Your fleet running reports

[Mito Man]

So it’s looking like a broken clutch fork and release bearing from just describing the problem to the mechanic with a video. Can get heavy duty replacement parts for everything including clutch.
Was debating hiring a trailer for £50 and having my dad tow it down with the F150 but 100 miles each way at 13mpg without trailer would be £100 just in fuel so it’s cheaper to get it recovered again for £150 and we don’t waste half a day getting there and back.

[mik]

Under warranty? You bought new non?

[Mito Man]

No mine is a 12 model year which is the final year they updated it. Defenders were discontinued in Jan 2016 (ignoring the V8 special edition), when I bought mine last year the low mileage 2015 ones were already going for almost double list price which must be the worst value for money vehicle you can possibly buy, unless you just store it as an investment.

[Jackleg]

Seeing as we're complaining about clutches, the one on the Accord it's way out.
The garage quoted £550 to replace it, as it's a front subframe off job. I'm giving ita damn good ignoring at the moment, whilst telling myself that pumping the clutch pedal is a good workout for the 80's Italian supercar that I'm going to own one day.

Sounds like one of the cylinders is on it's way out. Isn't the thing with these concentric slaves means that to change either cylinder (master or slave) you have to take the gearbox off to bleed them (or is there an access panel)? If it does mean gearbox off you might as well change the clutch and also the DMF as the box is off.

Carl.

Thanks Carlos. I'll get the garage to have a look as it's far beyond my mechanical skills, unfortunately.
No DMF though as it's petrol.

[integrale_evo]

Exhaust finished, its a little louder and a bit deeper, but that's not a bad thing. Thankfully it's not too obnoxious

[Simon]

Seeing as we're complaining about clutches, the one on the Accord it's way out.
The garage quoted £550 to replace it, as it's a front subframe off job. I'm giving ita damn good ignoring at the moment, whilst telling myself that pumping the clutch pedal is a good workout for the 80's Italian supercar that I'm going to own one day.

Sounds like one of the cylinders is on it's way out. Isn't the thing with these concentric slaves means that to change either cylinder (master or slave) you have to take the gearbox off to bleed them (or is there an access panel)? If it does mean gearbox off you might as well change the clutch and also the DMF as the box is off.

Carl.

Thanks Carlos. I'll get the garage to have a look as it's far beyond my mechanical skills, unfortunately.
No DMF though as it's petrol.

Are you sure? My petrol Mondeo has a DMF, as did my last one. They tend to last longer on petrols due to the less torsional vibration that petrols produce, but some still have them.

[GG.]

I thought pretty much everything had a DMF these days?

[Nic]

Started moving stuff over today. I struggled most with the UJ on the steering rack, I didn’t pay attention when taking them apart and i had to call a mate to come and help me put it back together, I think I’m there but not very happy with one joint but i’ll have another look at it tomorrow.



That’s most of the dash electrics moved over, heater electrics, light loom, steering wheel loom (wipers, horn, indicators, mfa).



Also put in the interior rear loom including the rear wash wiper fluid line. Interestingly my donor Driver is a higher spec car than the GTi in that it has central locking and door speakers so I’ve swapped them over too. Meant I had to fiddle about with rubber boots that connect the electric and vac lines between shell and door.



And to finish off for tonight I moved over the wiring for the wiper motors. Tomorrow I’m hoping that my new heater matrix turns up so I can put that in the heater box and install that before starting to put the dash back in, if it doesn’t turn up I’ve got a few more electrics and trim bits I can put in and I’ve got a box of foam sound deadening that I can cut to shape and start fitting.

[Sundayjumper]

Quite a useful day today. I reassembled the front end of the Compact and got it back on the ground. Wife is happy as the driveway looks slightly less like a breaker's yard now

I finally got the bolts I needed for the Touareg wishbones. It's been a long story, but to cut to the punchline I ended up getting them from the local Audi dealer, who without prompting gave me a nice discount making them £6 each instead of the £10 each I'd originally been quoted by VW ! Seeing as the Touareg shares a lot of underpinnings with the Q7 I think I'll be heading there for parts in future.

Next job is to set up the alignment on both cars. I've already got a thing for doing the tracking, camber & castor I'm going to try doing with a spirit level app on my phone.

[mik]

No mine is a 12 model year which is the final year they updated it. Defenders were discontinued in Jan 2016

Blimey - I genuinely thought it was new when you'd splurged £ratheralot on upgrades.

My mistake.

[Mito Man]

No couldn’t afford to have a new one and then have it modified, and then the psychological aspect of taking a depreciation hit every time I wanted to drive it would put me off using it.

[evostick]

So it’s looking like a broken clutch fork and release bearing from just describing the problem to the mechanic with a video. Can get heavy duty replacement parts for everything including clutch.
Was debating hiring a trailer for £50 and having my dad tow it down with the F150 but 100 miles each way at 13mpg without trailer would be £100 just in fuel so it’s cheaper to get it recovered again for £150 and we don’t waste half a day getting there and back.

It is very clear to me that this has only happened because you lowered the suspension.

I am also sure that bad things will continue to happen until you restore the natural balance of things.

[Mito Man]

Lift kit?

The ultimate solution would be air bags.

[JLv3.0]

The ultimate solution would be to burn it, and stop enabling such badly engineered products to exist.

[ZedLeg]

The end game for Mito.

A973E499-F87C-4DAC-AA6B-A4D866A79617.jpeg (165.33 KiB) Viewed 2268 times

[Mito Man]

It’s odd how some of the design flaws have been going on for decades and most of them are cheap/simple fixes - it’s like they must have left it flawed on purpose. I can only assume the person responsible for the Defender updates at LR was into extreme BDSM and smashing his cock with a nail gun on his weekends.

[JLv3.0]

That's my real downer on the Defender - I just think it's inexcusable for any product that's been around for so long to still have any reliability issues whatsoever, let alone when you consider what its actual intended purpose is.

[integrale_evo]

Why bother changing it if people still keep buying it?

[JLv3.0]

Yeah I guess, but the Defender reputation for reliability is absolutely atrocious. Wouldn't you want to give it the odd nip and tuck to improve it a bit over the decades?

Guess that's a redundant question really.

[Zonda_]

Yeah I guess, but the Defender reputation for reliability is absolutely atrocious. Wouldn't you want to give it the odd nip and tuck to improve it a bit over the decades?

Guess that's a redundant question really.

See the above answer...