J.R.

Agreed, I am old enough and could only afford doggy cars to know first hand what piston slap, pre-ignition, detonation, big end knock, main bearing rumble, loose flywheel bolts (the worst knocking imaginable) con rod bush wear, rocker shaft wear, tappet wear etc sound like first hand, other than trackday or competition failures of classic engines usually oil starvation I have not heard any of these noises probably for 30 years. All I ever get to hear these days is diesel knock or hydraulic lifter tap. Most people who speak of them have just picked up the terms from the internet. To the OP, try running your engine with the auxiliary drive belt removed to eliminate the alternator pulley sprag clutch, the absence of noise on over-run makes me suspect it.

It does not sound like there is air in the system from the description. It sounds like there is a firm pedal, the servo initially works, the brakes retard the vehicle & then for reasons as yet unknown the vacuum fails at which point the full force of the massive servo control loading spring opposes the drivers foot on the brake pedal. Its definitely worth bleeding both the master cylinder nipples which may bring a firmer pedal once the servo issue is resolved but bleeding the ABS block risks making things even worse for no possible (in my opinion) gain.

I didn't think having upside down calipers & not being able to bleed them properly could have caused your problem but reversing them is very common so just wanted to eliminate that. It sounds like the servo is losing vacuum, check all the hose connections.

Coppertop asked the right question, what outcome are you looking for? You speak about them "fixing it", fixing what? If something was broken then they could fix it, only you will know what it will take to fix your trust in them which was broken so you need to tell them what it is you require. I do not understand what is the purpose of sending a video to their insurers unless the OP has a claim to make, and they are unlikely to pass on the details of their insurer under any other circumstances.

Is rejection even an option on a second hand vehicle?

Did you put the left and right calipers back on the correct sides?

I have 3 box trailers in a field with the corner posts resting on wooden blocks but not quite as large as those, its so wet around here that they are all gradually sinking, today I went to swop some wheels and my 60's Bradbury trolley jack that has a really large footprint submerged like it was on quicksand After extricating it i put it on a 30cm wide MDF kitchen door that was amongst the tat in the trailer & it lifted OK. I am going to buy a job lot of those for the corner posts but also to go under the wheels so thanks for the tip. For some reason I cannot save either of the listings to my Ebay watch list.

That car will have already been rejected once for sure and just punted on to the next victim. Somebody should start a register with the registration/vin numbers of rejected vehicles and the faults they had. I'm not sure if you have the same rights of rejection for a used car than a new one, however being in posession of information about it having been rejected for the self same faults would give you a really strong case.

My 2015 is EU5 and does not have the urine tank.

Thanks for the explanations. Poor light output from black headlamp reflectors, who ever would have thought that!

There must be something special about Monte Carlo headlights aside from having poor light output and no headlamp flash function for you to have wanted to fit them, are they considered cool or something? Genuine question as your posting does not say why, perhaps it was an accident repair and you are fitting the only S/H lights that were available.

Amen to that!

I would be chuffed to have that anomoly in my leather seats if ever I were lucky enough to afford a car with them, chuffed because it would show that it was real and not imitation leather. They are beauty spots!

+ 1 for an emulator assuming there is one for that engine. Plug n play and no issues to date, if ever I do have problems and suspect it then its easy to remove it from the circuit by removing and repositioning 2 connectors, albeit one in a difficult position.

I have another tip, one where I failed to observe my own advice recently If you are working on the car with the battery disconnected and are have the removed parts, tools etc in the rear luggage compartment, if you are in a secure area, your garage/drive etc and dont want to be accidentally locked out by yourself or someone else closing the rear hatch then either manually close the latch while it is open or use something plastic to stop the tailgate from latching, I have a plastic SWA cable clip which does the job perfectly and stays in place but forgot to use it when I was replacing my clutch, my friend whose garage I used had good intentions when he closed my open tailgate to stop his cat from bedding down in there but it gave me no end of grief to get it open again.

Or do as I do and find what its transient behaviour is in safe lower grip conditions, for me that means driving on our rocade (by pass) after 22.00 at night when it is deserted when the road surface is wet and greasy (but not while raining which would reduce my visibility) choosing a roundabout where I know there will be diesel spillages and where there is uninterrupted visibility to all of the roads joining it. I have a play on it with and without any 3 letter acronyms switched off in relative safety, expecting and being ready for a slide knowing that if it all goes wrong it will only be my pride and metal that gets dented. Said roundabout happens to be the one 200m from the Gendarmerie which they take to whenever they leave for or return from a patrol which makes me all the more attentive to make sure I am the only vehicle out there. It wasn't always that way, the UK roads were once my personal racetrack, thank heavens that cars had little or no grip back then and not even enough power to brake traction unless you deliberately unbalanced them. I regularly see the results of young idiots driving like I used to in todays vehicles, at least one or two a week laying in the fields after multiple roll overs on die straight roads with never any other vehicle involved.

Not so. Whilst you wont get all the "added functionality" that the you must fit a coded system afficianados value so much using a bog standard low impedance trailer wiring module (described incorrectly as "canbus compatible") will not result in any reported faults, bulb warnings etc if fitted correctly by a competant person. As we are talking about Halfords then you are probably right The OP needs nothing more than the above for a trailer board socket if a towbar is not being fitted, nor does he if one is being fitted purely for the purposes of attaching a bike rack. I will leave the arguments on that point to the others.

I thought that was a very appropriate response, it certainly changed my view. Until I read the last paragraph that is. What a shame.

Me neither, every day is a learning day, thanks to Rum40 for that, it will be very useful in the future.

Nil carbon content steel, I knew they were simply clever but that is really clever considering that higher carbon contet steels have increased corrosion. There is no question though that any aftermarket discs, even the cheapest of the cheap that I fit massively outperform the factory fitted ones in terms of corrosion resistance, it cant be because of added cheapness or all the Chinese pattern part manufacturers would be producing the same.

Start a thread on your favorite Unobtanium toolbox and I will post some pictures of mine that I have used on site and my build for close to 30 years now, it was made for carpenters and is perfect for my needs but the bottom will surely drop out of it one day. I have never ever seen another one even after Google searching, it was in B&Q alone and was not recognised by the tills, the manager said it was probably a sample left by a rep and it was mine for a fiver, little did I know how attached I would become to it. It has lasted a silly long time considering that its plastic, I have had to hand make new latches etc but it cant last forever, it will be a very sad day when I have to cram all the stuff that it contains into something else that wont have the drill bits, driver bits, router bits, jigsaw blades, sockets, punches, screwdrivers etc all presented where I can find them easily.

I indulged myself in one of these a couple of years back because I was always in another country from my proper toolkit when I needed to do repairs, it lives in the back of the car and I now turn to it first even when I am in my UK workshop, its rare that I need anything else or better. https://www.bahco.com/gb_en/1-4--3-8--and-1-2--square-drive-socket-set-with-combination-wrenches-screwdriver-bits-pb_s138_.html It was about £130 at the time and the tools are really good quality especially the case.

When I was 13, 14 maximum all I wanted as a birthday present were tools for working on cars and bikes, I was already working weekends at a garage for nothing and often cycling 10 miles each way to get there such was my passion and desire for experience. For money I had a paper round & a business restoring and selling push bikes. No t'internet then and I didn't have the money for car magazines so the advertising I saw was in the Sunday papers, what gave me wet dreams was a 42 piece 1/2" drive A/F, Whitworth and MM socket set from Sillhill Products for £13.99 which my parents eventually bought for me although I had to repay them, it was a loan and not a present, they did buy me a pair of waterpump pliers and a pop rivet gun though. I still have the socket set although the case & inlay were eventually discarded as the contents now repose in my roll cab top toolbox. The speedbrace is something that we have not seen for years yet they were a real labour saver, with enough long extensions you could remove BLMC driveshaft donut U bolts from the wheelarch, todays equivalent is the battery impact wrench, the first and only time I used one of them was as pit crew for the works Mini Cooper team at the 2003 (I think) 24 hour Nurburgring race, they blew me away. I have never had my hands on one since until last week, close to 2 decades later when I bought a Bosch one from Ali-Express cheaply but nowhere near as cheap as the clones.

Regarding the disintegrating socket set plastic liners, 40 years ago a younger friend of mine used to turn them upside down and fill the void with mortar, after that they were indestructible but rather heavy. I have recently followed his inspiration but with expanding foam, a denser expanding PU foam adhesive applied from a Pro Gun (very good for controlled slow application of tiny beads of foam) to be precise. A lot of the cheap tools I buy now on the internet come in blister display packs, most are only strong enough to survive the transport in a jiffy bag but when reinforced by the expanding foam become very strong, I also save food packaging boxes as some here are as strong and good as Tupperware (it helps them sell their product) I will cut the tool blister backing to fit inside the margarine tub then foam it in place, it makes a very secure storage container for the tool, a recent example was a brake caliper wind back tool.

Yes or you will dogknot the cables & probably break them, they may well be corroded anyway. Find a similar connector in an accessible location, probably the MAF sensor and practice on that to perfect the art of removal, normally you have to push the connector home and keep pressure on it to release the latch, if you can even work out how to release the latch that is. I have spent more than a year of my life struggling to remove inaccessible VAG connectors and several years repairing/bodging them after I have broken them trying to remove.