cornuba waxing )- under really powerful lights in the garage the micro scratch swirls were very bad and the boot lid was scratched from the previous owner allowing wash chaps at Tescos to clean the car every Saturday - he should have known they use sandpaper instead of microfibers.

But I still have a vibration which comes in at 80mph and which makes the high speed ride very unsatisfactory. Having sorted all balljoints, steering couplings and trackrod balljoints and had the wheels balanced to death, I am advised that this is not an uncommon problem and it can often be traced to an unbalanced propshaft, which was a problem even from the factory.

So now the next job is to remove the propshaft and send it to Dunning and Fairbank, who come highly recommended and I will see if there is any difference. Can't do any harm having the UJs and propshaft fully examined and balanced for very little money, so I will report back how this procedure works out.

The fact that the tyres are not Avons nags the back of my mind but 80mph should still be an OK speed for tyres to perform OK whatever their intended vehicle was. Mine are Pirelli Scorpions ( inherited from previous owner ) Does anyone have anything other than Avons on their Conti ?

[matt5791]

I too have had a lot of problems with shudder at high speed. Despite having them balanced several times by several different people (including a firm called Chemix in Halesowen who I have always rated very highly - they were the only people capable of correctly aligning my old Lancia Integrale's) the shudder was still there. In the end RR&B Garages in Bromsgrove, who have had the car for repair work, tell me the wheels are notoriously hard to balance and they ended up buying their own kit to do it themselves.

They will be having a go at the balance shortly so I'll report back!

[matt5791]

Back to the original thrust of the thread, more to report on running costs. It should be noted that many of these running costs apply equally to other SZ family cars (Turbo R, Silver Spirit etc.)

Starting issue. The car had a strange starting problem whereby nothing happened when you went to turn over the engine. After waiting for some time (even up to 90 seconds) with the key held in the start position, it would eventually turn over and fire up in the normal way. Here is what was reported and the costs of rectification:

INVESTIGATE DELAYED STARTING ISSUE
CARRY OUT INITIAL TESTS, FOUND A BURNT STARTER RELAY.
REPLACE & TEST FAULT, STILL APPARENT ONCE CAR IS LEFT

CARRY OUT FURTHER TESTS
THE INHIBIT RELAY LOSES ITS FEED ON THE WHITE SLATE
WIRE AND RETURNS. REMOVE THE GEAR BOX ACTUATOR
AND TEST THE NEUTRAL START MICRO SWITCH, TEST OKAY

FAULT WITHIN THE WIRING LOOM
REMOVE TRIM , DASH FASCIA, AIR BAG & CENTRE CONSOL TO
CARRY OUT ELECTRICAL TESTS. TEST THE WHOLE CIRCUIT
FOUND FAULT BETWEEN THE 6 WAY & 12 WAY LOOM PLUGS

RE-ROUTE A NEW WIRE FROM THE 6 WAY TO 12 WAY
CONNECTOR AND TEST ALL OKAY. REFIT THE AIR BAG, CENTRE
CONSOL AND WOOD FACIAS.

Total cost £1044.56 inc vat (labour element was £987)


Rather unfortunate that this was pain of an electrical issue with the problem ultimately located behind the dash.

[RR-B fixer]

Contimaz said:

Matt - are your brake discs the standard size discs or the large discs on later chassis numbers - ? I went to huge trouble machining a mandrel to take the large front discs in order to skim them, having found that no-one wanted to entertain the job due to their size, so I am very interested if you have found someone who will do this work.

I know N.Sandell in West London can skim brake discs without removing them from the car including the bigger brake discs on later Turbos.

[spyker138]

matt5791 said:

I too have had a lot of problems with shudder at high speed. Despite having them balanced several times by several different people (including a firm called Chemix in Halesowen who I have always rated very highly - they were the only people capable of correctly aligning my old Lancia Integrale's) the shudder was still there. In the end RR&B Garages in Bromsgrove, who have had the car for repair work, tell me the wheels are notoriously hard to balance and they ended up buying their own kit to do it themselves.

They will be having a go at the balance shortly so I'll report back!

My Arnage has a bit of a vibe at 80mph/2000+ rpm which goes away if you press on. Couple of my other V8's have also had a speed in top where they do this. Could be prop shaft. Try going a bit faster!

[matt5791]

So, I needed to use the car and there would be some motorway cruising involved - so for the sake of a few quid a wheel, I took the car to a place around the corner from me, Lodge Tyre - they have greatly improved the wheel balance to the point where most people would not be able to detect any vibration at any speed.

The chap who did the balance, having been balancing wheels for many years, was of the opinion that:

1. The Avon tyres where always hard to balance, especially these large Turbospeeds. Tyres were never as "round" as they could have been and have improved a lot in recent years, apparently.

2. The way to get it absolutely spot on would be to do the balance with the wheel still mounted on the car - very few places offer this now, but it is a lot better because you are balancing everything up including the hub etc. and ideal for older cars. (it's also more costly of course!)


So, for the time being, I have wheels balanced about as good as I think I can get them. A huge improvement on what they were, but for perfection, it looks like balancing on the car would be the next step.

I would say to anyone who has a balance problem, don't think the worst until someone several people have had a go at balancing them!

Edited by matt5791 on Sunday 5th June 07:18

[Contimaz]

I have been struggling with the vibration issue for a year now on the Conti R and after, examination of the car by 2 expert companies, I have been steered towards rear wheel bearings, rebalancing prop-shaft, wrong tyres, balljoints etc. However, last week-end I was able to have the undivided attention of an expert wheel balancer for a couple of hours and hey presto - the problem is solved.

The issue concerns the way the tyre balancing machines are set up and the fact that they have a selection of adaptors and 'cones' to secure the wheel onto the rotational machine. The Bentley wheel has a very large centre hole and requires an adaptor and a very large cone to secure it on the machine - this is common to practically every machine - even in QuikFit depots ( apparently ). However, the Bentley wheel does not allow the cone to seat evenly in the centre hole due to the presence of the small extrusion which houses the thread for the bolt holding the hubcap to the wheel. This extrusion impinges by a very small amount on the cone and means that the wheel is very slightly off true when rotating on the balancing machine. The wheel can be balanced like this but then rotate that wheel by 90 degrees and the balance will be completely out again. The re-check by rotating through 90 degrees is never carried out so the customer thinks all is OK.

Anyway, having spotted this problem, we ground off a tiny amount of the extrusion as a chamfered angle and then checked that the cone did not bind when on the machine. Then carried out the balancing .... and then rotated 90 degrees and re-checked then rotated and re-checked again just to be sure ..... perfection - then I went for a 500 mile drive and could not believe that the problems that I have endured for almost 2 years have disappeared completely. Believe me, I have had the wheels balanced at least 4 times and no-one ever realized this problem.

If you are suffering from any vibration I hope this helps because my driving experienced has been transformed .

[matt5791]

Contimaz said:

I have been struggling with the vibration issue for a year now on the Conti R and after, examination of the car by 2 expert companies, I have been steered towards rear wheel bearings, rebalancing prop-shaft, wrong tyres, balljoints etc. However, last week-end I was able to have the undivided attention of an expert wheel balancer for a couple of hours and hey presto - the problem is solved.

The issue concerns the way the tyre balancing machines are set up and the fact that they have a selection of adaptors and 'cones' to secure the wheel onto the rotational machine. The Bentley wheel has a very large centre hole and requires an adaptor and a very large cone to secure it on the machine - this is common to practically every machine - even in QuikFit depots ( apparently ). However, the Bentley wheel does not allow the cone to seat evenly in the centre hole due to the presence of the small extrusion which houses the thread for the bolt holding the hubcap to the wheel. This extrusion impinges by a very small amount on the cone and means that the wheel is very slightly off true when rotating on the balancing machine. The wheel can be balanced like this but then rotate that wheel by 90 degrees and the balance will be completely out again. The re-check by rotating through 90 degrees is never carried out so the customer thinks all is OK.

Anyway, having spotted this problem, we ground off a tiny amount of the extrusion as a chamfered angle and then checked that the cone did not bind when on the machine. Then carried out the balancing .... and then rotated 90 degrees and re-checked then rotated and re-checked again just to be sure ..... perfection - then I went for a 500 mile drive and could not believe that the problems that I have endured for almost 2 years have disappeared completely. Believe me, I have had the wheels balanced at least 4 times and no-one ever realized this problem.

If you are suffering from any vibration I hope this helps because my driving experienced has been transformed .

Very interesting - I have heard about the "cone issue".

Since my last post, however, something else, very important, has come to light.

If the car is left and not used very much, the balance can go out again! The reason for this is because the Avon Turbospeeds actually don't like sitting at all and develop a slight "flat" which throws the balance out. It is worse in the winter when the rubber is harder.

This would explain why, on one occasion, I had them balanced and all was well. Then a few weeks later the vibration was back.

[MRPULLHARD]

noticed that despite the amount of Continental R'S / Azures on sale seems to be less than a few years ago , the value of cars has been more or less static for a few years ?
any reason why? they have been tipped as future classics but the market doesn't seem that fond of these cars ?