Turbocharger

Overall you're looking at 100hp into exhaust heat and 100hp into the cooling system for a 100hp engine - if the heater is sufficient to prevent it boiling at tickover when your cooling fan packs up (and my experience suggests it is... ) then it should be able to deliver about the same power as the engine takes to idle - 2 or 3 hp?

I had a set of BFG Trac-edges on my Ninety - I really rated them as an all-rounder. I was driving mostly motorway miles but there was something in reserve to get you out of the gloop, and they were as quiet as road tyres. The original BFG rubber was very hard-wearing too, not so sure about remould though. I went all round Europe on mine in fact.

Does anyone know where I can buy dye penetrant for crack-testing? I thought Screwfix would sell a kit but they don't and Google is unhelpful.

Umm - I want exactly the measurement in your second pic - thanks Tony

Yup, you've mirrored my thoughts. The bores look good, the diamond honing marks are still present even on the thrust side so oil changes at 7k miles have been doing their job. The pitting on the piston is restricted to the fuel spray star area so suggests the injector is hosing in that region - IIRC Tony Cordell melted a piston through the same fault further down the line? The water marks are more troubling to me - the gasket surfaces looked fine and there's nothing immediately visible on the head. I'll get some dye-pen and look for cracks. Does anyone have a Tdi piston loose and can measure the height difference between no 1 (top) and no 2 ring grooves for me please? I'd like to keep the pistons in mine if possible.

Good plan Nige - I welded U-shaped exhaust clamps to the legs of my cage and bent them outwards slightly - they take a shackle or a ratchet strap very well and keep everything where it should be.

Well, I've put around 100k miles on my 300Tdi over the last eight years or so and then strapped a VGT to it and found up to 2 bar boost at times. Not surprisingly, months later I found it was leaving a cloud of white/grey smoke if it was allowed to idle and then revved - such as at junctions. It's also been giving gradually worse mpg over the years. Big tyres + autobox + VGT + lead foot seems to give 18-20mpg around town which is expensive. I took the head off this evening and found the following. The block didn't drain fully so some water got into the bores, particularly #3 and #4. I soaked this up, turned the engine over a few times and then aggressively polished the bores with a light oil and a clean cloth - the water was in there for 5 mins or so. I have my own opinions which I'll reserve for now, I'd be interested to see what others think is going on. Sorry for the large photos, I need to show the detail: A number of small deformations on #1 piston crown: and water marks on the bore of #3 cylinder only.

Right, I'm just working out my plans to get to this - who else will be there?

I could take my Tdi - is it a two-day event?

If it's not a trade secret, how are you controlling the vanes?

They look to be 'fracture split' to me - they're cast with a notch in them and then hit with a hammer (but more cleverly). It's a manufacturing technique to prevent the two halves from 'fretting' against each other - nature ensures they fit perfectly back together again and it just happens to be quicker to make them too because there's two fewer machining operations. The bearing shells I can't speak for...

That Td5 auto Ninety appears to have a number of Td5 parts on it - headlight surrounds, bumper, aircon dashboard, aircon grille, rear crossmember etc - I'd be nervous about buying a 'G-reg' car with that many parts from a later vehicle, or at least scrutinise the number stamped into the chassis first...

Plenty of fun to be had around Bristol today - on the way to work I pulled an ambulance back out of the gutter where they'd slid on a blue-light run, and dragged out a Transit who was delivering to a bakery - he threw me a hot croissant for my troubles Last night I put a webcam out of my front window, and .

nothing scarier than driving a bendy bus (you know, the ones that spew death, suck in cyclists and kill children) in snow, slowly round a right hand bend and finding that you can only see the trailer in the LH mirror- especially since the engine and driving axle are in the trailer...

To quote Richard Hammond "I've taxed worse..."

I don't have an issue with fair failure, and I would have no issue with saying, in his opinion, that thin brake pads are due for a change. Once I had the wheels off I'd certainly not put the old pads back in, but my gripe was with a fail for reasons that didn't concur with a valid reason for refusal. I don't have time to take it up with VOSA, I'll take my cars elsewhere.

I've taken my cars back to my local garage for their retest with the removed 'failed' items, showing that they're still quite serviceable (eg brake pads with 2.5mm of material left on them). This year's phone call with the MG was "it's failed, it needs discs and pads all round, I've looked up the parts prices and we can do it all in for £650". £150 lighter I took it back with the old discs (which did not need replacing) in the boot and made angry remonstrations. I don't think I'll be back.

Hmm. My figures are brim to brim over the last 15,000 miles. It's not leaking fuel, the handbrake's not sticking and the wheel alignment is there or thereabouts. It dropped when the box went in and has been consistent, 2 or 3mpg either side depending on what I'm doing with the truck. Have I missed something like bleeding out the torque converter or setting the gearbox oil level to within a whisker of where it should be?

I'm on a 1.4 t-box and 285/75 tyres. The box is an unknown quantity but it certainly kicks down like a V8 should (ie up to 4000rpm, which is "exciting" with a Tdi on the front). The odometer under-reads slightly but by a third! I'm hoping the VGT + 1.2 t-box will get me some mpg back.

Sounds like you've got more chance of making a good one from them all...

If you blow misty oily air into your tyres then it'll degrade the rubber and rather negate the benefits of blowing them back up again... I expect it'd be fine for air tools though.

Maybe the 'cap of brake fluid' trick that works so well with power steering systems?

... and you're sure there's nothing else bouncing round in there?

I went from 26-28mpg down to around 20mpg, although I'm hoping to chase some of that back with the VGT and a higher ratio t-box. It sounds low but it's a V8 box and torque converter behind a 300Tdi and I really can't face pulling it all apart again to start experimenting with it...

You need to drive both to make a judgment. I converted from manual to auto and I think it's improved the car's driveability - especially offroad (and in traffic) but I might have rethought the decision if I'd known how much of a hit I'd take on my fuel consumption.