stevie_b

PM'd

Klump, I may be interested. I kerbed one of my alloys a couple of weeks ago, so might take them. How many in the set are near-perfect? Can I get back to you tomorrow with an answer?

Hi all, This morning I had a problem starting the supra. I hadn't used the car over the weekend at all. Turned the key, and the starter motor sounded VERY sluggish. Sounded like the battery was able to turn the engine over a couple of revolutions, but then just gave up. I tried again, but barely got a crank out of the battery. Waited a few seconds and tried again: the engine cranked over slowly, but luckily fast enough for the engine to fire. It's fine when it's running. I then drove 30 minutes to work. When parked at work, I tried re-starting the car immediately just to see what would happen. First attempt, a feeble crank but didn't fire. Wait a few secs, then a second attempt which gave a sluggish crank but did fire. I've done a search on this, and came up with many threads including the following: http://www.mkivsupra.net/vbb/showthread.php?t=63805&highlight=battery I'm guessing it's either the battery or starter motor. How do I know which one without trial-and-error? I could test the battery voltage, but is that reliable? I mean, a battery can appear to have a good voltage when not working, until you actually try to use the thing (i.e. crank the engine over). My frequency of supra-driving has recently changed a bit (not using it for small journeys at the weekends much now), so maybe the battery got used to the old frequency and is finding it hard to adjust. I've had this happen on a different car. PS If I need a new battery, which one should I ask for at Halfords? TIA, Steve

A newspaper article I read recently said that this offer may well start a price war between the service providers. As Snooze said, what seems like good value now might not be in 6 or 12 months time.

I feel a poll coming on .... (no, not a pole!)

Penguin, don't take this the wrong way, but I always thought you were female. It feels like ... Santa doesn't exist

Loaf of bread, anyone?

Welcome to the club! Loads of good info here. I like your username!

welcome!

Aaahhh, I can see it now. Previously, it just looked like the girl was standing in a creche!

[hijack] Charlotte, what's happened to your avatar? Is that baby stuff in the background?

I think what JohnA means, is that the fuel gauge won't move much for the first 50 ish miles. The gauge drops faster as the fuel level drops, i.e. it's not linear. The gauge should only be used as a rough guide. You can't use it to estimate how many miles you've travelled for a given drop in the fuel needle. Hope that helps.

I would hit the brakes and yank the hand brake on, progressively harder. Your brakes would be toast, but it's better than crashing. Easy for me to sit here and say it though.

Halfords can make up any colour: it won't be a 100% match (you'll need a pro to apply it to get that), but if you give them the colour code from the VIN plate, they'll knock you up a small bottle of touch up. It takes about 10mins to make if it's metallic, and the guy making it will end up with a sore wrist afterwards.

For those who don't know, Nic is currently doing a group buy on O2 sensors (and a few other things) . I didn't want to spam that thread, so I'm starting a new one here. Am I correct in thinking that my '93 NA requires 2 of these? How do I know if they should be (or need to be) replaced? If my car needs 2 of them, that works out quite pricey if they don't need changing! I drive like a grandad, with occasional bursts of spirited driving. I get about 25mpg, which is 50% motorway and 50% town driving. I can't see new O2 sensors making much improvement on that. Same question for fuel filters (also in Nic's group buy). How do I know if it needs changing?

Thanks chaps, I've tried using quote marks, but google still puts hits that merely contain the two words (usually in reverse order) before the actual phrase.

I've done some searches on this topic, but haven't come to any solution yet: I have a friend who is starting a business, and he'd like to increase his Google rating so that when you type in the name of his company (Stewart James) into Google, his website appears with as higher a ranking as possible. At present, his website is nowhere to be seen, and Google returns other companies' sites based on either Stewart or James, but not both. Is there anyone who could help with this? Of course, he'd be willing to pay for a good service. TIA, Steve

Yep, same here! Don't worry though, it's only the number of times you've been around the sun!

They're similar to the UK, from I can remember. The usual occasional sunken drains/ potholes in city centres, motorways (or whatever they call them) and other main roads I think were well maintained. Probably a bit better maintained than UK roads.

I'd change the title of the thread to 8/3 I won't be able to make the Winchester services, but I'll see if I can make the Wheatsheaf!

p_jay, You have a PM from me.

I tend to keep the car between 2k and 3k revs (preferably towards 2k). A previous car manual (not a supra one though) said that the car was most efficient at 56mph in 5th gear: this worked out at about 2.5k rpm.

I'd like to have a go at it myself. I was looking at the Haynes manual last night, and it seems OK, apart from the bit where you have to make sure that the crankshaft is at the correct position before you take the top cover off. I don't know what the "correct position" should be, how I can tell it's in that position, or how I can move it into that position. Can anyone shed any light on this? Any help is much appreciated.

Jake's right. My metro (and those from about 1990 onwards) has the K series lump. Pete: £400 with only 64k on the clock sounds like a bargain! I've looked in Autotrader and eBay (in case I decide to cut my losses on the metro), and similar cars are up for £600 or so. That's what haggling's for, I guess. Edit: how can you tell if the head's warped? I've only got the "standard" DIY tools, i.e. no machining equipment etc.

My daily driver (Rover Metro, yes, don't laugh) has just blown its head gasket I think. It really drinks coolant, and the oil around the filler cap and dipstick looks like mayonnaise. Now, I could get this repaired, but how likely is it that other damage would, have been caused as well? It overheated only once, but when it happened the temperature needle was nearly off the scale before I could stop safely. I'm trying to decide whether it's worth repairing, or whether HG failure is likely to lead to other problems. Edit: it's done about 80,000 miles, K reg, and I know the history so I know it hasn't been abused. Bodywork is good too (unlike 95% of metros of this age)