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Derv

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Everything posted by Derv

  1. I got my VCDS lead from ross-tech. I have tried a few cheap leads over the years, but I use VCDS a lot, and I can't afford to muck about with unreliable leads. The support from ross-tech has always been excellent. I made the mistake of using a very unhelpful middleman when I bought my first Vag-Com lead about 10 years ago, yet Uwe and Bruce at Ross-tech were still a great help. So the next time I went direct, and got a lead delivered from them in about 2 days. The basic settings procedure is here.
  2. I think the last time I bought a car without air-con was in 1998. I even have a car with no roof that has AC, and one that has AC, electric pop-outs and a sunroof. I recently had to drive the Lupo in 36°C heat, and I was very glad of the AC. It is very useful in the winter too.
  3. I have changed both front wheel bearings on my Lupo, and both times it was the opposite side to what you expect from the noise. When turning left, so loading the right, the wheel bearing would get louder, making you think it was the right bearing, but it was the left. The same with the other side, louder when turning right, and it was the right bearing. The wheel alignment can change the load on bearing, so the noise can change.
  4. An alternative is to learn the track, and brake less.
  5. At least that proves the cooling fan works. Otherwise the AC air will get warm when the car is stationary. The problem is most probably on the radiator switch side, either a bad connection somewhere, or the temperature sensor. Removing the thermostat will only buy you a little extra time. Once the system warms up, there is still nothing to cool it if the car is not moving at speed. Unless you use the heater blower. Removing the thermostat will worsen fuel economy, and could cause additional engine wear in the long term.
  6. Don't forget that even if your insurance company finds out that you have had a accident that is not your fault. Your future premiums could still be loaded. Plus if you get any repairs done through an insurance company, it is more likely to be cheap and substandard work. If the other driver is willing to pay for any damage and not use insurance, then this could be the best solution for the both of you
  7. The bumper definitely needs to come off to check for panel damage behind it. Also check the floor inside the boot, as if there is damage in there, then it's pretty likely to be game over for the car. Unless you're handy with cutting panels and welding.
  8. I agree with above, get a quote from a bodyshop and hopefully the other driver will meet the costs. You have to consider the consequences and penalties from even contacting your insurer about the incident.
  9. It's been in a VW garage for 4 months? That's probably your biggest issue. To be honest I think you need to get the car to someone who knows what they are doing, and some logical testing needs to be done, rather than just changing parts at random. In my case it looked like it was just fatigue on a bad weld from the factory, where the selector fingers join the rod. I still have it somewhere
  10. If you put the AC on, does the radiator fan come on? I suspect not. VAG fan controllers seem to have a habit of corroding and failing. I have one to fix sometime.
  11. It sounds like an actuator alignment problem to me. I have had to realign at least a couple of times before getting it right before. Can you select all the gears manually on the selector rod? Are the ball joints on the actuator in good condition? It's interesting, as I also had a selector finger break at 200k, meaning the selector would shift into 4th, but not the othe way into 3rd. So I had to drive without 3rd gear for a while, until I had time to fix it. I thought it was an odd fault for a car that always gets near perfect robot shifts.
  12. It's usually better practice to try a suspected faulty ECU in a car that is known to run ok, rather than risk a good ECU in a car that could be bad. You can get a warning sound, and lack of drive simply from running low on hydraulic fluid. What was broken on the gearbox actuator? What fault codes do you get? When the gearbox basic setting is done, which error do you get?
  13. What is the issue? If you suspect the ECU, then ideally you need another 3L to try it on.
  14. Have you slackened off the handbrake cable adjusters for a little extra clearance? If the drum lip is snagging on the shoes, then it shoudn't feel like it is stuck solid. There should be a certainy amount of springy movement. If the drum feels like it is stuck solid, then it is likely to be stuck to the hub. In which case it may need a certain amount of persuading, and/or levering to free it.
  15. I replaced my 'dog-bone' gearbox mount last year. I just fitted an original one. The original mount works pretty well compared to a worn out old mount. I was also concerned with the amount of vibration created by the 3 cylinder diesel engine. I also didn't want to risk any long term damaging effects on the aluminium subframe. I have a Powerflex dog bone mount on another car, and a Superflex on another, and they both transmit quite a bit more vibration through the chassis than a stock mount. But neither car is spec'd for comfort.
  16. I always make sure the roof is clean where the roof bar bases sit before I fit them. It only takes a quick wipe, as I make sure the area is well waxed. You could use an allen key instead of the OEM tool. But it depends how good the torque setting is in your hand.
  17. My OEM roofbars like Silver!'s were made by Votex. On my roof bars the stickers that show which corner each mount sits are mixed up. The fronts go on the rear, and vice versa. I almost sent them back, as it didn't seem very German to me.
  18. I have an Excel spreadsheet I wrote a long time ago. The maths are pretty simple. If you know the bore, stroke and compression ratio, you can find the chamber volume. from that you can work out what increase you need to give a certain CR, either by increasing the cylinder head chamber, piston dish, or gasket thickness. Or you could use shorter pistons. I don't know how much abuse the stock pistons will take. I guess you may find out.
  19. Just to make sure you understand, I worked out you needed 1.2mm on top of the stock gasket. So 1.8mm in total, if the original gasket is 0.60mm.
  20. Is it an MLS gasket? It may be that you need to separate the layers and still use a thin spacer.
  21. Obviously custom pistons would be a better solution. Otherwise you would need to increase the gasket thickness by ~1.2mm to get from 10.5:1 to 9:1, by my reckoning. How thick is a torqued down stock gasket?
  22. I think the offical figure is a 5.5% reduction in economy with ar-con. But you don't have use it all the time. I think it is more efficient than having the window down on a hot day, or the heater blower and demister on a damp day. I think my figures of 94mpg average, 118mpg best show that carrying around air-con is not really an issue regarding economy. The extra servicing costs are not big deal overall either.
  23. Exactly. For example, I would turn up to a show in the 3L, and people would say, "Where's your S8?" Because that was on Bilsteins and LMs, I suppose it was of more interest to show attendees, and probably rare enough, but not so rare to the point that it is completely unknown.
  24. Silver is a popular colour, and air-con is a nice rare option, and one that I cannot live without. The fact that it is UK registered and ready to go is worth a few pounds, in less alterations and paperwork. It's a shame silver isn't my thing.
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