Austin 7

One thing you don't mention are the two anti-roll bar rubber bushes. You could try dousing these with plastic and rubber lubricant spray. Better still, dismantle, lubricate and reassemble. When you brake or accelerate, the nearside and offside front suspension moves in unison, so the bar does not twist along its length but it does rotate slightly in the bushes.

On the topic of insurance and modifications, there was a recent case of an insurer who initially declined a large claim because the insured car had a towbar fitted which had not been declared. The towbar had no bearing on the accident/claim, but logic and insurance companies don't always go hand in hand. Worryingly, the insurance ombudsman initially decided in favour of the insurer.

The battery voltage should rise to about 14.5 volts once the alternator is being turned by the engine. If it's still sitting at 12.4 it's very likely that the alternator is not charging. If your car is new enough to have a smart alternator, diagnosis is not quite so clear cut, but I would still expect to see a noticably raised battery voltage immediately after starting. You should see some kind of warning light on the dashboard. The car can run with a failed alternator for an hour or two, provided you don't switch on big loads like headlights and heater fan etc, but eventually the battery will be flattened and the engine will stop. So if you wan't to drive to a nearby garage you should be OK. If you can fully charge the battery with a mains charger first, so much the better.

Not sure what you mean by "barely adequate". Even tiny discs would be able to take the ABS to the point of intervention on a single stop, and braking ability is ultimately determined by the tyres and the road surface. The only difference with larger discs is the ability to cope with multiple stops from high speeds and/or a heavy vehicle (or one towing) without heating up excessively. Maybe you drive down alpine passes in a spirited way ? A full brake service plus a change of pad formulation and possibly higher performance standard sized discs might be an awful lot easier.

Hi I suggest you find someone helpful with a copy of VCDS (VAG-Com Diagnostic System). The steps involved are described in this old thread: As a low-tech alternative, you can very cheaply buy a unit that takes an audio input and radiates a low-power FM radio signal which will just appear as an extra radio station.

I have gathered the parts for this job, and they work on the bench but haven't been fitted yet. None are particularly expensive. My head unit is too old to have a video input, so I need an independent LCD monitor. The camera is the type that is combined with a tailgate release switch as a bolt-in replacement. To avoid running video coax through the tailgate flexi-loom, I also have a 2.4 GHz radio transmitter/receiver pair. The idea is to power the camera and video transmitter from the ignition controlled +12 volt feed to the rear wiper, within the tailgate. The video receiver and monitor need a source of +12 volts from the reversing lights. When this is up and running I will give an update.

Hi again. I have dug out my notes from 2018. It has reminded me that the heating element differs between leather and non-leather seats. I will attempt to post the document, it's in MS Word format. Yeti heated seat replacement.docx

Hi The backrest and the seat pads have separate heating elements. The seat pad is much more vulnerable to failure than the backrest, especially the part under the raised side "bolster" which gets flexed every time you get in and out of the car. The heating wire is a bit unusual in that it comprises about seven individually insulated strands twisted together. Each time one of these strands breaks due to continual flexing, the heating power drops, and eventually when the last strand breaks there is no heat at all. The specialised nature of the wire makes it very difficult to repair by soldering or putting in a bridging section, I guess with enough patience it could be done if you can strip off the enamel insulation from all the strands. I have replaced my driver's seat heater in the past, the element is not too expensive and fits in place with double sided sticky tape, but it's a bit of a fiddly job to remove and refit the cover (leather in my case). I found a guide on the internet which covered all the steps.

I always find it astonishing that anyone can strip a sump plug, but what's done is done. I don't see why a helicoil should not be a permanent repair, especially given the low stress on the component. In some industries tapped holes in castings are helicoiled from new for extra strength. It's a proper engineering solution and by no means just a quick fix. An alternative would be to get the sump casting tapped oversize and have a larger standard or custom made plug fitted by an engineering shop. Main dealers are often pretty hopeless at thinking of cheaper alternatives, they are too tied into simple part swapping.

I have always had good results from NGK plugs, but the market is awash with counterfeits so get them from a trusted supplier. NGKs own partfinder shows the number you quote above. Some makers produce both OEM and Aftermarket ranges, which may or may not have detail differences. This might account for alternative part numbers being quoted. I changed the plugs on my 1.4 CAXA engine and found that getting the coil packs off was quite tricky - they are quite tight and the cables are short. There are various plastic mouldings to hold things in place and these seem to want to fight back. I ended up making my own extraction tool to give an upwards pull. Like all these jobs, it would be easier next time knowing what to expect.

Hi, If I'm right, this unit has the reference J519 so a Google search on that might help. Also, have a look at this list on a Golf Forum: https://www.golfmk6.com/forums/index.php?threads/complete-j519-cecm-pin-out.231417/

With a linkage problem the gearlever will feel odd If the clutch is not disengaging fully (dragging) it will be hard to engage gears

Many thanks for taking the trouble to write this up. I'm inclined to think that this is symptomatic of the disconnect between the folks who design cars nowadays and the people who actually use them and repair them. Maybe there is no handover between ones with experience and ones who newly join. Engineering tradition and knowledge simply evaporate when people retire. For what it's worth, I maintain a 2009 Mazda MX-5. These cars are renowned for "eating" anti-roll bar links (same front and rear), which are about 4 inches long and have a ball joint each end with a taper pin. They start to knock on rough roads after only 2 or 3 years. The nuts seize up so one always has to cut them off. The old links that come off have no noticeable play in the ball joints, and are still stiff-ish to manipulate by hand, but replacing with new ones seems to cure the problem. It must be only the tiniest of movements to cause a noise.

Hi This sounds like a linkage problem. There are normally two cables from under the gear lever to the linkage on to of the gearbox. One carries the motion of the gearlever from Left to Right, the other carries the motion from Forward to Backward. On top of the gearbox are levers connected to a vertical shaft going down into the casing. This shaft is rotated by the Left/Right cable and moved up and down (in and out of the casing) by the Forward/Backward cable. Under the gearlever is another mechanism to drive the cables from the lever, plus the reverse gear detent. If for example 1/2 are OK and 3/4 are OK but you cannot get 5/6, the problem is in the Left to Right cable or linkage. If for example you can move the gearlever from side to side but not engage any gear, the problem is in the Forward to Backward cable or linkage.

Hi From memory, the Evaporative emissions setup involves a charcoal filter in a canister to trap petrol fumes from the tank. This is cleared by drawing engine intake air through it as and when appropriate. I don't think this is especially important for the running of the engine, and probably nothing to do with the ESP.

The ESP system relies on signals from the wheel rotation sensors. If a sensor goes faulty you may get a warning like this. Time to have the error codes read, to narrow down the fault.

Modern cars don't smell of petrol. If they do, then there is a leak. I would not drive the car in that condition.

Hi I suspect the lack of cover means that a passengers feet have caught the resistor unit and ripped it out of the housing. If you are lucky it should just clip back in, it is latched by the white nylon connector housing. If it falls out again you might be able to carefully add a small self tapping screw and washer to hold it, but only attempt this if you are competent. It's pretty amazing that in this age of electronics manufacturers are still using crude dropper resistors to control fan speed. It's only by putting them in the air stream within the trunking that they can "lose" 20 or 30 watts of heat. As the trunking is plastic, as mentioned above this is a fire risk unless everything is reliably in place.

A long shot, but rattles are sometimes traceable to the air conditioning pulley and pump. Maybe you could use some flexible hose with one end held to your ear and the other moved around to pinpoint the noise source ?

Checking the battery voltage off load with a multimeter doesn't tell you a great deal unless it is completely dead. The starter and even the starter solenoid take much more current than anything else. Things may initially look OK with a weak or discharged battery when you turn the key to the first position, but as soon as you engage the starter solenoid the loading will cause the voltage to dip right down. There may not even be enough to engage the starter, and all you get is a click as the starter solenoid pulls in part way. I suggest charging the battery from a mains powered charger. If you use one of those typical 3 or 4 amp types this will take maybe 24 hours. Then try starting while an assistant measures the voltage at the battery terminals, if healthy this should be no lower than 9 volts. Assuming the engine starts, then check that you have around 14 volts showing which indicates that the alternator is charging. Rather less likely but still possible is a poor (high resistance) joint somewhere in the starter or solenoid high current circuits or the earth return to the battery. In this case, even with a good battery, voltage will be "lost" in the resistance.

It may just make economic sense to obtain a used transmission from a car breaker and have it fitted by an independent garage that do not charge top labour rates. Nobody buys a brand new transmission for a 10 year old car unless an insurance company is paying.

Hi This sounds like a misfire. You have done the obvious by renewing the ignition components, not sure what you mean by a multiplier but if it's the ignition coil then that's good. Another possibility is that the engine temperature sensor used by the ECU is faulty, this isn't necessarily the same sensor as used for the dashboard gauge. If the ECU "thinks" that the engine is warmer than it is, you won't be getting a bit of mixture enrichment and may have a lean misfire as a result. These direct injection engines don't need nearly as much "choke" as in the days of long cold inlet manifolds, but they still need some. If the ECU has set limp mode it will have stored error code(s), so reading these should be the next step.

Hi If fault codes don't answer the question, I would start by getting the fuel pressures checked. It sounds like the pressure after starting may be dipping below the minimum threshold for whatever reason. A second possibility is a crankshaft or camshaft sensor, which can exhibit heat-related intermittent failure.

Hi The EGR and the DPF are separate systems. EGR reduces combustion temperatures during cruising conditions, which reduces Nitrogen oxide emissions, and has been a diesel engine emissions fitment for at least twenty years The EGR valve, the EGR cooler and the associated throttle body in the air intake all get gummed up by oily carbon deposits. The engine will run quite happily without it, and it can be programmed out (so that the EGR valve stays closed) without physical modifications. This is of course in contravention of UK MOT regulations. The DPF absorbs fine soot which is later oxidised ("burnt off") if you drive far enough and fast enough. If the latter doesn't happen then regeneration is programmed to kick in. The DPF can be physically removed or modified to be inoperative, and again this is not permitted by MOT regulations. DPFs are a more recent feature, but still date back 15 years. I suspect that Yeti warning lights for emissions may be triggered by more than one cause, so it would help if you had the accompanying fault code(s) read to narrow down what it is "unhappy" with.

It would not surprise me if farm chemicals mixed with mud and animal "output" was as corrosive as salted roads.