TR Forums

ludi wrote:

First time I've actually seen this. H1 headlight bulb, less than 2 weeks young, melted wide open yet with no visible filament damage. My guess is that it had a chip in the globe or a spot of grease on it when it was installed:



Anyway, the light is repaired now.

What was the country of origin?

anotherengineer wrote:

What was the country of origin?

Uuhhhhh....China, I guess?

This was a Sylvania-branded bulb purchased as part of a 2-pack.

Got the engine management light in my car to go out today. The only problem with this is that the cause was a bit embarrassing, I hadn't changed the spark plugs in probably at least 3 years.

The hardest part of the job was getting the stupid ht leads off the old plugs, which of course are buried under the intake system so you can barely reach them. Is there some special tool for this job? I ended up making a sort of noose with wire to hook round the caps so I could pull them out.

The old plugs were pretty nasty, all of them had a lot of sooty crap on them, I assume from me having driven 50 miles in limp home mode but only two of them looked really worn which seems a bit odd. For now though it's running better than I can remember, maybe the little bit more I paid for NGK over Bosch this time around actually made a difference.

Yes, there is a specific spark plug socket that has a spring on it and a long extension.

cheesyking wrote:

Maybe the little bit more I paid for NGK over Bosch this time around actually made a difference.

Modern electronic ignitions are so powerful that spark plugs have to be pretty well shot before you notice much difference in performance. Back in the old days, you had to keep them gapped correctly on a frequent maintenance schedule or the old anemic ignition systems couldn't generate a spark strong enough to bridge the gap. Funny thing, I had a 1990 Honda Accord. I replaced the original plugs with a set of the recently-introduced high-dollar Bosch platinum plugs. It didn't like them at all. I then installed a new cheap set of the basic NGK plugs like it had from the factory, and it ran like a top. Even though both sets of plugs claimed the same temperature rating and operating range, they performed very differently in that particular vehicle.

JustAnEngineer wrote:

cheesyking wrote:

Maybe the little bit more I paid for NGK over Bosch this time around actually made a difference.

Modern electronic ignitions are so powerful that spark plugs have to be pretty well shot before you notice much difference in performance. Back in the old days, you had to keep them gapped correctly on a frequent maintenance schedule or the old anemic ignition systems couldn't generate a spark strong enough to bridge the gap. Funny thing, I had a 1990 Honda Accord. I replaced the original plugs with a set of the recently-introduced high-dollar Bosch platinum plugs. It didn't like them at all. I then installed a new cheap set of the basic NGK plugs like it had from the factory, and it ran like a top. Even though both sets of plugs claimed the same temperature rating and operating range, they performed very differently in that particular vehicle.

I've been told more than once that the older Japanese cars behaved better with NGK or Denso and not so much with Bosch.

Sunday was spent cleaning the Tail light of my VW POLO. Rain water had somehow entered taillight casing through the leaked rubber housing, shorting all the bulbs.

Jigar wrote:

Sunday was spent cleaning the Tail light of my VW POLO. Rain water had somehow entered taillight casing through the leaked rubber housing, shorting all the bulbs.

That happened on my Chrysler mini-van a few years ago. Corroded the bulb contacts in the housing...

cheesyking wrote:

Got the engine management light in my car to go out today. The only problem with this is that the cause was a bit embarrassing, I hadn't changed the spark plugs in probably at least 3 years.

I guess it depends a lot on the car, but I just changed mine, after 7 years and about 110k miles. The change was done for scheduled maintenance reasons, not any great performance degradation.

--SS

SecretSquirrel wrote:

cheesyking wrote:

Got the engine management light in my car to go out today. The only problem with this is that the cause was a bit embarrassing, I hadn't changed the spark plugs in probably at least 3 years.

I guess it depends a lot on the car, but I just changed mine, after 7 years and about 110k miles. The change was done for scheduled maintenance reasons, not any great performance degradation.

--SS

Interesting, this and JAE's post makes me wonder if there's something wrong with the ignition on my car since only two of the plugs had worn heavily. I doubt I'll investigate it though as the car is now 18 years old and I'm pretty sure these new plugs will "see it out".

JustAnEngineer wrote:

Modern electronic ignitions are so powerful that spark plugs have to be pretty well shot before you notice much difference in performance. Back in the old days, you had to keep them gapped correctly on a frequent maintenance schedule or the old anemic ignition systems couldn't generate a spark strong enough to bridge the gap. Funny thing, I had a 1990 Honda Accord. I replaced the original plugs with a set of the recently-introduced high-dollar Bosch platinum plugs. It didn't like them at all. I then installed a new cheap set of the basic NGK plugs like it had from the factory, and it ran like a top. Even though both sets of plugs claimed the same temperature rating and operating range, they performed very differently in that particular vehicle.

I had an 03 Subaru where an oil seal went on one of the spark plug holes through the rocker cover. I didn't notice anything until the engine got a misfire only at certain rpms and under certain loads. When I took the plug out the earth electrode was gone - melted off somewhere, and the centre electrode just slid out of the middle of the plug. I couldn't believe that thing was firing at all, but it was working 90% of the time.

Platinum and iridium plugs are about making the plugs last longer by not wearing down as much. Copper is a better conductor and with the extra cost of the exotic metals they make the electrodes tiny points. This means that copper plugs give you a hotter, fatter spark but will need replacing sooner. If your spark system is weak then the copper ones and frequent changes are the way to go.

Many years ago I had a 1981 Rx-7, that thing went through plugs like crazy with the hot rotary engine design.

I'm notorious for over striking splitting mauls (I blame snow and slippery gloves) so I decided this weekend to fix it once and for all.

I drilled and hammered out the old hickory handle then took a section of 2" schedule 40 black pipe and heated and hammered one end into an oval to fit the eye of the maul, then welded the living crap out of it using some old stick electrodes with the flux knocked off as a bit of filler where the pipe and the maul eye didn't quite line up. It's exceptionally heavy now, but the added weight makes it a monster for splitting and I won't be breaking any more handles any time soon.

SuperSpy wrote:

I'm notorious for over striking splitting mauls

I bought a fiberglass handled maul a while back and it's lasted many years without a hint of damage. Wood handles were not ideal.

That said, if you split a lot of wood (we burn wood for primary heat in Wisconsin winters) I'd HIGHLY recommend getting a hydraulic wood splitter (looks like there are electric ones now also, but I don't have experience with them).

just brew it! wrote:

Jigar wrote:

Sunday was spent cleaning the Tail light of my VW POLO. Rain water had somehow entered taillight casing through the leaked rubber housing, shorting all the bulbs.

That happened on my Chrysler mini-van a few years ago. Corroded the bulb contacts in the housing...

It also happened on my old Fold Contour. I first used some rubber sealant to try to plug up any gaps. When that didn't work I drilled some small holes in the bottom of the tail light lens. The holes "solved" it for me in that the tail lights quit getting shorted, but I never figured out how water was getting in there in the first place.

DPete27 wrote:

SuperSpy wrote:

I'm notorious for over striking splitting mauls

I bought a fiberglass handled maul a while back and it's lasted many years without a hint of damage. Wood handles were not ideal.

That said, if you split a lot of wood (we burn wood for primary heat in Wisconsin winters) I'd HIGHLY recommend getting a hydraulic wood splitter (looks like there are electric ones now also, but I don't have experience with them).

Yeah I was looking at electric splitters, but it seems they max out in the 5-7 ton region whereas gas models are typically in the 16-26 ton region.

My thought was to give it a try manually before going out and getting a splitter. I bought an outdoor wood boiler last fall so suddenly I need much higher quality (read: dry) wood than the rubbish wood I was able to get away with burning last year. I collect much of mine from work, but I also have a bit of woods with deadfall that's worth salvaging as well.

SuperSpy wrote:

I'm notorious for over striking splitting mauls (I blame snow and slippery gloves) so I decided this weekend to fix it once and for all.

I drilled and hammered out the old hickory handle then took a section of 2" schedule 40 black pipe and heated and hammered one end into an oval to fit the eye of the maul, then welded the living crap out of it using some old stick electrodes with the flux knocked off as a bit of filler where the pipe and the maul eye didn't quite line up. It's exceptionally heavy now, but the added weight makes it a monster for splitting and I won't be breaking any more handles any time soon.

2" schedule 40 black pipe

Did you mean 2" sch.40 ASTM A53 Type E Gr.B Black Pipe?? or something else perhaps?

just brew it! wrote:

Jigar wrote:

Sunday was spent cleaning the Tail light of my VW POLO. Rain water had somehow entered taillight casing through the leaked rubber housing, shorting all the bulbs.

That happened on my Chrysler mini-van a few years ago. Corroded the bulb contacts in the housing...

I had to use Kerosene to clean the contacts in order to get the new bulbs working, seems the water was there for a month corroding all contacts.

derFunkenstein wrote:

It also happened on my old Fold Contour. I first used some rubber sealant to try to plug up any gaps. When that didn't work I drilled some small holes in the bottom of the tail light lens. The holes "solved" it for me in that the tail lights quit getting shorted, but I never figured out how water was getting in there in the first place.

I have used the rubber sealant so lets see if that works. Also does drilling holes at the bottom of casing attract dust gathering inside the Tail light, India's roads are quiet dusty ? Let me know your suggestion.

I didn't repair anything... but I did decide to UNrepair a flaky HDD!

Exhibit A: one worn-out 500GB HDD with lots of bad sectors


Hey, I found the "void your warranty" screw! (This drive's warranty ran out years ago, so I don't care)


Look, ma! No head unload ramp! (I thought all semi-recent drives had one, but this one apparently still parked the heads on the platter)


Platter retaining ring and head actuator have been unscrewed...


Barracuda 7200.10 500GB, exploded view


I was unsuccessful in my attempts at harvesting the head actuator magnets. They were stuck to the brackets surrounding the head actuator pivot with some pretty strong adhesive, and my attempt to wrench them loose just broke them into pieces.

The magnets are tough to get out intact. They're small and brittle and don't like being unstuck from their mounting points.

Several months ago I salvaged two dead drives in a smiliar fashion. I thought they'd make good materials for some kind of super geeky project, but I'm not sure yet what that's going to be.

Jigar wrote:

I have used the rubber sealant so lets see if that works. Also does drilling holes at the bottom of casing attract dust gathering inside the Tail light, India's roads are quiet dusty ? Let me know your suggestion.

The holes I drilled were all rather small, around 5mm. I drilled one at the top to let air in and two at the bottom for water to come out. I needed two because the tail light lens was chambered and so the first one only let out half the water. I didn't notice any dust buildup, but I live in a pretty temperate climate.

just brew it! wrote:

This drive's warranty ran out years ago

Date code 07487 translates as 2007 week 48 day 7 so Friday, June 1, 2007. I'd say that's out of warranty.

Funnily enough I had a 500GB 7200.10 that I was using for offline backup storage die a couple of months ago as well. It lasted far longer than the 7200.11, those were terrible. I gave up on replacing those under warranty because the replacements kept dying as well. Never bought another Seagate drive.

The drive was actually still functional but had several hundred reallocated sectors. Given that I have several other spare drives which are both higher capacity and in better shape, I saw no reason to keep this one.

Yes the 7200.11 series was awful. I avoided Seagate for several years after that.

On one hand, those drives were terrible and I hate them of making me repair so many failed machines, including at least one that didn't bother to speak up until both copies of it's mirrored set had died (yaay backups + freezer trick).

On the other hand, they probably gifted me quite the pile of billable hours and miles spent going to remote offices.

The 7200.11s were definitely the worst of the modern bunch. I had a bunch of the 3 TB drives I was super lucky with (they still work!) but the four 1 TB drives from that line are all long dead...and their replacements via RMA...three times.

I managed to get out and "fix" my kit car yesterday a bit. I had the cam timing adjusted to maximize spooling of the turbo at the expense of high end power. It worked perfectly, minus the spool kicking in so quickly that it was impossible to keep the tires from spinning when it ripped from 2-3 PSI up to 16 PSI. I pulled the timing back together a bit to allow a bit more overlap for slower spool, but higher end power and a more manageable transition.

Even in this crappy cold weather it helped.

Jigar wrote:

I have used the rubber sealant so lets see if that works. Also does drilling holes at the bottom of casing attract dust gathering inside the Tail light, India's roads are quiet dusty ? Let me know your suggestion.

Suggest gluing or taping a piece of air filter material over the holes. It will let air and water move through but not dust.

derFunkenstein wrote:

The holes I drilled were all rather small, around 5mm. I drilled one at the top to let air in and two at the bottom for water to come out. I needed two because the tail light lens was chambered and so the first one only let out half the water. I didn't notice any dust buildup, but I live in a pretty temperate climate.

ludi wrote:

Suggest gluing or taping a piece of air filter material over the holes. It will let air and water move through but not dust.

I am going to try your suggestions, lets see if that works. Thanks

Not repaired yet, but in process... I have a Dell Bluetooth (DH956) mouse, actually I have three of them. The one I use in the office has developed a "bounce" in the left button. Quite frustrating when you don't know if you will single or double click on an item. Last night I ordered replacement Omron D2FC-F-7N switches. They won't be in until Wednesday, but it should be a quick session with the soldering iron.

--SS

The washer fluid tank in my car wasn't holding water. Checked around the waterline and figured out that the plastic pump housing had cracked at the base... that bout of really cold weather apparently was protracted enough to freeze the water inside it. Another original part on my 21 year old car gone, was a quick swap out for a $7 part off ebay. I wish all car problems could be that easy.

I installed a monitor arm on my workbench to allow me to re-purpose an old 17" LCD display with a busted stand, for bench testing motherboards and video cards. So not exactly a "repair"... more of a "reuse/recycle".

Kougar wrote:

The washer fluid tank in my car wasn't holding water. Checked around the waterline and figured out that the plastic pump housing had cracked at the base... that bout of really cold weather apparently was protracted enough to freeze the water inside it. Another original part on my 21 year old car gone, was a quick swap out for a $7 part off ebay. I wish all car problems could be that easy.

Water? Good luck with that up here.

Do they even sell washer fluid in gallon jugs at every gas station/C-store down there?