Sorry for the lack of posting recently. There's seems to be a decreasing amount of spare time as I get older. What spare time I have I've been indulging my other long standing hobbies, maybe I'll post something in my mega thread about that. Cars have definitely not been forgotten about however, and I'm still just as interested as ever.
Since spring this year, the V6 has actually been my daily driver. Completely bonkers in the middle of a fuel crisis but I didn't have much choice. We were using my mother in law's Smart car for a time but it was made quite clear that I am only allowed 2 cars here at Knole. So the choice was get rid of one of the Cavaliers or get rid of the Smart car, so it was obvious which one had to go!
To be honest, I don't do very much driving these days, one of the benefits of living in the same building that I work in!
LEBO, Lizzie's Green Cavalier CD however, does take a bit of a hammering. It's the main family car and what she uses for her daily 10 mile commute to work and to drop off/pick up William from nursery every day in heavy traffic. Quite incredibly really considering it's now 29 years old.
Anyway, I have done a few minor jobs on the V6 since my last post. Firstly, I had a bit of bother with my alarm going off for no apparent reason.
Diagnosing this sort of issue can be troublesome and it's these situations that I'm really thankful for my Tech1 unit. All I had to do was plug it in and look up what set the alarm off. There were about a dozen codes stored on the alarm ECU, all of which were the same. It was the ultrasonic sensor which was triggering an alarm every time. It definitely wasn't cobwebs setting it off so I went on the hunt for a replacement unit.
I have actually replaced this very sensor before, back on page 10 of this thread
here, but last time I got one second hand and in the pre-facelift champagne colour. Luckily, one was listed on eBay for a decent price. Unlike the last one I replaced, it was the right grey colour too:
New left, old right:
Fitting these is easy enough, just need to prise off the plastic surround, undo the two screws and unclip the connector:
New one fitted:
Then it was back to the Tech1 to reprogram the new sensor:
Not only did this solve all the issues with the alarm, but it seems to have also sorted out my central locking. Occasionally, I used to have trouble when locking the car; turned the key and the door locks would go into spasm and lock and unlock themselves a few times. This issue seems to have gone!
Rather annoyingly I managed to loose a wheel badge form my alloys. Actually heard it fall of this time on the motorway, so no chance to retrieving it. Thought I'd try out a metal reproduction from eBay. Fairly pricey at £15.95 each but not so bad if it's just one that needs replacing. Quite impressed with the quality, almost indistinguishable from the original:
Fitted:
Quite happy with it; fits very well and, looks good. Comes with an adhesive backing pre-applied so hopefully won't come off! Thoroughly recommended if anyone is looking for one.
Last little job was replacing this:
Nothing wrong with it per se, just didn't feel very nice. I replaced the indicator stalk on my Dad's CD a year or two ago for the same reason and really liked how it felt so thought I'd treat myself to the same thing. Unfortunately, unlike with my dad's car, I couldn't find a genuine part. So I settled for Febi, thought that would be the next best thing.
All fitted now and feels great. Here's the old one removed, made by Delphi, If anyone wanted to know who made the genuine parts.
Lastly, I finally got the steering rack replaced with that spare I bought earlier ion this thread. Only cost £150 to fit, which I thought was quite reasonable. Apparently it took 4 hours to do but I was only charged for 2 as that's how long the Vauxhall service manual said it should take!
It's made a big improvement to the steering, especially after I got the tracking and balancing done. It's not the end of it though, as annoying this rack has the same issue.
No way near as bad, but it is worn. I'm going to send my old one off to be reconditioned. If anyone knows a good old fashed engineering company that can do this sort of thing let me know. Most of the places around me just replace the seals, clean it it and paint it. This needs new internals.