Simple fixes your thought were going to cost a fortune
Discussion
It's one of those little joys in life which only the home mechanic experiences.
My Freelander's brakes were getting steadily worse to the point of being dangerous. A quick google revealed all manner of possible issues (servo, master cylinder etc). Great, big £££ and all the time to fix it.
And the problem was - a small hole in a vacuum pipe. I snipped 1" off the end, pushed the pipe back onto the turbo and... fully functioning brakes! Must have taken me a total of 3 minutes from bonnet open to bonnet closed
I'm not going to bore you with all the times the reverse was true though.
My Freelander's brakes were getting steadily worse to the point of being dangerous. A quick google revealed all manner of possible issues (servo, master cylinder etc). Great, big £££ and all the time to fix it.
And the problem was - a small hole in a vacuum pipe. I snipped 1" off the end, pushed the pipe back onto the turbo and... fully functioning brakes! Must have taken me a total of 3 minutes from bonnet open to bonnet closed
I'm not going to bore you with all the times the reverse was true though.
Not long after getting my F355, while driving, a light saying "Slow Down" started flashing on the dash, it lost all power and only one bank was running. I pictured many twenty pound notes flying out of my wallet. Turned out that the potting on a piece of fine Italian electronic engineering that monitors cat temps had cracked and let some moisture in and the car had erroneously cut a bank to protect the cat. Two screws to remove the black box, then overnight in a bowl of rice in the airing cupboard, sealed it back up and it has been fine for the last three years.
I bought a cheap Corrado (£700 I think) from someone at work, but stupidly didn't drive it before taking it.
Couldn't get half of the gears on the way home, pretty sure seller plead ignorance to the fault! I was thinking its new gearbox time but it was a missing circlip under the gearbox gaiter - cost me a few pence.
Couldn't get half of the gears on the way home, pretty sure seller plead ignorance to the fault! I was thinking its new gearbox time but it was a missing circlip under the gearbox gaiter - cost me a few pence.
Once had a 200SX which developed all sorts of random warning lights on the dash, took it to an auto electrician who could find nothing wrong with it. Turns out the plug for the ECU had come fractionally loose, so just pushed it back in and all was fine again (well, except for all the other faults)
On an MG TF160, I noticed I wasn't changing gear as smoothly as before. Thought it was me, but it got worse and I could feel the clutch pedal was sticking to the point it was barely driveable. I took it to the local MG specialist who insisted that it needed a new clutch as the mechanism was siezed.
I took it home to think about it, and decided I had nothing to lose by trying to lubricate the clutch release arm from the outside. Took a bamboo cane and taped a load of drinking straws to it, and dripped a few mls of PlusGas directly onto the point where the arm enters the bellhousing whilst OH pumped the clutch pedal. Sure enough it started to loosen up, a week later I did the same with 3-in-1 household oil and several years later it is still smooth as silk.
£500 for a new clutch vs a few pence of oil.
I took it home to think about it, and decided I had nothing to lose by trying to lubricate the clutch release arm from the outside. Took a bamboo cane and taped a load of drinking straws to it, and dripped a few mls of PlusGas directly onto the point where the arm enters the bellhousing whilst OH pumped the clutch pedal. Sure enough it started to loosen up, a week later I did the same with 3-in-1 household oil and several years later it is still smooth as silk.
£500 for a new clutch vs a few pence of oil.
1993 Honda Prelude
Bought from breakers yard with no MOT and the engine management light on. Passed the MOT with a new joint on the steering rack (£80). Engine management light, did the paperclip trick to get the dash to flash the light sequence and found it was EGR valve, drove around to a mates and he took one look and said - "someone has unplugged this cable from the EGR" - problem fixed!
Driving through town the dash board lit up like a Christmas tree. Bit of online research pointed to a bad earth most likely in the rear lights. Back to the breakers and £8 for a new circuit board for the rear light and bingo.
Bought from breakers yard with no MOT and the engine management light on. Passed the MOT with a new joint on the steering rack (£80). Engine management light, did the paperclip trick to get the dash to flash the light sequence and found it was EGR valve, drove around to a mates and he took one look and said - "someone has unplugged this cable from the EGR" - problem fixed!
Driving through town the dash board lit up like a Christmas tree. Bit of online research pointed to a bad earth most likely in the rear lights. Back to the breakers and £8 for a new circuit board for the rear light and bingo.
206 Gti used to live on my steep drive and when it rained the rain would drop down through the bonnet vent and straight onto the Ecu.
Develops a bad misfire , I replaced loads of things . Injectors , injector rail and plugs ht leads etc etc.
Various specialise said it's probably a ban connection somewhere and advised to replace the wiring loom on the car as a last resort to cure the misfire .
One night I sprayed a full can of wd40 all over the Ecu connections , all plugs and anything that looked electrical .
Driving to work and my usual bad misfire began to ease up and suddeny disappeared .
Quite happy .
Had a 4 year old Bmw that flashes up needing a new abs pump . Bmw wanted £800 just for thre pump and as the car was relatively new and on its first mot I thought I was going to get shafted .
Tried a few breakers , no joy . A local back street garage had some old pumps lying about and had a pump that looked identical . Fitted and sorted for £80 and a passed mot lol.
Same car a year or so down thre line , gearbox went limp and was like a spoon in a bowl of soup.
AA man came out jacked car up and reconnected something with a bolt and washer . I was thinking new gearbox time or clutch had gone bang lol.
Col.
One night I was annoyed so sprayed a full can
Develops a bad misfire , I replaced loads of things . Injectors , injector rail and plugs ht leads etc etc.
Various specialise said it's probably a ban connection somewhere and advised to replace the wiring loom on the car as a last resort to cure the misfire .
One night I sprayed a full can of wd40 all over the Ecu connections , all plugs and anything that looked electrical .
Driving to work and my usual bad misfire began to ease up and suddeny disappeared .
Quite happy .
Had a 4 year old Bmw that flashes up needing a new abs pump . Bmw wanted £800 just for thre pump and as the car was relatively new and on its first mot I thought I was going to get shafted .
Tried a few breakers , no joy . A local back street garage had some old pumps lying about and had a pump that looked identical . Fitted and sorted for £80 and a passed mot lol.
Same car a year or so down thre line , gearbox went limp and was like a spoon in a bowl of soup.
AA man came out jacked car up and reconnected something with a bolt and washer . I was thinking new gearbox time or clutch had gone bang lol.
Col.
One night I was annoyed so sprayed a full can
A few months back with my Volvo S60R the clutch pedal went straight to the floor when driving, with clutch fluid leaking quite substantially from underneath the car!
A quick search online and it pointed straight towards a failed clutch slave cylinder, which on the Volvo is inside the gearbox bellhousing, so also factor in a new clutch, dual mass flywheel and labour for removal of the relevant AWD components the repair bill looked to be around £1500!!
Anyway fast forward a few days later after topping up the brake/clutch fluid reservoir as I was nursing the car around until I could get it sorted, I noticed a few small drips of brake fluid from underneath the car but not actually from the gearbox but from the back of the engine bay... Back up top I followed the metal clutch lines from the reservoir and the leak was proudly coming from a plastic 90 degree connector for the clutch lines! Turns out an O ring had failed and when under pressure was absolutely pissing the clutch fluid out! £2.50 for a new O ring, bottle of brake/clutch fluid and a bleed of the system and all is well!
Saved an absolute fortune on that discovery!
A quick search online and it pointed straight towards a failed clutch slave cylinder, which on the Volvo is inside the gearbox bellhousing, so also factor in a new clutch, dual mass flywheel and labour for removal of the relevant AWD components the repair bill looked to be around £1500!!
Anyway fast forward a few days later after topping up the brake/clutch fluid reservoir as I was nursing the car around until I could get it sorted, I noticed a few small drips of brake fluid from underneath the car but not actually from the gearbox but from the back of the engine bay... Back up top I followed the metal clutch lines from the reservoir and the leak was proudly coming from a plastic 90 degree connector for the clutch lines! Turns out an O ring had failed and when under pressure was absolutely pissing the clutch fluid out! £2.50 for a new O ring, bottle of brake/clutch fluid and a bleed of the system and all is well!
Saved an absolute fortune on that discovery!
I live not from a quarry. One day following a truck that was leaving the quarry it spilled several tennis ball sized lumps of stone from the back nearly taking out a motorbike going in the opposite direction, one hit me destroying the rear wheel arch trim on my then 1 month old Mini Cooper.
Went to Mini fearing a large bill for new trim. Service manger fitted all new trim immediately in the car park. £10. Happy days.
I did contact the quarry a few days later. They couldn't find any record of one of their trucks leaving the quarry on that day...
Went to Mini fearing a large bill for new trim. Service manger fitted all new trim immediately in the car park. £10. Happy days.
I did contact the quarry a few days later. They couldn't find any record of one of their trucks leaving the quarry on that day...
Many years ago a hose split on my Fiat X1/9. The dealers told me it wasn't something the had in stock and it needed to be special ordered from italy at great expense.
The split was on a dead straignt section, and looked close to copper pipe size. 6"inches of copper pipe and 2 jubilee clips lat and all was well. It was still like that when I sold the car a few years later.
The split was on a dead straignt section, and looked close to copper pipe size. 6"inches of copper pipe and 2 jubilee clips lat and all was well. It was still like that when I sold the car a few years later.
Tubocharger failed, bought a chra core kit off ebay for £75, as a get me by until my dci150 turbo swap. Still not got round to the turbo swap and running an aggressive remap i checked the chinese core for shaft play at the last service, 40k on still like new. I have been doing 9k oil changes with decent oil insteak of the 18k renault recommend as i'm over quarter of a million miles now and i'm really fond of this van. I might just leave the chinese turbo on it until it gives any problems as going from a wategate to a vnt involves a lot of rolling road time.
My neighbour couldn't believe it lasted so long as the £1100 reman turbo technics turbo he had done on his bmw by a specialist lasted 25k miles before it shat its blades out.
My neighbour couldn't believe it lasted so long as the £1100 reman turbo technics turbo he had done on his bmw by a specialist lasted 25k miles before it shat its blades out.
A long time ago I bought a second hand Citroen C5. I was dismayed to find that it had a tendency to cut out whilst driving.
But it could be restarted no problem. I took it to a local specialist and they couldn't find a thing wrong.
A week after that I discovered that my bunch of keys hanging from the ignition was brushing my right knee slightly and this was all that was needed to turn the key and so turn the engine off.
But it could be restarted no problem. I took it to a local specialist and they couldn't find a thing wrong.
A week after that I discovered that my bunch of keys hanging from the ignition was brushing my right knee slightly and this was all that was needed to turn the key and so turn the engine off.
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