Big Red Beast passed his Mot on Friday with one day to spare. Unusual for me as I usually get in early but replacing rear brake shields turned into an on-off-on 2 month battle.

As the straps can't be got new I had to find a pair of used shields with straps to recon. Straps supplied were ropey so job one was to make new ones to pattern. Job 2 blast and powder coat quoted 3 day turn round, actually nearer 3 weeks. Then getting things undone was less than easy. 10 bolts to shift, only two came out under their own steam. Even Irwin extractors wouldn't shift the rest so had to weld nuts on the end to spanner off aided by heat and copious librations of Plus Gas over a couple of days before. Fortunately i had new bolts in stock. Then Blondie Brain got rush headed and stripped one of the disk retainer screw heads. Instead of drilling off the whole head and sorting the stub after pulling the disk he decided that pulling the welder trolley round from the workshop out back to front drive again was too much hassle. Drilling through to use a Rigid splined rod extractor meant much less stuff to hump round. Which worked fine except I didn't drill dead straight damaging the thread so a Timesert had to go in to repair it. At least I'd put lashings of coppaslip on his and disk when putting new disks on about a decade ago so the disks came off OK.

Malcom had the usual list of minor corrosion advisories which don't really matter but he reckoned the rear shock absorber bushes needed changing. Problem wis where to find replacement rubber bushes for the Bilstien B6 shocks. Island have a kit part no TFSBK03BIL, which looks about right, listed for Defender, Discovery and RR Classic. Does anyone know if that will work or a source of a correct fitment?

We have concluded that the rear crankshaft oil seal is leaking a bit. Reckon I shall have to find someone to fix that for me. Getting too old to heave gearbox out for access to it.

Concerning Gavins stubborn ball joint issue I reckon that you need the hydraulic puller device to be sure they will come out. Whether very expensive official Sykes Picavant or home brew clone using a cheap import 12 tonne ram. Spending time and £ on a one time tool is a bit irritating but sometime in the future I shall make a couple of more bits to convert my home brew puller into a small, but mighty, hydraulic press for when the big one in the workshop is too much tool.

Clive

Absolutely get a good specialist in to check for leaks and do a proper refill job. The P38 system takes a lot of gas and, even in the days when operators were more trained Halfords, Kwikfit and the other fast-fit places routinely under-filled them. Considerable heat and light on my one and only experience of Halfords when I asked why they had only half filled it. Much crap about machine settings and a maximum delivery per job so no possibility of top up.

The aluminium pipes are getting old and fatigue splits / partial fractures can occur. It appears that some can no longer be got off the shelf too. A good specialist will know where to get fatigue splits repaired or custom pipes made. Going to a specialist also means they are on the hook if a new condenser fails. Did my own condenser replacement in 2011 but when that that showed a leak at the tag end of 2023 I got the specialist to change it. A good thing too because the new one popped after about 6 weeks which he replaced free of charge. Apparently the quality of even known reliable brands has dropped off.

Clive

+1 for the Irwin extractors.

Most important thing in my experience is not to delay bringing them into play. If you think you might need them don't bother with normal sockets or spanners, just go straight to the extractors. Especially if it's a 12 point head. The more head you have left the better they grab.

Guess what dinklebrain got rush-headed and forgot that lumbering himself with couple of tricky "weld a nut onto the mullered head" tasks on round two of a job!

Clive

Yesterdays plan to, finally, fit my nicely refurbed and powder coated rear brake shields having fallen apart due to corroded heads on the caliper bolts I resolved to do something really easy off the round-tu-it list today.

The wheels seem to get heavier and heavier as the years go by so figured it was way past time I made a fitting pin to easily locate and support the wheel when installing.

Dug out the mullered locking wheel nut I'd been saving for over a decade for the job. Fired up the P&W and turned the business end down to go through the holes in the wheel and reduced the locking bit to 3/4`' diameter so it was round. Made a 3" extension with an inch or so of 1/2" diameter stub protecting at one end to force into the thread helping ensured alignment when pressed together. Welded the join, trimmed it all up round and straight at 0.72" diameter with a nice taper up to the large end. Just to be swanky I took the outer end down a bit for about 3/4" and did a nice knurl with plain rings each side. Tomorrow I shall dig out the gas torch, take it up to just under red hot and dunk it in oil to black it.

Perhaps I'll do another one to keep in the car. Only an hour and bit of work after all, be quicker second time round. Still got four locking nuts hanging around.

Clive

Might be worth asking COH Bains ( coh-bains.co.uk ) if they have any suitable sections in their range. if I recall correctly they a make up specific lengths and shapes. But it's many years since I dealt with them.

Clive

Gilbertd wrote:

No, you can't get in behind the disc to do the bolts into the hub up.

Thanks, I thought that was the case but the old one on the left was so corroded that it all simply fell out. Right hand one hanging in, just.

Used plenty of coppaslip when the new disk went on over 10 years ago so it might come off without too much effort. Might.

Finally a bit of sunshine and nobody pestering me for things so I got the new left front airspring fitted. Just the drier left to service and I'll have a happy for EAS the next decade or so. I hope.

Next jobs are re-fitting the front mudflaps and rear brake shields now the parts are back from powder coating. Had to make new brackets for the mudflaps and disk shields as the old oneness were rusted to nearly nothing. Blasting and powder coating a used set of brake shields was a useful saving over new ones. One of mine was too far gone to re-furb and new shield brackets can't be got. Fortunately I had some square steel tube in stock that was the right size to slice down for shield brackets.

Can the rear brake shields be changed without pulling the brake disk off?

Clive

Sounds like you need a freight forwarding company attuned to single transaction business.

A now deceased friend ran a "one man and girl Friday" business doing such things up until 30 years ago. He was very good at arranging that sort of there and back journey at a reasonable price. Not the only thing he did but a speciality. Was training girl Friday, a very sharp young lady, to take over the business so he could retire in a few years when a heart attack wrecked the plans.

I imagine there must still be people doing that sort of thing, just a matter of finding one able to get your box into a corner of a shared container. The sea leg is the cheap bit, about £6,000 or so for a 40 ft container from OZ to UK I believe.

Clive

Where is the wear? Wiper arm or drive shaft?

If most of the wear is on the wiper arm then a new arm ought to be OK "for a while". If its on the spline shaft you will largely be stuffed. Especially if things have been run loose letting the arm pivot sideways under the action of the spring that hold it onto the screen. If that happens a section of drive spline can get completely worn away.

If the drive splines look good I'd try loctite or similar. I'd use the green high strength bearing retainer an accept that the arm isn't coming off without destructive methods. I you use the ordinary blue stuff I think one of the puller widgets should manage to move a well glued on arm. Fitting a nice new arm will give it the best chance.

Clive

Comes as a complete unit, motor and all as part DLB101770 .

LR Parts and Rimmers offer them for almost £400. Yikes! Although adequate value these days considering how much you get for your money.

Breaker time methinks.

There are ways to refurbish the spline drive part once things are disconnected and the spindle removed. Not seen a write up on how to for a goodly few years but if it happens to me I know a way to do mine. But frankly dear I'd rather not.

Back in the day the Bodgitt'n Bend folk talked about sett6ing the wiper in position and drilling the arm for a pin to take the load. Plausible as it never needs adjustment once in the right position. Naughty words if the drill slips and goes through the screen tho'.

Clive

Mrs Google finds Melexis analog output rotational sensors for around £2.50 each one off, probably more like £0.50 in production quantities.

Sounds cheaper than a suitably durable OEM quality potentiometer.

With electronics involved it would be wise to make sure the heat shields at the front are in decent nick.

The amount of stuff Autodoc lists is unreal. But delivery is slow in my experience. I guess they don't generally hold stock.

Clive

When it comes to electrical issues I find it really helpful to print out extra copies of the relevant parts of the circuit diagrams from my PDF format version of RAVE so I have something to scribble on as I go. Notes of voltage readings, where things are and so on.

I actually printed out all of RAVE and slipped the pages into transparent ring binder wallets. This lets me assemble job specific "mini-manuals". Wallets are wipe clean of oily finger marks too. Being intended for computer access RAVE tends to jump around a bit, "see this section..." is a pain when working from the whole thing but easily dealt with when assembling a mini-manual. Complete print out in big binders needs over a metre of shelf space tho'.

I use the same technique for building up an add on manual covering things hoovered up from the internet or forums. Either in advance of a potentially tricky job or when everything comes to a grinding halt half way through needing research before you can carry on. Doesn't always work. Wasted half a day at the weekend trying to re-discover a trick I used 12 years ago and over optimistically thought I'd remember for ever 'cos it's so obvious.

Clive

OK so now we know what killed the compressor.

Right hand rear airbag has gotten a significant leak. Collapses in about a short minute when doing the quick and dirty EAS disable by leaving a door open when ignition is off. With everything running and the car up to height the replacement compressor is cycling on for a bit under a minute and off for a bit over a minute to keep up with the leak.

Original issue was clearly the diaphragm, it was seriously manky and the car was settling level before the EAS could properly get its act together obscuring any individual air bag problems.

Best guess is that that rear airbag either had no leak or just a tiny one when the problem first showed up. Seems that the leak got worse over the two 300 mile runs until it was all that the old compressor could do to bring the car up to normal height during the last 30, non motorway, miles. Finally managed it about half a mile from home. How often it was cycling on and off during the motorway legs is anyones guess.

Looks like I'm about to find out how well my anti-rust efforts around the top of the rear bag were in 2012 when I last changed them. Getting the rear ones out then was a right battle. 20/20 hindsight says "Why didn't you do them back in the summer when it was warm and dry?"

Clive

Eeek. How on earth do they manage to make such a lightly loaded bearing so badly that it collapses under intermittent use.

Used real it is. Off to E-Bay tomorrow.

Clive

Pulled the compressor today and started rebuild process. On closer inspectionI'm not happy with the motor. Clearly been run way too much with the usual "hot" smell. Internal inspection showed well worn commutator and tons of carbon dust inside. Surprisingly the piston seal looked fairly good but the cylinder liner was seriously scuffed.

Island will sell me a new Dunlop branded compressor with two year warranty for £180. I know these are said not to be as durable as the original but, as a low mileage user will it be good enough for long enough. or should I get a used real one and re-build that as I have the kit.

2026 is shaping up to be a bad year all round!

Clive

Finally got my release papers from Manchester signed on Saturday night. Herself working into tizzy about snow issues. It's a P38 for chrissakes, not an Audi A6 Quattro like hers. Snow is not an issue. But anything for a quiet life!

Took about 15 minutes to lift up before setting off on Sunday but held fine at lower setting for the motorway leg. Dropped during a 10 minute pit stop after 200 motorway miles tho' and took about 10 minutes to come up. Once off the motorway he took nearly half an hour to climb back up to normal setting. Which was worrying. Frankly I expected the thermal link to go after running the pump that long. About 3 minutes to drop once home. Effortlessly under 5 hours for the 300 mile run so everything else is just fine tho'.

Pulled the valve block this morning and was surprised how much air there was still in the system. The front two pipes were a right pain to get off.

Two blocks to rebuild, this one and the spare, so nice warm workshop jobs. Dunno whether it's worth inspecting the pump. I have a re-con kit just in case but it's maybe 12,000 miles and several years since I re-conned it last time I had valve block issues. Cheated and bought a re-conditioned valve block that time after the original refused to let the pump turn off despite replacing all the O rings and seals. Now wondering how good that purchased recon job was.

Is there a way to part fill the EAS system from an external compressor so the pump doesn't have to run so long when coming up from empty?

Clive

When I changed the two short brake pipes and flexi hoses at the reart of my year 2000 P38 I clamped the caliper piston right back and ran the ABS pump running bleed process with the caliper unmounted. I figured this gave the most direct route for the air to escape without any being entrained in the fluid pumped into the cylinder.

Second run through with the calibers in position gave a decently firm pedal. A third run after lunch break shifted a few more air bubbles. All was fine until the next full bleed process a couple of years later.

I make sure I have properly sealing male and female pipe connector caps in the right threads before commencing any brake pipe work. A bit anal but sometimes it saves the day,

Reckon I just managed to get away with things by not introducing too much air into the system. I was fully prepared to go for a full bleed process but thought the short cut was worth a try.

Clive

Harv wrote:

Driving 300 miles on the bump stops would be horrible.

Doesn't bear thinking about. Fortunately he seems to stay up OK when running. Just collapses when parked. Bit like me.

Thats really nice of you to offer your extra Schrader valve set but I've just ordered a new set for myself along with seal kits from X8R.

So, hopefully, I'm about as well prepared as I can be. At least I've got no running around to do up here.

Thanks for the recommendation. I've got a spare valve block at home so might as well buy two kits and do that one as well.

$64,000 question is whether to try a rebuild up here with nowhere to work and only the on car toolkit, basic spanner roll, screwdrivers'n socket set, or run 300 miles home with an "only when parked up (so far)" fault.

Clive