My first breakdown
Discussion
The car has been supremely reliable since I bought it but yesterday I suffered the first hiccup. I wasn't even surprised when it happened, while exiting a local Safeway car park.
"Oh dear, the accelerator pedal has gone limp - must be the cable. I'll just coast to a stop in an empty space."
And so it proved to be the cable, having frayed at the pedal end. Luckily it hadn't happened in a more annoying area. In fact, of all the places to break down, a half-empty (or half full) supermarket car park is one of the best.
With the new one installed (pretty easily once my brother arrived with some pliers), I now need to work out an effective bodge that overcomes the exceedingly poor design of the pedal / cable union.
Al in all, it was a pretty painless end to my 'Tivirginity'.
"Oh dear, the accelerator pedal has gone limp - must be the cable. I'll just coast to a stop in an empty space."
And so it proved to be the cable, having frayed at the pedal end. Luckily it hadn't happened in a more annoying area. In fact, of all the places to break down, a half-empty (or half full) supermarket car park is one of the best.
With the new one installed (pretty easily once my brother arrived with some pliers), I now need to work out an effective bodge that overcomes the exceedingly poor design of the pedal / cable union.
Al in all, it was a pretty painless end to my 'Tivirginity'.
at the cost of a replacement cable!
You told me - about £60! Damn good fortune you bunging it in as part of the deal - saved a LOT of trouble.
Throttle cables eh?
Where did you get it from, mate? I forgot to phone Peninsula today.
Does anyone know of a place I can get a cable made up that has some kind of nylon bush to stop the fraying? It seems very badly designed and don't see why I should re-fit a part that is ultimately going to fail again because of it.
Throttle cables eh?
Where did you get it from, mate? I forgot to phone Peninsula today.
Does anyone know of a place I can get a cable made up that has some kind of nylon bush to stop the fraying? It seems very badly designed and don't see why I should re-fit a part that is ultimately going to fail again because of it.
I've been through about half a dozen of these over the years. The current one has been on for about 100k miles so I guess I've found all the gotchas now.
Because the pedal moves in an arc and the cable tries to keep a straight line, the inner has to kink right by the pedal at the extremes of travel. THis is made worse by the fact that the ferule used to locate the cable has a sharp corner so the cable has to kink rather than curve gently. If you adjust the pedal too high (perhaps you've got short legs, or want to make heel and toe easier) then this exagerates the problem in the 'no throttle' position.
The car doesn't have a throttle stop as standard, so when you bury your right foot in the carpet you strain the cable, this occurs while the inner is kinked which increases the effect.
The cable isn't particularly well located where it goes through the bulkhead, and it is important that it lines up with the top of the pedal otherwise the inner will kink at the end of the outer.
Now for the good news. All of these problems are easily fixable. I hope you kept the remains of the old cable. You can reuse them, but more importantly with a couple of careful adjustments you can make the second hand cable far more durable than a standard new one.
To reuse the cable, carefully shorten the outer sheath by six inches or so. With care you can do this without completely removing the inner just by carefully cutting through the coiled outer with a small hacksaw. If you do pull the inner out by mistake, re-threading it is tricky, but possible once you have cleaned up the frayed ends. The second step is to open up the end of the retaining ferule. This is a small cylindrical lump of metal which is a push fit into the end of the pedal and locates the cable inner. Flare the hole out so instead of a parallel hole it forms a 'bell mouth' shape. This is easier to do than to explain, drill in 10mm or so with a small drill slightly bigger than the cable, then 8mm in with a slightly bigger drill, and so on until you have formed a bell mouth shape.
Next you need a screw-on cable nipple. Most pushbike shops will happily sell you one which is too small. I use a screw terminal from an electrical 'chop block' jumbo connector.
To be on the safe side, pass the cable through a washer and back through the clamp so you get twice the clamping effect. Put all this together before you try to fit the cable because threading it all together at the bottom of the footwell is a good spectator sport. You can adjust the length slightly at the engine end, but if you need to make a big adjustment you will have to loosen the cable nipple and move it up or down the inner. Take the cable off if you need to do this, otherwise you'll spend hours upside down in the footwell swearing at the d*mned thing.
After you've refitted it all and got everything lined up, it should be good for tens of thousands of miles of use. The last step is optional but recommended - if you fit a throttle stop the cable will outlast the rest of the vehicle. Mine is adjustable, made from £5 worth of bits from a DIY store and fitted in less than an hour, but all it needs is a simple block of wood the right size to stop the pedal moving any further once you have got full throttle. Incidentally I lost an inch or so of travel at the pedal when I fitted this, that's how much I was stretching the cable in the heat of the moment!
Last point, if you find yourself stuck in the middle of nowhere, you will find that the heater control cable is secured with a screw-on cable nipple just the right size for the throttle cable. It's under the bonnet right by the throttle assembly, just asking to be used for a 'get you home' repair. The only other thing you would need is a borrowed junior hacksaw to cut back the outer. (This bodge was enough to finish a sprint at Curborough, get me home, and take me to work for the next month until I got round to fixing it properly.)
Because the pedal moves in an arc and the cable tries to keep a straight line, the inner has to kink right by the pedal at the extremes of travel. THis is made worse by the fact that the ferule used to locate the cable has a sharp corner so the cable has to kink rather than curve gently. If you adjust the pedal too high (perhaps you've got short legs, or want to make heel and toe easier) then this exagerates the problem in the 'no throttle' position.
The car doesn't have a throttle stop as standard, so when you bury your right foot in the carpet you strain the cable, this occurs while the inner is kinked which increases the effect.
The cable isn't particularly well located where it goes through the bulkhead, and it is important that it lines up with the top of the pedal otherwise the inner will kink at the end of the outer.
Now for the good news. All of these problems are easily fixable. I hope you kept the remains of the old cable. You can reuse them, but more importantly with a couple of careful adjustments you can make the second hand cable far more durable than a standard new one.
To reuse the cable, carefully shorten the outer sheath by six inches or so. With care you can do this without completely removing the inner just by carefully cutting through the coiled outer with a small hacksaw. If you do pull the inner out by mistake, re-threading it is tricky, but possible once you have cleaned up the frayed ends. The second step is to open up the end of the retaining ferule. This is a small cylindrical lump of metal which is a push fit into the end of the pedal and locates the cable inner. Flare the hole out so instead of a parallel hole it forms a 'bell mouth' shape. This is easier to do than to explain, drill in 10mm or so with a small drill slightly bigger than the cable, then 8mm in with a slightly bigger drill, and so on until you have formed a bell mouth shape.
Next you need a screw-on cable nipple. Most pushbike shops will happily sell you one which is too small. I use a screw terminal from an electrical 'chop block' jumbo connector.
To be on the safe side, pass the cable through a washer and back through the clamp so you get twice the clamping effect. Put all this together before you try to fit the cable because threading it all together at the bottom of the footwell is a good spectator sport. You can adjust the length slightly at the engine end, but if you need to make a big adjustment you will have to loosen the cable nipple and move it up or down the inner. Take the cable off if you need to do this, otherwise you'll spend hours upside down in the footwell swearing at the d*mned thing.
After you've refitted it all and got everything lined up, it should be good for tens of thousands of miles of use. The last step is optional but recommended - if you fit a throttle stop the cable will outlast the rest of the vehicle. Mine is adjustable, made from £5 worth of bits from a DIY store and fitted in less than an hour, but all it needs is a simple block of wood the right size to stop the pedal moving any further once you have got full throttle. Incidentally I lost an inch or so of travel at the pedal when I fitted this, that's how much I was stretching the cable in the heat of the moment!
Last point, if you find yourself stuck in the middle of nowhere, you will find that the heater control cable is secured with a screw-on cable nipple just the right size for the throttle cable. It's under the bonnet right by the throttle assembly, just asking to be used for a 'get you home' repair. The only other thing you would need is a borrowed junior hacksaw to cut back the outer. (This bodge was enough to finish a sprint at Curborough, get me home, and take me to work for the next month until I got round to fixing it properly.)
and keep!Gassing Station | S Series | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff