I've just seen an old Volvo 460 (I think) parked at a service area.
Tidy enough for its age, but the nearside had sagged lower than the offside - I had a Triumph Herald which was the same.
It made me think of faults which are not common on modern cars, but were often found on older ones.
Another example is the speedo needle which constantly swings up and down giving a spread reading of 20 or 30mph above or below the true speed.
Any more?
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The entire back-end lighting up like a christmas tree when somebody indicates or brakes... because the wires got crossed somewhere or other.
In the modern-day vehicle, with plumbed-in electrics and hard-wired light panels, plus on-dash 'bulb fail' warning lights, it's harder to do.
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Rotten rear arches which seemed common on 90s Cavaliers and 80s Mk3 Granadas/Scorpios as well as the aforementioned Volvo 400 series.
I was also going to suggest tail light units full of water but I saw a two year old Volvo XC90 with about an inch of water sloshing about in one of it's rear lamps the other week.
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Rust.
Dim lights.
Backfiring.
Wartburgs.
Neighbours car churning over trying to start in winter.
Oil stains on road / drive.
JH
Last edited by: Webmaster on Wed 4 Aug 10 at 01:11
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Burnt out points & condensor.
Distributor cap worn and rotar arm.
Cortina axle void bushes.
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Non starting due to points needing adjusting every few thousand miles
Front wings missing their front 3" due to rust. Great big holes in sills
Hydrolastic systems meaing that some BL cars started the month very high on one side, gradually fell and ended the month very low that side (before a top up after payday)
neighbours working on their cars at weekends
filler, glassfibre and sandpaper being available in virtually every high street shop (or so it seemed)
stick on rear screen heaters
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Illuminated indicator stalks that were reluctant to cancel.
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>> stick on rear screen heaters
>>
Off topic, but - Those chavvish 'Peter and Sonya' windscreen sunshields ...
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'Pinking'
Running on,
Tiny amount of dirt in idle jet,
Air filter intake in winter position (in summer)
We wont mention auto chokes :(
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>> 'Pinking'
>>
>> Running on,
>>
You drove a Ford Sierra 1.6 too then. What an utterly dreadful car. Truly the worst.
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...You drove a Ford Sierra 1.6 too then. What an utterly dreadful car. Truly the worst...
'Ere, do you mind?
I had two of those, both utterly reliable workhorses in the finest Ford tradition.
OK, one used to smoke a bit, but as someone else has commented, a lot of cars did in those days.
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>> ...You drove a Ford Sierra 1.6 too then. What an utterly dreadful car. Truly the
>> worst...
>>
>> 'Ere, do you mind?
>>
>> I had two of those, both utterly reliable workhorses in the finest Ford tradition.
>>
No argument there. It was very reliable. Just dog slow and thirsty. And the pinking and running on drove me nuts. And it wallowed too much.
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.... It was very reliable. Just dog slow and thirsty. And the pinking and running on drove me nuts...
Odd, don't remember either of my Sierras pinking, but a couple of people on here have mentioned it.
The valve stem oil seals failed, leading to a bit of smoke.
An indy I used replaced them without removing the head - I think they made up a small pry bar which would go in through the spark plug hole and wedge the valve shut.
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>>You drove a Ford Sierra 1.6 too then. What an utterly dreadful car. Truly the worst.<<
I used to have to tune the critters Chicago :(
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I had a 1.6 Sierra. 83 on a Y. A bit slow but otherwise brilliant. Reliable, cheap to run, very good fun in the wet on its skinny 165 section tyres. Did 100,000 largely troublefree miles in it and it had 100k on it when I bought it.
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they did pink terribly badly tho, I could almost play zylaphone tunes on mine with a bit of practise.
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>>they did pink terribly badly tho<<
2 ltr woz worse, especially when they started fiddling about with the octane rating of 4*
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>> >>You drove a Ford Sierra 1.6 too then. What an utterly dreadful car. Truly the
>> worst.<<
>>
>> I used to have to tune the critters Chicago :(
>>
That's a great job to have, because they only stay in tune a couple of days - you must have been rolling in it.
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>>That's a great job to have, because they only stay in tune a couple of days - you must have been rolling in it.<<
Yes! I did enjoy my hobby/work, I didn't do it for the mone£ believe it or not,
The thing with being a mobile car tuner is that the customer will soon be on the phone to you if the car starts playing up again, so its in your (my) interest to make sure it doesn't.
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>> You drove a Ford Sierra 1.6 too then. What an utterly dreadful car. Truly the
>> worst.
>>
Strange, I had a 1.6 Sierra, and it was a great car, slightly underpowered, but didn't drink to much petrol, never drank oil, and never pinked or ran on.
Then I had a 1.8 CVH Sierra..... seemed to have less power than the 1.6, loved petrol stations, I had to carry a 5ltr oil can with me (replaced the stem seals to try and reduce it - failed), and had to stall it to stop the engine...
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I never really understood why Ford switched the 1.8 Sierra from the Pinto to the Constant Vibration & Harshness engine. The Pinto was no peach, but no engine ever built by the hand of man was worse to use than the CVH. Not as robust as the Pinto either.
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>> Off topic, but - Those chavvish 'Peter and Sonya' windscreen sunshields ...
>>
the best one I saw was Ian & Myra
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>>the best one I saw was Ian & Myra<<
I cee'd one in the westcountry a few years back ~ Fred & Rose.
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Private Eye joke: car swerving about with windscreen stickers: Brahms and Liszt.
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Sticking auto chokes
Porous ignition leads
Early digital displays going wrong
Fibre teethed timing gear stripping off
Noisy tappets (Now what was that car renowned for tappet noise, Talbot or something?)
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Rust.
Think back to about 1980. How many [ordinary] cars in good nick were still on the road aged over 10 years? G, H, and J reg cars then were serious bangers, whereas today a typical X reg car will still probably be structurally OK. Welding cars up was bread and butter work - and I hated it with a passion.
Welding nice clean metal on the bench is a doddle; nearly pleasurable. Stitching together manky metal at some awkward angle with boiling underseal dropping onto you, and lumps of motlen metal finding their way under your overalls is no fun. Molten metal landing in your ear is about the worst!
Mechanical engine control.
Contact breaker ignition systems, mechanical petrol pumps and carburettors were all responsible for lots of breakdowns, and lots of failures to start in a morning. Now, if you've got some petrol in and your battery is OK, you are very unlucky if your car doesn't start. It didn't used to be like this.
If the luddites of this parish really want to turn the clock back, then they must accept the naff engine peripherals and the manky bodywork too!
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A lot of these are still common. My dads Fiesta has just failed the MOT on excessive rust one of the sills meaing the brake pipes are loose.
Noisy tappets will be common until the last of the Endura engines are scrapped. My old Corsa used to pink badly all the time.
These days though cars go on for ever and ever but when they die they can't be fixed.
In five years time I don't think any of these faults will really exist any more.
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Improperly hardened camshafts.
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>> Improperly hardened camshafts.
>>
...or poor lubrication arrangements - Pinto engines with blocked spray bars?
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I've just had a big hole welded in the sill of our 7 year old Xsara Picasso. And I spent most evengins last week under my car fixing the exhaust (more welding!). My neighbours think I'm barking anyway, so just a bit more ammo!
We'll have invented a whole new list of common faults in a few years (DMFs, wonky ECUs etc etc).
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Wow surely the car is too young to need welding?
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>> Wow surely the car is too young to need welding?
If it's got a 6-year rust warranty, that implies the manufacturer isn't confident enough to guarantee that it won't be rusty at 7 years old.
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>> Wow surely the car is too young to need welding?
Maybe, but that didn't stop there being a big hole in the sill when I poked the soft spot!
>>If it's got a 6-year rust warranty,
Actually it's got a 12 year rust warranty, and this should have been covered - the paint was intact, and the metal was thinned from inside out - however, the terms of the warraty require inspections at 4 and 6 years (and later, but we haven't got there yet!) - no service history, so no idea if it had been for the 4 year, and I know for sure it didn't go for the 6 year, so I have a pretty good idea what Citroen would have said - and I doubt it would have involved the phrase "Yes, we'll pay"!
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Gear levers that came off in your hand. Never happened to me but more than one person of my accquaintance had such a tale.
And didn't the steering wheel centre nut on M2 Viva's have a tendancy to unscrew themselves with interesting results? An old ADI who'd been round for years reckoned a driving school he worked for had a few such instances with the Vivas on their fleet.
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Perforated carburettor floats that when you shook em you could hear the petrol inside :)
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The smell of petrol on a cold morning as cars start on full manual choke: neat petrol in the inlet manifold..
Rust : except on Mercedes and Kas..
Bald tyres.
Shell stickers.
"I've a Tiger in my tank "stickers... both in the back window blocking the rear view.
Side mirrors pointing skywards..
Rust on chrome.
Hubcaps rotating squint..
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>>I've just had a big hole welded in the sill of our 7 year old Xsara Picasso.
That raises an eyebrow. Had you said it was an E class Merc, then, yes, that's to be expected.
My 1991 Audi 80 sailed through its MOT last week. It hasn't been doted on - there has been no extra waxoyling or other fussing, and the body is absolutely sound. It's a lot better than my W124, which is annoying, as I like the W124, and merely tolerate the Audi.
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>> I've just had a big hole welded in the sill of our 7 year old
>> Xsara Picasso.
That's very unusual for a French car (these days). Maybe it had poorly repaired accident damage in the past?
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>> metal at some awkward angle with boiling underseal dropping onto you,
>>
Likewise, Water !...often found a pool of old water in a chassis member which the torch boiled up nicely before dripping out down your neck
I once set fire to the plastic fuel pipe under a Hillman Hunter. I didn't notice straight away until I took my goggles off and saw a stream of burning liquid landing on the floor behind me.
I didn't panic, turned the torch off and went and got a mole wrench, crimping the pipe off....phew !
Something i've never seen in all the welding tips and hints is to get yourself comfortable.
Nothing worse than wiping the flame across the back of your other hand trying to balance.
So glad I don't have to do it any more although I keep the kit as it can be useful for other things.
Ted
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I can't remember the last time I saw visible exhaust smoke from a petrol engined car.
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HaHa....have a trip down our road, Buddy !
Ted
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>> Likewise, Water
Ah yes, the worrying sound of water actually sloshing round in the bottom of a door when leaves and algae have blocked the drain holes...
I've never set fire to a live stream of petrol leaking out of a car. But a few years ago, hammering an elderly 2 litre Scorpio along the Spanish motorwy system in high ambient temperatures, checked the oil at a fuel stop and found to my horror that it was below the bottom of the dipstick. When pouring in the necessary several litres of oil got a bit hurried - the underbonnet temperature was scorching - and overflowed a pint or so of oil onto the exhaust manifold, where it immediately burst into flames.
Looked at it in horror for a few seconds, then blew it out. Phew (so to speak).
That car still went all right but drank oil and liked a drop of petrol. And the ABS was dodgy. I graunched it embarrassingly against a concrete bollard in Seville or somewhere too.
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The spin of inertia starters failing to reach the worn teeth of a flywheel ring gear.
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Yes!, fitting new starter ring gears used to be an interesting job - quite a performance racing against time to get the new ring gear fully home before it cooled down.
Warming to the theme - propshaft universal joints, king pins, trunnions, leak springs breaking or sagging, diesel injectors with blued needles, DPA injector pumps snapping their driveshafts, decokes, cars failing the MOT for an illegal mix of radial and cross ply tyres.
Lurching off into HGVs for a moment, I well remember us all looking with dismay at the front springs of our new Scammell Constructor in 1982. Instead of a multi-leaf spring with about a dozen flat leaves held with shackle pins running in bronze bushes, we saw springs with two tapered leaves running in shackle pins with plastic! liners - the springs were only about half as thick at mid point as the multi leaf springs on the Leyland Octopus the Scammell was replacing. We all thought that this mickey mouse design wouldn't last 2 minutes, and that we had better order in some spare springs now, before the vehicle even went into service. We were badly wrong!, and apart from replacing the plastic liners in the eyes at reasonable intervals, the springs were much better than the heavy old ones. Removing the old multi leaf springs, taking them apart, and fitting a new leaf because of breakage was routine and tedious work on the old springs which the new design avoided completely.
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I was going to put the flywheel in the fridge as well as the ring in the oven to help with that one, but found a second hand flywheel with a decent starter ring so was able to chicken out...
Great relief.
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Ah, the old Frigidaire, Armel.
My own foray into the world of white goods/motoring abuse was when I put a load of small engine castings, from a Jowett engine I was cleaning up, into the dishwasher.
SWMBO was at work, of course, and not expected home for some hours.
Needless to say, I ended up dismantling and cleaning the dishwasher whilst the parts, now relieved of all the loose muck , were still looking filthy!
We live and learn.
Ted
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I remember my mum tearing her hair out when she found the austin 7 ring gear simmering gently in the oven...
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>>I put a load of small engine castings,.......... into the dishwasher.
It's worked well for me before. Wheel trims come up particularly well, but too often and they go dull.
Don't tell SWMBO.
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>> Lurching off into HGVs for a moment, I well remember us all looking with dismay
>> at the front springs of our new Scammell Constructor in 1982.
Ah the Constructor, yes it lasted well and would go almost anywhere a track layer could, however the dampers were next to useless and along the roof line just infront of and above the drivers head there would be a series of dents...caused by the driver/victim involuntariyl ramming the thing daily with his bonce.
On some bumpy roads i spent much of my driving time airborn not really steering more like hanging on for dear life.
Seddon Atkinson 401 artic circa 84 had parabolic? front springs, one single tapered leaf spring, i had the truck for roughly 3 years and used it on farm and quarry work so lots of rough ground, i well remember slowing gently for a set of lights in Runcorn (empty) when 1 spring decided to give up, frightening sound and sudden drop to the bump stop.
HGV wise, not so long ago that rear dampers especially were not fitted at all with leaf sprung vehicles.
Car wise, i wonder if we the DIY mechanics are not seeing these faults as so many cars are now almost impossible to work on constructively except for routine servicing/replacements.
I wonder too, as cars have got more complicated does the average car get at least levels checked and vital fluids renewed, seeing as there is little else to do maybe at least servicing has improved.
Going by some threads many now use oil extractors to make their oil changing easier, i wonder just how many cars ever get a full underside inspection except for MOT's.
The rust comments i could disagree with up to a point, when you collect truckloads of used cars, age range 3 to 8 years you see some rust forming and some suspects newer than that.
However as said the inbuilt untreatable rust worm is thank goodness with rare exceptions a thing of the past.
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>> Warming to the theme - propshaft universal joints, king pins, trunnions, leak springs breaking or
>> sagging, diesel injectors with blued needles, DPA injector pumps snapping their driveshafts, decokes,
Now replaced by; CV's knocking in corners, wishbones (bushes knackered - not serviced as a part), ball joints, injectors going down (new MB diesels anyone?), high pressure injection pumps (often caused by missfueling) head gaskets (some cars are renowned for weak head gaskets)
add to that ECU's and sensors @ the thick end of a grand each, and I still would rather replace £5.00 worth of points, and tune the carb at each service!
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>>The spin of inertia starters failing to reach the worn teeth of a flywheel ring gear<<
Hahaha! Nice one :-D
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Now, if you've got some
>> petrol in and your battery is OK, you are very unlucky if your car doesn't
>> start. It didn't used to be like this.
>>
>> If the luddites of this parish really want to turn the clock back, then they
>> must accept the naff engine peripherals and the manky bodywork too!
>>
>>
>>
To an extent NC I agree with you; however for all their faults older vehicles were "bodge-able" inasmuch as a scrape round the points with a nail file or a quick strip and clean of a carburettor would get you home. Nowadays it's a culture of replacing the unit rather than repairing it, and for many motorists the only tool available to them in the event of a breakdown is an AA card.
I fully accept that the down-side to this was a lot of rough-running (and sometimes downright dangerous) vehicles on the road, but I can't be alone in being frustrated that nowadays I have to take my car or bike to a dealership to sort out what to me is a very simple fault.
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>> Front wings missing their front 3" due to rust
An 02 MINI near me has several quite large patches of rust on the leading edge of its bonnet, where it meets the front bumper. Carrying on the tradition of the old Mini then. ;-)
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I wouldn't mind seeing a Wartburg again. I'd be tempted to buy it, too.
Sure, mine had most of the faults listed in this thread but it could never have suffered from the stupid electronics issues that bedevil many modern cars.
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>> I wouldn't mind seeing a Wartburg again. I'd be tempted to buy it, too.
Stay away from me then if you do. I don't fancy being gassed to within an inch of my life again.
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>>I wouldn't mind seeing a Wartburg again. I'd be tempted to buy it, too.<<
You're not the only one, it seems ~
www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C155353/
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Rubber bands snapping and writing off the engine. Whoops - that still happens all the time!
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Head gaskets - rarely see a car boiled over on the hard shoulder.
Punctures - even though I had my first one in years recently, I still reckon they are not as common as they used to be.
Broken windscreens - laminated glass has seen to that. Anyone remember 'Zebrazone' toughened screens?
Broken fanbelts - I think most belts are now the flatter, wider, profile type which seem to last a lot longer.
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Leaking windscreen seals.
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Halfrods is such a different place these days - no longer is the bulk of the store set aside for rust remedies, camshaft kits, uprated carbs, ...
What else don't we see any more:
Home made towbars
Big bull bars
Wing mirrors (though I find lots of people still say wing mirror)
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Exhaust box leaving a trail of sparks as it drags along the road.
( never used to stop one driving home :-)
Noisy exhausts except on chavmobiles or 50cc scooters.
Propshafts dangling down.
Front wheels at different angles ( or one missing)
Bonnets popping up.
Bad eggs smells.
Flapping spot lights.
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>> Bad eggs smells.
>>
I've often wondered, what happened to them? They were a feature of early catalysed exhausts.
You don't see bits of rag in place of fuel filler caps anymore either.
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"Bad eggs smells."
Lower sulphur content of petrol now.
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>> "Bad eggs smells."
>>
>> Lower sulphur content of petrol now.
>>
Last week the smell was very noticeable from a passing car in my area.
SWMBO also commented on it. Using up old petrol from the garden shed ?
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>> Exhaust box leaving a trail of sparks as it drags along the road.
>> ( never used to stop one driving home :-)
>> Noisy exhausts except on chavmobiles or 50cc scooters
Yes, exhausts on cars are much better quality now, you rarely hear one that is holed. Used to hear that terrific noise of a holed manifold in the 70's/80's quite a lot. Quite often a lone exhaust box in the gutter would raise a smile.
My Rover SD1 had a holed manifold. I started it up about 4am after leaving a girlfriends house and roared my way home. It didn't go too well, but being a V8 it sounded great!
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>>Used to hear that terrific noise of a holed manifold in the 70's/80's quite a lot.
>>
The flange at the bottom end of the four branch exhaust on my 1600E was always a problem.
So much so I collected flanges from the breakers yard and I made up a jig to hold the whole lot for rewelding.
Oh yes I remember the sound of it so well.
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>> Head gaskets - rarely see a car boiled over on the hard shoulder.
I bet every car you see on the hard shoulder (and there are still a few) is there due to HG failure, or Cambelt breakage.
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>> I bet every car you see on the hard shoulder (and there are still a
>> few) is there due to .....
>>
I thought a lot were stopped for potty training and that is not just little kids.
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>>You don't see bits of rag in place of fuel filler caps anymore either.
Actually, you don't see that many filler caps.
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Heating up the spark plugs in the oven on a cold damp morning in order to get the heap of junk BL car to start.
Spraying engine starter fluid into the inlet manifold of a Mk2 Escort on the same cold damp morning.
Having to stop the car for half an hour to prevent the engine overheating.
Spending weekends adjusting points, replacing condensors, adjusting tappets.
Ah yes, the good old days.
Oh and of course, wing mirrors on the front wings, though they still have these in Japan.
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>> Having to stop the car for half an hour to prevent the engine overheating
Having to stop the car for 10 minutes to allow the ice in the carburettor to melt!!!!
Clothes peg on the choke to keep it out.
Ice on the inside of the windscreen in the mornings.
The thin lead on Vauxhall distributors moving slightly and bringing about instant, complete ignition failure.
I really felt my age when someone above mentioned how catalysts used to smell of sulphur - in my world of bangernomics catalysts are still a recent innovation (having run new/nearly-new diesels from the mid-90s to mid-00s)!
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>> Having to stop the car for 10 minutes to allow the ice in the carburettor to melt!!!!
Golf Mk2's suffered from a bizarre problem. We had a 1600 CL that lost power on the dual carriageway in winter, it felt like it was running out of fuel. You would pull over, wonder what the hell was wrong, then after a few minutes the car was fine again. Turns out that there was a waxstat in the air cleaner assembly that controlled a flap directing hot exhaust gases to the carburettor. This had failed allowing only freezing cold air to it, causing it to freeze up. So sitting stationary for a few minutes allowed the ice to melt and normal progress resumed. It was worse if you drove into a dip in the road, where the cold air accumulated.
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...Having to stop the car for 10 minutes to allow the ice in the carburettor to melt!!...
My old Triumph Herald suffered from the reverse problem - percolation.
The carb was dead atop the engine, and on a warm day the fuel in the line/float chamber would vaporise, causing the car to conk out, or more often, refuse to restart after being switched off when warm.
Simple cure - open the bonnet and wait....
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>> My old Triumph Herald suffered from the reverse problem - percolation.
Renault 5 GT turbos actually had a perc fan within the air trunking leading to the carburettor to keep the thing cool, the engines ran so hot on them.
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>> Renault 5 GT turbos actually had a perc fan within the air trunking leading to the carburettor to keep the thing cool,
>> the engines ran so hot on them.
ISTR reading that problem was peculiar to the UK market because of the petrol volatility here.
Might just have been "nothing wrong with the car, it's your english petrol" propaganda though..
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>>It was worse if you drove into a dip in the road, where the cold air accumulated.
Not cold air, but moisture. I understand it wasn't the temperature that caused carburettor icing, but the humidity.
One of my daughters 'phoned me at an ungodly hour and her description of the problem fitted carburettor icing perfectly. I told her to switch it off and have a fag then try it. She replied 'how did I know she smoked'.
I found the hot air pipe from the exhaust manifold had fallen off.
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ice on the front carpets in winter
headlights swinging by their wires
different coloured doors fitted to vehicles
badly filled holes painted with house paint
chicken wire in sills
struts coming through inner wings
back axles tied in with wire
rear subframes held in place with 3x2
keys made of chocolate
2 speed wipers that were hopeless
5 inches of oily crud on all engine ancillaries
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>> I bet every car you see on the hard shoulder (and there are still a few) is there due to HG failure, or Cambelt breakage.
Not quite every car - some run out of petrol.
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...some run out of petrol...
When I worked as a breakdown mechanic in the late 1970s, 'run out of fuel' was quite common.
We also got a lot of electrical faults - I think the AA will tell you the same is still true today.
Overheating was another regular cause of breakdowns, often caused by something as simple as a broken fanbelt.
Motorists in those days saw anti-freeze as just that, something you only needed in the winter, so you would see a lot of cars in which the coolant was brown sludge.
Last edited by: ifithelps on Sat 31 Jul 10 at 19:05
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Poorly designed windscreens and door posts obscuring view of 4 corners of car.
Tiny boot with no room to put a proper spare wheel.
Lack of roof gutters so water runs down neck when opening door in the rain.
Ground clearance inadequate for everyday bumps and potholes.
(tongue in cheek)
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>> Lack of roof gutters ..........
If you had roof gutters you'd only be complaining about their effect on the aerodynamic coefficients of the car. Every car is a compromise.
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>> Motorists in those days saw anti-freeze as just that, something you only needed in the
>> winter, so you would see a lot of cars in which the coolant was brown
>> sludge.
They still do, only long life coolants these days save their bacon...
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...only long life coolants these days save their bacon...
Good point - I think Ford quote 10 years.
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>> I think Ford quote 10 years
6 years for blue coolant, 10 years for orange, according to the handbook on my 13 year old Escort.
I shall replace the (still) blue 50% ethylene glycol mix this September, because I last did so in September 2008.
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you cant beat having your oats
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Universal joints both metal and those rubbery type as fitted to minis etc.
Fitted quite a few of those in the past along with the rubber "donuts" that you got on Hillman Imps.
Which in turn reminds me of the delights of seized up kingpins and seized up trunnions on Morris Marinas and cars with that design of suspension.
I suppose that we have traded relatively cheap problems for more rare but vastly more expensive ones, the story of the Nissan CVT comes to mind.
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>> I suppose that we have traded relatively cheap problems for more rare but vastly more
>> expensive ones
In a nutshell, MrTee.
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>>>I suppose that we have traded relatively cheap problems for more rare but vastly more expensive ones.
Indeed and a situation I'm more than happy with. Happen to be looking through an old 1960s Which magazine with the car supplement.
By 8000 miles from new their Triumph 2000 had suffered...
Water leak in boot. Thermostat failure. Fan blade fractured and pierced bonnet (!). Petrol tank leaking twice. Silencer heatshield fractured. Exhaust mainfold gasket blowing. Throttle linkage failure. Diff oild seal leaking. Steering column bush fault. Water leak to drivers feet. Wiper switch failed. Headlamp blown. Panel light switch failed.
This level of faults was quite common in these tests going back to the 60/70s.
By way of comparison My new C5 at 8000 miles has not had one single issue.
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>>
>> This level of faults was quite common in these tests going back to the 60/70s.
>>
>> By way of comparison My new C5 at 8000 miles has not had one single
>> issue.
>>
Weren't manufacturer warrantees limited to 3 months back in the 1960s ?
I recall my Dad's (bought new) Ford Escorts suffering from failing alternators, broken seat frames, broken steering racks and failed clutches in their early life and him accepting this as normal. By 6 years old these cars were rust-buckets (despite him paying for Ziebart treatment). A well looked after modern Focus can look like new at this age.
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>> By 8000 miles from new their Triumph 2000 had suffered...
Of course that particular model also had an additional entertaining design flaw in the rear suspension, whereby the sliding splines used for mounting the drive shafts stick and then suddenly release. This caused the back end to lurch of its own accord resulting in heart in mouth moments for the driver (and probably the passengers).
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Car splutters to a halt because the points on the SU fuel pump have eroded.
Car splutters to a halt because the driver has forgotten to reset the reserve fuel tap after filling up.
Brake failure because the master cylinder and fluid reservoir live under the driver's floor carpet and collect all manner of grit and rubbish.
Partial brake failure and an exciting manoeuvre on the M62 because the brake pad backing plate and the friction material have come unglued.
Car (or lorry) becomes lopsided because one or more of the leaves in the cart spring has broken.
Engine fails to start because of a broken choke cable.
Car runs rough because there is so much play on the dizzy shaft the rotor arm has eaten much of the distributor head.
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Having to take plug leads in and put them in the oven of the Rayburn to warm them up and dry them out before it will start.
Why was the feeler guage you always used, the only one that was bent?
Pat
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>> Why was the feeler guage you always used, the only one that was bent?
>>
>> Pat
>>
Because you tried to be clever and check the tappets with the engine running. :-)
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>> Because you tried to be clever and check the tappets with the engine running. :-)
>>
>>
On my GMC pick-up, this is the factory recommended method.
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>> Partial brake failure and an exciting manoeuvre on the M62 because the brake pad backing
>> plate and the friction material have come unglued.
Swap M62 for A34, and this has happened to me as well. Pant filling.
The first, and last time, I'd bought parts for the lowest possible price.
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Feeler gauges?
Luxury.
Used to use the card the new points were mounted on.
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Confession time for tappetts and clearances, i used to set them by feel only unless the vehicle was new with no wear spots, which ruled out any of my cars in those days.
Last edited by: gordonbennet on Mon 2 Aug 10 at 22:24
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Faults rarely seen these days - Ian (Cape Town)
