More frustration

Following on from the frustration of the problems with my cambelt change..........

The car was running again on the Tuesday of the week before last so I was able to do the last few bits over last weekend and took the car in for her first MOT under my ownership on Monday.

She failed

wipers (easy) and washers (opps, didn't top them up beforehand :oops: ) and emisions.

As she hadn't been used much for a while and had a new head gasket etc and old fuel I though a good old italian tune up and another exhaust test would resolve the fail so on tuesday morning I returned the car, again she failed so they had a look, T4 showed several old codes including sensor faults which they cleared. The inlet temp sensor was a bit off so they changed that, then apparently they detected that the radiator fan wasn't coming on so assumed there was an airblock somewhere and thought the cambelt mechanic should check it out.

I collected the car and brought it home, coolant and oil temp all showed up to temp when I got here so I sat outside for a few minutes and the fan came on, I assumed they hadn't got it warm enough so for the next 3 days took the car to work with the intention of getting her really warm at lunch time and getting a quick retest, however this week has been one of the most manic ever and I didn't get to eat, let alone have a break.

So this morning I went for a nice long run and popped into the garage.

She failed! Again

The readings were all high and all over the place! Garage sugested that the lanbda probe may be shot and and I may as well do the cat as it could be shot.

Popped into the unipart motorfactors just up the road, they list 2 probes, 1 with a square plug, 1 with a rectangular plug.

Not having time to sort it out I brought the car home, remembering on the way that the mobile mechanic had mentioned that the cat was rattling. Looking at the cat and the exhaust I have decided to swap both but wont be able to get it sorted and back to the MOT station before we go away on Monday, we were planning to take the F to Scotland but that won't happen now.

Just got to locate the plug for the probe now so I can order the parts.

Have some sympathy, mate. :yesnod:

Popped the engine cover off today (first time I've done that) to see which lambda probe I have, showed Mrs TC what I needed to do to change it and the down pipe and lamented how much easier it would be if I had a ramp, she said "just order the parts and get the garage to do it, your time is far to valuable to me to waste it trying to do that."
she then added "then I'll use it as my daily car!"

so I'm not sure if that is good or bad news................

Keep your eye on her, mate. :whistle:

THe replacement exhaust arrived while we were away, decided to replace the whole thing as disturbing it to replace the cat wont do it much good after 13 years.

I thought long and hard about it, no, not that, fitting the exhaust, decided undoing the manifold to down pipes bolts would be the worst part.

Several hours of cutting and it is all off, cut the cat to exhaust pipe, cut the exhaust band, sheared the 2 bolts at the end of the siliencer, tried grinding the bolts off the other end of the cat, 2 were easy, I just couldn't reach the third so as I had a new down pipe I cut the cat off.

I then dropped the manifold off the head and cut the down pipes on the bend.

All sounds easy but the car is still on all 4 wheels, just jacked up slightly on 1 corner.
Also I am using a 4.5" grinder so only have about 1.75" of useful cutting disc so had to cut out a section wide enough to get the grinder across to the other side.

I've even managed to get the nuts off the manifold, now got to find my 22" spanner for the probe, last used it when I was doing some plumbing back in March.

Forgot to say, the cat is well and truly fubared, there is only a small section of the honey comb rattaling around and lots of fairy dust coming out.

Well at least you know why the car failed its emmisions test. :yesnod:

As I'm beyond the 10 working days retest limit I hope he doesn't fail it on something else.

Having found my 22mm spanner I thought we were starting to win - however the lambda probe starting to be a problem - see http://www.mgfforum.com/en/forum/9-mgftf-pitstop/25198-please-explain-lambda-probes

Not the probe but the hole!

Got a spare manifold so we are back on track.

On Friday last week I bought a 15mm ratchet spanner from Halfords because I didn't think there was 1 in the set I have so I could do the manifold/down pipe bolts mostly from above, clearing the car for todays MOT I went in the correct gap in the set, next to the 14mm and 15 mm, or should it be the 15mm and 17mm?..........................

I bet that makes sense to you! :yesnod: