What did you do to your x40 today???

[clarkey1984]

Originally Posted by Hoggy32

Nice car man, I like the door trims/list, have you painted them black? If yes, what did you paint them with?

Sorry I missed your reply, this was plastikote plastic primer after a light sand and panel wipe, then a top coat of insanely cheap satin black from QD, I think it was about a pound a can, 3 light coats did it perfectly, although I did have adhesion problems on the door handles as they have gone flaky, ill be doing it all again once I get some filler as it's cracked where I smoothed out the side markers.

[Worms]

Just back home from the annual trip to the Mediterranean. Just over 3,500 miles, Inverness to Nice and back and the only problem is that the (original) tail-gate struts are no longer keeping the tail-gate open. Now at 220,000 miles and trip fuel consumption was 42.7 mpg, which is pretty good for an old petrol engine and cruising at between 70 and 80 mph most of the time.

[clarkey1984]

As much as I didn't want to do it, from a practicality point of view I really had to adjust the ride height up, it was just too stiff before, certain bits of road even at low speeds were just ridiculous, it used to do this really harsh lump thing where there were multiple bumps whereby the suspension rebound from the first bump would exactly coincide with hitting the next one, it used to chuck you about so hard that it almost felt like you'd taken off, it did it the other day and was so forceful that everything flew out of the little cubby hole below the radio and the parcel shelf jumped out of its place and fell into the boot, this was on the a11 and I was doing about 55, it was just stupid, so now ive gone up around 22mm on the front and around 30mm on the back, I'd aimed for a 100mm gap between the edge of the rim and the top of the arch on all 4 corners, I ended up with 98 99 on the front and 99 100 on the back, bloody well near enough, and it took me 2 hours to do the front, the C spanner was useless, stilsons did one side but wouldn't do the other, in the end I had to resort to a massive cold chisel and a club hammer, it's mangled the edges of the ring a fairly badly but they still work, the back took about 15 minutes a side, practically fell undone, and I consumed about 10 cigarettes and about a litre of Yorkshire tea during this operation haha.

[bobthecabbage]

Finally got round to changing the gasket on the inlet manifold - renault part number 7701059142 - which was slightly less than £9 ex vat from a dealer with discount for account holders. I've come to think that this dealer is a bit of a rip-off.

The job was a pig because the garage that sold me the car had slathered sealant underneath and over the top of the old seal so that I had to dig it out in bits and broke some of the plastic on the housing. Complete cowboys as their laziness nearly resulted in me having to buy the whole shut-off assembly which I wouldn't be surprised if it cost £120 or more. All because they were too tight and lazy to replace a seal for £10.

I had to replace it as after removing it to clean the EGR (a few years ago!) it was spraying black stuff all over my engine and so much so that it drips off the bottom. I nearly broke the shut-off assembly just removing it at that time due to being glued with sealant.

Also washed the car and cleaned some of the windows yesterday. It looks miles better as long as you don't get to close and see all the paint damage and marks from suncream, bird poo etc.

Also changed the oil (Shell Helix Ultra 5W40) and filter (Mann made in germany) a few weeks ago and put a bit of Shell V-Power Diesel in the tank.

All this is in preparation for a potential 320 mile round trip to the Brecon Beacons starting Wednesday.

Maybe not a big deal to you but my standards quite daunting as I rarely have the energy to drive that far these days and still might have to call it off if I'm too tired!

Hoping it will be okay though and hoping to get up to a few of the Beacons too.

[bimmer49]

Put a new center section on my exhaust a while back. Now I have a rattle from underneath. I thought cuh! cheap exhaust box! Got it up on the ramp and found it's the cat converter guts have become detached from the casing. Mine includes the front pipe so that's a job for later...£110 on Flea Bay!

[bimmer49]

I've had an SRS lamp displayed for ages. It comes up as a passenger seat sensor intermittent fault. I've reset it a number of times. Someone sits in the seat then after a while the light comes on. Grrr!
I've made, remade, adjusted all the underseat connectors.
I also noticed that if the driver puts his/her seat belt on the "pester light" goes out even if there is someone in the passenger seat.
That set me thinking it was a "person in seat" issue.
So I sat in the passenger seat with my seat belt on and set about resetting the SRS module. Cleared the intermittent fault, light went out. Several ignition on/offs, fine.
2 days later and several bods on the perch it's still out! TFFT!

[Haizum74]

I attempted to fit a shark fin aerial and completely bollocked it up. Hunt is on for the standard one

[grow junkie]

Originally Posted by bimmer49

Put a new center section on my exhaust a while back. Now I have a rattle from underneath. I thought cuh! cheap exhaust box! Got it up on the ramp and found it's the cat converter guts have become detached from the casing. Mine includes the front pipe so that's a job for later...£110 on Flea Bay!

Recently had my exhaust replaced from the cat back and snapped this pic of the cat before the pipe was welded. If anyone is interested what the inside looks like.

[grow junkie]

Originally Posted by Haizum74

I attempted to fit a shark fin aerial and completely bollocked it up. Hunt is on for the standard one

Your honesty is commendable...

[Haizum74]

Originally Posted by grow junkie

Your honesty is commendable...

Thanks, it was a right pain in the arse to feck up. Heh. Suffice to say I have no radio.