I've had a persistant coolant leak from the inlet manifold for a while. There was always a puddle of coolant underneath the big fitting on the right side of the manifold that feeds the heater matrix. I had actually assumed the threads were leaking (theres signs of PTFE tape).
Inspecting it closely earlier i noticed some slightly worrying signs, firstly, it think the hose looks noticable swollen. Its ~19mm at both ends, but it bulges out beside the inlet manifold in a rather unnatural manner, and replacement hoses on ebay look nothing like that, they appear to be 19mm all the way along. Secondly i think its leaking from the cords... I tightened the clip up but it continues to leak. I think the coolants actually seeping along the reinforcement cords and out the end, suggesting the inside of the hose is compromised. A disaster waiting to happen for sure!
The small complex that feeds the heater/expansion tank/thermostat, also has signs of pink coolant leaking from the joints, so i'll replace all of those, and i think actually i should just replace everything. The lower thermostat hoses are drenched in oily ming which also isnt good for rubber hoses, and the main top rad hose looks a wee bit "uneven" though not swollen to the extreme of that heater hose.
So that leads me to the question. The heater o-rings. They arent (obviously) leaking, but i believe removing the heater hoses runs the risk of disturbing them? I've noticed when inspecting the pipes earlier that the top heater pipe that pokes thru the bulkhead was covered in the usual tell-tale pink deposits, suggesting coolant is leaking either from the pipe or the o ring. Theres no obvious dampness inside though.
I dont really have time to sort the o-rings at the moment, but i'd like to get this clearly knackered coolant hose sorted out before it leaves me stranded... What are my chances!?
hmm! I've booked it during work hours, thinking i was being clever and getting it fixed when i'm otherwise busy!
Noticed the other day that my windscreen had cracked. The crack has appeared from the bottom edge, under the rubber seal and its working its way up and across.
I had booked autoglass for today, but unfortunately he turned up with a non-heated screen, so its now rebooked for next week.
However he did point out that it could be rust thats caused it... Something i hadnt even thought about.
Anyone know if the P38 tends to be susceptible to rust in/around the scuttle/windscreen area?
Clive603 wrote:
Find that the older I get the quicker I reach for the saw or grinder.
I find similar with rounded off or seized bolts. Years ago i might have spent hours messing about with vice grips and stiltons, or hammering on sockets, now i just reach for the welder.
Dad came to me recently with his new car and had no locking wheel nut key. It took more time stuffing some cardboard around the wheel rim to protect it than it did to buzz an old bolt onto the end of the locking nut.
With these though, surely if you cut the head off, you still end up with a bit of the bolt sticking out of the bush thru the axle, that stops you getting the arm out?
Gilbertd wrote:
But with it blanked, there's no path back to the header tank for any air trapped in the inlet manifold. Think about it, that's one of the highest points in the cooling system so air is going to sit there. Anything trapped in the heater hoses will get pushed through by the water pump and end up in the header, any in the radiator will do the same through the bleed hose but any in the top of the engine has nowhere to go.
I did think of that, but figured i'd try it and see, and its been fine. The port comes off the manifold in the main coolant channel from the cylinder head so its unlikely air will get stuck there, it'll just get pushed thru into the radiator which then has its own air bleed to the header tank. The main radiator outlet is also at a pretty similar height anyway.
If you were really worried about bleeding, you could simply pop the blanking pipe off and let the air out.
I've given up using copper slip type anti-sieze on bolts that have a propensity for siezing up. Instead i'll usually slather them in moly CV grease, as most will know from experience, when that gets on something it never goes away again!
makes sense, see what it looks like when it arrives.
I guess i can have a poke and see, can always resell the switch pack or keep it as a spare.
Seems weird that the whole thing would be dead rather than specific buttons, is there a common fault that takes out the whole thing?
Perfect thanks. I had a look this morning and my eyes near popped out my head at the price of the switch packs. However that dead one from east coast 4x4 looks the part so i've ordered that.
Any thoughts on the lid itself?
Just took a pic of it open:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/TjWweTMzvnhEMfCv9
That silver bolt at the bottom of the gas strut is clearly abnormal and the lid jams in the pictured position unless you really force it down.
My console is a bit shonky, and I'd like to fix it.
First off the button to open the hatch is missing:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/pYWhcyy43hMMair59
But the hatch itself is also hard to open and kinda gets stuck when you flip it over to the cupholders. The hinge side has been messed about with.
But I don't know what bits I need to replace, I've looked on eBay and can't see where the button actually is?
Any advice would be appreciated.
What did you use as a pusher?
ooh, using a taper bearing race is clever!
From memory the grant signal goes out to the engine ECU and back. This is to ensure the AC clutch is only engaged when the ECU is happy. Be worth buzzing those two lines as well.
The answer is probably a larger lithium pack so your not booting its arse quite so hard. But as always its a balance between cost, size and what you can get away with.
Like the aforementioned 6mm jump leads, my mate had used them a few times to jump start cars, and they worked fine. Becuase in those situations it was just a helping hand. But trying to jump start a totally dead battery is a different task that they just werent up to.
sorry didnt think to take a pic.
If you look into the door towards the hinge edge, you'll see a steel channel. the rubber seal can go in one of two ways. You want the seal installed so it pushes the glass towards the door skin. Test fit it to get a feel for installing it etc, and then once your happy take it out and apply some glue or whatever.
You need to peel back the rear section of the door panel thing. Dont remove any of the front part, or any of the modules, it doesnt help.
Got it sorted, wasn't too bad once I realised what was going on. Put a dab of glue on the back of them to hopefully hold them in.
And yes, there was a spare one, two came out the driver's door and only one out the passengers
A lot of these devices rely on the fact that a car battery often isnt actually flat, its just discharged by enough to be unable to get "over the hump" required to get the engine turning.
Even actual jump leads fall into this category. My mate had an issue recently where the starter feed from the rear mounted battery in his BMW had broken. He tried to jump start it and got nothing. The engine wouldnt even turn. The AA came out with proper jump leads and the car started immediately. When i popped round i looked at his jump cables and despite having a nice thick jacket, the actual copper core was about 6mm^2.
If you look at a typical LiPo pack for an RC car you can get an idea about how actual decent Lithium batteries can perform:
https://hobbyking.com/en_us/turnigy-5000mah-4s-40c-lipo-pack-with-xt90.html
This ones rated 5AH and is a "4S" pack (so 4 cells in series) rated around 14v, however it has a maximum discharge of 40c, which is around 200A.
Clearly, these batteries are capable, they are both more energy dense than a lead acid, while also having a much larger maximum discharge for a given capacity, and a properly designed jumper pack using decent cells would very likely be able to jump start a car with a completely flat battery.
The issue ofcourse is that many of these batteries are sold by shonky chinese sellers, using poor quality or lowly rated cells.
I would find yourself a "group test" type review that does decent testing and have a bit of a compare, heres one example:
https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/accessories-tyres/92728/best-mini-jump-starter-packs-2019
But try to find a few reviews and cross reference the results.
When i had my door apart to fix the latch, i discovered two rubbers in the bottom of the door. I asked about it at the time and someone said they were the rubbers out of the window rails and will cause the window to rattle when they're missing and its open. Sure enough my window rattles and i'd like to fix it.
Does anyone have any pointers for refitting these rubbers? After todays efforts at trying to fix stuff, i'd like to be a little better prepared and avoid another frustrating day getting nowhere!
Cheers