What are some car-repair jobs you always wished you could do

On Sun, 5 Nov 2017 04:59:33 +0000 (UTC), RS Wood <rswood@is.invalid>
wrote:

rickman wrote:

Because they are making the table to sell at the lowest price while the bin
has a specification. Price, stop buying things based on the price! I bet
you didn't even ask about the materials used in the table. I can assure you
the city who bought the bin asked what it was made of. So the fault,
really, is yours.

While I'm sure the fault is always mine for buying *anything* but garbage
bins that is made of plastic, I'm not as confident as you that the material
is so easy to figure out.

For one, we still don't know what material the garbage bins are made out of
(coating or otherwise).

Most are made of polypropelene.
Some are made of Polyethelene. The table was likely made of ABS orPVC

So asking wouldn't work unless we knew what answer we wanted to hear.
What I'm saying is that it's not so simple.

I'm also assuming that NOBODY here knows what the answer should be.
Do you?

Most are made of polypropelene.
Some are made of Polyethelene. The table was likely made of ABS orPVC

What chemical are we looking for?

When you return the table tell them that... and you will be ignored because
they made a lot of money selling the same crap they sold last year in spite
of the few who returned them.

Luckily, Costco takes anything back (except electronics), even years later.

 

[RS Wood]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

Not so. There is a BIG difference between some good rotors and some
cheap one - bad metalurfy will cause hard spotting, and glazing and
pitting and warping. The trick is finding the good ones -

There are very few things I'm gonna disagree with you on.

Just like the garbage-bin guy, it sounds great to tell me to buy the right
plastic (or coating) after asking what's the plastic (or coating) used -
but in practice that's shit advice because there are a billion kinds of
plastic and you have to know which are the better ones.

Same with rotors.

I've heard everything there is to hear from people telling me about crappy
Chinese rotors. While I generally go Brembo or Meyle, if someone else gave
me a good price, I'd go with them.

If I hear one more guy tell me to buy Zimmerman drilled and slotted, I'm
gonna go postal on him. He's the same guy that insists that rotor warp
caused his brake-related vibration at speed. Run, do not walk, run away
from those people.

Same with anyone who tells me to buy good solid rotors.

I have nothing against quality but you can't tell a good solid rotor from a
bad solid rotor if they're the same thickness, same cooling veins, etc.

You just can't.
How are you gonna know the metallurgy?
Really?

You can't.
You just can't.

Unless you give me a way to tell (other than just saying a brand name),
then I'm not gonna believe the advice ... not because it's not true advice
.... but because it's like saying don't breathe when someone farts.

You can't give advice that is unusable in practice.

Specifically, how are you gonna know a good rotor metallurgy from bad rotor
metallurgy if all you have are two unbranded rotors in your hands that are
the same size and cooling vein arrangement?

> Or retractor tools for rear disc brakes with integral e-brakes.

I forgot about that tool. Yup. $10 and you have a brake-pad-sized C clamp
that pushes the piston(s) back into the calipers. Thanks for reminding me
of that tool. I only have one, which is fine - but someday I'll buy a
second one so that I can do both wheels on an axle at the same time.

No, some rotors DO warp. So do some drums. Most "warped" rotors,
however, are either pitted or hard spotted.

Nope. But I'm not ever going to say that a rotor "can't" warp (because it
can).

But I will tell you I have heard ten thousand times that some idiot says
his rotors warped and each time I asked him how he *measured* it, and guess
what?

Never once in my life have I found a single person who has *measured* the
warp.

You know why?
They don't even know *how* to measure rotor warp.
They don't have the tools to measure rotor warp

(Hint: It requires a flat benchtop and feeler gauges and it's not hard -
but they don't know that because they didn't measure a single thing.)

Nobody but nobody who claims their rotors warped actually measured a single
thing. They lied. Worse, they don't even realize they lied. It's like the
original sin. They have it and they don't even know it because they were
born with it.

Street rotors just don't get hot enough to warp.
They just don't.

It's pad deposition I tell ya. Now it could be other things too.
But I'll betcha 90% of the time it's uneven pad deposition.
And 0.0000000000000001% of the time, it's actually rotor warp.

What makes the morons think they're geniuses is that the short-term
solution to both pad deposition and rotor warp is the same.

It's the long-term solution that is different.

That is, while the short term solution to both is the same, the long term
solution to rotor warp is completely different than the long term solution
to pad deposition.

And that's the shame because these two solutions are nothing alike even
though most people do the wrong solution since street rotors just don't
warp (in practice) because they can't get hot enough to warp.

That's the kind of stuff you learn by doing the job yourself.

The kind of stuff you learn working on hundreds of cars a year for 1/4
century, and supervizing a shopfull of mechanics for a decade.

Nope. Street rotors don't warp in practice.
They don't get hot enough to warp.
Look it up.

I'm not gonna disagree with you on too many things, but if ANYONE is gonna
tell me their street rotors warped, I want them to tell me at what
temperature steel gets that flimsy and I want them to tell me how they
MEASURED the warp (because never once have I found anyone who said they
warped who knew those two answers).

Sure you can *LOOK* up the answer.
But they never did the measurement so they can't ever tell me offhand what
I already know they don't know.

 

On Sun, 5 Nov 2017 05:13:47 +0000 (UTC), RS Wood <rswood@is.invalid>
wrote:

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

The aluminum alloying science has made leaps in the last 50 years -
and so has steelmaking and heat treating. Never heard of Cryo
treatment years ago. Never heard of powdered metal either. Lots more
chromium and moly and cobalt etc used in exotic steels today too.

Lots of good stuff there.

Synthetic rubbers and plastics have also improved in thousands of
ways in the last 50 years. This means seals , belts, hoses, etc can
ALL last MUCH longer than their older counterparts.

Good stuff there too.

Emission management , as I noted previously, does a lot more than make
cleaner air. How do you think we get as much horsepower out of a 2
liter engine today as we got out of 5 or 6 liter engines in the very
recent past???

Ok. Good stuff there too.

The oil pressure sensor has nothing to do with it until the engine
fails. The coolant temp sensors are much more accurate than they used
to be, and now they actually do something more than telling you if the
engine is overheating. The oil level sensor is also an afterthought
and basically un-necessary - as most engines will go over 3000 miles
without using ANY measurable amount of oil.

Gotta agree. Mine leaks not a drop.

Doesn't burn any either - and it's 0w20, not 20w50.

You don't see it because you do not understand all the implications
of fuel mixture control.

Can't disagree with you.

There again, you have no comprehension of the inticacies of corrosion
control and metal primers etc - not to mention seam sealers. Goes WAY
beyond the surface coating, color and shine.

Gotta be true because rust buckets don't seem to exist anymore.

Except Mazdas, Chevys, and Dodge trucks - - -

It's more the prep than the paint - but the paint has REALLY changed
in the last 20 years - more rhan in the previous 100.

See above. No rust buckets anymore so there is truth in there somewhere.

The timing changed when the points wore, among other things.

Yeah. I forgot. It has been, oh, how long since we adjusted timing?
Decades at the very least.

And you don't think plastics and rubbers have changed appreciably for
the better?
Maybe. I still see lots and lots of buna o-rings that should be viton.

Even back in the early seventies I was using wires that allowed me to
run my old Chrysler products with a carwash hose trained on the
ignition system. The cheapest wires today are better that those top
quality "space age" wires.

Gotta agree with you. Wires don't even exist much at all but those that do
exist, seem to last a long time nowadays. We used to replace ignition wires
with every second or third tuneup, as I recall.

I even bought the set where you cut them and made them to fit.
Dumb idea because they stunk the most.

And unleaded gas is one of the main reasons this is possible today.

I don't know enough to disagree.
Detergents (polyetheramines) probably helped too, Techron be known.

The platinum is a large part of this - you never saw platinum plugs
in the past. Iridium finewire plugs were the hot item for snowmobiles
and bikes back then - and they were PRICEY.

Must be the platinum because a plug is a simple thing.
I'm sure engineers fret about every little thing, but pretty much you buy
the right one and put it in. I never found anything useful about changing
the heat ratings. It's amazing to me that we don't gap them anymore though.

They now come pre-gapped - and the gap is HUGE - .060 to .085"
instead of .028 to .035 - so accuracy is relative.

They don't wear/erode any more, so you don't "re-gap" them any more,
By the time the gap has changed the combustion seals are getting iffy
too, so younjust replace them.

You'd wonder why the gap mattered in the days of yore and now it doesn't
matter. I don't get that.

With 20,000 volts, the gap was critical With 60,000 - not so much!!!

Believe me, as someone who worked on Toyotas back in the very early
seventies, quality was not their strong point back then They rusted
like a ford (or worse) and they had metalurgy problems in their
aluminum heads, and a lot of other places. What made the difference is
they learned from their mistakes - the Japs have never really been
inventors - but they can refine a poor design into something fantastic
- that's what they do exremely well.

Yeah. I forgot about my "Z" cars (Datsun days). They were rust buckets.

Most cars were junk at 10 years back then. People didn't put on the
miles they do today, generally speaking, but I've put a LOT of
vehicles over the 200,000 mile mark in the past.

Yep. 10 years was about it. Now it's 20 years.
Double.

Or even 30

But if they have to work too hard, the bigger engine won't need as
much repair - so it sometimes more than ballances out.

Not gonna take you up on this one. There's no such thing as 'working
harder'. Just not gonna fly with me. The torque curve is the torque curve
and the gears do the fixing of that for me.

When I drive a 2.3 liter 4 cyl ranger down the 401 , my foot is
pretty much on the floor, the manifold vacuum is zero, and the engine
is working it's poor tail off. The 4 liter V6, is just loafing,
throttle barely open - manifold pressure about 13-15 inches - barely
working. A LOT easier on the engine. The gearing is such that the 4
cyl is turning 3000 RPM, the 4 liter 2200, and a 5.7 liter iforce
Tundra about 1200 RPM at the same road speed.

Makes a BIG difference on engine wear and life.

As for "working harder" - specific power output - the amount of
torque and horsepower per cubic inch of displacement -

Call it whatbyou may, but a small engine "works a lot harder" than a
big engine to do the same work. - and generally doesn't last as long.

The SIZE is physically different.
I'm not gonna believe a small engine has to 'work harder' than a big engine
and so it won't last as long.

Nope. That's the one thing you're going to have to prove to me.
(The rest I believe you on.)

She doesn't have a "honey-do" list that, in her mind, takes priority
over the car repairs?? "you haven't got it fixed YET???" -

Yeah. But I don't think she even remembers my name anymore.


At least my oldest is back in the country most of the time now -
even though she's only been "home" for about 3 weeks since the middle
of September and she'll only be "home " for about 15 days between now
and Christmas. "home" being about 5 miles from here. She will be in
Africa and Asia the rest of the time (work)

That's another thing. My kids have been flying to other countries since
they were born. When did YOU first leave the country? I think I did when I
was in my thirties. Maybe late twenties. Boy oh boy though, did the
airplanes have service!

I left Canada for Africa at 21. I had been to the USA many times by
then. I was out of country for 2 years.

My daghter turned 16 in France and had travelled to Mexico several
times before that. She was an exchange student in France in Grade 10

But that's another difference in the days of yore!

Yup - no service on planes now unless you pay for it through the nose
!!

 

[RS Wood]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

It doesn't need plastic inserts.
It doesn't need a ratcheting mechanism.
It doesn't need replaceable heads.

All that stuff makes it BIGGER (which is bad when it matters).
All that stuff makes it WEAKER (which is bad when it matters).
All that stuff makes it less reliable (which is bad too).

KISS.
I call that crap "knuckle busters"

Yup. It's gonna break when they are applying the most force.

All the kinky tools I just smile at when I see them in the store.

Basic stuff for me.

The only kinky things I need are the slimmer wrenches, the longer ones, the
curved ones, the angled ones, etc., all of which are for the toughest jobs
and where I generally buy them as oneoffs as needed.

Adjustable wrenches should be banned as a menace to society.

 

[RS Wood]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

A good low impedence multitester, and occaisionally a "power
injector", and occaisionally a logic tester (generally part of the
power injector)

I have a logic tester for TTL circuits (TI 7100 series stuff, as I recall),
but nothing for a car's "logic".

A good Fluke DMM is de rigueur though, I agree, for any homeowner.

And an attachment to measure the starter amperage.

But my point is that there doesn't seem to be a lot of "new fangled" tools
that we need to work on for a car.

It's the same old tools, with minor exceptions of emissions and ECU/DMU/ABS
control, isn't it?

 

[RS Wood]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

Gotta agree. Mine leaks not a drop.

Doesn't burn any either - and it's 0w20, not 20w50.

The whole viscosity thing is a red herring where I live.
You probably live in really cold areas, where it matters.

Where I live, a straight 30 or 40 would work just fine.

The whole "W" thing only lasts for a minute or two so it's gotta be cold to
matter even the slightest bit.

Gotta be true because rust buckets don't seem to exist anymore.

Except Mazdas, Chevys, and Dodge trucks - - -

Funny, but I never had any of them.
I never had a truck though.
Just cars and vans and SUVs, and, oh, yeah, station wagons in the days of
yore.

They now come pre-gapped - and the gap is HUGE - .060 to .085"
instead of .028 to .035 - so accuracy is relative.

Yeah. Plugs got easier.
a. They last forever
b. You don't gap them anymore (except in home tools)

They don't wear/erode any more, so you don't "re-gap" them any more,
By the time the gap has changed the combustion seals are getting iffy
too, so younjust replace them.

And they're still cheap as they always were.

> With 20,000 volts, the gap was critical With 60,000 - not so much!!!
Yup.
High voltage is nice.
You'd think it would wear the metal, but with platinum, it doesn't.

Not gonna take you up on this one. There's no such thing as 'working
harder'. Just not gonna fly with me. The torque curve is the torque curve
and the gears do the fixing of that for me.

When I drive a 2.3 liter 4 cyl ranger down the 401 , my foot is
pretty much on the floor, the manifold vacuum is zero, and the engine
is working it's poor tail off. The 4 liter V6, is just loafing,
throttle barely open - manifold pressure about 13-15 inches - barely
working. A LOT easier on the engine. The gearing is such that the 4
cyl is turning 3000 RPM, the 4 liter 2200, and a 5.7 liter iforce
Tundra about 1200 RPM at the same road speed.

The I4 and V6 engines are COMPLETELY DIFFERENT engines.
Take Toyota's 3RZFE and the 5RZFE (from memory).
Completely different engines.
Both last forever.

Sure, one makes for more BHP, but in reality the gearing handles all that.
Besides, did I mention they are COMPLETELY DIFFERENT engines?

You can't say one "lasts longer" than the other when all you're comparing
is the external size of the engine.

All I'm saying is that the I4 leaves more room in the engine bay than does
the V6. You don't argue with that, so we can accept that as a fact.

Now you're saying the I4 works harder and hence won't last as long, but I
just don't take that on face value because I might not have mentioned this
yet, but they're completely different engines.

Whether they last longer or not will depend on those billion completely
different things, and not on whether they're working harder cruising at
60mph on the freeway or pulling into or out of your driveway.

How long an engine lasts has more to do with how many cold starts it has
than what you call "working harder".

Besides, I might not have mentioned this, but they're completely different
engines, so you can't compare one thing and say that one thing will make
one last longer or shorter. You just can't.

At least not with a serious look on your face you can't.

> Makes a BIG difference on engine wear and life.

Nope. Not gonna buy that elixer today.
Logic prevails.

There are so many OTHER factors that matter far more to engine life than
the size of the engine displacement.

Just too many.

As for "working harder" - specific power output - the amount of
torque and horsepower per cubic inch of displacement -

I'm not gonna argue that the V6 has develops more BHP than the I4 but I am
gonna let you know a little secret.

Two little secrets in fact.
1. They are completely different engines.
2. Even if they were the same engine, there are so many factors that matter
MORE to engine life than displacement that displacement isn't a major
factor in engine life anyway.

Now if you told me one engine had 10K cold starts and 20K short trips,
while the other only had 1K cold starts and had mostly long trips, then
*that* would be a factor in engine life.

But even then, it would only be one of a zillion factors.
Displacement is just not gonna be a major determinant in engine life.

Call it whatbyou may, but a small engine "works a lot harder" than a
big engine to do the same work. - and generally doesn't last as long.

You can sell that one to other people. Just not to me.
Displacement is just not gonna be a major determinant in engine life.

But that's another difference in the days of yore!
Yup - no service on planes now unless you pay for it through the nose

And even then, you still get no service.

 

[RS Wood]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

The platinum is NOT plating - it is a platinum chip welded to the
(usually copper cored) steel electrode. Many have plat chips on the
ground electrode now too.

Good to know, I didn't even know to *think* about how they did it.
Thanks!

 

[RS Wood]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

> I gave up on patching mufflers after the first one.

I agree also.
I used to patch the junction between the pipes with that white stuff.
Yuck.
Never worked for more than a week (to get through inspection).

I did patch a holed gas tank once.
Amazingly, it worked for the remaining life of the car.

 

[RS Wood]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

I have not changed an exhaust system or a muffler in about 20 years -
and my current vehicles are 16 and 22 years old. But then I buy REAL
cars that come with stainless exhausts from the factory.

My experience exactly.

 

[RS Wood]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

> Most have been stainless steel for over 20 years.

I agree with you on this.
I haven't had, AFAIK, a non SS exhaust in decades.

 

[RS Wood]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

Most are made of polypropelene.
Some are made of Polyethelene. The table was likely made of ABS orPVC

If it's that simple, what happened to the "UV coating" someone suggested?

Anyway, if it's that simple, I'm all for it.

Just like getting oil is simple (you aim for the lowest spread in viscosity
and the highest SX rating alphabetically) and just like getting pads is
simple (you aim for the highest cold/hot friction you can get) I'm all for
simplicity in specifications.

So your recommendation is:
a. Polypropylene or Polyethylene
b. but not ABS or Polyvinylchloride

If that works, I'm ok with that.
Simplicity is good. When it exists.

Still ... what about UV coating?

For example, eyeglasses get complex when it comes to UV coatings because
some plastics don't need it while others do (although I always argue that
naked eyeballs don't come with UV coatings so why do people with glasses
need them when people without glasses don't need them?).

 

[rickman]

RS Wood wrote on 11/5/2017 12:59 AM:

rickman wrote:

Because they are making the table to sell at the lowest price while the bin
has a specification. Price, stop buying things based on the price! I bet
you didn't even ask about the materials used in the table. I can assure you
the city who bought the bin asked what it was made of. So the fault,
really, is yours.

While I'm sure the fault is always mine for buying *anything* but garbage
bins that is made of plastic, I'm not as confident as you that the material
is so easy to figure out.

For one, we still don't know what material the garbage bins are made out of
(coating or otherwise).

So asking wouldn't work unless we knew what answer we wanted to hear.
What I'm saying is that it's not so simple.

I'm also assuming that NOBODY here knows what the answer should be.
Do you?

What chemical are we looking for?

I'd have to do a little digging, but it's not an impossible question to
answer. Google is your friend, but more importantly, you won't get a useful
answer unless you can find out what plastic the table is made of before you
buy it.

I am currently designing something that will be used outside and needs to be
clear. Initially I was going to use polycarbonate as it is very strong.
But it is not very tolerant of UV light unless coated, so I'm going with
acrylic which withstands UV without coatings.

When you return the table tell them that... and you will be ignored because
they made a lot of money selling the same crap they sold last year in spite
of the few who returned them.

Luckily, Costco takes anything back (except electronics), even years later.

I know, I returned a lawn mower 10 years later. In my defense, it actually
quit after two years and I got ticked off and shoved it in a shed. I
couldn't find anyone I trusted who could work on a Honda mower, so I hired
someone to mow the lawn. Eventually I cleaned out the shed and took the
mower back to Costco. They didn't accept it back without... discussion, but
I repeatedly referred them to their own policy written on the wall I was
facing. So don't think Costco will honor the return policy completely.

I used to patch mufflers, like we all did.

Illegal because the patches are crap and the rest of the muffler won't last
another six months. My mufflers don't get leaks, the flange breaks off on
the pipe. Try fixing that.

I don't disagree. I hated working on mufflers. That was before my gas
welding days.

With a gas welder, removing mufflers would have been a *lot* easier.

Because it isn't worth it. When any part of the exhaust system goes bad you
are better off replacing it all.

Not gonna disagree. It's like replacing "just" the water pump. Once you rip
all that stuff off, you may as well do the thermostat, hoses, radiator,
cap, overflow tank, etc.


I don't even look at the exhaust anymore, it's that reliable.
I thought the whole thing from the cat back was stainless steel.
Is it not?

No, it's not. It's still the same steel that lasts around 4 years.

My bimmer is approaching 20 years on the same exhaust system.

Maybe they used stainless, but you paid for it, no?

--

Rick C

Viewed the eclipse at Wintercrest Farms,
on the centerline of totality since 1998

 

[rickman]

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote on 11/5/2017 1:27 AM:

On Sun, 5 Nov 2017 00:40:49 -0400, rickman <gnuarm@gmail.com> wrote:

RS Wood wrote on 11/4/2017 11:55 PM:
rickman wrote:

The only plastic that I know of which lasts forever outside is whatever
plastic the garbage company uses for those blue, green, and gray wheeled
bins!

That's your standard? Things have to last "forever"???

I leave plastic stuff outside and within a year or two, it crumbles in my
hands. So two years is too short.

Meanwhile, the garbage bins last forever outside.

Why can they make a garbage bin last forever but not a Costco picnic table?

Because they are making the table to sell at the lowest price while the bin
has a specification. Price, stop buying things based on the price! I bet
you didn't even ask about the materials used in the table. I can assure you
the city who bought the bin asked what it was made of. So the fault,
really, is yours.


I wish *all* plastic things were made out of *that* plastic, especially
pool tools.

You can ask about the materials when you buy stuff. It's not the plastic,
but whether the plastic has UV resistance additives.

Is that what makes those garbage bins last forever outside?
If so, that's what I want in my picnic table from Costco!
And in all the pool equipment.

When you return the table tell them that... and you will be ignored because
they made a lot of money selling the same crap they sold last year in spite
of the few who returned them.


I still have to replace the exhaust system ever four years. That part
hasn't changed. If you know anything about why they fail, you would
understand the only alternative is stainless steel which is *much* more
expensive.

I used to patch mufflers, like we all did.

Illegal because the patches are crap and the rest of the muffler won't last
another six months. My mufflers don't get leaks, the flange breaks off on
the pipe. Try fixing that.


I do it all the time. Cut off the flanges and fit a pipe over the
joint. Clamp or weld the sleave. Use stainless pipe and stainless
clamps. The flanges rust off because they are welded with mild steel
amd/or are not passivated after welding.

And we all know what a pain it was to get the old ones off.
Forget about those u-bolt nuts ever twisting off.

But I haven't replaced a muffler in decades.
Why?
I'm not sure why.

Because it isn't worth it. When any part of the exhaust system goes bad you
are better off replacing it all.


You could get a stainless steel exhaust system the first time
you replace it, but you would need to keep the vehicle for twenty more years
to make it pay off.

I don't even look at the exhaust anymore, it's that reliable.
I thought the whole thing from the cat back was stainless steel.
Is it not?

No, it's not. It's still the same steel that lasts around 4 years.

What crap are you driving??? Most have been stainless steel for over
20myears.

A 20 year old Toyota T100 with 240,000 miles. Is that your typical crap?

--

Rick C

Viewed the eclipse at Wintercrest Farms,
on the centerline of totality since 1998

 

[The Real Bev]

On 11/04/2017 10:24 PM, clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

On Sat, 4 Nov 2017 21:39:37 -0700, The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com
wrote:

On 11/04/2017 05:49 PM, clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:
On Sat, 4 Nov 2017 16:33:57 -0700, The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com
wrote:

I cut my hands to ribbons on the first water pump -- the fan (which had
to be removed) was attached with at least 4 bolts which could only move
1/4 turn without repositioning the 12-point box wrench, the only thing
that would fit. I swore I'd never do that again no matter how much it
cost -- until I found out how much it DID cost. Some of us are too
cheap for our own good.

KD makes a special tool for that - at the value O put on skin and
suffering, cheap at twice the price

30+ years ago. Ratchet box wrench?
Nope - just a real shallow socket on a steel bar about 1/8 x 1/2 x
16"

I may have seen a tool like that somewhere and wondered what it was for :-(

I could only move the wrench in a <90 degree arc before it bumped into
immovable objects and I think that 16" might have been too long -- I
might have thought of slipping a hunk of pipe over the wrench if that
was possible or helpful. Putting the wrench on the bolt was the hard
part -- my fingers were right down between the fan and the bolts.

Never again!

--
Cheers, Bev
"The almost universal access to higher education here in the US has
ruined a lot of potentially good manual laborers." -- Bob Hunt

 

[RS Wood]

rickman wrote:

I'd have to do a little digging, but it's not an impossible question to
answer. Google is your friend, but more importantly, you won't get a useful
answer unless you can find out what plastic the table is made of before you
buy it.

That's my point. I have bought stuff from TAP Plastics for example, and
that's all they sell, and even THEY often have trouble telling me what the
plastic is that I'm buying.

Not only do you have to know what plastic (and coating) you want, but you
also have to ask someone who knows what they are selling.

It works for eyeglasses, for some reason, but I doubt it's gonna be easy to
figure out the plastic on anything else that easily (at least not when
you're in the store).

I am currently designing something that will be used outside and needs to be
clear. Initially I was going to use polycarbonate as it is very strong.
But it is not very tolerant of UV light unless coated, so I'm going with
acrylic which withstands UV without coatings.

I get your point, which is that there are plastics which handle the
sunlight (which I agree since my garbage cans handle it better than anythin
else I've ever seen that is stored outside).

You just have to know the answer.
And the people who sell the stuff have to know the answer.

 

[The Real Bev]

On 11/04/2017 10:27 PM, RS Wood wrote:

The Real Bev wrote:

One more thing, the word "brake warp" or "rotor warp" is banished from your
vocabulary. Anyone who uses those two words, is simply proving they're an
utter fool.

BUT you do need to replace the rotors (wrecking yard is probably OK) if
you kept putting off changing the pads until they stopped squealing and
the backing plates started grinding deep (1/4") grooves into the rotors.
Amazingly enough, braking worked just fine until the hogging-in started.

I'm confused by what you wrote, especially in context with the words "warp"
when rotors never warp (or almost never, and never in terms of mattering).

Just an aside.

> So anyone who *thinks* rotors warp, is an idiot.

It might have happened a little on my mom's (end eventually mine) 88
Caddy. Slight vibration when braking, but they felt OK. Until 2 of the
calipers seized 8 years later, of course :-( POS, I'll never own
another GM product.

The replacing of rotors is also determined by idiots most of the time
because people don't have the concept of measuring the thickness because
many people don't have the concept of owning a micrometer.

I can't count the number of times I've heard someone say to replace the
rotors on the second pad change, where the real answer is to replace the
rotors when they are worn down to the minimum thickness (everything else
being ok).

In general, the rotors are ok except for pad deposition which is solely a
driver-caused problem (long story later if people ask).

Sure, grooves can be there but gouges have to be the size of the Grand
Canyon to matter (just look up the specs, you'll see) so grooves are, in
reality, not what makes rotors into paperweights.

These looked like a high-school first-time lathe project. Each of the
steel projections on the backing plate had dug out its own trench.
Godawful noise, but the brakes still worked fine so I figured I could
wait another month :-( (Not the Caddy, this was a 68/9 LTD.)

--
Cheers, Bev
"The almost universal access to higher education here in the US has
ruined a lot of potentially good manual laborers." -- Bob Hunt

 

[rickman]

RS Wood wrote on 11/5/2017 1:29 AM:

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

Most are made of polypropelene.
Some are made of Polyethelene. The table was likely made of ABS orPVC

If it's that simple, what happened to the "UV coating" someone suggested?

Anyway, if it's that simple, I'm all for it.

Just like getting oil is simple (you aim for the lowest spread in viscosity
and the highest SX rating alphabetically) and just like getting pads is
simple (you aim for the highest cold/hot friction you can get) I'm all for
simplicity in specifications.

So your recommendation is:
a. Polypropylene or Polyethylene
b. but not ABS or Polyvinylchloride

If that works, I'm ok with that.
Simplicity is good. When it exists.

Still ... what about UV coating?

For example, eyeglasses get complex when it comes to UV coatings because
some plastics don't need it while others do (although I always argue that
naked eyeballs don't come with UV coatings so why do people with glasses
need them when people without glasses don't need them?).

Do some research. Polyethylene is an incomplete description. It can be
high density (milk cartons and canoes/kayaks and some lawn furniture) or low
density (and a few other newer, specialty forms). Both types are
susceptible to UV damage unless stabilizers are added.

I'm not so familiar with polypropylene and UV. I know most plastics are
susceptible unless additives are used. There are lots of references
available... read!

--

Rick C

Viewed the eclipse at Wintercrest Farms,
on the centerline of totality since 1998

 

[Xeno]

On 5/11/2017 9:37 AM, RS Wood wrote:

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

How can you do a proper alignment if you don't load the suspension?

You can adjust it with the tie-rod on the bench if you want to and
are smart enough to figure out how many turns it takes. Only the
measurement requires the suspension to be loaded.

Thanks for answering as I know that the measurement is what takes loading
of the suspension.

I guess, at home, time isn't the issue, but it is a pain to load, measure,
unload, adjust, load, measure (repeat).

Then again, it doesn't really matter if it takes a week to do the alignment
as it's not a critical issue if it's close enough and not driven for long.

Of course, it has to be checked again after doing the camber and caster.

I forget the proper order from high school mechanics class.
I think it's either caster, then camber, then toe?
Or it might (offhand) be the other way around?

If toe is last, then unloading, adjusting, reloading makes more sense.

Toe is last. Adjustments to camber will alter toe. Adjustments to toe
will not alter camber.

--

Xeno

 

[Xeno]

On 5/11/2017 11:43 AM, clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

On Sat, 4 Nov 2017 22:37:59 +0000 (UTC), RS Wood <rswood@is.invalid
wrote:

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

How can you do a proper alignment if you don't load the suspension?

You can adjust it with the tie-rod on the bench if you want to and
are smart enough to figure out how many turns it takes. Only the
measurement requires the suspension to be loaded.

Thanks for answering as I know that the measurement is what takes loading
of the suspension.

I guess, at home, time isn't the issue, but it is a pain to load, measure,
unload, adjust, load, measure (repeat).

Then again, it doesn't really matter if it takes a week to do the alignment
as it's not a critical issue if it's close enough and not driven for long.

Of course, it has to be checked again after doing the camber and caster.

That's why you set the camber and caster FIRST!!!!

I forget the proper order from high school mechanics class.
I think it's either caster, then camber, then toe?
Or it might (offhand) be the other way around?

If toe is last, then unloading, adjusting, reloading makes more sense.

BTW, how's the camber scrub issue going with your vehicle?

Get it sorted yet?

--

Xeno

 

[Xeno]

On 5/11/2017 2:32 PM, RS Wood wrote:

clare@snyder.on.ca wrote:

For example, in the olden days, how many rotted out "mufflers" did you
replace compared to today?
No lead and phosphorous in the gas makes a BIG difference - as does
more complete combustion. Stainless steel doesn't hurt either.

Yet there is a lot more aluminum in engines nowadays.

I don't see how the lead matters although we all went through the phase
where we switched from leaded cars to lead-free cars and had to change
pumps in the process.

I still don't see how the *gas* has anything to do with engines lasting
longer. Maybe it does, but I don't see the connection.

Positive crankcase ventilation systems were the start of the
improvements that led to long oil life, hence longer engine life. Add to
that better metals, better combustion processes, fuel injection,
computer control, electronic ignition systems.

Getting rid of the carburetor was a big improvement.

--

Xeno