Housebound !

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Finally just had to grit teeth and book the motor in to have the problems looked at - engine warning light on and chucking out smoke on startup from cold.

They think it's an air leak somewhere and not the ecu so at least that's something. I've told them to cap at 3 hours labour and I just want a diagnostic as to what's actualy wrong.

Poor broom broom



So, until it's back I'm housebound ! (or at least in as much as I can only go where my little legs will carry me ! )

 

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Hope it doesn't end up costing you a lot of £££ to fix. Just found out over the weekend that my honda accord year 96/97 passenger back rear shock aborber needed to be changed.

I would be heading down to the breakers yard to look for a second hand and then looking for a cheap garage to have it fixed and pay just labour.

Well, probably time to walk more and use the public transport. Best wishes either way

 

Well they've found a completely blocked breather and another pipe on the throttle valve that had become disconected.

Upshot was oil going directly into the inlet manifold (this is all double dutch to me btw so don't ask me anything technical - I just like to drive !).

Bill's gonna be around £370 - thank heavens for helpful parents ! I don't think my Jobseekers Allowance would cover it !

 

Best wishes and keep plugging away, your break would come

 

It's do with the fuel/air mixture. The smoke was oil being burned along with the petrol. Must have been a mess inside.

 

Ewww E38 lol, glad they found the problem dude, dya take it a dealers or just a normal garage?

 

Nothing wrong with an E38 - 4 litre engine, 286 bhp and 0-60 in 7.1s

Main dealer round here has very bad name but there's a couple of specialist Merc/BMW garages I use.

 

Nothing wrong other than a very pricey car to run if you are unemployed. What ya get, 10MPG on a good day?

I also hear it's quite pricey having the optional indicators enabled on a beemer, or did you go with the normal BMW policy of just not having any?

Anyway, at least it didn't cost the earth to have it fixed, that's pretty cheap by the sounds of it for work on a car like that.

 

Lol. Yeh, all servicing and bits etc. is fine as long as you don't use BMW main dealers. Bought the car just over 3 years ago for the princely sum of £5600 - previous owner was (coincidently) also the MD of an IT company. Got the original purchase receipt with all the docs - £53k when new

I've always liked big cars - previously had a Senator and my fav, my old Carlton 3000 GSi (kept that one for 10 yrs ! and did over 200,000 on it).

Economy - around town about 18 mpg and on a run/motorways I get 30 mpg so not too bad. It's a real dream to drive, just sits on the road rock-steady with plenty of power there if you need it. Being a gadget freak I made sure I got one with aircon, satnav and TV !

With big cars as long as you get a full service history they're fine. Mine's done about 106k miles now and is barely "run-in" in terms of the engie - will cope easily with well over 500k.

At my age even the group 19 insurance isn't too bad - under £500 fully comp and with protected ncb.

Of course, as you say, not ideal to run when unemployed but then currently I don't do much driving anyway so only get through £15-20 on fuel a week.

Be glad to have it back all tickety-boo and may just have to take it for a blast to celebrate

 

...you have a TV in your car?!

Riiiiiight

 

The satnav doubles as a TV (optional extra but factory fitted) and is all built into the centre console :



Comes in handy waiting in car parks or if you arrive early for an appt. Only 4 analogue channels.

Like I said - gadget freak ! In reality, it's probably the least used gadget in the car

The satnav could do with an upgrade too as it's 9 years out of date (makes it interesting sometimes ! ) but the upgrade would be around £400 and that's off ebay.

 

I see.

Perhaps your next upgrade should be a satelitte on the roof of the car? You could get Sky then

If it were me, I'd probably hook up a laptop to output to the tv for laughs. Could get a decent game of pacman going then.

Qs

 

There are sites that offer Freeview upgrades for it

Oh and it has voice control too for the phone and satnav

You can ask it where the nearest garage or restaurant is

Luv it !

 

*sigh*

The insurance would kill me... but I kinda like it.

 

I always really liked the sporty Senator's and Carltons. This was the daddy though ...



Have only ever seen one in the flesh, so I guess they are uber rare. 177mph top speed and 382BHP. Kind of the forerunner to the now insane Vauxhall VXR8.

 

Yup they were real nice. Seen a couple (nearly bought a really old one !). Local dealers to me sued to take purchasers out to the local airport for driving lessons if they bought one !

My GSi did have a nice bright yellow LCD dashboard - you really knew when you were speeding - dirty great 3" high numbers right in your face !

 

I know what you mean about E38's being nice to drive, theyre good cars unless stuff goes wrong, wait til you need a new nav drive, will be tomtom time for sure I can guarantee it (around the £1600 mark new) lol.

Have you priced up the nav disc at a dealer? didnt think they were that much but maybe they are, never really look them up that often.

 

A blocked pipe full of oil will do that, You need a clean shot of air so it mixes with the petrol properly in the chamber, so that you get the right compression at the right time of the spark, normally this is about 8 degrees befor Top dead centre.

On thing i dont get is the charges you seem to be paying, seems a bit too much to me. When i first saw your problem i thought that it may have been something called valve stem seals. Theses are situated under the rocker cover and as the valve goes up and down it stops the oil from slidining on the valve into the compression chamber. As time goes on or 30000 or so miles kicks in these little rubber seals becom hardened and thats where the bit of smoke comes from etc, and this stops when the engine has warmed up, As the seals expand and so do the vlaves due to heat.

Wow cant believe i remeber all that whoo hoo

Ed