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Dave W

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Everything posted by Dave W

  1. I converted mine, the gearbox pushed it further back than normal so the mechanical link would have been difficult to relocate, especially the diff lock. The diff lock is simple enough as it uses the same connection as the mechanical link and I don't remember having any issues with it. The hi/lo is a completely different lever at the transfer box end though and posed more of an issue. i can't remember the exact details as it's about 12 years since I did mine but ISTR that the lever is incompatible and the cable won't connect to it properly without some fettling. I was lucky as, having failed to remove the old lever to make a new one, I lucked across a broken cable selected transfer box and swapped the whole hi-lo lever assembly over.
  2. If you have a set of accurate scales, you could weigh 1 litre of each...
  3. There is no simple "quick fix", more likely a combination of things. Tyres certainly make a huge difference and winter tyres will grip better at lower temperatures, tyre pressures can also make a huge difference. The compound on winter tyres gives far more grip in colder temperatures and, on ice especially, lowering the pressures will give a bigger contact area. Driver style and experience can make just as big a difference, as in any low traction situation. Chains would help but then there's the problem of having to remove them and put them back on again as road conditions change can be a real pain.
  4. Strangely, shortly after this thread appeared, having bought one of the packs I linked to earlier, I needed to use it for the first time this week on my Range Rover (V8 diesel). On Monday morning the car was completely dead, wouldn't unlock with the remote and after unlocking with the key no lights at all on the dash. So, popped the bonnet and hooked the starter pack up to the battery, had to use the "manual" switch to engage the pack as it couldn't detect the battery. It almost started the car but unfortunately the lights were on auto so as soon as the ignition was powered up the headlights came on, did their merry dance and all the pack could manage was a couple of slow turns of the engine before calling it a day. I put it on charge but got an error on the charger. AA man put his big starter pack on it and it turned over but wouldn't start, alternator had shorted out and was draining his starter pack at around 25 Amps with the ignition turned off ! So, new alternator fitted and battery partially charged on Wednesday then driven around in the dark on a few short journeys. With a train to catch on Friday morning I went out and the car would open but wouldn't start. As soon as the key was in the crank position all the lights on the dash went out. Mad panic with only 15 minutes to get to the station and a 10 minute drive... connected the starter pack up again and, thankfully, this time it started the engine without too much fuss. A short trip to the station and back then left in the drive. Saturday morning I went out to it again and battery worse than Friday, no lights on the dash at all and wouldn't let me turn the ignition on although the central locking worked, slowly. Battery pack connected again but not enough power to start it. I hadn't got around to recharging it after Friday so that may be a bit of an unfair test. So, these packs can start a vehicle, even a big diesel with loads of electronics, providing that the battery has enough life for the lights on the dash to work ! I think that alternator short that tied the battery to earth for a day or so (it measured 2 volts when I disconnected the earth lead on Monday) has probably killed the 6 month old AGM battery but, ever the optimist, it's been hooked up to my CTek battery conditioner for 24 hours so far... the starter pack may end up paying for itself at this rate !
  5. It would be worth contacting any decent local independents, many of them have an arrangement with the local franchise dealer and can often offer things like that at a reduced cost without the same markup. I got a new key for my Range Rover this way and it was about half the price the main dealer quoted.
  6. Main dealers can supply them, had to get one for ours and we just had to take the V5 and proof of ID form what I remember. It came stamped with the VIN number. You should also have one on the top of the bulkhead, at the bottom of the windscreen.
  7. There's a lot of power in LiPo/LiOn batteries for such a small size and these jump packs do work although the lead acid versions are cheaper and work just as well... just take up more space. There are better and cheaper versions available than the one listed though, this one for example... https://amzn.to/2CxMxZM I've not used a modern one but the older lead acid versions I've used have always worked well, as long as you remember to keep them charged up !
  8. As i understand it, you left the handbrake on while driving ? That being the case, it's a diff or half shaft gone in your rear axle. If the rear axle was in one piece then you would not be able to drive with the "hand brake" on as it would effectively lock the rear axle unless you also removed the rear prop shaft. It's unlikely to be the viscous, if it was you'd have lost all drive, front and back, not just rear. If the centre diff (viscous) wasn't working at all you wouldn't have drive to the front but it sounds as if it's functioning as you'd expect with the transmission brake on - all drive going to the front. BUT it would only need to have the brake on if the centre diff was no longer locked and was slipping. The viscous diff on these is, effectively, locked all the time with the diff "slipping" when the front/rear torque is different. It sounds to me as if you've had an issue in the rear axle, the viscous diff has compensated for it and now the viscous diff has given up and is slipping. If you can easily turn the rear propshaft (with the handbrake off) and all wheels on the ground then you have both a rear axle problem and a viscous diff problem.
  9. The fog light switch is in the centre dash console thing... along with the hazard light switch, heated rear screen etc...
  10. One thing to bear in mind is that you do not want the MS wiring to act as the earth for the engine. That's why you normally try to use a point on the engine for all earths. If you consider the, not uncommon, situation where the earth strap between the engine and body fails, you don't want the MS or it's wiring to try and take it's place. All the earths in the MS are joined together so if, for example, you have one earth connected to the battery and one earth connected to the engine then the MS can try and provide a path for the starter motor if the earth strap fails or goes high resistance. Picking up earths on the body side of the strap and then having another earth (TPS, coolant temp etc...) going to the engine means you risk bridging the earth strap. Anyone who's ever had their handbrake cable try to do that job will probably know why that's a bad idea.
  11. Regarding the CLT, it may have already been done but RV8 standard sensors use a different range to the GM ones that MegaSquirt firmware supports "out of the box". You need to make sure your firmware has been updated with the correct values and THE best way to do that is to test the sensor manually - a pot of water on the stove, sensor suspended so that it's immersed in the water and use a thermometer to create a series of reference points of resistance vs temperature. I found when I was still messing with RV8 engines that there were quite large differences in temperature/resistance between the different RV8 sensors. 3.5 sensors were different from 3.9 sensors, for example. I always ended up using EasyTherm because at least then I knew that it was right and matched my sensor. It's also worth swapping the sensor anyway as, even with the stock ECU, the CLT sensor was always prone to going out of spec and causing weird running and starting problems. On the hotwire system it was almost the first thing you did when you came across an odd issue ! One thing that does occur to me though, it would definitely be worth double checking the earth connection on your CLT sensor, make sure it's got a decent connection to the ECU earth otherwise you'll always read low - the sensor is only running at 5 volts so it doesn't take much to skew the readings. If your IAT (MAT) is using the same earth you can also end up with a bridge effect where both sensors feed each other, similar to the effect of a bad earth on a trailer where the indicators cause the tail lights to dim. When you unplugged your IAT, did you see any difference in CLT ? NB lambda sensors are fine for tuning and running, they are not completely linear and you can get decent readings either side of centre albeit quite a small (narrow) range before it falls off the edge. I know WB are the "holy grail" for some but I've never had a good experience with them and never trusted one, not helped by the fact that the early adaptors from innovate were bloody awful and, by all accounts, haven't improved much since ! For longevity and long term accuracy you really can't beat a NB lambda, the one in my competition motor is now 12 years old, it's been drowned in water and mud, it's seen pretty much every extreme of temperature from Scotland in winter to the Australian Outback and never missed a beat. Earlier this month it was in for it's MOT and, while testing the emissions, the tester said it was absolutely spot on and you could see the ECU switching either side of the centre point as I have EGO correction turned on at idle. NB always tunes by voltage, not AFR and you pretty much just set a switchover voltage. I don't think the AFR table in TS is used at all for true Narrow Band but can be used if you're running a WB in NB 0-1v mode. Tuning in NB gives you a base map and, ideally, you want to end up with a simple NB tuned VE table across the board. You can then start to manually lean it out in cruise positions and increase the fuelling in higher power areas although your throttle enrichment often does most of that.
  12. Not sure about the thread, think they are the same BUT, from memory, I think the taper is different so you need to make sure the TRE matches the component it's being mated to or it will only contact on a small part of the taper.
  13. If you wanted a simple method to disable the engine, you could always use the dual map option with one map set with 0 fuelling. That way an external switching earth can be used to enable/disable the engine.
  14. N1 is cheaper tax, speed limits are the same as M1 is you fall into one of the special categories such as dual purpose (4x4 for example) or motor caravan, otherwise some limits are lower, as above. My camper van is N1 and I pay the lower commercial rate of tax (£220 ish per year from memory) whereas my Range Rover of the same year is M1 and costs £550 per year for similar CO levels.
  15. LPG makes life more complicated on a Thor but that aside for now, the 4.0 Thor is essentially the last step in the RV8 ladder, a 3.9 with all the toys. It had all the features and refinements that evolved through years of experience with the engine with a cross bolted block, better oil pump, serpentine front end. The engine also delivers noticeably better low end torque, allegedly due to the inlet manifold. It had a bit of a bad rep at one point but, in all honesty, if it's still running OK after nearly 20 years it's pretty much NOT going to be one of the bad ones unless it's been sat in a barn from new. From a MegaSquirt PoV it's really easy because everything is there already that you would otherwise have to add on: Standard crank sensor is a VR sensor that can hook straight into MS (just make sure you use a shielded cable) Coil packs are arranged in a wasted spark configuration, mounted at the rear of the engine and can be driven direct or, if you really feel the need to, via EDIS Idle control uses a simple PWM controlled valve (with the addition of a resistor) If you want to use it, the AFM is also compatible with MegaSquirt ECUs that support it. Essentially you can fit an MS1-Extra, MS2-Extra or MS3-Extra straight onto it without any additional hardware being required. Where life gets complicated is that, unlike the earlier inlet manifolds, the Thor isn't really suited to a gas ring style LPG system so you would need to use a more advanced system with LPG injectors alongside the petrol ones, often tapped into the manifold.
  16. IMHO the 4.0 V8 Thor engine is the best RV8 out there, as long as it's in good condition it'll make a good option for a 110. To run it you will need an ECU, either the one on the Disco or it's very well suited to a MegaSquirt setup as it has a crank sensor, coil packs and idle control valve that can be used directly with a Megasquirt ECU without needing additional trigger wheels etc... I've been considering getting one for the garage myself for a future conversion.
  17. A few people struggling with VW T5s but not seen much with Defenders. In the T5 cases it's mainly due to them being tested at the "wrong" levels and "fixed" by either blasting them down the road before the test or defacing/covering/removing the sticker (if the value on the sticker cannot be read the test is carried out against the default values, which are MUCH less strict). Strangely, despite all the predictions to the contrary, DPF and EGR removal doesn't seem to have caused many issues at all.
  18. I have, bent the rear axle on my motor, probably on the Outback Challenge. Took ages to figure out that it was bent though, the rear diff lock would leak air under load (fine on the drive) and I spent a LOT of time trying to fix it. New air seals, rebuilt the diff, replaced shafts, all the pipework etc... In the end, out of desperation, swapped the axle casing for a spare and, lo and behold, never had an issue again. The axle wasn't bent much, just a few mm but the slight misalignment where the half shaft went into the diff must have been twisting it enough to unseal the O ring and let the air out. Think it was due to a heavy landing at speed but I don't actually know for certain when I bent it, could have been on a trial ! The problem first appeared about 6 months after getting the motor back from Australia.
  19. It will only play on your account if it's protected, if it weren't protected then you could use iTunes to convert it for you as it will do for CDs etc... If it's protected you won't be able to send it to anyone. Do you have a Mac or PC ? As Arjan has suggested the best and easiest way to convert them is to use some software that records the sound while you play it. I've used SoundTap in the past for this on Mac, I think it's also available for PC. You can get a free unlimited 14 day trial version...
  20. No, the crank sensor is pretty much the only sensor that will stop the engine running (throttle will stop it revving). All the other sensors can be disconnected and will use defaults. AFM and IAT, for example, are the first thing to unplug when you're having issues.
  21. After a few more hours work this evening I've pretty much tested everything on MS1/Extra so the app has now been released to those who signed up to test it.
  22. I've updated the app's user manual to bring it in line with the app about to be released to TestFlight. The manual includes details for creating the Bluetooth interface as well as reflecting the app as it is now rather than 6 years ago https://mobisquirt.org/user-manual/ The app itself is pretty much ready for "external" testing with all the functionality appearing to work as expected, at least with MS1/Extra versions. I need to resurrect my MS2/Extra ECU this weekend so I can check that myself as I have no idea if that's still working, especially for the Bluetooth connection. I'm expecting to release it to testers by the end of the weekend. The iPad views are, frankly, a bit of a mess at the moment but now the app has been rebuilt using newer techniques it should be more practical to maintain a much better experience for iPad, including having more gauges visible. One benefit of the rebuild is that the app now supports split screen mode on the iPad, allowing the app to run alongside other apps. I'd rather get the app out there and having it's functionality tested first and worry about fixing the iPad (and by extension iPhone 8 Plus) views to make use of the larger viewing area. I had an interesting conversation this morning with someone (who currently sells Bluetooth adapters "off the shelf") about adapting their design to be compatible with the app and they're making a test batch using the same Bluetooth module as I've tested against. Very reasonably priced if you don't want to build your own.
  23. I thought there already was an Android one ? It's not out of the question as I develop apps for both platforms for my day job, I've steered clear because there already was an Android offering and didn't want to compete with that.
  24. A sneak peak of tonight's progress... recorded on my iPhone, connecting to an MS1/Extra ECU (hooked up to a simulator) via a Bluetooth to serial module. Details of the module will be added to the web site together with links to suitable items. Cost for the one I'm using in the test is just under £16 and it's powered from the MS ECU via the serial port.
  25. Yes, it works on iPhone and iPad at the moment, Apple Watch will come later... maybe
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