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What have you done to your Elgrand today?

Today I added a 4G internet router to keep the PC online without faffing with a phone hotspot. Connected via ethernet with wifi on the router turned off, using a 1.98€ monthly per gigabyte sim card, so we shall see how well it works with the GPS etc.

Then, with a major service due I ordered spark plugs, PCV, gaskets, including rocker cover, and o-rings. Preparing for the CT due in July.
 
Well in a fit of preventative maintenance I decided it was time to replace the battery, went with the much recommended silver yuasa, delivered by Amazon for a smidge over £100. And I didn't have to leave the sofa to order it.

Fitting straight forward, unclipped the top left electric box, cut off the left hand side abs plastic, refitted and nice new battery.

Dose not show up well in the pics but the old battery was starting to bulge at both ends.View attachment 114328View attachment 114329
I do like a Yuasa battery, got one in the motor home, If the part from @msl parts fixes my gearbox issues I'm going to treat the Elgrand to a new battery
 
I think the Skeggy run is spoiled now, at least on a and b roads anyway, it used to be fun
Every open road is governed to 50mph which is where my bus like to start pulling lol
Lots of average speed cameras on the "twisty bits" these days, I understand it though. Peak & Lake districts, North Wales roads attract the weekend biker who think they are Guy Martin and TT capable. I'm lucky enough to drive some great roads and get paid for it, always put my hand up for the road trips, take the usual routes going up and find some interesting roads on a longer journey home :) . I can be driving anything from a 5-series Beemer to a Luton van, managed to get the back of the Luton to step out of line on a lap of the IOM last year lol.

Finally remember, speed doesn't kill, stopping suddenly may.
 
Is it just me that’s troubled by the misspelling of tyres!
What troubles me is when something is advertised for sale and has its name on it only to be misspelt by the seller. The number of Elgrandes and four birth motor homes I see for sale is disturbing
 
Lots of average speed cameras on the "twisty bits" these days, I understand it though. Peak & Lake districts, North Wales roads attract the weekend biker who think they are Guy Martin and TT capable. I'm lucky enough to drive some great roads and get paid for it, always put my hand up for the road trips, take the usual routes going up and find some interesting roads on a longer journey home :) . I can be driving anything from a 5-series Beemer to a Luton van, managed to get the back of the Luton to step out of line on a lap of the IOM last year lol.

Finally remember, speed doesn't kill, stopping suddenly may.
I understand it too Keith and I’m ok with the limits and with the cameras , I’m just not a happy bunny as to the placement of both
Even the graduated limits have changed to absurdity in some places, you were at one time able to safely slow from a 50 to a 40 to a 30 in comfort, now ( in places) you have the graduations much much tighter and sometimes the use of bends is just stupid.
Why do they allow national limit or 50mph to suddenly hit 30 in a matter of yards

I’m beginning to think wales has it right 😇😇
 
I understand it too Keith and I’m ok with the limits and with the cameras , I’m just not a happy bunny as to the placement of both

Remember in the early 90's when speed cameras were first commonly used, back then they had no speed camera warning signs and the cameras were painted grey and hidden in sneaky positions so you couldn't see them on approach.

Just before then you could get your foot down and in terms of getting caught for speeding only had to worry about police traffic vehicles on raised motorway embankments or the odd unmarked police car, but you knew it wasn't an unmarked police car behind you if it was more than a few years old. Back then driving by night I could make it to Newquay in Cornwall, 350 miles, in 195 minutes, mostly motorway except for 80 miles on the A30 (which had mixed dual and single carriageway back then) and the smaller roads on approach to Newquay. That's maintaining an average speed of close to 108mph over the 195 minutes and this wasn't in a supercar or even sports car but in a 2L Cortina with modded pinto engine and standard 185/70/13 tyres lol. We'd be doing 120+ on the motorways and dual carriageways but also pushing it on A and B road sections. Sometimes a group of likeminded people, who didn't even know each other, would stick together on motorways doing high speed because if police saw a group of speeding cars (in the days before cameras) they could only pull one car up so if one car was pulled up the others got away without being done for speeding, not racing but just sticking together. I'd usually be the odd one out in such groups because other cars in the group, and I still remember one particular group of us that stuck together for a long time maybe 100 miles on the M5, would be stuff like 205 1.9GTI's or fast Mercs etc while I was there keeping up in my modded Cortina lol.
 
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Remember in the early 90's when speed cameras were first commonly used, back then they had no speed camera warning signs and the cameras were painted grey and hidden in sneaky positions so you couldn't see them on approach.

Just before then you could get your foot down and in terms of getting caught for speeding only had to worry about police traffic vehicles on raised motorway embankments or the odd unmarked police car, but you knew it wasn't an unmarked police car behind you if it was more than a few years old. Back then driving by night I could make it to Newquay in Cornwall, 350 miles, in 195 minutes, mostly motorway except for 80 miles on the A30 (which had mixed dual and single carriageway back then) and the smaller roads on approach to Newquay. That's maintaining an average speed of close to 108mpg over the 195 minutes and this wasn't in a supercar or even sports car but in a 2L Cortina with modded pinto engine and standard 185/70/13 tyres lol. We'd doing 120 on the motorways and dual carriageways but also pushing it on A and B road sections. Sometimes a group of likeminded people, who didn't even know each other, would stick together on motorways doing high speed because if police saw a group of speeding cars (in the days before cameras) they could only pull one car up so if one car was pulled up the others got away without being done for speeding.
Those cameras used to stick out like sore thumbs when placed on the verge "nearly behind rubbish bins", well my dad told me they did lol
 
Well I actually got round to doing my headlights it took a long time no more crazing so I thought how can I protect it from happening again I found this on AliExpress it is Automotive TPU Headlight Film Intelligent Light Control Protection Film Photochromic Modification Film so it's clear at night but turns black during the day it reacts to UV light I have only temporary put it on because it's the first time I've ever done it, it will need doing again at some time definitely looks good and the film is very strong you can't pull it apart.

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Meant to ask before, how well do the indicators work when dark? And was 30vm X 1m enough to do everything?
 
Meant to ask before, how well do the indicators work when dark? And was 30vm X 1m enough to do everything?
No problems with the indicators it not that dark you need 2 m x 300 mm because you will use half a metre on each light bottom half and then you need half a metre cut in half to do the top half's which means at least one and a half metres but of course that is of course if you have the the split lights. Otherwise you will need 400mm wide I think for the single light with no bar you probably will get away with 1m length.
Is always better to have bigger and more.
 
No problems with the indicators it not that dark you need 2 m x 300 mm because you will use half a metre on each light bottom half and then you need half a metre cut in half to do the top half's which means at least one and a half metres but of course that is of course if you have the the split lights. Otherwise you will need 400mm wide I think for the single light with no bar you probably will get away with 1m length.
Is always better to have bigger and more.
Cheers. Yeah I have a series 1 with split lights. That's a bummer. I needed to pad out a temu basket so I threw in one 30x100 in. Should have waited.
 
Remember in the early 90's when speed cameras were first commonly used, back then they had no speed camera warning signs and the cameras were painted grey and hidden in sneaky positions so you couldn't see them on approach.

Just before then you could get your foot down and in terms of getting caught for speeding only had to worry about police traffic vehicles on raised motorway embankments or the odd unmarked police car, but you knew it wasn't an unmarked police car behind you if it was more than a few years old. Back then driving by night I could make it to Newquay in Cornwall, 350 miles, in 195 minutes, mostly motorway except for 80 miles on the A30 (which had mixed dual and single carriageway back then) and the smaller roads on approach to Newquay. That's maintaining an average speed of close to 108mph over the 195 minutes and this wasn't in a supercar or even sports car but in a 2L Cortina with modded pinto engine and standard 185/70/13 tyres lol. We'd be doing 120+ on the motorways and dual carriageways but also pushing it on A and B road sections. Sometimes a group of likeminded people, who didn't even know each other, would stick together on motorways doing high speed because if police saw a group of speeding cars (in the days before cameras) they could only pull one car up so if one car was pulled up the others got away without being done for speeding, not racing but just sticking together. I'd usually be the odd one out in such groups because other cars in the group, and I still remember one particular group of us that stuck together for a long time maybe 100 miles on the M5, would be stuff like 205 1.9GTI's or fast Mercs etc while I was there keeping up in my modded Cortina lol.
I remember back in the 80s going to Silverstone, 4up in my 205 GTI (1.6 unfortunately). Around Chesterfield, I tucked in behind a 911 which was behind several 308GTSs, gradually I let the odd Prancing Horse pass and join the gang but stuck with them at daft speed for a Pug. I went my usual way and avoided the daft tailbacks and it was great when I went down the hill and saw the queue of 308s on the other entrance, we were eating a bacon butty before they all got parked
 
I remember back in the 80s going to Silverstone, 4up in my 205 GTI (1.6 unfortunately). Around Chesterfield, I tucked in behind a 911 which was behind several 308GTSs, gradually I let the odd Prancing Horse pass and join the gang but stuck with them at daft speed for a Pug. I went my usual way and avoided the daft tailbacks and it was great when I went down the hill and saw the queue of 308s on the other entrance, we were eating a bacon butty before they all got parked
Posh fecka's on the Wirral hide them in not very convincing horse-boxes, be very aware around Heswall lol
 
Not on my own Elgrands but on customers..

Yesterday I did this with an E52 https://elgrandoc.uk/forum/threads/vibrating-in-gear-standstill-low-idle.44757/#post-641352

I also had an E51 delivered to me on the back of a lorry by a forum member. This is one the owner had me convert to LPG years ago but from the day he bought the Elgrand he said it occasionally put the engine warning light on with error code P0350 (supposedly pointing to a duff coil pack) though it didn't seem to effect how the car drove, no misfires or other symptoms. In attempt to stop the occasional P0350 error code the owner tasked a garage local to him with changing all 6 coil packs but the garage only managed to change 5 coil packs saying they couldn't change one coil pack because 'LPG stuff was in the way'. Heh all they had to do was undo a small clip on a narrow diameter low pressure rubber gas hose (which as an injector outlet pipe so open to atmosphere so had no pressure or gas in it anyway) and they could have changed the coil pack easily enough, the mechanics won't have any qualms about disconnecting much higher pressure petrol pipes or hydraulic lines on vehicles so I don't know why they'd be concerned about disconnecting that little pipe... After the garage's attempt at changing the coil packs the car ran rough, so the owner thought it better to have it trailered to me than to drive it to me in case of a big problem such as a cat failure (which I could better diagnose and probably cure than the garage). The owner also wanted me to change the last coil pack that the garage couldn't/didn't change and have me change the spark plugs while I was at it (if changing the coil packs might as well change the plugs while at it if they've been in there a long time or have done a lot of miles).

The car arrived with me earlier than expected so I had a quick look at it last night and had the misfire fixed in 5 minutes lol. I used NDS2 to find which cylinder was misfiring using the cylinder power test, it was #1 cylinder. I switched that cylinder to run on LPG to see if the fault went away (which could point to a clogged petrol injector on #1), the fault didn't go away. I switched all cylinders to LPG and turned off the petrol pump (if the fault went away now it would point to a stuck open #1 petrol injector), the fault didn't go away so it was looking like an ignition fault. It seems the mechanic tried to change the coil pack on #1, partly removed it (at least slackened it's securing bolt) but either lifted it then didn't reseat it properly so the narrow end of the pack wasn't on the plug or just didn't tighten the bolt up enough so the contact spring in the pack wasn't making contact with the plug. I removed the old coil pack, changed that plug while I was at it, fitted the final new coil pack, and all the problems went away. Then I removed all the other 5 coil packs, changed plugs and refitted those 5 new coil packs. #6 Coil pack bolt was loose too, I expect even if there wasn't a misfire on #1 cylinder there would have been problems with #6 misfiring soon, the garage can't blame LPG stuff for being in the way of #6 coil pack but there is a Nissan bracket a bit in the way for #6 coil pack on 2.5's like this one.

Just about to do a test drive then give the owner the good news.

Got another well known forum member coming for plugs change and flaps threadlocking tomorrow.
 
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Haven’t done much today , or any other day recently but did manage to give the bus a quick rinse ( in between getting a six sorry seven yr olds party stuff ready), can’t have the bus dirty when visiting uncle simon now can I lol
 
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