Great news, thanks guys :)
I'm on call this weekend so I'll be mooching round the house, so this looks like a nice job to get cracked. With a bit of luck I won't get a call when the car's in bits or I'll have to bike in to work!
OK, I want to fit the silicon hose that bypasses the heater throttle body direct to the expansion bottle. The Duchess is using too much coolant, and I'm worried that the many-joined pipe will let go some time and cause a big problem.
So, I can't fit my sausage fingers behind the aircon compressor to get to the stub pipe on the top of the... whatever the stub pipe sticks out of. It looks like I should be able to move the aircon compressor if I undo a couple of bolts and also remove the plastic belt guard. Is that all it is? Should I be wary of anything else? Will I break something, release the gas and kill all the dolphins?
I do have the remote clippy pliers/clip remover things but I can see that there's pink staining the stub pipe so the seal isn't great. I really hope I won't need a jubilee on there because the access is woeful...
The Duchess is now steering better than ever, but the wise old mechanic said that the next place to look would be the Radius Arm Bushes if I wasn't happy. This has got me wondering if there's more improvement to be had. Is there a way to tell how good/bad the bushes are from a visual inspection?
Then if they are suspect, does anyone happen to have one of these?
http://www.lrseries.com/shop/product/listing/7650/3809/LRT-60-004-BUSH-FITTING-TOOL.html
that maybe I could borrow?
If not, would it be something we could buy/share as a group?
Lpgc wrote:
realised I may have some time toward the end of this month.
Oh, you do, do you?
(just kidding, they're both running great - thanks!)
So, you probably don't want this one either?
:D
Although, to be fair, it's a much nicer example
OK, it's not ebay and it's not a P38 but... I'd love this!
https://tinyurl.com/y8tyqkhm
even if it won't do Gilbert's blood pressure any good ;)
Bloody Hell! I'm massively impressed and not a little jealous.
hehe, and fix the satnav, cd player and cruise control....
Although, if either of the first two turn out to be expensive I think it's time for an Android tablet/headunit.
Victory!
Just done about 500 miles down to Salisbury and back and she's much less of a handful. Hitting surface changes on a slip road used to be a white knuckle ride, no longer :)
We even got 3.3 miles per litre on the motorway run back (although that wasn't a refill from the same pump).
Well you've had a bit of a mission! If mine doesn't start steering straight very soon you might be unlucky enough to get a visit ;)
Yes, there's a bit of tension building!
It's not really big bumps, it's asymmetric bumps. If you hit a speed hump straight on, no problem. If you hit one at an angle the wheel will tank slap left and right 3-5 times in about a second. There's also a lot of vagueness in the steering, especially when on cambers. It adds up to making a wide car feel even wider on narrow roads.
She needed a rear hub as well :)
Bah. The Duchess is still in dry dock :( They had a merry time with the ball joints, although they're on the way back in now. The guy doing them knocked off because he'd had enough and they're waiting on an oil seal for the rear axle. Apparently it was leaking so they may as well do it while they're there. Monday night - fingers crossed!
I'm hoping it won't take them too long to do one side of the front, and put new drag link, track rod, panhard bushes and roll bar links in when building it back up. At least they'll be able to hack away at a lot of the old stuff without worrying about putting it back later. The next step is obviously tracking it all up afterwards, I daren't send them the RAVE pages as they get grumpy when soft-handed office types try to tell them their job - but I can get the "specialist" to track it for £50 if necessary. I reckon Smiler would call that a bargain ;)
Oh, they've got presses and a load of experience. I was just surprised when the "Land Rover Specialist" had to turn down the job. Apparently he has recently moved location and lost access to diagnostics and Land Rover tools. I'm not sure what he story is there :(
If the locals have the bits, happy days. They're far too old and wiley to give a fixed price, but they're not gougers either. Basically the two old boys (in their 70s) use their brains and the young lads get to do the heavy lifting.
Hah! that makes total sense :)
The next question is: Have my local garage over-promised or do they have the special axle spacing tool thingy. Watch this space (but don't bother tuning in until Thursday)
Folks, am I right to assume that if you're changing the lower balljoint one one side you'd also do the upper balljoint at the same time?
They're pretty much the gold standard...
12 ton ram doesn't do it? Hell, no wonder we spent hours on Marty's!
Something like a Nanocom. Honestly, they're worth the cash.