The Joy of Running an Old Shed (Vol 2)

[gruffgriff]

Goodbye old friend.



A mate suggested a minutes silence. Not with that timing chain death rattle...

[ST565NP]

Kitch's new shed :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ExFgEmfFwI

[r3g]

r3g said:

Finally picked up the new bus tonight and can confirm it's a good'un . I treated it to a nice tank of Momentum 99 and after resetting the trip computer achieved a respectable 36 mpg across 30 miles of towny roads (30 and 40 limits, traffic lights, stop start) without even trying. Engine is silky smooth and it drives like new despite having done 105k. Quite enjoyable wafting ... in a Vauxhall Zafira of all things . Thinking of treating it to a hand wash in the morning

[anarki]

gruffgriff said:

Goodbye old friend.



A mate suggested a minutes silence. Not with that timing chain death rattle...

There becomes a point when anyone of us has to throw in the towel. With all it service its given you (from what you posted) I'd say its been a good shed. RIP.

[anarki]

r3g said:

Finally picked up the new bus tonight and can confirm it's a good'un . I treated it to a nice tank of Momentum 99 and after resetting the trip computer achieved a respectable 36 mpg across 30 miles of towny roads (30 and 40 limits, traffic lights, stop start) without even trying. Engine is silky smooth and it drives like new despite having done 105k. Quite enjoyable wafting ... in a Vauxhall Zafira of all things . Thinking of treating it to a hand wash in the morning

I hate these, BUT I admit they are very versatile as a load lugger/family chugger. Extra shed points for the most bland colour too

I ran a Xsara Picasso 1.6 90hp Petrol around 10 years ago (picked it up for £400) I hated it too, but it spent 99% of its life with the rear seats removed and used as a van, so I totally get your use case. Good luck with it!

[r3g]

anarki said:

I hate these, BUT I admit they are very versatile as a load lugger/family chugger. Extra shed points for the most bland colour too

I ran a Xsara Picasso 1.6 90hp Petrol around 10 years ago (picked it up for £400) I hated it too, but it spent 99% of its life with the rear seats removed and used as a van, so I totally get your use case. Good luck with it!

Yes, my mate had a Picasso for a long time too, a 1.6 HDI model and also used it basically as a van. A rather dull thing, but was supremely reliable and wafted from place to place without fuss.

I am currently browsing FBMP to see what I can buy to put in the back . I have my eyes on some kitchen units, worktop, computer desk, fence panels, turf, water butt, paving slabs, mattress for now

[Davie]

I'm teetering on the edge with my sister's sheddy V50.

2010 2.0D bought a couple of years back for shed money and it's been great. Had the usual power loss / no boost that would reset upon restart and it was a split vacuum pipe. Easy fix. However, few weeks back it was loosing power again, going into limp mode usually after a fairly prolonged boost session - checked the usual suspect, swapped out TCV x 2, swapped the MAF , new fuel filter and it seemed better.

Then she booked it in to a garage for rear discs, pads and a caliper... fine, good price and saved me the hassle but she also got them to check the power loss. It returned several days later minus half a tank of diesel, sporting a replacement accelarator pedal and a bill for £250 for the privilege. However, it went into limp mode again. I rechecked the codes, generic pedal communication live fault so checked and cleaned the connections at the CEM and it went away and seemed fine... aside for it vents exhaust fumes from out the back of the block.

Said fumes were traced to a cracked flexi just after the turbo. It could be welded but it needs to come off the car and the bolts are terrible and it needs to be up in the air and I've not had the chance. However the more pressing issue is that i seems to have developed a diesel knock, just for a couple of second as it comes on boost then it stops. It also gone in to limp mode a couple of times but oddly, it surges... like kangaroo petrol. In all other cases of limp mode, including my identical 2.0D when it's in limp mode it'll have zero power but you can give it maximum throttle and it'll just flatline, do little. However hers, if you give it throttle it's starts stuttering and misfiring. But, switch off and restart and it's back to full health and full power again. Adding two and two together... I get potential fuel starvation yet everything "appears" ok so I'm now at a loss and nobody seems to want to touch it.

She's not stuck, shes had my leaky V50 for the past 8 weeks but I need a solution or it'll be getting drop kicked to scrap and she'll have to get a replacement... but I don't like being beaten, so I'm not quite ready to admit defeat just yet.

Any thoughts... aside for "give up"

[r3g]

^ The short version of that is nobody knows what it is and you'll be throwing thousands at it and a lot of time swapping out bits trying to figure it out. My solution to that problem would be putting it on ebay as spares/repair and buying something reliable.

[Davie]

r3g said:

^ The short version of that is nobody knows what it is and you'll be throwing thousands at it and a lot of time swapping out bits trying to figure it out. My solution to that problem would be putting it on ebay as spares/repair and buying something reliable.

All cars are reliable right up until they aren't. Spares or repair might get £500 if you're lucky... up and running it's a £3k car. That gives me £2500 to play with. I'd rather try and fix known quantity than start over with an unknown.

[r3g]

Davie said:

All cars are reliable right up until they aren't. Spares or repair might get £500 if you're lucky... up and running it's a £3k car. That gives me £2500 to play with. I'd rather try and fix known quantity than start over with an unknown.

But by your own admission, you've already spent money and time changing vacuum pipes, TCVs, fuel filters, MAF, none of which have fixed it. You've now burnt through another £250 for a new accelerator pedal you didn't ask for and another £50 for half a tank of diesel.

It's now billowing out fumes from the engine which it shouldn't be doing, but might be a flexi pipe on the turbo which you can't get to without access to ramps, and then it needs a bloke with a welder, and on top of this the engine is now knocking and it's basically undriveable with no power - "so I'm now at a loss and nobody seems to want to touch it."

I think you're throwing money into the fire trying to fix this now that it has a diesel knock. I'd be cutting my losses and moving on. It seems like it was a lemon right from the start.

[Davie]

r3g said:

But by your own admission, you've already spent money and time changing vacuum pipes, TCVs, fuel filters, MAF, none of which have fixed it. You've now burnt through another £250 for a new accelerator pedal you didn't ask for and another £50 for half a tank of diesel.

It's now billowing out fumes from the engine which it shouldn't be doing, but might be a flexi pipe on the turbo which you can't get to without access to ramps, and then it needs a bloke with a welder, and on top of this the engine is now knocking and it's basically undriveable with no power - "so I'm now at a loss and nobody seems to want to touch it."

I think you're throwing money into the fire trying to fix this now that it has a diesel knock. I'd be cutting my losses and moving on. It seems like it was a lemon right from the start.

I should add context... this is shedding so TCV, airflow meter, replacement vacuum pipes were all from my big box of bits that I regularly keep topped up whenever I'm in a scrapyard as it'd be financial suicide buying new so on that front, it's cost next to nothing. The rear brakes were done at such a good rate, it really wasn't worth my time to do it myself.

The exhaust fumes, it's got a crack on the flexi... it's weldable but needs the exhaust dropped and I'm done lying under cars, so usually use a mates ramp but he's been pretty poorly of late, hence we've not had the chance to do it. The £200 bill was to clean the DPF and fit a used throttle pedal, neither of which I think it needed but that's why I said to her not get that side of things looked at.

So, FOC exhaust repair aside... the limp mode issue remains and is slightly odd as I've never experienced the surging it's doing which, with the diesel knock under initial load makes me think it's under fuelling but live data pretty much matches my own V50 as far as MAF rates, temps, boost etc and there seems to be the correct pressure at the rail.

Nobody wants to touch is as these days, few garages seem to want to actually diagnose... point in case, the throttle pedal was replaced "because computer says so" when in reality I traced it back to a poor CEM connection, which is a common V50/S50/C30 complaint though usually when said CEM fills with water... which isn't the case here.

It's certainly not lemon, it's done her 3yrs with only the basics - tyres, brakes, a spring and a couple of lower arms the latter of which we can think the staff of the roads for. It's never failed aside for the split vacuum which wasn't hard to fix and the swapping TCV was a process of elimination.

It's trying my patience but more so as I'm reaching the limits of my knowledge and as per usual, the forums are hit or miss and I'm certainly not going to hand it over to a random garage to play parts darts... I can do that for a few pounds, not several hundred. The diesel knock only happens for about a second just as if builds initial boost and it's a bit hesitant from cold but out with those scenarios, it's drives well.

I just need / hope somebody will have experience of it's current symptoms and give me a new avenue to explore. It only ever records "boost parameter" codes but that could be down to a few things, some of which are evading me hence my frustration is building...

Anyways, sounding board mode switched off again.

[r3g]

Good luck with it! You have far more patience than I. Diesels at any age within the last 20 years, or especially since DPFs became standard, require far too many prescriptions of brave pills to keep my sanity levels in check. Far too much crap to go wrong on them and it regularly does, then as you say, you are playing parts bingo with them, shelling out hundreds and hundreds at a time replacing parts, hoping that one of them fixes the issue.

[Wheel Turned Out]

Davie said:

Nobody wants to touch is as these days, few garages seem to want to actually diagnose... point in case, the throttle pedal was replaced "because computer says so" when in reality I traced it back to a poor CEM connection, which is a common V50/S50/C30 complaint though usually when said CEM fills with water... which isn't the case here.

Got to look at it from a garage's point of view. They put in the time and effort to go full Poirot on a car that most people would say "sod it, too much, getting shot" on, when they could be doing something much easier. Okay you're paying for the time, but they could probably book in several much more profitable and simpler jobs in that time. If you're a business owner chasing profitability, that'll be your mindset. I know they're not all like that, but those that are I can't really say I blame them.

You seemed to intimate yourself that the only thing stopping you giving up on the car is stubbornness.

[Davie]

Stubbornness plus a complete lack of desire to run the gauntlet of a) selling this as spares / repairs then b) find something else suitable, for a small budget... that also won't need time / money invested immediately. So as far as which is the lesser of two evils... I'm still swaying slightly towards getting to the bottom of the current issue.

[r3g]

Davie said:

Stubbornness plus a complete lack of desire to run the gauntlet of a) selling this as spares / repairs then b) find something else suitable, for a small budget... that also won't need time / money invested immediately. So as far as which is the lesser of two evils... I'm still swaying slightly towards getting to the bottom of the current issue.

You could buy yourself a cheap shed to run around in while you diagnose and fix your other shed! You can never have too many sheds.

[gruffgriff]

anarki said:

gruffgriff said:

Goodbye old friend.



A mate suggested a minutes silence. Not with that timing chain death rattle...

There becomes a point when anyone of us has to throw in the towel. With all it service its given you (from what you posted) I'd say its been a good shed. RIP.

Thanks for your understanding, I do feel I'm letting the shed community down by bailing out.
We will remember a prince of sheds. 8x4 sheets on the roof, mixers in the trailer, a proper work wagon as a second life and took it all in it's stride.

[mercedeslimos]

I recently had a boost parameter code in my Mondeo with the same engine. I reset the learned values with the diagnostic kit and cleared the codes. All sorted. I reckon it came on due to the leaking injector washer on cylinder 1 which I sorted yesterday - not the worst job, these 2.0 Peugeot diesels are a really robust old bd! 271k and counting!

[anarki]

My insurance is up for renewal at the end of the month (I posted in another thread about car insurance rises) and I've seen a petrol Mondeo I quite fancy...

So I'm tempted to sell the civic and upgrade to the Mondeo I've seen, with the view of picking up the Mondeo on the day my renewal starts, to avoid admin fees with the insurance company in changing cars mid policy. There's not much difference in insurance price between the two.

Although the civic has just passed its MOT, I'm just not keen on it anymore, I can't be arsed spending money on finding the source of the knocking/clunking noise coming from it, and I've got a few trips coming up into Bristol and outer London, so I'll be getting penalised in the ULEZ for each trip.

I travel to Bristol quite often too. So far I've managed to skirt around the ULEZ but it's a hinderence in doing so and I have friends and family I visit there.

Not quite sure how to pitch the civic and at what price, there's not many for sale, and although mine is clunking away, it's got a lot of newish bits on it. But it's a 19 year old high mileage shed so I have to be realistic.

Decisions, decisions

[gruffgriff]

The v-tech yo! boys might surprise you with interest? The ones on the lower rungs of the type-r ladder anyway?
I speculate, no knowledge here!

[r3g]

gruffgriff said:

The v-tech yo! boys might surprise you with interest? The ones on the lower rungs of the type-r ladder anyway?
I speculate, no knowledge here!

The sporty ones go for silly money. The cooking spec ones only 3 figures at this kind of age. My 05 pre-spaceship is a cooking spec 1.6 vteckickedinyo but even with only 65k on it I doubt it'll do a grand.

Anarki's is also a pre-spaceship mk7 like mine, but his is a coal burner so no vtec anyway lol.

Edited by r3g on Wednesday 26th June 05:30