Your fleet running reports

[mik]

Evora drivers door has been a bit “crunchy” recently - feel resistance when you pull the exterior handle in particular.

Lubed up the visible lock/latch elements last weekend, but (not really surprisingly) that didn’t make a lot of difference.

Popped out to get a curry tonight, and it felt a notch worse, so I pulled the door card off, thanking the Internet gods again for providing a well described guide with pics almost immediately. Nothing difficult, but a couple of concealed fixings that I would have been fighting otherwise.

Lube. Excercise. Lube. Exercise. Satisfaction.

[Sundayjumper]

Evora drivers door has been a bit “crunchy” recently - feel resistance when you pull the exterior handle in particular.

Lubed up the visible lock/latch elements last weekend, but (not really surprisingly) that didn’t make a lot of difference.

Popped out to get a curry tonight, and it felt a notch worse, so I pulled the door card off, thanking the Internet gods again for providing a well described guide with pics almost immediately. Nothing difficult, but a couple of concealed fixings that I would have been fighting otherwise.

Lube. Excercise. Lube. Exercise. Satisfaction.

And after that you fixed the door I hope ?

/veryobvious

[Mito Man]

Using ones own bodily fluids to lubricate a door latch is a new one!

[nuttinnew]

mikturate; Scottish for white grease.

[Matty]

Evora drivers door has been a bit “crunchy” recently - feel resistance when you pull the exterior handle in particular.

Lubed up the visible lock/latch elements last weekend, but (not really surprisingly) that didn’t make a lot of difference.

Popped out to get a curry tonight, and it felt a notch worse, so I pulled the door card off, thanking the Internet gods again for providing a well described guide with pics almost immediately. Nothing difficult, but a couple of concealed fixings that I would have been fighting otherwise.

Lube. Excercise. Lube. Exercise. Satisfaction.

My door card on the Evora had the scars of a broken door mech. Better to get it early rather than having to replace/repair the door card because it has to be ripped out.

[Swervin_Mervin]

Now I remember why I hate working on cars.

Started on taking the struts out today. Spent an hour just getting the car on stands - it's hardly slammed but still, trying to lift it centrally was a pita. Then the strut refused to come out of the hub assembly without a lot of hammer action.

And after all that I found that despite ordering a 21mm pass through socket to undo the strut tops (std fitment is 21mm) it has 19mm nuts on it

Despite all the years of accumulated tools from keeping French cars going I still don't have all the tools. And why are pass through sockets not more of a thing without having to order online?

[integrale_evo]

Grind two flats on the sides of a normal socket near the top so you can use a spanner (adjustable) on it and an Allen key through the middle

[Sundayjumper]

At risk of getting shunned by the moral majority, some mole grips *right* at the top of the shaft and an impact driver on the nut. If your bump stops are working the shock never reaches that last 10mm.

YMMV.

[Swervin_Mervin]

At risk of getting shunned by the moral majority, some mole grips *right* at the top of the shaft and an impact driver on the nut. If your bump stops are working the shock never reaches that last 10mm.

YMMV.

This is my last resort. I've a pass thru set on order so we'll see whether that works.

[mik]

For struts I’ve always used a big closed-end spanner with an Allen key. And yeah - if I know the damper is going in the bin, a pair of mole grips can be very useful.

[Jobbo]

I’ve never encountered pass-through sockets. Looks a good idea, then I realised none of my extensions etc would work.

Wouldn’t a ratcheting ring spanner set pretty much make them superfluous?

[Swervin_Mervin]

I’ve never encountered pass-through sockets. Looks a good idea, then I realised none of my extensions etc would work.

Wouldn’t a ratcheting ring spanner set pretty much make them superfluous?

Not in this instance no. The nut is in a deep well and you can't get in even with a swan neck ring spanner. The nicer pass through sets are still compatible with a spanner as they have a head like a spark plug socket so you can get a spanner on them, but they're expensive - I think the Hazet set, which looks lovely, it's about £300 It does include long Allen sockets as well but still!

[integrale_evo]

Yep, most top nuts are recessed into the rubber mount, and most deep ring spanners have the head attached to the body at and angle, not dead vertical.

Some sparkplug sockets have a hex on the top and can be used if they happen to be the right size.

Shame manufacturers don’t do the same with normal deep sockets, but then I guess they couldn’t sell you massively more expensive specialist ones if it became a standard feature.

[Matty]

Z4 Looks great - crazy how much of a difference to the overall look of a car a drop can make.

However, as I'm an old man now my first thought to things like this is whether it makes speeed bumps more of a PITA

My compact rides really nicely on its schnitzer springs. I’m not totally happy with how it sits, but reluctant to put coilovers on it and spoil it

I totally ruined a scooby sti and paid over the odds for the privilege, never again. The ACS coilover delete the dynamic dampers which makes the decision even easier for me.

It's a nightmare to know what's good or not. I'm looking at kits for the Up, but there's no 'reviews' for stuff like this; buying aftermarket suspension always feels like a roll of the dice unless you go down a more 'approved' path.

[Broccers]

Yes. Knew it wouldn't be cheap. Can't be fixed apparently.

ring your insurer - they won't be sorting it direct.

Thanks. I told my insurance about it and it's all being sorted by other party. I've passed on the quotes.

They've been in touch. Awaiting approval of costs. Their max hourly rate for repairs is 25 quid. I've a feeling this may take some time.

They have offered a car though equivalent to a boxster for 120 a day. Presumably they get better rates than Joe public.

[nuttinnew]

Do you know if they've checked the availability of a bumper? That has the potential to be a massive pita.

[Rich B]

ring your insurer - they won't be sorting it direct.

Thanks. I told my insurance about it and it's all being sorted by other party. I've passed on the quotes.

They've been in touch. Awaiting approval of costs. Their max hourly rate for repairs is 25 quid. I've a feeling this may take some time.

what does that mean? No automotive industry works for £25 per hour?

[Swervin_Mervin]

So the pass through set worked perfectly. Sadly I've still had to give up though.

Spent an hour trying to get the pinch bolt out of the n/s hub. The nut came off fine but the bolt was seized solid. Had to very slowly just wind it out with a bar. Took almost an hour to get out and the bolt looks totally shagged - it's all swollen in the mid section . So I'll get some new ones on order.

And after all that, even with the new spring compressed as much as possible with the spring compressors we couldn't get the top mount back on. The strut rod was fully down and we couldn't get it to come back up.

So I'll bell the local garage tomorrow and see if they'll fit the springs for me so I just have to put everything back together.

What a total pita

[Ascender]

Stereo day... fixed the microphone on the Porsche's PCCM Plus - I'd connected in to the wrong socket. These things happen when the instructions are on the brief side/non-existent.

Sony CarPlay unit installed in to the camper van. A two day job, with the fishing of cables from A-pillar to centre console being the usual PITA that they always are. The DAB+ aerial is designed to go on the passenger side and it was a nightmare trying to get a cable from there. I gave up last night and ordered one of those cable fishing kits from Amazon and it did the job in about 15 minutes instead of the two hours I was at it for last night.

[tim]

Jaguar XJ8 forgotten what it's like to drive edition

STILL IN THE FUCKING GARAGE!!! It's been two months. They've been "half done" for about a month. I am running out of patience.

Rover 45 1.4 Expression S jesus fucking christ why did I buy this POS edition

When it works, I really rather like it. It's slow but it is fun to drive and handles susprisingly well. And it sounds like my Caterham.

Unfortunately we're at the not working stage again. I went into town lunchtime on Thursday and coming back it went into a massive mis-fire. I naturally thought the bodge repair I had done before Christmas to the wiring loom where it had rubbed against a metal cooling pipe had finally given up. I bought some heat-shrink connectors with solder inside them and some wire, swore A LOT, and managed to patch in some fresh wire around the crappy bits.

Made no difference. Arse. Also the CE light has been on since Christmas.

I've never been able to get my OBD-II connector to work with the Rover, but I stumbled across possibly the world's most boring man on youtube - even more - and I really hesitate to say this - boring than Mockdiamonds. He has a collection of Rovers, and one of his videos was connecting up an OBD-II reader. A different one to mine, but as it connected it flashed through the protocols it was using, and I managed to reconfigure mine to the same.

Huzzah! It is working now. The only error code is a camshaft position sensor. I removed it and cleaned it because why not, but it made no difference. Disconnecting it while it's running also makes no difference, which makes sense.

Have ordered one from Rimmer (fnar) Bros so hopefully in a couple of days I'll be friends with it again and no longer on the cusp of setting fire to it in a field. I managed to clear the CE light as well, as a bonus.