Ho hum

Mmm I do recall having a cheap set on an old car and they were rubbish. They never actually stayed flat.. so the middle of the blade was always off the screen! That said, the Bosch and proper BMW ones I've had on other cars since have been fine.

Boring question time!

Currently I have a pair of Britpart's finest £2 wiper blades on my car. Stuck them on an Island order to get free postage... as expected, they work about as well as 10 year old dried up blades pulled off a barn find. Chattering on the way up making a lovely noise.

I'd like some nicer looking (and preferably better working) flat blades - but I'm not sure what to go for. I'd also like the passenger side to be a bit shorter than standard, the overhang on all the blades I've had in the past bugs me.

Thoughts? Riveting stuff.

:) the stock head unit and either DSP or door amps does sound good when paired up with a good source doesn't it!

It was a shame mine was dead/dying when I got the car, or I'd still have it.

Do it :)

Dishwashers work well for keyboards too... they take a few days to dry out mind, but they normally survive.

I had to do mine a few days after summer camp... I couldn't stand it much longer. Did the mirrors too.

Good news!

Found my problem... I didn't have a blockage as such, there was some muck in the gearbox end of the drain, which I cleared out on both sides and removed one of the 'petals' to stop it sealing itself up in the future. Also checked the actual drain ports in the bottom of the heater box and they were free.

It seems the problem was actually the flexible sections of pipe - either they have been stretched, or somehow become slightly elongated. When fitted to the drain port, the passenger side corrugated flexible bit was bending at such an angle that it was collapsing internally, only letting a tiny bit of water through. Hence when I wiggled it... it came through.

Cut about 4-5mm off the end and reconnected - and now I have consistently draining condensate and a dry footwell!

Is nice :) eBay 2 years ago or so. 10kw Multi split Hitachi system with two indoor units taken from a business being stripped out. All in I think it cost about £550, including finding someone to do the pipework and gas it up. Gets most of its use during the winter - we have a tiny sort of 2 up / 2 down (living room/kitchen downstairs, bedroom/bathroom upstairs, does that even count as 2/2?) house with no separation between floors.

So all heat from the pathetic radiator downstairs just goes up if we use the gas central heating. Forced air works far better, and takes a couple of minutes to warm up rather than running the boiler for hours getting nowhere. Nice being able to get to sleep in a cool room too on the rare hot weather days we get...

Sounds like they might have overcharged it quite a bit if the fans were coming on and now you've popped a hose...

Mine is making a bit of noise from under the dash for a few seconds after the compressor starts, though to a point that is normal I've found. I've got the glovebox and centre console panels removed currently so that makes it easier to hear. Even my air conditioning / heat pumps at home does it from time to time when the compressor goes to a high speed from resting quickly. If its hissing constantly while the compressor is running though, that's less good.

Whoops :)

Last week I bought a replacement Webasto diesel heater for my 5 series. This is the unit in 'good working order':

Coolant passage is completely full of oily nastiness. So I can only assume the car it came from had a pretty nasty head gasket failure, or someone poured oil into the coolant... it also had a communication fault registered locking it out, so it clearly wasn't working when removed...conveniently all I needed was the control board from it - and for the price I paid, I'm happy enough, and I have some other spare bits now. But had I needed the whole thing, I'd be stuck trying to clean that mess out entirely or sending it back.

Nice of Sennheiser to come through for you on that one!

I'm of the opinion the majority of breakers don't really give a toss about the parts they're stripping off vehicles and selling. Certainly in the case of parts that can and do fail, I don't believe and of them them 'carefully test before removal' at all. Strip it off the car, list for a low price, offer 30 days warranty. Hope for the best.

There are certain things you just can't test without either specific diagnostic kit or the right conditions, and I'm pretty certain a breaker isn't investing in the kit for all the weird and wonderful things fitted to different cars on the off chance they'll come across some to sell...

Great if it plays out, a load of hassle for the buyer to fit an awkward as hell part only to find it doesn't work. At least with eBay/PayPal, for the buyer it will usually play out in the end. For sellers though, like in your case, it can be a nightmare. I've sold stuff on eBay before, but I can't be bothered anymore, too much potential hassle.

That's a piss poor response. Extractable or not, you've paid money for something that should be ready to use.

I've just put a Hankook in mine too - the tiny little watch battery would start it okay, but if you had the radio on or lights for more than a few minutes... you'd be tempting fate.

Oddly enough that HB019 is the battery that goes in my BMW. Which died on me yesterday while fixing the diesel heater. Hankook do the same physical size but more powerful battery for half the price Halfords want... I think I know what I'll be putting in it :)

Wait till you need to spend £1200 on a couple of common rail diesel injectors... I'd have a fully built V8 on the way for less than the cost of a full set!

I needed a new condenser on mine too, so did that and drier. I have noticed my distribution flaps are getting stuck so most of my air is going to my feet at the moment, with what remains going to the dash vents and some of that is then leaking out through the naff ductwork. The dash needs to come out to fit a loosened up heaterbox and Audi heater core, so maybe that will improve things.

I don't know - maybe I'm expecting too much. In my E39, I could actually make hell freeze over if I so wished. But like Morat says, bit of a BMW thing. Two E39s, an E90 and now an F30 and they're all / have been superb. I think what helps is (on the E39s certainly, not sure about the 90/F30) the heater core actually has PWM driven valves that cut off the coolant supply when there is no demand for heat. So no unnecessary source of heat within the car at all.

Hmm. Mine just seems to be a bit weak. Though when we had some actual summer-like weather last week or the week before, it did seem to cope relatively well.

I definitely wouldn't describe it as being able to make you uncomfortably cold though. I'd wondered if the blend flaps were letting air past the heater core, but it seems a bit unlikely having rubber strips rather than foam.

I'm not particularly impressed with the A/C in my P38. It gets cold... but it isn't fantasically cold shall we say.

The evaporator is getting down to 3-5c depending on blower speed, engine speed etc. With the blowers on full, it sits around 8 at idle. The condenser fans are currently running on slow all the time the A/C is on - single pressure switch bypassed as I initially thought it was warming up at idle due to a faulty switch. Seems they rarely come on even in hot climates, but at that point I hadn't noticed it was colder with higher engine/compressor speed.

Have forced the blend motors all the way to cold and even had them unplugged for a bit to see if they were misbehaving, but no difference. I don't believe I have a leak, it has been a bit meh since I replaced the condenser/drier and had it vacced down and filled etc I think 2 months back. The suction back to the compressor is nice and cold too.

I only have our BMWs to compare it to. My E39 on full speed/lowest temp is too cold to endure for long on a day like today - 22c outside. I prefer it chillier in the car, and I sort of expected more from a system as big as the one on the P38.

Thoughts?

Mmm I know I could disconnect the battery and then lock it all manually etc to at least prevent lockout issues. But then the windows need appeasing, the head unit needs tweaking to get it right, mirror dip needs turning off, set the clocks...

If I were leaving the car for a long time - then fine. But I'm talking periods that could be a couple of days, or maybe a week or two. I'd just rather safeguard against the possibility of something upsetting it and draining the battery.

Hmm true!

Minor snag in my plan. When my old car is gone, I'd planned to park the new one up there when not using it. But the trees above means it will need a cover or I'll be forever cleaning it. I suppose I could get some magnetic feet and put it on the roof over the cover. Just got to hope some delight doesn't come along and steal it...

Not to hijack slightly... have you tried one of those in the sunroof of your P38 Orangebean? Not sure about the horrible dot matrix effect on the glass... would have thought it would cut out a lot of light from reaching the panel?

I'd like to give my P38 a break soon, but don't want to deal with dead batteries etc with nowhere to plug it in on a CTEK charger etc.

Worth the wait for the MF31-1000 if you can!

If you go to Halfords, they'll try and sell you a tiny little thing for a P38! Same size battery my little 2 litre Mazda has fitted.