Safe Speed Forums

Looking back to the FF post, reminded me of a visit to a specialist in Mini WORK .(Most of their work was in PROPER Mini's ,not the foreign rubbish). I noted an older mini with coil packs in place of the old coil. ( No damp protection ,so how often does he get stopped in the wet ,I wonder ,as the olde cure for this problem on Minis was an old rubber glove.Try fitting one to a coilpack. )But I digress. I lurk on a site for my workhorse and how often do I see mentions of coilpacks failing. My daughter has had this ,and so has friends of hers. But way back in the days of ye olde ignition systems we had one coil. I,personally have never had one go bad. I do know of one bloke who had two go down - he somehow managed to insulate the coil body from earth, and the flashover burnt out the wiring ( my estimation).

Now , a question for the Mini folk out there. Way back in 1970 ( H was the year letter), I got fed up with old cars and decided that a new Mini Van would be a better bet. I remember that the bonnet badge was the new Mini ,square one. Anyone know when it was brough tin, as I've noticed a van ( B reg) on a well known TV program with this sort of badge, and to my mind it's a bit early.

_________________
lets bring sanity back to speed limits.
Drivers are like donkeys -they respond best to a carrot, not a stick .Road safety experts are like Asses - best kept covered up ,or sat on

You'll struggle to get a meaty enough spark these days out of a single coil, via a dstributor and plug leads, to get the combustion clean enough to meet current emissions requirements. Remember that back in those days, cars ran so rich at idle, your eyes would water if you got near the tailpipe! To be honest almst any kind of spark (however feeble) would probably ignite it.

Anyway, I can't believe you're extolling the virtues of the "old tech" systems whilst at the same time citing the infamous "rubber glove" fix! I have had one coil pack go down since I started having cars with such devices. Prior to then, I had points closing up, condensers failing, rotor arms burning, dizy caps tracking, plug leads breaking down, one coil failure, the wires under the distributor base plate fatiguing as it swivelled backwards and forwards with the vacuum advance...

When we were students, I lived in a house with 4 cars. A Marina, an Opel Kadett, a Citroen DS and an MG Magnette. First job in a damp morning was to take the distributor caps and leads off ALL of them and put then in the oven for 10 minutes in the hope that at least ONE of them would start! I've got to say that if there's ONE area of modern technology (which, I agree, is getting a bit out of hand now!) to moan about, I'd have thought ignition systems would be at the bottom of the pile!

Yep, modern ignition systems take some beating.

_________________
My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

You wouldn’t have thought that if you were on the back of my motorbike coming back from Borth the other week Grabs. It’s an ongoing problem I have when it’s done prolonged high speeds; it’s starts to buck like a mad bronco ride. It may not be the ignition in itself but some sensor which is dodgy, but it amounts to the same thing. So under the heading “It’s new it must be better” well - it most certainly isn’t!

I rarely had a single misfire years ago with carbs, electronic ignition or plain ole fuel injection when that came in, but since software came into the equation of ‘all things modern’ and thanks to Euro 3/4 (5 next?) emission laws it’s crap and it’s damn dangerous sometimes!

I’ve mentioned this before about the Mazda 323f I used to own and how if I fluffed starting up from cold it was an absolute bugger to get started again. This is from the forum on my motorbike I subscribe to and what could be at fault. (The experts can only guess and “try this an that”). If an error code is present, the error code(s) will be displayed as follows. How do you like these apples: -

C00 No error
C11 Camshaft Position Sensor (CMPS) - 1000 Only
C12 Crankshaft Position Sensor (CKPS)
C13 Intake Air Pressure Sensor (IAPS)
C14 Throttle Position Sensor
C15 Engine Coolant Temp. Sensor (ECTS)
C17 Intake Air Pressure Sensor (IAPS) - 07 & Up 650 Only
C21 Intake Air Temp. Sensor (IATS)
C22 Atmospheric Pressure Sensor (APS) - 1000 Only
C23 Tip Over Sensor (TOS)
C24 Ignition Signal #1 (Front Coil)
C25 Ignition Signal #2 (Rear Coil)
C28 Secondary Throttle Valve Actuator (STVA)
C29 Secondary Throttle Position Sensor (STPS)
C31 Gear Position Sensor (GPS)
C32 Injector Signal #1 ( Front)
C33 Injector Signal #2 (Rear)
C40 ISC Valve - 07 & Up 650 Only
C41 Fuel Pump Control System (Fuel Pump Relay)
C42 Ignition Switch Signal (Anti-Theft)
C44 Heated Oxygen Sensor (HO2S)
C49 PAIR Control Solenoid Valve

It’s only got two cylinders too! (I’m sure ed_m or Mole could trump that list with one from a car). This is just begging for something to go wrong IMO, something expensive an' all! (No cheap pair of points to replace or re-gap).

So on the way back home I had to keep the throttle open to prevent it stalling, but that’s not easy while trying to ride and concentrate on everything else. When it does this, it either wants to be throttle wide open, in which case you’re accelerating like the clappers, or off in which case it wants to stall. The danger is, being 1000cc twin, when the engine stalls the back wheel locks up as indeed it did going around a bend near home. Luckily, I reacted quickly enough to pull the clutch in and recover the skid otherwise I’d be posting a new topic “Gobbed it the other day, emailing from A&E”

_________________
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

Here’s another story from just the other day, at the weekend, which drove me nuts.

I did a firmware upgrade on my telly cuz it started to crack up. So, desperate for a solution, I downloaded the software off the Net on a USB stick and plugged it into my TV. From there you go through the settings and it all went smoothly, for once.

But the thing for me is it’s just a telly for Christ’s sake and I just want to be able to see programs, you know - like I used to be able to do. They’ll be having firmware updates for my pen next.

Anyway, it didn’t work because I found out there’s some cheap components used which I need to replace. Some poorly rated capacitors on the power supply, so I find from the Internet. It’s a good job I have the technical skills to do it myself (Not buying Samsung again; that’s the second one that’s gone wrong).

It’s just one thing after another these days. I was born 50 years too late...

_________________
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

Even back in the days when i used to mend TVs , Samsung wasn't that great and as for poorly rated caps on power supplies...when will they ever learn????

_________________
My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

So I'm the only nob that didn't know this Who was it that said experience is something you get just after you needed it.

In future, when I'm going to buy something I'll ask here. My fear is, these days, you will read something bad about anything you want to buy. The 'smart' mob I'm using to post this on ain't so smart I can tell you. It's like an intelligent child; there's all the difference in the world between clever and wise. (Made all the worse because no-one listens to wisdom anymore).

_________________
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.