oneohtwo

Cheers folks, I was pleased with the steering wheel. It's funny I do these things and put them back on expecting it to magically transform the car, but by the time I have put I back on I have forgotten how it looked before so there's always a bit of an anti-climax! Good to know about the sunroof not sitting exactly flat, surprising as it doesn't look "right", but you learn something every day. I hadn't changed the sunroof seal, it's still the old one, but maybe it got a bit dislodged when I was messing about with it. I'll have to get the cassette down either way, and maybe look out for a replacement motor. Shame it'll have to be second hand as you never know if the replacement motor will be any better. The top one is tempting, even though it'd be completely hidden from view! I will think on that. The pipes sealed OK around the outlets even though they were smaller, but the unit had started to give up the ghost and was leaking through the plastic joint. Could potentially have taken it apart and replaced the O-ring or seal, but preferred to have a proper Bosch unit in there.

Finished a couple of small jobs at the weekend. Firstly recondition my steering wheel with the Liquid Leather dyes, before and after pictures below: I don't think the before picture shows how bad it was, but the top bit where it gets the sun was really bad. All worn and pitted and cracked up. And similarly the after photo probably doesn't do it full justice, but it looks nice and smart now. Had to sand down the worst bits on the top first, and there's still a bit of texture to it. Not perfect as it is still a worn and old wheel, but didn't necessarily want it to be. Wanted to sort the steering wheel pretty well since I bought it, and had the Liquid Leather stuff for a few years, so nice to finally get round to it. Slightly less successful was reattaching the sunroof headlining. Struggled to get the headliner out, which I think, now having put it back in, was due to it not being correctly installed in the first place. The little pins for the tilt portion of the trim weren't in the slots in the trim, but were underneath it somehow. So in wrestling to get it out think something else might have gone awry. It now makes a clunk when operating the slide mechanism, and whilst it seems to open OK, it doesn't go all the way back and it doesn't close properly. It slides a bit then stops, so you have to keep pressing the button and gradually it closes. It did this once before and was then fine, so don't know if that is the motor going. Either way I am going to have to get the whole cassette off I guess. I also noticed that at the rear of the sunroof the seal isn't sealing as there was a tiny gap through which daylight was visible. My sunroof seems to sit slightly higher at the rear than the surrounding body work, and lower at the front. Pictures of other peoples don't seem to have this, so I don't quite know what's going on there. Anyone else notice this?

Could be worth a try when I next drain the coolant. Didn't have any tape so tried the blue Loctite. Will see how that works out.

Yeah, I think that's the one I found also! £165 including shipping and taxes, so not that bad. We'll see if it helps out. Need to see about adjusting the dashpot as well.

Ah interesting. I can see it would stiffen the whole thing up if the gearbox wanted to twist. It's surprising how much movement there can be in these things. I wonder why they left it off some of the VR boxes. Cheers for the offer, but I probably don't need it and it'd be a faff trying to fit now, so I'll do without!

I think you'll be OK. You've got the anti-seize on the threads as well. The gear box has come up a treat, reminds me of the feeling after I did mine. Shame it goes back on the car and ends up getting dirty straight away! The short shifter is interesting, not seen it before. Is it a straight swap? Interesting you have the bracket that runs from the front of the transmission to the engine mount, mine doesn't have that, but I did notice it in the Bentley manual so I guess it is a N. American feature. Any idea what its purpose is?

Found one straight away on ebay for a good price, so snapped it up only for it actually to be out of stock! Typical. Only other source I can find is about £200 which is a bit steep seeing as you managed to find it for £90, but might still be worth it.

Hmm, I think I'll pick one up. Any obvious differences between the new and old? They look pretty well identical as far as I can see. If the electrical values are the same across all three, I can't see why it wouldn't work properly.

I think what I'll have to do is take it in to an exhaust fitter and get them to take the CAT off and have a look. I was taking it anyway to get a new exhaust as the current stainless one is too droney, most likely to Longlife. If they get it off and find it's duff then I'll have to replace it there and then, but if not they can refit it. Maybe I can then take the OE one back with me and try cleaning it, so at least I'll still have the original part.

Around the thread do you mean?

Interesting, I remember seeing some guidance in the Bentley on this, so will double check what the tolerance should be. Would that just have the effect of causing the throttle to snap shut suddenly, rather than a slowly close?

Fitted a new Bosch auxilliary water pump to replace the cheapo GSF one I fitted yonks ago, which had started leaking and making whining noises. Comparison of the two parts below for reference, Bosch on the left: Unsurprisingly looks much better quality, and the pipe fittings are a slightly larger diameter for some reason. However, neither fit in the rubber holding rings properly. I remember when I bought the GSF one years ago it was a slightly different size to to OE one, and was too short to slot properly in the top ring. I assumed this was because it was a pattern part, and gettign a proper Bosch one would sort the issue, but as you can see it's arguably worse, as the ring won't go over the fatter bottom section. I cheked the part numbers so I am guessing they changed the design at some point. It's not a major issue, but as below it's not neat: I also fitted the small non return valve that is pushed into the hose that runs between the throttle body and heater matrix. Had to cut it out of the old hose and push into the end of the silicon but it's an easy job that had been on my mind to do for a while, so nice to tick one off. It has stopped the sloshing and gurgling noses from behind the dash so that's that sorted. One thing while I am here, I ordered black silicon hoses from Roose when I did the rebuild, expecting them to be a really nice deep black that would make the engine bay pop but, whilst they look a lot nicer than the OEM, I have always been a little disappointed that the colour has been a little flat, and more of a very dark grey. Anyone else had the black hoses from Roose and found the same? They also made the little length of hose that connects to the expansion tank too long (oddly, as it's the right length in all their pictures) so the hose does not sit right, and rests on the throttle cable which is a bit annoying. Might have to just cut that to length.

I was wondering that, but thought the risk of it clogging something somewhere was too great. But crisis averted. Sat down with a cup of tea and the cricket to calm down, and then had another look and you can reasonably easily undo the thermostat housing end of the crack pipe and pull it out from there. Washer fell straight out. No just got to find a better way of sealing it. Maybe some blue loctite/threadlock would do the trick?

Ah, this is potentially a great find. How did you get on? I know my ISV has been sticking a bit, Stealth freed it up and cleaned it with some carb cleaner, but it's still not 100%. Do occasionally stall when pulling to a stop, so assume that's the ISV sticking

I've made a bit of a major error chaps, that could do with a bit of help on. Long story short, a rubber washer has got trapped in the coolant system, and I am not sure my best course of action from here? Longer story, I have one of the ECS billet crack pipes, but it doesn't seal properly around the drain plug they have provided. My plan was to stick a rubber washer in the hole for the plug to seal against. However, it turns out part of the reason it doesn't seal is that the hole is straight through, there's no base for the plug to seal against. It is no wonder it doesn't seal as it's only relying on the thread of the plug to seal. Very poor design. Anyway, in the dark under the car I didn't notice this, popped the washer in the hole and... it disappeared. And I couldn't grab it back. As the coolant was drained from the drain plug, hopefully it hasn't gone very far but I am now working through my options. All I can think is that I will need to get the front end off, get the crack pipe out and hope it's just sitting in the bit before the water pump and hasn't gone any further. Ordinarily I would just crack on with that, but I am parked on the road, so it's not ideal getting the front end off. Any thoughts?

Was it difficult to get off? I've got a hunch my cat is a bit coked up from when the engine was old and worn. The hunch is that the plastic trim around the gear shift can get warm, especially in slow moving traffic, and coincident with everything getting warm, there's a weird smell. It's only really where the gear shift is, which is just where the cat is. Heat sheild is all intact as well. I've read both heat and smell could be signs of a blocked cat, and there used to be loads of carbon deposits in the exhaust before the engine rebuild so it stands to reason, but I can't verify it. I have contemplated getting it replaced just to see if it makes a difference, but seeing yours, and testimony from Keyo about how good the Leistritz parts are, I am reluctant to junk it if it is in perfectly good order. I'd rather keep it, especially if it can be cleaned, than replace it on the off chance for an inferior product. Car is parked on road, so doing any work to it isn't easy at the moment.

Oh, interesting thought. I should have followed where all the other wires went, but the brown one did head off to the passenger side then up towards the boot. Not sure where they go from there as they definitely aren't under the boot carpet. Might need to do a bit more investigation, but at least I know it's not something OE.

Sorry, I completely forgot to follow up on this, what with one thing and another. I didn't get the seats out in the end, but did find this picture I took the first time around: This is the mystery box. It is on the drivers side, under the front beam for the rear bench seat. There is something a bit aftermarket looking about it. The brown wire went off to the passenger side, but I didn't manage to trace it.

Wow, that's a super shine. Can you see the carbon weave through the blue, that'd look smart? Or was it where the resin had continued to shrink so you just had the texture of the weave? Possibly a bit late now as you've bought them, but if you were after some fancier looking fuel lines, Hel can cut you a length of their braided fuel hose with fittings. They can't preform them into a shape, but they are flexible enough to fit into the clips perfectly, and looks pretty smart.

I didn't delete the aux pup, mine is essentially OEM, so couldn't tell you what it is like without it. From what I know it: 1) Comes on pre-ignition 2) Runs after shutdown 3) Comes on with Speed 2/3 (Unsure on this one) I can't really see what difference not having it for point 1 makes, I don't entirely see the purpose of the pump coming on for this. Point 2 makes a bit of sense to help get rid of some of the heat in the block, although I don't fully understand this, as once the engine is off it shouldn't be getting hotter! Although perhaps this is more to eliminate residual hotspots - so not having the pump may place more stresses on the block, head, etc... Point 3, if true, must be there to give a boost to the main pump and help circulate coolant faster and get more heat away from the block, I guess this could be important as the main pump won't be at full speed if just sat idling in traffic. I think on balance I would probably rather have it... it gets hot under there so anything that helps with that can only be a good thing. The fan spec should include the current draw, if you have a look at those. The Comex fans I had, had a maximum draw of 8.1A.

I quite like the idea of deleting the FCM, agree it is a bit of an eyesore stuck in the middle there, and adds clutter to an already cluttered bay. Cutting down some of the wiring wouldn't be amiss either. I can't really help on wiring up the aux water pump, but kinda agree it would be nicer to keep it, even though everything seems fine without it. I had a look at the HM video on the wiring, and if it is the same one you refer to he seems to have fan 1 come on for temp 1 then fan 2 for temp 2 and 3, but he didn't seem to include any resistors as the original circuit so they'd be running full chat from the get go as far as I can see? I can't see it being a major issue, other than the fans may wear out quicker, and be noisier, but if you wanted to replicate the OEM function exactly, the write up and wiring diagram I posted on page 2 (about halfway down) does this. The only thing I don't really like about it is mounting the resistors is a pain, so the install isn't the neatest.

I went from 15s to 16s and didn't notice any difference in terms of comfort or handling on the standard suspension. I did improve the tyres at the same time though, Kumho - Uniroyal Rainsports, which may have kept the balance. Definitely worth taking the tyres into account at the same time. Interestingly I weighed the overall package and from memory there was no real difference to the 15 speedlines, may even have been marginally lighter. The 16s are MAMs so not a particularly high end wheel, but came to under 8.5kg. Tyres were still on the Speedlines so couldn't weight them without for a direct wheel to wheel comparison unfortunately, but as the MAM wheels were not significantly heavier the smaller tyre keeps the overall weight down.

That's interesting. I too changed the chains and tensioners, and had the head and injectors refurbished. Prior to doing the work, I had hoped it would fix that the warm start issue (among other things), assuming the same as you did that it was down to worn parts and tolerance. But, alas for some reason it hasn't. Interesting read, I couldn't work out what this was referring to "look at the back center of the engine compartment for a missing part. There is a damper for the idle control system that often is blown apart by a backfire when enough fumes collect in the intake/breather system (see photo 2)."

It's also worth noting that I do have a non-return valve installed on my fuel line, so in theory whether the pump is priming or not there should always be pressure in the fuel line - and I still get the issue. Based on that evidence I am inclined to agree with Vince that it is not an issue with fuel supply, or at least pressure. But either way, if it is a fault with the fuel pump not priming or not, or pressure dropping in the line, installing a non-return valve doesn't resolve it. It's extra work for not a lot of gain, and compromises the fuel line slightly, which is what happened to me when fuel started leaking out and down the road...!

I couldn't really say, but doesn't the pump run on the first ignition stage before you turn over? Vince did mention that they've tested the pressure in the system when trying to get to the bottom of it, and the fuel line has never lost pressure - he was pretty convinced it was not a fuel issue.