What did you do to your mk 3/4/5 today.

[cherniy_chack]

From prolonged use, the steel cable inside the shell became shaggy.
It happens.

[Noctule]

A general day of fixing stuff.

Cleaned up the courtesy light switch on the sliding door.

Fitted a turbo boost gauge to finally get the 'new' turbo set up after 2 years of it not doing much. Gauge showed 6psi, so taking inspiration from Spinal Tap I turned it up to 11. Other semi-fictional rock bands are also available. Vroom!

It's blown two nearside headlight bulbs recently. The crimps in the socket have become loose, presumably with age, so they got squeezed up with some longnose pliers to keep it working until a repair kit arrives.

Drilled out the latest and last mk6 wheel to arrive in readiness for getting a set of all-season tyres fitted.

[Chug]

Are you drilling out mk6 wheels to fit your mk5 Mat?

I swapped the noisy propshaft centre bearings for some quiet ones, good timing as one had its rubber split half way round and the other the ball bearings fell out when I pulled the prop sections apart

[Noctule]

Are you drilling out mk6 wheels to fit your mk5 Mat?

Yup, finding quality tyres for twin-wheeled mk5s is getting harder all the time, and I need all seasons as I spend a lot of time in Germany, Italy and Spain over winter.

[cherniy_chack]

Today I was driving from the dacha, turned on the wipers, they twitched and stopped.
The fuse turned out to be intact, although the plastic melted.
This means there is a mechanical problem.
When examining the mechanism, I saw that two bolts securing the wiper motor-reducer to the frame were unscrewed.
The lever of the mechanism caught on the head of the bolt and stopped the engine.
I tightened all three bolts, checked the operation of the wipers and drove home.

[gotgcoalman]

Van wouldn't start.
After buggering about with batteries and wiring took the starter off to test it.

It was fooked.
Got a new one and all is well again.
New one is the "little one"
Nearly spun the engine out of the van

Supposed to be minus whatever tonight,so we'll see if it's any good in the morning

IMG_20221207_114228.jpg

Sent from my ONEPLUS A6003 using Tapatalk

[gotgcoalman]

Vroom vroom chaps.

New starter had the van running in the blink of an eye

Allegedly the coldest night up here this winter

Sent from my ONEPLUS A6003 using Tapatalk

[Noctule]

Finished off the 16" wheel conversion with a set of Vredestein Comtrac 2 All Season for the rear four. They have a good 10mm of tread, unlike the Firestone's already on the front that came with about 8mm.

IMG_20221208_1426184.jpg

[gotgcoalman]

What's the price and availability on the 16" tyres.?

Local place I go to are pissing and moaning about getting 185/15/102/103 for me.

Apparently not a common size anymore

Sent from my ONEPLUS A6003 using Tapatalk

[Noctule]

16" tyres are seriously easy to get hold of, and all season tyres are readily available. Prices seem to start around £60, but you'd be buying Buttscratch Van Miracle M+S or Dogzeggz Cargo Knackers for that money. Paying a bit more will get you a tyre that grips, handles, lasts half as many more miles, and has a name that doesn't sound like a villain from Santa Claus Conquers The Martians.

My mk6 rims worked out around £30 each (mk7 rims tend to be cheaper), you just need a drill butch enough to drill them out to 18mm. Drill bits came from Foolstation.

[gotgcoalman]

I'll look into the larger rims.speedo came from Ned's mk6 so it's miles out at the moment.

Just got a pair of 15" ditchfinderspecials today. Not a lot of change from £160
Good ones nearly £100 each

Sent from my ONEPLUS A6003 using Tapatalk

[ned]

15 inch tyres seems to be like finding a unicorn riding a hog naked in the snow I have trouble finding 225 70 15 for my wellers.

[Noctule]

Drove onto the ferry at Hull.

Didn't help that I had to repair a water leak and replace a squealing blower fan before setting out.

[Noctule]

It does seem really odd that certain 15" tyres are disappearing.

The tyres I needed to replace were Westlake (front) & Goodride (rear). They were, on the surface, exactly the same tyre except for the manufacturers' name, but the westlakes had a larger carcass and so couldn't be mixed with the goodride on the back!

Next-door have a four wheeled smiley and his last tyres were of the Foo-Kyng Terrable variety because that's all that was offer.


Tyres are what keep us on the road, so why do we have to tolerate inconsistant non-stick crap from the far east?

[gotgcoalman]

That's why I like at least half a ton over the back axle at this time of the year

Think my 15" tyres are "suckyfuckyfivebucksiloveyoulongtime"
Brand.

Vroom vroom

Sent from my ONEPLUS A6003 using Tapatalk