jon dee

Looking at repairing or replacing the driver's side seatbelt server as the spring that holds the shiny bit on the end has given up. Does anyone have a spare broken server arm lying around that I can practice on before I start messing with the one on the car ? Alternatively, does anyone have a good not-broken driver's side server arm (as per pic) that they would part with ? Wellington area is best but happy to pay postage. Cheers...

Hahahahah... I have no interest in electric cars nor do I wish to ever own one. So I don't keep up with the politics and incentives that are being offered to entice buyers. In my book battery power is great for delivery vehicles, the type of thing that can be used in city malls, small fork lifts and cars like taxis that are predominantly used within city limits. The most disturbing thing about the current trend in electric cars is the push towards autonomous driving. This is a classic case of introducing unwanted/unneeded technology by stealth. Microsoft showed the way, so now autonomous driving is being bundled with electric cars. FFS, if people don't want to drive the car themselves, and want to sit a metre off the bumper of the car in front, they should be catching the bus or a train !!!! Cheers...

Cars are the easy target for government legislators. As pointed out above, cars contribute a minor proportion of CO2 emissions but car manufacturers are constantly having to meet tighter and tighter emission regulations. Governments like this approach as it does not cost them anything. The car manufacturers bear the development costs and the car buying public pick up the cost of incorporating the developments into their vehicles. Alternate energy sources are always welcomed with open arms and eagerly endorsed as "the way of the future", until the unforeseen downsides are uncovered. Nuclear power was once going to displace fossil fuels. Hydo dams periodically fail and have been responsible for disastrous effects on downstream agricultural economies. Oil tankers have accidents. Pipelines and storage facilities are primary targets for terrorist and military activity. Windfarms disfigure our landscapes and so on. Over the last 100 years hydrogen has been visited many times as an alternative fuel and discarded due to the difficulties it presents. In a few more years due to economies of scale and design improvements, electric cars will start to displace gasoline powered cars as a natural transport evolution. Rising gasoline prices will help speed the process !! So do we REALLY NEED hydrogen fueled cars ?? By the way... how is the government going to tax electric cars when the number of gasoline powered cars drops ? They are not going to like losing the $1.60/litre that pours millions into their coffers every week. Road User Tax anyone ?? Cheers... PS: This wouldn't fit in the Quick Rant thread... any decent rant needs at least a few paragraphs

Anyone who has had to shift oxygen bottles in an engineering shop will know that they are seriously heavy... and they only have a rated pressure of about half of that required for storing hydrogen. Likewise high pressure storage vessels are always cylindrical or spherical to allow them to accommodate hoop stress... so forget large flat tanks for high pressure hydrogen storage. The best that I can envisage is multiple small cylinders manifolded together and is not as efficient use of space as a single large tank for an equivalent storage capacity. Not saying that the worlds greatest engineering brains can't come up with a workable storage system for hydrogen use in cars, but it won't be easy and it won't be cheap Cheers..

Haven't got one of these tucked away by any chance ? Would be the perfect answer for the alternative fuels brigade... could probably run one of dried cow pancakes and create a side business for the dairy farmers Cheers... PS: Tailpipe emissions nothing but water.... where have I heard that before ?

CNG was introduced as an alternative fuel, the government jumped on it enthusiastically to the extent that they offered a substantial subsidy to anyone prepared to convert their car (have a familiar ring ?). It produced less power than gasoline and had a short range between fill-ups. None the less gas stations with access to the natural gas distribution network were coerced into installing special high pressure compressors and banks of storage cylinders. It was a classic example of a knee jerk reaction to the fuel crisis at that time, and seen as a way to reduce our dependence on overseas fuel supplies. There was no consideration given to the fact that much of the country did not have access to natural gas, the large CNG tank substantially reduced boot space, and no-one jumped at the thrill of lower performance and difficult starting on cold mornings. One of the reasons that CNG fell out of favor and eventually disappeared was the mandated requirement for the cylinders to be pressure tested by an approved testing agent which involved taking the cylinder out of the car... at a cost. Most opted to simply removed the CNG conversion. Jumping on the hydrogen bandwagon and forcing people into electric cars is another knee jerk reaction to a problem, chosen because big polluters are not so easy to push around. Go for the short-term solution, sell the benefits and ignore the downside... that's how politics work Now, where did I put that gasifier ??? Cheers...

https://www.facebook.com/WAGS.ltd

EU figures from 2019 claim that the transport sector contributes 30% of the total CO2 emissions. In that sector 72% is attributable to all forms of road transport. Cars account for 60% of the road transport emissions. So when looking at the big picture, cars are responsible for 60% of 72% of 30% of CO2 production.... FARKKKKK !!!!!! That's awful !!!!! lets take the big stick to road transport and force them to reduce emissions Let's force everyone into expensive battery powered cars But wait... 60% of 72% is 43% and 30% of 43% is 13% so cars are only producing 13% of CO2 emissions in the EU. That's not good, but why not do something about the evil bastards that produce the other 87% of CO2 emissions ?? Hey what do you do if you are a politician ?? Be like trump and kick the sh*t out of the little guys while turning a blind eye to your rich pals. Choose the easy options, ignore science and obfuscate hard. QED. Now, any more questions ? Cheers...

Car club uses and recommends these guys.... Wellington Automotive Gearbox Specialists... https://www.wags.co.nz/ Cheers...

Yes, you are correct... my bad The ethanol was manufactured by Fonterra and diverted for use in making hand sanitizer for protection against the spread of covid. The Gas to gasoline plant did this before cutting back... The Synfuel gas-to-gasoline complex is sited within 180 hectares of land at Motunui, Taranaki. It is designed to convert 52–55 PJ per annum of natural gas into 570, 000 tonnes (14, 450 barrels per stream day) of high octane gasoline. The conversion of gas to gasoline (GTG) takes place in two stages: first gas to methanol (GTM) and second methanol to gasoline (MTG). The two stages are integrated into a single complex to achieve optimum efficiency in management and operation. So still possibly has the potential to be re-purposed if a plant for generating hydrogen was built in Taranaki. Cheers...

NZ has some experience in the manufacture of synthetic fuels thru the Gas to Gasoline plant at Motunui. One of those plants is apparently mothballed due to gas supply issues... hence the lack of methanol production that killed off production of e85 fuel. Not being a nuclear surgeon I don't know how feasible it would be, but maybe that plant could be re-purposed to process captured CO2 and clean Hydrogen into a synthetic fuel. Old school Hydrogen producers use brown coal and steam and magic to generate Hydrogen with a byproduct of a much greater quantity of CO2. In typically eco-sensitive manner the plan is to bury this CO2 in depleted oil wells much as nuclear waste is buried underground. This is called hiding your sh*t so that future generations can deal with the problem. Becoming carbon neutral is a kind of political shell game... never mind how dirty the manufacturing process might be... feel the purity of the end product Cheers...

From a practical and environmental viewpoint, we should be considering this... Based in Canada, Carbon Engineering’s Direct Air Capture system directly removes CO2 from the atmosphere, purifies it, and produces a pipeline-ready compressed CO2 liquid using only energy and water. This CO2 can be combined with non-fossil fuel-generated hydrogen, to produce ultra-low carbon intensity hydrocarbon fuels such as gasoline, diesel, and Jet Fuel-A. https://energypost.eu/extract-co2-from-our-air-use-it-to-create-synthetic-fuels/ A Carbon Engineering staff member holds clean synthetic fuel made from Carbon Engineering’s Direct Air Capture system and hydrogen split from water. / SOURCE: Carbon Engineering So why fcuk around with building an entire new distribution network for hydrogen when you can manufacture and use a synthetic fuel that can easily be distributed thru existing networks. And it helps remove a major greenhouse gas from the air we breathe. Works for me Cheers...

If your memory goes back that far, you will remember the glory days of CNG and LPG as alternative fuels. And perhaps you will recall the plethora of regulations and safety fears and over reaction to any accident that involved a vehicle that used one of these fuels ? Every LPG fuel tank was a potential BLEVE that required the road to be closed in both directions and spectators to be kept 200 metres clear I shudder to think of the raft of regulations that will be introduced in the advent of hydrogen being introduced into NZ !!! I really think that we should be looking at something that requires no fuel at all and is intrinsically safe... Cheers... PS: Wellington for the WIN.... oops... for the WIND

There is one small problem with hydrogen fueled vehicles...

And of course, if the E-Type is too modern for your taste, what about an XK150 ? The last, and IMHO the best of the XK series that still retained the classic English sports car styling. When you have a car that looks this good you don't need to drive fast... https://beacham.co.nz/beacham-xk-150/ Cheers...

... what do you think of this ? These guys... https://beacham.co.nz/beacham-e-type/ have come a long way since I saw them installing the entire drive train from a late model Corvette into a restored E-Type shell. Their work is right up there with the very best in the world, and they are doing it all right here in NZ Cheers...

Apologies for going off topic, but does this mean that you always do U-turns towards the side with the leg ? I met a guy once who had both hips replaced and he had power operated "trainer wheels" fitted to his Goldwing to get around this problem. Cheers...

FWIW my 2008 335i came with this battery... https://superstart.net.nz/bosch-performance-din75l-730cca/ and it seems to do the job just fine. It is a calcium type and not a AGM type, but considering the price differential, if I ever need to replace the battery I will go with the same again. Cheers...

Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse....

This post reminded me of this.... Cheers...

Could be.... I know less than nothing about X5's of any species. Th web page from which I obtained that wisdom is labeled as Vacuum pump with tubes BMW X5 3.0sd E70 SAV Europe M57N2. But if the 40 in you model code means 4 litres then you probably do have a different engine. Cheers... Oops... my bad, I didn't read your reply correctly. I haven't memorised all the engine codes yet

This part 11 66 7 791 232 appears to fit if your vehicle is one of these... BMW X5 (E70) (Year of Construction 02.2007 - 03.2010, 211 - 286 PS, Diesel) 3.0 d, Year of Construction 02.2007 - 09.2008, 2993 ccm, 211 PS, 3.0 sd, Year of Construction 10.2007 - 03.2010, 2993 ccm, 286 PS. And the pump mounts to the end of a camshaft one end of the head Cheers...

Was looking at this... https://www.nomaallim.com/brake-vacuum-pump-maintenance.html as the pump in the article appears to be similar to the type of pump used by BMW on many engines. Don't know if it applies to your E70 though. However, if it is this style of pump there does not seem to be any possibility of the vane sticking as both ends are constantly in contact with the wall as it rotates. The tips of the vane have seals, so the possibility of seal wear exists. An alternative hypothesis for your issue would be a vacuum leak in the booster. If the check valve is good the booster should still be holding some vacuum after the vehicle has been sitting. Do you get the hard pedal after you have driven enough to get normal braking back and then shut the engine off for a few minutes ? Or do you get normal pedal when re-starting ? Cheers...

What I am suspecting is that you have a high resistance connection that is causing the starting circuit voltage to drop. The usual culprit is a loose or corroded terminal or ground connection. WD40 won't help... as a minimum you need to loosen the connection just enough that you can twist them by hand before tightening again... that will be enough to break the corrosion layer. Longer term it is better to break the connections and remove any corrosion by wire brushing or sanding so that you can obtain a solid bare metal connection to ground. If you are handy with a multimeter, you can test the resistance of your connections providing one end of the cable is isolated. Cheers... PS: If your battery is dodgy, then that can cause much the same issues... one good start and then difficulty with subsequent starts. If the battery is borked it will take a surface charge (takes maybe 15-20 minutes to show full), but if the battery is good it should take 8 hours or more to fully charge from flat. Got another known good battery you can try ?