Car D.I.Y.

[tyred]

Modern cars should not burn oil. The manufacturers use thinner piston rings to reduce drag improve efficiency. That's great, it passes the legislative requirements to sell said engine in new cars

But it passes the massive headache onto the customer with oil burning issues several years down the line, emissions problems with ever tightening MOT requirements.

Customers spend hundreds if not thousands trying to pass MOTs because manufacturers are building engines with chocolate parts

That's what did in my Fabia. I had hoped to coax it through another test and get shot of the thing with a year's test on it but it proved to be impossible to pass the emissions test and the tester said he hated to see 1.2 or 1.4 petrol VW engines coming in for test as they always fail emissions unless the mileage is extremely low. It only had around 100,000.

My Yaris uses more oil than I would like too but not as bad as the Skoda and has sailed through test twice iny ownership.

My 1124 cc Peugeot 205 with the TU3 engine still wasn't burning oil at 250,000 miles. It's progress apparently.

 

[Gunk]

None of our Minis with the PSA engines burnt any oil

 

[Drago]

None of our Minis with the PSA engines burnt any oil

The Prince engines date back to the early 00's and in engineering terms are pretty conventional. They aren't really afflicted with any of the tech wheezes that contribute towards high oil consumption of the sort we see how in small bore high output engines.

 

[mikeIow]

Funnily enough, 1980s, a colleague had one. It was indeed very unreliable and the highlight was Eddie, the owner, driving it to Glasgow from Peterborough.
If I remember the story correctly, it broke down and or a warning light came on as he got very close to his family home in Glasgow. He opened the bonnet to find the crankshaft pulley had dropped off. Incredibly luckily, the pulley AND its retaining bolt were sat on a crossmember and it turned out to be an easy fix.

Eddie was one of those guys who only ever brought virtually scrap cars...and invariably paid the price. He was constantly running out of fuel in a VW Beetle he had, it was so old it was a 6volt version. We never knew if it was because the tank leaked...or he just hated putting petrol in them

Never a dull moment with Ed. 😀

Heh heh!
When mine got stuck in 3rd, I slipped the clutch to get to the Alfa garage. He warned me it could be very expensive. I pleaded my student status, so he popped it on the ramp, unscrewed something to reveal the innards, got a screwdriver out, popped a cog & put it back: 10 minutes and sorted 💪

On the fire: I was driving into the college car park when my pal started pointing. I thought she had seen a parking space, but she was pointing at the smoke coming from the edge of the bonnet 😱
I popped the bonnet (well, strictly speaking I got her to, ‘cos my vehicle was weird and had the catch on the passenger side….). As I lifted it, a brown stain appeared in the middle (my white car 🫣), & flames were licking up from the distributor. I seriously considered wafting it round to write the thing off, but instead blew it out.
The garage again sorted it fairly cheaply 👍

Saddest, by a huge margin, was that the owner of the garage shot himself a few weeks after sorting my car. Big debts, it appeared 😔

 

[tyred]

Y

Heh heh!
When mine got stuck in 3rd, I slipped the clutch to get to the Alfa garage. He warned me it could be very expensive. I pleaded my student status, so he popped it on the ramp, unscrewed something to reveal the innards, got a screwdriver out, popped a cog & put it back: 10 minutes and sorted 💪

On the fire: I was driving into the college car park when my pal started pointing. I thought she had seen a parking space, but she was pointing at the smoke coming from the edge of the bonnet 😱
I popped the bonnet (well, strictly speaking I got her to, ‘cos my vehicle was weird and had the catch on the passenger side….). As I lifted it, a brown stain appeared in the middle (my white car 🫣), & flames were licking up from the distributor. I seriously considered wafting it round to write the thing off, but instead blew it out.
The garage again sorted it fairly cheaply 👍

Saddest, by a huge margin, was that the owner of the garage shot himself a few weeks after sorting my car. Big debts, it appeared 😔

You didn't get that much excitement from a Datsun Sunny!

 

[mikeIow]

You didn't get that much excitement from a Datsun Sunny!

Well….my sister had a lovely little 3-door blue one of those, & I managed to provide a little excitement 👀

Picked up a pal for a night out - 4 in the car, him behind me in the car.
Imagine how funny it was when we were tootling along on the IOW, when I discovered he had loaded up on tequila & was feeling a bit ill 🤢
Told me too late for me to stop & get him out, so he opened the rear window to be sick out 🤮
Of course, being ye olde 3-door, it was a quarter light that opened 3”…..so I could see it all dribbling down the car 😱

Next day found me removing her rear seat so I could properly clean it. What a mess 🫣

The car, of course, was ludicrously reliable with a buttery smooth gearbox 💪

 

[Bristolian]

I went out to top up the coolant (had a message on the dash), screen washer and check the oil today. Coolant level was a little bit low but I clearly hadn't screwed the top on the expansion bottle properly when I did my monthly checks at the beginning of December - memo to self! Screen wash bottle was still full.

Pulled the dipstick from the sump, cleaned it off and re-inserted ready to check the oil. Pulled it out again only to be confused by the fact all I had was the yellow plastic bit from the top of the dipstick Um, that's not right. Retrieved the rest with a pair of pliers and the oil level looks good BUT how do I stop the dipstick from dropping further down the tube until I can get a new one? 💡 drill a hole in the top of the dipstick and fit a keyring ... brilliant New dipstick on order

 

[Fastpedaller]

I went out to top up the coolant (had a message on the dash), screen washer and check the oil today. Coolant level was a little bit low but I clearly hadn't screwed the top on the expansion bottle properly when I did my monthly checks at the beginning of December - memo to self! Screen wash bottle was still full.

Pulled the dipstick from the sump, cleaned it off and re-inserted ready to check the oil. Pulled it out again only to be confused by the fact all I had was the yellow plastic bit from the top of the dipstick Um, that's not right. Retrieved the rest with a pair of pliers and the oil level looks good BUT how do I stop the dipstick from dropping further down the tube until I can get a new one? 💡 drill a hole in the top of the dipstick and fit a keyring ... brilliant New dipstick on order

It the dipstick just 'melted' into the plastic handle - can you heat it and re-insert it into the plastic handle? I suspect a new one is very expensive.

 

[Badger_Boom]

I spent about five minutes topping up the screenwash last weekend, followed by an hour freeing up the bonnet catches and release cable so that I could get it shut again.

 

[CXRAndy]

I went out to top up the coolant (had a message on the dash), screen washer and check the oil today. Coolant level was a little bit low but I clearly hadn't screwed the top on the expansion bottle properly when I did my monthly checks at the beginning of December - memo to self! Screen wash bottle was still full.

Pulled the dipstick from the sump, cleaned it off and re-inserted ready to check the oil. Pulled it out again only to be confused by the fact all I had was the yellow plastic bit from the top of the dipstick Um, that's not right. Retrieved the rest with a pair of pliers and the oil level looks good BUT how do I stop the dipstick from dropping further down the tube until I can get a new one? 💡 drill a hole in the top of the dipstick and fit a keyring ... brilliant New dipstick on order

But now you may make the car run rich, due to vacuum leak through oil dipstick tube. Some cars will run so poorly they stall out at idle

 

[fossyant]

20l of Mannol Synthetic 5w30 delivered. 3 of the car's run on it.

 

[Drago]

In days of old it was common for tradesmen to,service their car, keep the old oil, and then use it to service the van.

 

[fossyant]

In days of old it was common for tradesmen to, service their car, keep the old oil, and then use it to service the van.

The van I'm getting needs a bit more fancy stuff. It will be getting serviced more often than the 'every 2 years' - blimey. I expect if I get one that's just 3 or 4 years old, it might have had the oil changed once depending on miles. Yikes.

 

[Bristolian]

But now you may make the car run rich, due to vacuum leak through oil dipstick tube. Some cars will run so poorly they stall out at idle

No, the old dipstick is fully engaged in the tube so no leaks. The bit that broke off was just the bit that you hold to pull it out/insert it

 

[Bristolian]

It the dipstick just 'melted' into the plastic handle - can you heat it and re-insert it into the plastic handle? I suspect a new one is very expensive.

The part you actually take hold of to remove/insert actually broke off. I guess it had become brittle over time. I trimmed off some of the plastic from the top end of the dipstick, drilled a 2mm hole through it and fed a keyring through the hole. The dipstick still goes into the tube fully and the keyring prevents it from falling further into the tube and helps with removal. A new one was just £22.