What's made you grumpy today?

[The Panda Nut]

Wife's Panda hit a pothole last week. No visible damage, but 2 days later she was driving to work and suddenly got a scraping noise.
I had taken the wheel off and checked the damper, spring, spring pan and hub flange after the pothole, and it all looked OK.
Got it home and did the same inspection again. Nothing immediately obvious, and the wheel didn't look out of position.
But... the tyre had definitely been rubbing against the fuel filler pipe, destroying it. Wierd!
Lots more light on the subject showed the problem.
Long crack in the beam arm, allowing it to flex wildly when it hit bumps. Then it returned to normal. When unloaded, crack was nearly invisible. Sprayed water on it and it was much more obvious.
Had a new beam ready-built so fairly quick swap, but once it was off I re-checked the spring pan and hub flange. Both completely solid, and other than some flaky surface rust, in very good condition.
Not had one fail like this before, and now I'm wondering how many others look more solid than they are.
(Its more obvious now as I did a torsion test on it once it was off. Explained a lot)

A lot I expect. I had an Astra that was written off when T boned. Of the 16 welds holding the pivots on the front suspension arms, half had clearly been failed for some time. The arms that were both snapped off revealed no contact at all on 25% of the welds had existed at the time of its demise. Although it passed MOTs and drove fine it still makes me shudder. I suppose its a firm suggestion that servicing is a good idea. I wonder however if the superficialinspections that are made would reveal such faults. One of the reasons I prefer to do my own where I can.

 

[vexorg]

Indeed which is why I went with it. Each of the long panels (closed baord) are 12ft long. Also there was so much of it (42 metres) I dreaded having to do odd patch repairs in the future. Digging out old rotten posts, new posts in different locations to avoid old post concrete, etc. was something I never wanted todo ever again.

Impressive indeed!

 

[Cheest]

Well, sh!t.

No working on the lathe or much of anything else for the next four to six weeks. Broke my ankle roller skating last night.

 

[The Panda Nut]

Well, sh!t.

No working on the lathe or much of anything else for the next four to six weeks. Broke my ankle roller skating last night.

Oh deers. Just proves on the words of Dirty Harry.... A mans got to know his limitations. I hope 6 weeks is right. Mrs took 18 months to get back to normal, so now you have to wait on Mrs Cheest while hopping. I bet she's given you quite a bit of stick??

 

[Cheest]

Oh deers. Just proves on the words of Dirty Harry.... A mans got to know his limitations. I hope 6 weeks is right. Mrs took 18 months to get back to normal, so now you have to wait on Mrs Cheest while hopping. I bet she's given you quite a bit of stick??

To say Mrs.Chest is pissed would be putting it mildly. What also is getting her goat is that I have so much experience on crutches that I can still do about 85% of what I'd normally do around the house. My SIL is coming over this evening to retrieve my evil knee scooter from the garage attic.
I am the oldest 20 year old I know, but this may have been the wake up call. Continue to skate when I get the go ahead, but sit out the races. I still don't know what happened, but it was painful.

 

[PuntoHowTo]

Well, sh!t.

No working on the lathe or much of anything else for the next four to six weeks. Broke my ankle roller skating last night.

No story about how you single handedly picked up a lathe but at that moment a bear appeared so you dropped the lathe and fought the bear only realising later that you broke your foot possibly dropping the lathe or maybe kicking the bear in the head….

Fell over roller skating doesn’t have the same prestige to the story.

You and your wife cannot get a break at the moment (excuse the pun)

Hope you both get well soon. Go check out the Tested Channel on YouTube while you convalesce Adam savage (off of mythbusters) has just put a second lathe in his workshop and is modifying it

 

[Cheest]

Well, one of the nurses said that at least I was doing something fun until it wasn't. Nothing mundane like standing up from the couch or turning to hear what my other half was saying that resulted in my first two knee surgeries.

 

[The Panda Nut]

No story about how you single handedly picked up a lathe but at that moment a bear appeared so you dropped the lathe and fought the bear only realising later that you broke your foot possibly dropping the lathe or maybe kicking the bear in the head….

Fell over roller skating doesn’t have the same prestige to the story.

You and your wife cannot get a break at the moment (excuse the pun)

Hope you both get well soon. Go check out the Tested Channel on YouTube while you convalesce Adam savage (off of mythbusters) has just put a second lathe in his workshop and is modifying it

You missed the bit where he saved the baby in the pram from the bear....

 

[vexorg]

Adam Savage's workshop would be my ideal man cave

 

[PuntoHowTo]

Adam Savage's workshop would be my ideal man cave

Mine too and he’s just expanded it having moved all his cool movie props out.

 

[The Panda Nut]

I went to Ruby today and cant find the blasted wheel nut key. What a total pain in the butt. Im off away tomorrow too. As luck would have it all 3 Pandas use the same key so I have removed the locking bolts for now. I had it just last week when cleaning the brakes but was very tired when clearing up so have no Idea what I did with it or if I left it on the nut.... Needless to say its cheaper to buy another set of bolts than a replacement key. What a farce. Im thinking of leaving the lock bolts off but Ruby's wheels are an odd size so possibly irrpelaceable now. What a pain.

 

[Pugglt Auld Jock]

I went to Ruby today and cant find the blasted wheel nut key. What a total pain in the butt. Im off away tomorrow too. As luck would have it all 3 Pandas use the same key so I have removed the locking bolts for now. I had it just last week when cleaning the brakes but was very tired when clearing up so have no Idea what I did with it or if I left it on the nut.... Needless to say its cheaper to buy another set of bolts than a replacement key. What a farce. Im thinking of leaving the lock bolts off but Ruby's wheels are an odd size so possibly irrpelaceable now. What a pain.

One of the "getting older" symptoms I'm afraid - leaving the locking nut on the wheel I mean. Done it a couple of times over the last couple of years but, as the kids usually leave their cars with me overnight I've always remembered before or noticed it before they drove off. Only once has it cost me real embarrassment. What happened was I noticed a woman with two youngsters looking in despair at the flat O/S/F tyre on her car, which was parked two houses down the street from us. Galahad here, asked her if I could help. She didn't even know if she had a spare. Luckily she did so I offered to change it for her. The older of the children was a boy, maybe around 10 years old, who "liked cars" and was very keen to "help" so he walked back to my garage and "helped" me put my small trolley jack, power bar, tyre pump and a few other things in my wheel barrow and then accompanied me back to their car - all within plain sight of Mum - you have to be so careful with this sort of thing these days. Anyway, wheel changed and during conversation she mentioned the the street name where she lived nearby. After they had departed I walked the barrow back to my garage and started unloading it only to find the lock nut key under the jack in the bottom of the barrow. The young lad must have put it there while I was putting the flat wheel/tyre in their boot. So lucky she'd mentioned the local street they lived in as we chatted, so I jumped in my car and drove to their street. Of course I'd no idea what their house number was so, hoping the car would be there, I started at the top of the street looking for it. Some of the houses had driveways and some were street parking. Anyway, the Gods must have been keeping an eye on me because about half way down the street I heard the woman's voice. She'd just come out of her front door and was calling to the boy. Handed the locking nut back to her with apologies but all was well because she was so grateful I'd changed the wheel for her so all was good. Didn't stop me feeling an absolute idiot though.

 

[portland_bill]

Does anyone steal alloy wheels any more? Back in the late seventies and early eighties, it happened a lot, as most cars still had steels, and stolen wheels had a ready market. Nowadays, most cars come with alloys, so the only market for stolen ones would be to replace broken ones.
Unless they just want the tyres, of course.

 

[Pugglt Auld Jock]

Does anyone steal alloy wheels any more? Back in the late seventies and early eighties, it happened a lot, as most cars still had steels, and stolen wheels had a ready market. Nowadays, most cars come with alloys, so the only market for stolen ones would be to replace broken ones.
Unless they just want the tyres, of course.

On a similar theme, I was wondering if catalytic converter theft is still such a big thing. The reason I'm wondering about it is that I became very aware of it being a problem when we had a Mk1 jazz in the family with it's Cat under the floor so very easily stolen. Most cars now seem to have their cat mounted as near as possible to the cylinder head - so it heats up as quickly as possible - so are much less easily got at.

 

[vexorg]

The manicat as it's now known

 

[PuntoHowTo]

On a similar theme, I was wondering if catalytic converter theft is still such a big thing. The reason I'm wondering about it is that I became very aware of it being a problem when we had a Mk1 jazz in the family with it's Cat under the floor so very easily stolen. Most cars now seem to have their cat mounted as near as possible to the cylinder head - so it heats up as quickly as possible - so are much less easily got at.

I read a report recently that the Jazz has been black listed by a lot of insurance companies because of the high frequencies that Cats are now being stolen.

I think If I had one I would modify it to try and fit the cat to the down pipe like a manicat.

I don't understand the thefts given that a replacement cat can be bought for as little as £20 from some places. surely there has to be more valuable things to take? I have heard a few times of would be thieves being kills by cars falling on them so its not without its risks.

 

[Pugglt Auld Jock]

I read a report recently that the Jazz has been black listed by a lot of insurance companies because of the high frequencies that Cats are now being stolen.

I think If I had one I would modify it to try and fit the cat to the down pipe like a manicat.

I don't understand the thefts given that a replacement cat can be bought for as little as £20 from some places. surely there has to be more valuable things to take? I have heard a few times of would be thieves being kills by cars falling on them so its not without its risks.

The wee Honda specialist near me offers a "cat protector" which seems to be some sort of heavy duty cage fitted to the exhaust/underneath of the car? I suspect it probably costs more than just fitting a new Cat? The Mk1 was especially vulnerable, he tells me a chap with a trolley jack and a sabre saw can be away with one in just a couple of minutes! There's a number of posts on you tube about it.

 

[s130]

Four caliper carrier bolts from Shop4Parts costing £33. Over £6 for postage.

Now these are M10 Metric Fine 1.25 pitch and 22mm cap head bolts integral washers.. The killer is metric fine and plated as opposed to natural plain black dusting finish. Could have gone with hex head at 20mm or 25mm and fine pitch for £2 (or less per bolt. Both 20mm or 25mm length I can adjust for.

But, wanting to keep things standard, i.e. original I'm getting screwed. I gather Fiat now want £10 (or there abouts) for one of these little *uggers.

What really *isses me off is that here in the UK metric fine pitch, whilst listed by many UK comapnies, can (depending on sizes and lenghts) can take up to 14 to 20 days to arrive. They are obviously being imported.

Fiat and others probably pay 1 pence, or less, for these items in manufacturing quantities but we get stung for £7+ per item.

I could clean up and reuse the original cap head M10 bolts but at 19 years old due to corrosion I could not get the Allen drive head into the socket head without scraping the inner flanges. Even then tapping with a brass drift was required to fully seat the driver. Then a vice and narrow drift to tap the socket bolt off the Allen driver bit.

Oh the joys (not) of working on aging vehicles.

 

[vexorg]

In general the fine pitch is on high torque bolts, and the bolt material rating is much stronger/higher

 

[vexorg]

Old man rant, at the gym tonight they had the local radio on, always playing the latest stuff. Someone phoned in asking for turning japanese by the vapors, laughed at the guys for wanting an old song, had to look it up to see it was from 1980 and told him to phone back on one of the classic request shows.

And it's a better song that any of the new trash he played while I was there!