tomperkins

That's a good shout, any idea of cost?

I do have a crutch strap (not fitted) but have leather seats so need a spare cushion to modify and add a hole. If you know anywhere I could get an old seat pad I'd love to know.

Probably not a common question but I'd like to shorten my lap belts. I'm fairly tall and therefore have my seat quite a long way back. The problem is that even with the lap belts tightened as much as possible my lap belt is not as tight as I'd like. This means that if I want to do my shoulder straps up really tight the lap belt starts to ride up over my ribs, not ideal. Does anyone have any tips or tricks on how to shorten the belts further or take some length out of the belts? Thanks in advance, Tom

Hi Heather, Could I have first dibs on the Aeroscreen and Autocom please? Regards, Tom

Thanks Tim and Jonathan, I'll give Racetech a call this morning and see what they suggest.

Thanks for your suggestion. I've taken the float out of the tank, disconnected the gauge and then measured the resistance from the wire that comes from the sender and normally connects to the gauge. Ishould say that I have a separate sender and pump. The resistance goes from 19 at one end to 195 at the other. Both earths are good. so what do we think the conclusion here is, that the wiring is good, my Caterham gauge is faulty and my Racetech gauge needs a special sender?

So I've just tested the old Caterham gauge again and it is still stuck on full. It doesn't move no matter how it's connected or even if it's disconnected it still sticks on full. It's making me think it could be broken. So based on that assumption, and the fact that I now know that the Racetech gauge needs a special sender it's making me think the wiring could be fine. Would you agree? Any other tests I could do before I order either a racetech sender or a replace,ent Caterham gauge?

Here's the new gauge: http://www.demon-tweeks.co.uk/performance/gauges/racetech-fuel-level-gauge-electrical I'm feeling pretty stupid right now as I've just looked on the Racetech site and there it mentions 'the necessary sender unit' making me think there's no fault, just that I'm missing the right sender. http://www.racetechdesign.com/fuel-level-gauge/4589434900 I'll try the old Catetham gauge in the morning and see if that's working now. Strange thing is the Caterham gauge uses a block with three spades so there's no way that could have been wired up wrong as there's only one way it connects.

So I've investigated this further and I'm still no closer to a solution. Here's what I know: The earth going to the sender is good The earth going to the gauge is good Continuity between the end of the wire that goes into the sender and the other end of the same wire that goes into the gauge is good The tank is full of fuelIn checking continuity I've discovered I had the sender feed and 12v feed going into the gauge the wrong way round (How this produced the same fault as the old gauge when the old gauge was working previously I've no idea). When swapping these round the needle now slowly makes its way to the empty mark on the gauge. Not resting on the pin but top of the red. It moves in the same was as it used to when it was working turning on the ignition. It's almost as if the gauge is reading back to front (i.e. Full is showing as empty and vice versa). Is that even possible? Any other thoughts as I'm stumped? Tom

Thanks Jonathan, I'll see if I can find that wire earthing somewhere. It's a 2004 car with a carbon dash and k-series engine if that helps. Do you know if there's a way to use a multimeter to connect to either end of the wire in question and see if there's a 'leak' anywhere?

Hi there, A few weeks ago my Caterham fuel guage started reading full all the time. I had already purchased a Raceline gauge so I swapped to that in the optimistic hope that this may cure the problem. It didn't. After reading numerous posts on here I then took the boot floor out and started checking earths. The earth going into the sender appears to be good, as does the earth going into the gauge. I took out the sender and the resistance appears to be correct (based on some numbers I've seen on here) and changes as the float moves. That leaves me a bit stuck on the next thing to check. Any ideas would be appreciated, Tom

Just road use, no academy. That's good advice, thanks. I'll check the clutch adjustment first, if that doesn't solve it I may check which oil was used and oil level.

It doesn't seem to change too much with temperature. Im not sure what oil it's filled with, whatever was used when it was rebuilt. The box was rebuilt as I lost the ability to select gears (not just knotchy, selector in box not working at all). A good opportunity for a full rebuild. Does that give you what you need to know?

That's an interesting thought Duncan, I presume to test that I just need to adjust the clutch cable where it enters the pedal box?

Hi there, I have a 2004 car with a Type 9 5-speed gearbox. The gear change has never been the smoothest (I've owned the car for a year and a half). The box was rebuilt in Autumn last year (for a different issue) and recently the gear change has been getting very rough and knotchy. After researching the issue on Blatchat I found a good guide to replacing the bearing that the shift lever goes through, which can become corroded (http://www.myothercarsa2cv.co.uk/howto/glbearing.htm#sthash.a8UqIm2z.dpuf) I spoke to Quaife to get a new bearing who were super helpful and sent through the new bearing. When I removed the shift mechanism from the car this morning to replace the bearing I was surprised to see the bearing looking in perfect condition and moving beautifully. Clearly this bearing was not causing the poor gear change, but based on the fact that the box has recently been rebuilt, I'm now stumped as to what could be causing the issue. Any light anyone could shed on the issue would be massively appreciated. Thanks in advance, Tom

Orange with black stripe, spotted between Wherwell and Andover, Hampshire, Wednesday evening around 6pm.

Hi Gareth, Hope it helps, be interested to hear how you get on with the Quantams.

So it's a few months on from the start of this thread and I thought I'd give an update on progress. I'm now really happy with the way the car is driving. Overall I've carried out the following tasks: Softened suspension damping Raised steering rack to reduce bump steer Lowered rear trailing arms Set toe to neutral Reduced rake (from 20mm to 15mm) Changed to CR500's for the winterRaising the steering rack did make a big improvement in the amount of bump steer and softenng the damping helped but by far the biggest improvement came from fitting a set of new CR500's. People have mentioned the fact that CR500's are softer and lighter than the Toyo R888's that I had on the car for the summer and it's so true. My car feels light on it's feet now, beautifully balanced and predictable on all but wallowy roads at high speed. I suspect the bouncing on wallowy roads at high speed is simply down to the silly spring rates (350/200) and the dampers not being able to keep up. Next job will be to fit some sensible springs on the existing dampers, with the longer term aim to swap to some high quality suspension (Quantums or Nitrons I suspect). Thanks for eveyone's help and input on this one.

Could you send me some photos please? I've emailed you so you have my email address.

Hi there, As Ian kindly said, very interested in this. I've sent you a private message. Tom

Interested (thanks Ian), I'll drop you an email.

So we found the problem. Turns out someone had installed a connector in the look that runs through to the block that connects to the ECU. This was giving a dodgy connection. We replaced this with a sound connection but there was still an issue somewhere further up the line between the ECU and the ignition. We therefore ran a bypass connection from the ignition to the loom going into the ECU solving the issue. Thanks for everyone's thoughts on this one.

Thanks for everyone's comments, glad the helpful nature of the community still exists on the new site. There's no light at all on the ECU so it sounds like we can conclude its a power issue to the ECU rather than a sensor not working. I'll take a look with a probe and have a look at the wiring diagrams and see if we can work out what's going on.

I've got a 2004 S3 with a 1.8 k-series and an emerald ECU. The cars not starting, it's turning over but there's no light on the emerald ECU and the fuel pump is not kicking in. All the fuses are good and I've tried a brand new MFU to try to fix with no difference, so MFU is good too. Any ideas of where to start?

Looking for a MFU for a 2004 1.8 k-series (EU2 I believe).