Turbocharger

Ooh, handbags at dawn from the vapour king... I'll put the OEM turbo back on (again ... sigh) and look at it all again in December.

It really isn't as bad as it looks in the photos, the flow will be pretty smooth. Not perfect, but good enough. I did used to work for Cosworth, remember...

Just to close this one out, he ignored all of our advice above and picked up a '96 Jeep Cherokee 4.0 auto, with an undiagnosed fuelling problem for £200. Two evenings playing with the EFI setup and lots of carb cleaner seem to have resolved the part-throttle hesitation and he's got a good working truck which fits all the demands above (except fuel economy, at 14mpg...)

I can see it now: Fat bloke with a mark on his T-shirt from his big-rig's steering wheel walks towards the camera. Banjos play in the background. Dee da dee de dee de dee "Hello. Ma name's Big Jez, and we're the Shack of Flying Spanners. Come for a look at ma lifted Chevy - it's gona com-pete in the Lay-doggy comp'tition next fall..." I'm quite looking forward to his fab'n'comp DVD.

Thanks Jim - back to the parts shop. Timmy - I thought about tidying the welds up but they're not as bad as the photos show and there's a lot more about nailing on a homebrew turbo from a different engine that will reduce efficiency before I start to worry about diffusing gas flows between different places! It's a diesel so the massflows are lower, and if I'm looking for benefits at the low-end speed range of the engine then it's even less important.

[cat among pigeons mode] As part of what little apprenticeship I served, I remember being rather confused by the following warning: Calibration may be affected by grip position- always use the handle. When I got home and did the maths, they're right! The grip position makes a big difference to the deflection and breakover types (ones with a pivot halfway up the handle that "break" into a slight elbow shape at the relevant torque). I suspect that doesn't apply to spring-loaded wrenches that "click" at the torque value you set by turning the end of the handle. In the past I've had to use a "click" wrench to measure belt tension while someone else does up the tensioner. It's not ideal but you can just about hold it "on the click" while your mate frantically tightens. My theory was that most people are using uncalibrated wrenches anyway so the margin for error must be quite large. Of course, I don't know how many of those belts have failed... Mine's still going but try this at your own risk

Quick update - Lara's bespoke diaphragm has landed at my office - and promptly disappeared into our internal mail system Looking at my calendar I'm not going to have time to get it up together before the Peak District trip, so I'd better put the old turbo back on it - again. Next time I'll do the job once, properly, and try to integrate my jumbo intercooler into the same job too. Anyways, I took some of the advice above and had the manifold skimmed flat for twenty sheets: and bought a new manifold gasket, although I'm not sure there was anything wrong with the old one. Now I've got two types though, any thoughts on which I should prefer?

NFU asked for an engineer's report on my car after swapping to 300Tdi. I asked what constituted "an engineer" and apparently a chartered engineer with thirty years engine development experience was sufficient - so I wrote the report and Dad signed it This time round I'm insured with "another" company - I read out my mods over the phone, they quoted me quite competitively and sent me some paperwork to sign. This paperwork had 'no modifications from manufacturers spec' written on it, so I rang them back and they said that it "didn't matter" and I should sign it anyway. Needless to say, there are now more crossings-outs, initialled changes and additional amendment sheets than there are original documents...

I'm surprised we've not heard of this before. I suspect their way out would be to say "it is chargeable with road fund duty, but at a nil rate." Since you get a receipt for 'nil' then you've paid, albeit paid nothing.

I've got MM too but I think the inverter in my car is unwell. By and large, the tracks are well defined and I've driven most of them before (and we can all use reverse gear...) so how hard can it be? By all means bring the laptop as an option though... We'll certainly be taking in Tiss Ford before the end of the day. After past events at Biggin Quarry we found that when simply parking down there, within half an hour a member of the public would normally do something stupid to entertain us...

Retro - no problem for me, I'll consider my group full again and carry a spare place for Sunday in case Tim and Pugwash fall out and we have to split them up to make sure they behave... From Ashbourne my group will head north by road straight away, almost to Sheffield to meet mmgemini since they're driving down from the Arctic. That might mean we end up with a higher mileage than other groups so we might not be the cheapest for fuel, but it's only for one day. This means I've not met anyone at all in the group I'm leading (so you could be muppets who'll demand nothing rougher than cats-eyes or dive straight into a 4hr recovery), and crucially none of you know that my navigator will be a colleague who's been in the country for 6 months, whose first language is Tamil and who's never seen an OS map before... It's going to be good.

^^ what Chris says. As long as there's enough travel in your fuel pump diaphragm it'll just tip in a little more fuel accordingly. The calibration won't be quite right because the pump probably won't be specced to deliver that fuel level at exactly that speed but the principle is sound. Choosing a turbo - that's more of a "wider subject". Without reference to maps and matching then your principle is basically sound - to save yourself the hard sums then look for a turbo off a vehicle which makes the same power level as you have or are aiming for. The turbines work on massflow, so a 2.5litre engine at 4000 rpm is shifting the same amount of gas as a 1.25l engine at 8000rpm, although they may not be making the same power (this is the essence of the "matching" part). Be aware that a VGT won't give you any more power, especially if you stick to standard boost levels. What it should do is give you a faster response (less lag) and better low-end torque. If peak power is currently 190bhp at 3500rpm with 1 bar of boost (say) then if your new turbo is delivering 1 bar from 800rpm to 4000rpm then the peak power will still be the same - so don't budget for a big increase when picking your turbo just for 'down the pub' figures, unless you expect to be running higher boost (then there's more to consider when picking your turbo). Step one - find a VGT'd engine of the same power Step two - post up on here and see if we can find a map for it Step three - open bonnet and lob it in* Step four - VroomWOOOOSHchangegear Have a look at my (soon to restart) VGT thread for some hands-on trials and tribulations. *slight underestimate

You can run it as a 12-car rally if you like - you need to notify the Police but it's not onerous, they didn't seem that bothered at all when I ran a similar thing for the Uni motor club. There's a good piece on 12-car rallies on Wikipedia, and a link to the Wessex Car Club's guide to doing the same. For a general treasure hunt I usually put film names, music tracks or names of car parts onto scrap CDs and cable tie them around a ten-mile route. Then give out a mixture of grid refs, herringbone diagrams, tulip diagrams or clues on a sheet to each team, and a second piece of paper for each team to record what they find. Set people off at 2 min intervals; the route coincidentally finishes in a pub (ask beforehand, you might be able to get a room or reserve one end of the bar) and you can do the scoring while you wait for people to turn up. If you let them know which pub they're aiming for then they can find the end even if they're hopelessly lost...

Mo - no probs Sticky - yes, there's still a couple of places left for camping so Chris can add you to the list at the beginning of this topic. I'll PM all the campers with directions nearer the time. 1 space in my group left Miniturbo has dropped out because he's got two things I haven't* so I've got one space in my group left. We're a Ninety on MTs, a Ninety on ATs and a 110CSW on road tyres, so won't be attempting anything sillier than Stanage, aiming for scratches rather than dents. Any takers? * mechanical sympathy and a desire to see his girlfriend for the weekend

You could find that some internal wear in the injector pump has created some swarf which is getting stuck inside the stop solenoid occasionally. If you're changing the solenoid again, have a fish around inside with a magnet first?

For an everyday car, I'm guessing you'd want a diesel - but there aren't any that will just bolt in except the 2.25D which is a little .. ahem .. lacklustre. For the reasons you give, you want coil springs and disc brakes. If people aren't going to laugh at you you'll want a car which is the same colour all over. I have to ask - is this the right car to start with?

Of course, any insulation only works if there's some heat there to be conserved. If you leave the truck unused for 24hrs your blanket won't help at all. As you say, for £3 you can't go wrong. If you haven't got any way to strap the battery down, at the very least two or three cable ties through holes in the floor will stop it from bouncing and setting fire to your car (and all your insulation....)

I did like the fact that Clarkson's review of the Porsche GT2 was simply "WAAAAAAAAAH AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRGH AAAAAAAAAAHHHH NOOOOOOOO WAAAAAAHH". It's a good strap line for any company to quote, I think...

I have to say, I wasn't that impressed with the "we've got trucks and we've seen Jackass" stunts at the end - although I didn't mind the constant references to dead prostitutes as much as the wilful destruction of a drumkit for no reason... They did work towards showing the hard work that goes into driving a manual heavy vehicle on the road in traffic though. There were some laugh-out-loud moments but I'm hoping the series is yet to get underway.

I'd be interested in coming down if Im in the SW too, depending on the date - want a lift Matt?

Although it isn't LR Tech, it's a harsh moderator who'll discriminate against my religion: For your viewing pleasure, Messrs Clarkson, Hammond and May will return to our screens tonight. If you've not caught the rather sparse trailers, BBC2 8pm. PS Well done to Lewis Hamilton.

I used to have some eyeball fog lights which I mounted upside down on the roof of my Ninety for exactly the reasons David gives above. If the light source is higher than your eyes then there will be light deeper into any potholes than you can see anyway. The cutoff didn't stop any bonnet illumination though, it wasn't that "sharp". In the end I mounted them back up the roof, which solved the problem. They only came off when the cage was fitted, and are now replaced with pencil-beam spotlights in a cowl.

... and I can guess who the 109 belonged to

I got a jumbo repair washer, bent one edge twice in opposite directions to form a crude hook, and self-tappered it to the chassis rail with big crosshead screws so it should come undone again. Not one for the tech archive but very effective for me.

Nick, I appreciate that fuel is probably the greater part of the trip costs but if the accomodation's a worry there's still space for camping and I'll even lend you my tent