What did you do to your connect today?

[deps-online]

Today i finished lacquering my old st wheels.
Over the last few days i've scraped the old lacquer off the alu faces using a linbide scraper, wet and dried the faces followed by some t cut metal polish and three coats of lacquer and i'm pretty happy. Although i've not quite matched the finish of the centre caps, they look loads better than they used to. Will take a pic of them fitted on Tuesday when my van goes in for MOT

wheels look awesome mate

[SWtechnologies]

So today I did a few things.

Van was getting close on a 98500mil and had a strange Squeeek from the engine bay so got on with a New cam belt and water pump along with a new alternator and rollers on the aux belt.Took my time Pretty straight forward job 4.5 hours all in. And the Squeeek has gone result!!!


Gave it a bit of a wash and polish to.

[deps-online]

Wheels fitted....check
Brakes cleaned and painted...check
Van valeted...check

[mrtn]

Love the vinyl jobs (y)

[Gaffa]

Well I spent the day making my roof rack not rattle no more and also fitted some flyeye to it.
What do you think?

[spinn]

Fitted my New Wheels.......

[gt_addict]

Gaffa, what have you done to your roof rack to stop it rattling? I've got the same rhino rack and get te occasional rattle. I thought it was the roof making all the noise.

[spinn]

....and added a second cargo-light that i picked up at Ford today. I have fitted them With 2X1.5w leds each. Beats the crap out of filament bulbs....

Sorry for poor image quality....my S3 isn't better....

[Gaffa]

Gaffa, what have you done to your roof rack to stop it rattling? I've got the same rhino rack and get te occasional rattle. I thought it was the roof making all the noise.

Hi mate, I have just wrapped some foam to the back roller, and put some elec tape around it, I use my rack for Kayaks so the foam helps and the roller can still roll a little haha. if you need better pictures let me know. the sound the roller makes was driving me mad, I thought it was my ply and insulation at first moving about on the walls.

[spaceaware]

Engine service.... Changed the oil, did a flush, changed air filter.... Boring but necassary... Ordered Alpine Under seat sub...fitting later today if the let me pick it up in the morning

[spinn]

Yesterday i tried to Swap my steering Wheel. I say tried, because it was over midnight before i had the fooking airbag out of there. I looked in here for a how-to because i didn't remember from the last time.

And i found Graham's Method and thought " That is a Nice way to do it! It will be like a breeze, i am used to my wife poking her finger in my eye whenever i screw something up. And i get to drink some tea!" So i went out after dinner to remove the airbag and ended up going back in again With no change to the car.....other than i swear i could hear the airbag chuckle at me when i closed the door....

Tea-time. I substituted the tea for a serious irish coffee.....or two. Got to late so i grabbed a flashlight to get my Tools out of the car. Before i went Down to the car, I read the prosedure again and caught on to a little detail..... " ....poke screwdriver into pencil size round hole...." WTF??!?! Round hole? I had been poking around the oblong hole that is SO hard to Reach, not the round one! Ran out, staggered Down the stairs and into the car: Poked in the right hole and the bag was out in Seconds..... so today I'll swap out my steering Wheel for a leather one......

[deps-online]

Had to repair the gear selector again this time we welded it to so hopefully thats that cured for good

[Gromitt]

Just started a engine change in my 2003 Connect TDDI 220T she has done well at 247000 miles dosn't use any oil but the compressions down about 15% and the injectors and fuel pump are tired she started with with the Ford diesel knock a couple of months back all indications from the fault codes are the fuel timing solenoid is shot about £110 for a new replacement but its hardly worth it on a pump that's done 247k so i shopped around and bought a Focus TDDI engine & gearbox complete and fitted with a new fuel pump,injectors, turbo and EGR valve /inlet manifold over the last 18 months, engine has done 69k i heard it running before removal it was as sweet as a nut apart from the water pump is shot and peeing water out. i will change crank to pump to cam timing belts fit a new water pump, new ancillary's drive belt and hope this engine last as long as the original. Oh i only paid £200 for the whole bag of mashings i even got the inter-cooler, starter motor and a nearly new alternator in the deal i think the guy had spent that much on repairs over the last 18 months the water pump packing up was the last straw so he decided to scrap the car much to my good fortune unless his sh*t luck transfers with the engine to my Connect. Lol

[dieselboy1978]

Just started a engine change in my 2003 Connect TDDI 220T she has done well at 247000 miles dosn't use any oil but the compressions down about 15% and the injectors and fuel pump are tired she started with with the Ford diesel knock a couple of months back all indications from the fault codes are the fuel timing solenoid is shot about £110 for a new replacement but its hardly worth it on a pump that's done 247k so i shopped around and bought a Focus TDDI engine & gearbox complete and fitted with a new fuel pump,injectors, turbo and EGR valve /inlet manifold over the last 18 months, engine has done 69k i heard it running before removal it was as sweet as a nut apart from the water pump is shot and peeing water out. i will change crank to pump to cam timing belts fit a new water pump, new ancillary's drive belt and hope this engine last as long as the original. Oh i only paid £200 for the whole bag of mashings i even got the inter-cooler, starter motor and a nearly new alternator in the deal i think the guy had spent that much on repairs over the last 18 months the water pump packing up was the last straw so he decided to scrap the car much to my good fortune unless his sh*t luck transfers with the engine to my Connect. Lol

Dont forget to get pump coded to your ECU as its coded to vehicle it come from.

[Gromitt]

Just started a engine change in my 2003 Connect TDDI 220T she has done well at 247000 miles dosn't use any oil but the compressions down about 15% and the injectors and fuel pump are tired she started with with the Ford diesel knock a couple of months back all indications from the fault codes are the fuel timing solenoid is shot about £110 for a new replacement but its hardly worth it on a pump that's done 247k so i shopped around and bought a Focus TDDI engine & gearbox complete and fitted with a new fuel pump,injectors, turbo and EGR valve /inlet manifold over the last 18 months, engine has done 69k i heard it running before removal it was as sweet as a nut apart from the water pump is shot and peeing water out. i will change crank to pump to cam timing belts fit a new water pump, new ancillary's drive belt and hope this engine last as long as the original. Oh i only paid £200 for the whole bag of mashings i even got the inter-cooler, starter motor and a nearly new alternator in the deal i think the guy had spent that much on repairs over the last 18 months the water pump packing up was the last straw so he decided to scrap the car much to my good fortune unless his sh*t luck transfers with the engine to my Connect. Lol

Dont forget to get pump coded to your ECU as its coded to vehicle it come from.

Thanks for the reminder diesel boy have already got the pump virginized ready to reprogram when i refit it, every thing now ready to lift out the old engine today, i also found the N/S C.V joint final drive side was on its way out and the boot had split so will need to replace those as well glad i found it before it got really bad