Looking at a car the other day, when pressing on the rear suspension it seems to be a little soft for the first few inches and when it bounces back up is a little slow returning to level on those last few inches. Any ideas?

--

Cheers

Rich

It's leaking oil. Scrap it.

--

Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune.

Rebound is set differently to compression on the dampers, also a dual rate spring will be soft at the top for comfort and progress to harder as the bigger bumps come into play.

What's the car and the age? Could be knackered or fine.

It's a E46 M3 with 100k+ miles on it.

Therefore it the rear subframe is badgered, the springs have snapped, the MAF needs cleaning and it needs four new crank sensors.

One does not simply clean a MAF, Nathanial.

The correct method:

It was a puma, i took it for a spin tonight, clutch high and brakes low, the heater only blew hot and the rear drivers side suspension was NOISY. Nil points.

--

Cheers

Rich

Not sure on the suspension but the rest is rather easily fixed. If you had the time and space you could do it yourself.

Rich B said...

It was a puma, i took it for a spin tonight, clutch high and brakes low, the heater only blew hot and the rear drivers side suspension was NOISY. Nil points.

Clutch = £200-£400 fitted depending on where you go.

Heater = Heater Control valve - well known and straightforward fix, part is about £40 and an hour to fit.

Rear suspension probably top mounts, bushes or mixture of both. Fit polybushes, get top mounts replaced, two hours tops (as the polybushes don't need pressing in, just coating in copper grease and slipped in).

What price? If it's £600, worth a look, £1000 or more, there will be better maintained ones around.

Rich B said...

It was a puma, i took it for a spin tonight, clutch high and brakes low, the heater only blew hot and the rear drivers side suspension was NOISY. Nil points.

but surely the rest of the driving experience was out of this world

--

cheers,

Harry

Too many old sheds.

Beany said...

Rich B said...

It was a puma, i took it for a spin tonight, clutch high and brakes low, the heater only blew hot and the rear drivers side suspension was NOISY. Nil points.

Clutch = £200-£400 fitted depending on where you go.

Heater = Heater Control valve - well known and straightforward fix, part is about £40 and an hour to fit.

Rear suspension probably top mounts, bushes or mixture of both. Fit polybushes, get top mounts replaced, two hours tops (as the polybushes don't need pressing in, just coating in copper grease and slipped in).

What price? If it's £600, worth a look, £1000 or more, there will be better maintained ones around.

Yeah, it was up at £995 - proper fsh, 82k, just had cambelt, xenons (I didn't know the had them?), cd, quick clear, but one slightly dodgy arch, tires not long left, etc...

It just had too many things that could easily be done but all added up to too much - couldn't be bothered with haggling there and then.

--

Cheers

Rich

integrale_evo said...

Rich B said...

It was a puma, i took it for a spin tonight, clutch high and brakes low, the heater only blew hot and the rear drivers side suspension was NOISY. Nil points.

but surely the rest of the driving experience was out of this world

i was too terrified by the never ending break pedal to enjoy it!

--

Cheers

Rich

Rich B said...

Yeah, it was up at £995 - proper fsh, 82k, just had cambelt, xenons (I didn't know the had them?), cd, quick clear, but one slightly dodgy arch, tires not long left, etc...

It just had too many things that could easily be done but all added up to too much - couldn't be bothered with haggling there and then.

Probably made the right decision - if you could have haggled 'em down to maybe £800 it'd be worth a punt all in though.

Also, never came with HIDs - so you'd need a friendly MOT centre. Generally agreed to be well worth having as standard low beam is pretty poor, even with a direct relay and Nightbreakers.

Brakes aren't grabby at the top like most modern cars so do need a bit more prod than you might expect, but I woudn't describe their travel as long, TBH.

Updated February 4, 2013 at 11:13 PM

Beany you're being gay. £30 part from the scrappy, 20 minutes to fit the valve. Clutch can wait until it starts to slip (could just be an adjustment to get some meat back in the pedal)

Do the suspension yourself.

Beany you're being gay. £30 part from the scrappy, 20 minutes to fit the valve.

...and then two hours waiting for recovery after it breaks from being badly removed and old when you got it, and pisses your coolant on the road because you scrimped £10 on a brand new one (can be had for £40 delivered). Never buy a second hand HCV, it's just not worth it.

Clutch can wait until it starts to slip (could just be an adjustment to get some meat back in the pedal)

If it's biting high, it's on it's way out, simple as that. They are self adjusting and once it gets to that point, it's basically time to at least think about replacing it sometime soon. It's no worse to fit than any other FWD car, but it still needs the gearbox dropping which is a pretty daunting task if you don't do it regularly.

Do the suspension yourself.
Completely agree, nothing complicated there, if you have the time, space, tools and knowhow (edit: and common sense - why good spring compressors are a necessity) to do it. It's all Fiesta based, not particularly pricey, and plenty of guides on how to do it all.

I have no idea if Rich is a wizard DIY mech with a big drive and a toolshed that would make most backstreet garages get moist, but if he is, the garage cost ballpark prices are what he'd need for haggling anyway.

And if he isn't, then knowing that the car likely wants £400-500 of work on it (don't forget the tyres - £40 a corner, then add alignment/tracking) from a garage by the end of the summer is probably fairly relevant.

On a car that costs £800, that's probably acceptable - screw cost/repair ratios, you're talking well under £2k for a couple of years of fun motoring. On a car that costs £1200 or more, I'd expect only a couple of those problems, and the rest of the car to be pretty straight. Clean Pumas are out there at that sort of price.

More importantly, worn tyres, clutch and broken HCV that's not been fixed just scream "I only fix it enough to pass the MOT" and as such, that other bits likely want looking at too.

I generally agree that it's a pretty easy car to work on, but if you don't have the ability, space, or even interest, then you need to know the sort of costs involved - and an £800 quickly turns into a £1500 that way. As I know only too well

Updated February 5, 2013 at 12:49 AM

Get a MK1 Focus, its better.

Dave!

--

I came here to drink milk and kick ass..... and i've just finished my milk!!!!

TL;DR.

GraniteV8 said...

Get a MK1 Focus, its better.

Dave!

Id happily have one - if I could find a half decent one. The sub £1k car market is bloody difficult. Full of crafty photography, faked unawareness of faults and downright lies.

--

Cheers

Rich

Beany said...

Do the suspension yourself.
Completely agree, nothing complicated there, if you have the time, space, tools and knowhow (edit: and common sense - why good spring compressors are a necessity) to do it. It's all Fiesta based, not particularly pricey, and plenty of guides on how to do it all.

WTF happens to that strut? Does the spring platform shear off?

You wouldn't normally stick spring compressors on before you take the strut off, so I don't see any "malpractice" there

Updated February 5, 2013 at 10:31 AM

It is a bit of a pain, we paid 1700 for a mechanically sound 1.6 LX with the right spec as literally every other one we saw was really sub par.

Dave!

--

I came here to drink milk and kick ass..... and i've just finished my milk!!!!

mik said...

Beany said...

Do the suspension yourself.
Completely agree, nothing complicated there, if you have the time, space, tools and knowhow (edit: and common sense - why good spring compressors are a necessity) to do it. It's all Fiesta based, not particularly pricey, and plenty of guides on how to do it all.

WTF happens to that strut? Does the spring platform shear off?

You wouldn't normally stick spring compressors on before you take the strut off, so I don't see any "malpractice" there

I concur, but it's worth remembering that springs are stupidly dangerous should they decide to let go for Spurious Unexpected Reason X!

As I say, I generally agree that if you can do the work yourself, you should. But not everybody can, or even wants to - in which case a cheap car can become not very cheap very quickly.

Not that I've got an MOT coming up and I'm crapping myself or owt....