it works!
Haven't updated for a while - but plenty to report now.
The peugeot
Quite a bit done of late - as mentioned a couple of posts ago I changed the oil, replaced the passenger side suspension drop link and pulled out the dent in the sill. This weekend I got around to tackling one of the peugeot's most obvious issues - it's so difficult to start! Usually starting the car means keeping the throttle to floor and cranking for about 30 seconds while all of the cylinders catch. This isn't ideal and points to a couple of possible problems: The worst case scenario is that the head-gasket is starting to go - allowing a little water into one of the cylinders which needs to be cleared before it starts; another possibility is a leaky injector meaning that all fuel pressure is gone from the system when the car is left for a while and therefore needs a boot-full of gas to build up the pressure again before starting and one of the cylinders will be full of fuel meaning it doesn't spring into life too easily hence the rough 10secs of running once started. From all the evidence (including the constant smell of petrol around the car haha um) I was pretty certain it was the injectors so I grabbed a set off ebay and got around to having a play with them this weekend. first thing to do was relieve the pressure in the fuel system - this was achieved by starting the car (not too easy) and then pull-out the fuel pump fuse (number 14) so that all pressurised fuel gets used up. this was pretty easy. I nearly chickened out at the next task - I took out four bolts retaining the fuel rail aginst the inlet manifold and started pulling at the fuel rail to get it off the injectors - it was in there pretty well but after a bit of wiggling and wd40 it came off and then a load petrol (thankfully not under pressure) dribbled out over my hands and the inlet manifold (oops) that evaporated quickly enough (i felt slightly fuzzy for a while) and I had a look at the injectors individually. unfortunately two of my ebay injectors had slighly cracked nozzles - i wasn't sure if this would effect the spray but i decided not to use them. I picked the two best looking ones and set about replacing the two worst looking originals - one of which looked to have been burned slightly? is this even possible? but seemed to be a good likely culprit.
i made sure to clean each injector with a good dose of carb-cleaner and put the lot back together and kept my fingers crossed! I got in the driver's seat and went to start the car - no gas, just turning the key, then with no drama it started perfectly, just as you expect a fuel injected car to start! yes! - As a bonus the petrol smell seems to have diminished too but that might just be because I got such a lung-full that I can't tell anymore!
Another ongoing problem with the peugeot has been the lousy idle - revs dropping off to nothing when the engine isn't quite up to temp but the SAD (supplementary air device) has closed. I've played with the idle control valve a bit and sprayed carb cleaner all around to try to improve things but it just goes back to it's surgy, stalling self after a while. I went onto the forum (http://forum.205gtidrivers.com/) and found that the surging and stalling my well be down to my air flow meter being worn, so I read up this article - http://frwilk.com/944dme/afm.htm and reconditioned mine, re-tracking the variable resistor and so far so good - a nice stable 900 rpm idle today and no stall so fingers crossed that it stays like this.
Despite some still un-explained and intermittant motorway noises and the rumblings round tight, fast corners, The peugeot is in my good books at the moment, i'm hoping that it continues to respond and behave and maybe an mi16 conversion will be on the cards once it's retired as daily driver and replaced by the mr2 turbo. I have visions of 16v power and reliability, on top of koni-adjustables and full rollcage with a big disc conversion and stripped interior just crying out to be track-dayed.
I still haven't written about my birthday and drive at mercedes-benz world. I went there with the intention of getting some good auto-motive thrills and i wasn't disappointed. Initially, on looking through their experience menu, I had intended to take out an sl55 amg and get a dvd of myself doing it, unfortunately minutes before I was due to drive it, it was taken away to the garage as someone had obviously broken it. They were very apologetic and offered me a drive in the cl63 amg instead which i was happy to take but it meant that i couldn't get the dvd, although the staff were happy to offer me a free drive and dvd of me in the sl55 at a later date (i must get back to them about that!) driving the 63 meant that now richard could tag along as this thing had 5 seats and 4 doors which was a bonus. It also had a 6.3litre v8, 480bhp and every possibly electronic thing imaginable! The instructor, kieron, was great and as we found out he was also driving instructor to the stars having taught simon pegg and nick frost to drive for hot fuzz. The 63 did some frankly unbelivable things with it's traction control and stability control that would easily save your life many times over - cars shouldn't be able to brake and turn like that - it's impossible. having been very skeptical I really was surprised. doing several laps of the track kieron was able to show me racing lines and it was really worthwhile, the most fun however came when I got to have a go on the wet-circle where I spent half an hour learning to drift. it was fantastic! Richard was dying to take the supra round after!
I've had a few car spots recently - although today was Maserati day as I saw two quattroportes and a v8 coupe! also today in guildford I saw a lambo diablo - I can't remember ever seeing one on the rolad before. I have also seen a corvette around guildford i took a pic but can't find it now :P
one last thing - I bought the game RACE the other day, it's the fully licensed BTCC game and possibly the most realistic driving game i've ever played especially the force-feedback - you can really feel when the tyres are letting go - something that is soo hard for games to simulate. The best feature of the game however is the ability to drive e30 m3 and alfa romeo turbo from the 1987 touring car season - ace! At some point i intend to get back into 3d modelling and make myself a 205 gti for the free racing sim RACER (not to be confused with RACE)I have the blueprints - now all i need is about 40 hours spare to make the model!
The peugeot
Quite a bit done of late - as mentioned a couple of posts ago I changed the oil, replaced the passenger side suspension drop link and pulled out the dent in the sill. This weekend I got around to tackling one of the peugeot's most obvious issues - it's so difficult to start! Usually starting the car means keeping the throttle to floor and cranking for about 30 seconds while all of the cylinders catch. This isn't ideal and points to a couple of possible problems: The worst case scenario is that the head-gasket is starting to go - allowing a little water into one of the cylinders which needs to be cleared before it starts; another possibility is a leaky injector meaning that all fuel pressure is gone from the system when the car is left for a while and therefore needs a boot-full of gas to build up the pressure again before starting and one of the cylinders will be full of fuel meaning it doesn't spring into life too easily hence the rough 10secs of running once started. From all the evidence (including the constant smell of petrol around the car haha um) I was pretty certain it was the injectors so I grabbed a set off ebay and got around to having a play with them this weekend. first thing to do was relieve the pressure in the fuel system - this was achieved by starting the car (not too easy) and then pull-out the fuel pump fuse (number 14) so that all pressurised fuel gets used up. this was pretty easy. I nearly chickened out at the next task - I took out four bolts retaining the fuel rail aginst the inlet manifold and started pulling at the fuel rail to get it off the injectors - it was in there pretty well but after a bit of wiggling and wd40 it came off and then a load petrol (thankfully not under pressure) dribbled out over my hands and the inlet manifold (oops) that evaporated quickly enough (i felt slightly fuzzy for a while) and I had a look at the injectors individually. unfortunately two of my ebay injectors had slighly cracked nozzles - i wasn't sure if this would effect the spray but i decided not to use them. I picked the two best looking ones and set about replacing the two worst looking originals - one of which looked to have been burned slightly? is this even possible? but seemed to be a good likely culprit.
i made sure to clean each injector with a good dose of carb-cleaner and put the lot back together and kept my fingers crossed! I got in the driver's seat and went to start the car - no gas, just turning the key, then with no drama it started perfectly, just as you expect a fuel injected car to start! yes! - As a bonus the petrol smell seems to have diminished too but that might just be because I got such a lung-full that I can't tell anymore!
Another ongoing problem with the peugeot has been the lousy idle - revs dropping off to nothing when the engine isn't quite up to temp but the SAD (supplementary air device) has closed. I've played with the idle control valve a bit and sprayed carb cleaner all around to try to improve things but it just goes back to it's surgy, stalling self after a while. I went onto the forum (http://forum.205gtidrivers.com/) and found that the surging and stalling my well be down to my air flow meter being worn, so I read up this article - http://frwilk.com/944dme/afm.htm and reconditioned mine, re-tracking the variable resistor and so far so good - a nice stable 900 rpm idle today and no stall so fingers crossed that it stays like this.
Despite some still un-explained and intermittant motorway noises and the rumblings round tight, fast corners, The peugeot is in my good books at the moment, i'm hoping that it continues to respond and behave and maybe an mi16 conversion will be on the cards once it's retired as daily driver and replaced by the mr2 turbo. I have visions of 16v power and reliability, on top of koni-adjustables and full rollcage with a big disc conversion and stripped interior just crying out to be track-dayed.
I still haven't written about my birthday and drive at mercedes-benz world. I went there with the intention of getting some good auto-motive thrills and i wasn't disappointed. Initially, on looking through their experience menu, I had intended to take out an sl55 amg and get a dvd of myself doing it, unfortunately minutes before I was due to drive it, it was taken away to the garage as someone had obviously broken it. They were very apologetic and offered me a drive in the cl63 amg instead which i was happy to take but it meant that i couldn't get the dvd, although the staff were happy to offer me a free drive and dvd of me in the sl55 at a later date (i must get back to them about that!) driving the 63 meant that now richard could tag along as this thing had 5 seats and 4 doors which was a bonus. It also had a 6.3litre v8, 480bhp and every possibly electronic thing imaginable! The instructor, kieron, was great and as we found out he was also driving instructor to the stars having taught simon pegg and nick frost to drive for hot fuzz. The 63 did some frankly unbelivable things with it's traction control and stability control that would easily save your life many times over - cars shouldn't be able to brake and turn like that - it's impossible. having been very skeptical I really was surprised. doing several laps of the track kieron was able to show me racing lines and it was really worthwhile, the most fun however came when I got to have a go on the wet-circle where I spent half an hour learning to drift. it was fantastic! Richard was dying to take the supra round after!
I've had a few car spots recently - although today was Maserati day as I saw two quattroportes and a v8 coupe! also today in guildford I saw a lambo diablo - I can't remember ever seeing one on the rolad before. I have also seen a corvette around guildford i took a pic but can't find it now :P
one last thing - I bought the game RACE the other day, it's the fully licensed BTCC game and possibly the most realistic driving game i've ever played especially the force-feedback - you can really feel when the tyres are letting go - something that is soo hard for games to simulate. The best feature of the game however is the ability to drive e30 m3 and alfa romeo turbo from the 1987 touring car season - ace! At some point i intend to get back into 3d modelling and make myself a 205 gti for the free racing sim RACER (not to be confused with RACE)I have the blueprints - now all i need is about 40 hours spare to make the model!