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Car DIY Thread.

You lot need to do the flying controls rigging on an Apache. Or replace a rudder actuator on a Tornado. Or replace the nose landing gear hydraulic manifold on a Tornado F3 in 50°c heat. Outside.

Me. Looking forward to doing something easier before I retire.
 
That Subaru video is horribly reminiscent of a friend's Triumph GT6, he and I spent a day trying to get a similarly long bolt out from the diff. That too goes through bushings and seizes, it was a horrible job even with 2 of us taking turns. I can't understand the guy's approach though, in light of your comments re using oxy acet, why the guy running a commercial garage is messing around for an hour trying to save 2 suspension bushes that have been on from new and are mostly knackered anyway. I'd just tell the customer "If it's all corroded in place, like this one appears to be, I'll probably need to burn out the bushes, it will cost X. If I'm lucky, happy days, you won't need them. OK?" Surely to God an hour's labour isn't worth a couple of bushes. In the UK plenty of mechanics reach for the gas axe before the spanners.

Very good point Steve67 but having watched these SMA videos for years I get the impression these motors belong to customers on a budget, not always of course. I guess it also makes good youtube content!

Interestingly it’s the same issue on the first Mazda video. Bushings, castings and bolts with added New York road treatments makes a relatively simple job a bit of a nightmare!
 
My first car was a Hillman Avenger. Pile of sh1t! I had to replace the alternator, fuel pump, starter motor, timing cover oil seal..even the bloody petrol tank came half off one night. I could hear a metal scraping sound and fortunately clocked my fuel gauge suddenly went to E.
I learned enough to confidently tell a colleague that I could replace his starter motor (mk4 Cortina) during a lunch break. Including a trip to Halfords for a exchange one. I haven't used my socket set for many years..wouldn't know where to start on a modern car.

That's a fantastic name! "Hillman Avenger." You didn't make it up did you? If not, I can imagine the meeting of Hillman directors sitting around and someone coming up with "How about 'Avenger'?" and everyone collapsing in hysterical laughter.
 
To be fair drum brakes can be hard work. It's often awkward to get the shoes snapped into place against the springs. Far harder than discs. That's before you start wrestling with seized adjustors and all the rest.
...and when you manage to get the rusty drums off, you find an 'orrid oily mess where the slave cylinders have leaked all over the shoes. You try & get away with fitting a new rubber kit, but you've turned a blind eye to the pitting inside the bores & the bloody things still leak. You should really get new brake shoes, but instead you try putting them under the grille to try & draw the leaked fluid out. Doesn't work very well, so the brakes are still pretty crap.
 
That's a fantastic name! "Hillman Avenger." You didn't make it up did you? If not, I can imagine the meeting of Hillman directors sitting around and someone coming up with "How about 'Avenger'?" and everyone collapsing in hysterical laughter.

Part of Rootes group then (the original constituents of whom, had made some good cars in their time.)

--but Chrysler bought in in a big way early 60s, seen as a lifeline at the time (UK seemingly had several hundred manufactures/ labels left, all making small numbers of production runs , in an essentially just-post-war attitude & manner unaware that it was possible to aspire to build more than 20-30000 cars in a mass production run, let alone ... well)

So by the time the Avenger came about, scraping through a consolidation of sorts - not what it might have been: too many brands, not enough industry, or something; the disease that killed BMC, later known as BLMC, then BL, then Austin Rover, then eventually Rover, later.... oh, nevermind.

The Avenger Tiger - same thing, just painted yellow, with a black stripe or two & a slightly less-pathetic engine is still a sought-after thing though. Not sure why - but I'm also glad there are a few out there who preserve such things lovingly.
(even if only as a warning to others: but also remember in any guise, it was so very much better than the Marina. And the only 'hot' Marina was the one you'd finally enjoyed setting-fire to.)
 
Worst drum job I had was a Peugeot 405 I had in the early 90’s. It had been well maintained but handbrake performance wasn’t great. I suspected the self adjusters but really needed to get in and look.
Turns out with the high mileage the drums had worn and now had a not unsubstantial groove made by the shoes and as a result there was no way they were coming off!
The adjusters had done their job and the shoes were firmly in place, with no inspection cover I ended up drilling the drum so as to get a screwdriver in to spin the adjuster. The shoes were just on the rivets so caught just in time but the groove in the drum was substantial. I removed the lip with a burr on a drill, itself not a great job but I had no access to a lathe at the time.
On reflection actually a great car, ride and handling was excellent although both the petrol and Diesel engines were a bit soft and had issues I believe.
 
Now I just take the Volvo to a dealer once a year for a quick service and MOT, all delivered with a pleasant smile. I do top up the washer fluid and take it to a car wash from time to time.

My friend has no mechanical knowledge ( l mean zero!!!) takes his Volvo to the dealer for top ups as Arnold Clark offer free top ups.

Once when visiting us he had run out of washer fluid. He couldn't even show me how to open the bonnet
 
My friend has no mechanical knowledge ( l mean zero!!!) takes his Volvo to the dealer for top ups as Arnold Clark offer free top ups.

Once when visiting us he had run out of washer fluid. He couldn't even show me how to open the bonnet
Sounds fair to me. I bet 1/3 of car owners these days can't.
 
...and when you manage to get the rusty drums off, you find an 'orrid oily mess where the slave cylinders have leaked all over the shoes. You try & get away with fitting a new rubber kit, but you've turned a blind eye to the pitting inside the bores & the bloody things still leak. You should really get new brake shoes, but instead you try putting them under the grille to try & draw the leaked fluid out. Doesn't work very well, so the brakes are still pretty crap.
Seal kit? You must be joking, they stopped offering them 30 years ago! These days you fit a new cylinder or an exchange caliper. An exchange caliper at £80-100 is cheaper than a seal kit and an hour's labour, and it's a more effective repair. Do this, once, and that's it for the life of the car. Not so the old days of wire wooling the rust off and replac ing seals that will be leaking again in 1 or 2 MoTs time.
 
I changed the strut inserts on my Mazda RX-3. As I started on the second side I thought to myself "I don't remember putting these bits back on the first side", a quick scout round the bench revealed the missing parts. Job took about 50% longer than it should!
 
Seal kit? You must be joking, they stopped offering them 30 years ago! These days you fit a new cylinder or an exchange caliper. An exchange caliper at £80-100 is cheaper than a seal kit and an hour's labour, and it's a more effective repair. Do this, once, and that's it for the life of the car. Not so the old days of wire wooling the rust off and replac ing seals that will be leaking again in 1 or 2 MoTs time.
Last time I fettled drum brakes was probably 45 years ago or so. Running cars on a shoestring, we couldn't afford to lash out on luxuries like new cylinders!
 
Back in the day I hired a car and was given an Avenger. The hire agent made sure that he showed me the light switch. They stuck it on the side of the steering column, all but invisible when seated. I'm sure they had many calls about the light switch.
 
Economy hatches do still, if only at the back. I think it makes for a nice easy handbrake mechanism, and no maintenance for 50k miles at least.

My Merc’s parking brake is a drum set up inside the hub of the rear brake discs. 140k and still fine. I make sure I drive a few feet with it on every now and then, just to satisfy a weird concept I have.
 
A quick look on Pistonheads suggests that all new Polos under 115bhp have rear drums. Blimey.

Really efficient for the first heavy application, not so good after that, so I suppose on a weedy shopping cart they’ll be fine.
 
My Merc’s parking brake is a drum set up inside the hub of the rear brake discs. 140k and still fine. I make sure I drive a few feet with it on every now and then, just to satisfy a weird concept I have.
Perhaps you & I share the same delusion; I do sim. HB bites balanced and solidly.... in 4th or 5th car I've had with such an arrangement.
 


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