What have you done to your car today?
- Thread starter mattyprice4004
- Start date
I have a bag of those in the glove box from the same seller!
I need to order some interior trim clips now too as a few have fractured out of old age :/
I have the same sitting in a draw too, albeit black ones and for an EP3. An Ebay job too.
Where do you guys source most of your bits from online? I need filters, spark plugs and various other bits and pieces for a Focus C-Max and if I can save a few quid from ordering online instead of crashing through Halfords I'd be happy.
Soldato
Changed a wishbone on my C4GP yesterday, got the other side to do tomorrow and then the antiroll bar bushes sometime next week 
I seem to mainly end up getting stuff from eBay, Car Parts 4 Less and Mick's Garage (10% TCB), depending on what works out cheapest.
Whilst I'm in the thread; switched my headlight bulbs for Nightbreaker Plus, seeing as winter is on the way! Will see how they last, was quite careful to keep them clean when installing.
Two new rear tyres as the ones that were on it were manufactured before the car was made and were cracking! Managed to get 50% off wheel alignment and the car feels so much more positive when going into corners!
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is it running -3 front camber?
Associate
Changed the gearbox on the Discovery, fitted a new clutch/clutch plate and release bearing while I was in there.
A few jobs left to do on it before I'm all set for winter.
A few jobs left to do on it before I'm all set for winter.
You can't shim an E46, the strut slides into the upright and is pinch bolted in. They do have slotted top mount holes standard though.
CSL spec is 1'45" at the front, max spec 2'05", which is about what I would expect for a fast road 3er. It will still eat tyres, but who buys a CSL to be economical with tyres?
I did not know that they had rose jointed rear lowers as standard though, everyone says they are too high maintenance and too much NVH for a road car.
CSL spec is 1'45" at the front, max spec 2'05", which is about what I would expect for a fast road 3er. It will still eat tyres, but who buys a CSL to be economical with tyres?
I did not know that they had rose jointed rear lowers as standard though, everyone says they are too high maintenance and too much NVH for a road car.
Don
Fitted new front discs, pads and sensor on my xf today
Simple job, made more difficult by doing it on my sloping driveway by the light of a 500w flood
Simple job, made more difficult by doing it on my sloping driveway by the light of a 500w flood
Soldato
The XF has spherical bearings on the damper to arm connection, the damper kills the high frequency noise to mitigate any vibration / noise transfer functions and they are rubber sealed to deal with any corrosion/dirt ingress concerns. CSL probably doesn't have the same NVH attribute requirements as most cars anyway and the air box probably masks the rest.
Today i swapped the outer shaft on the Wife's MINI, only to realise the replacement was shorter! Must have been off a diesel or something, no idea but just mixed around with the spider joint and bearings to make a good one, got to love CV grease....
Today i swapped the outer shaft on the Wife's MINI, only to realise the replacement was shorter! Must have been off a diesel or something, no idea but just mixed around with the spider joint and bearings to make a good one, got to love CV grease....
Nope, 2° and it's too much.
Couldn't move it Clarkey, even after undoing the slotted strut brace, it seemed like it was fully out already which would suggest something was bent. It didn't show up on the setback or the caster figures though, so I drew a blank. As you say mind... "in spec" so not a lot else I could do.
Was a nice round 1°30 on the other side with a nice shiny new lower arm. hmmm! Would have been nice to even them up.
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The lesser models you can adjust by knocking out the small locating pins in the top mount, CSL is supposed to be adjustable but I think this one was already on max adjustment (couldn't see the slot as it was covered over by the strut brace.) but certainly didn't want to move in the direction I wanted it to and there's only so much beating you can give it with the customer watching
Replaced the gaiter on the handbrake for a new "leather" one. Quite an easy job thankfully.
Old one looking horrible.
Un-clip it, roll it back, cut the cable tie, and it's lose.
Had to persuade this bit away from the leather, was quite well stuck on.
New one on the plastic and cable tied in place.
Clipped back in and looking so much better.
I've got one for the gear stick sat on the side too but that's proving a complete ***** to get the actual gear stick off, so will wait till I can get someone stronger to help lol.
Fog light surrounds were also looking badly faded, so popped those off and gave a quick two coats of Plastidip.
Need to get other interior trim bits off now too so they can be Plastidipped as they're looking a little scratched.
Old one looking horrible.
Un-clip it, roll it back, cut the cable tie, and it's lose.
Had to persuade this bit away from the leather, was quite well stuck on.
New one on the plastic and cable tied in place.
Clipped back in and looking so much better.
I've got one for the gear stick sat on the side too but that's proving a complete ***** to get the actual gear stick off, so will wait till I can get someone stronger to help lol.
Fog light surrounds were also looking badly faded, so popped those off and gave a quick two coats of Plastidip.
Need to get other interior trim bits off now too so they can be Plastidipped as they're looking a little scratched.
I've been playing around with my rear brakes this morning trying to free off a binding handbrake.
The cable operates a lever on the calliper applying the handbrake, but some time ago this had seized solid in the off position. A mate had a play around with it a few weeks back but it then seized in the on position so I've been driving around with the brake locked on one side for a few days! They got pretty toasty
So plenty of penetrating fluid and working it back and forward lots seems to have sorted it. It's gone from needing a pry bar to shift it to moving back and forth easily by hand.
The plan is to change the callipers soon anyway. My 1999 S4 comes with small solid rear discs but I'm uprating them to the larger vented ones found on later cars. I've bought the conversion kit for it, with extended braided hoses, custom made calliper carriers, bolts etc, I'm just waiting for the right kind of calliper to come up in decent used condition.
The cable operates a lever on the calliper applying the handbrake, but some time ago this had seized solid in the off position. A mate had a play around with it a few weeks back but it then seized in the on position so I've been driving around with the brake locked on one side for a few days! They got pretty toasty
So plenty of penetrating fluid and working it back and forward lots seems to have sorted it. It's gone from needing a pry bar to shift it to moving back and forth easily by hand.
The plan is to change the callipers soon anyway. My 1999 S4 comes with small solid rear discs but I'm uprating them to the larger vented ones found on later cars. I've bought the conversion kit for it, with extended braided hoses, custom made calliper carriers, bolts etc, I'm just waiting for the right kind of calliper to come up in decent used condition.
Soldato
Oh fun and games. Taking advantage of ECP's massive sales I bought wiper blades as per the other thread for £12 for the pair and they were also listed as compatible via ECP's car registration checker so I thought awesome...
I wanted to go back to normal non flat blades as they fit so nicely on the E46 arm it just looks proper as if it is one single piece of wiper arm and since the OEM blade for the E46 is Bosch anyway I thought nothing more of it.
Arrives today:
1: The spoiler is too small, doesn't span the entire arm like the OEM E46 one does.
2: The spoiler clips touch the arm when installed and put in normal position so it doesn't sit flush.
3: In a frustrated effort to remove the spoiler I broke it... both of them.
4: Threw my toys out of the pram and went to Halfords and bought these on sale for the pair at £22:
1: These fit as expected but the buckle is just too big as with all these retrofit blades leaving a gap between the arm itself and the blade top. This makes it look crap but hey what can you do.
I think I will just go to the dealer and buy an OEM set because it's impossible to find them anywhere else. I just home there's a dealer out there that still sells them because last time I checked they replaced them with flat retrofit ones
I am not surprised, EuroCarParts are a joke, bought several car model specific items from them, used the reg checker, and surprise surprise they are always wrong parts, whats worse is there atrocious customer service, I felt like smacking the idiot at the counter with his attitude, made me wait an hour to get my refund! Never again, considering main dealer parts can be had for the same price.
Anyway will be doing the fuel filter on my car today to finish off the service.
Man of Honour
Yup, parts wise I'm going to stick with gsf/bypartsby or C3. Oil and filter though or other liquids and maintenance bits ECP seem perfectly fine and do send the right bits.