Quote from: klondike on April 02, 2023, 06:20:31 PMThe 308 diesel I has has been trouble free. I gave it to my daughter when her car had a terminal decline - a reliable car returning excellent fuel economy and on paper worth nothing. I wasn't so enamoured of the car I bought to replace it at the time which is why I swapped it for the one I have now,

Meanwhile the 308 soldiers on still. It did have a minor hiccup at the last MOT which was its first ever fail. I just checked on a really good site that gives all sorts of details about vehicles and see it was the 2021 MOT not the most recent one and it was unsurprising wear and tear given its age...

Mileage:
101,333 miles
+ 12,751 miles travelled since last MOT.
Refusal Notices
Front inner brake pad(s) less than 1.5 mm thick (1.1.13 (a) (ii)) - Dangerous
Nearside front windscreen wiper does not clear the windscreen effectively (3.4 (b) (ii)) - Major
Offside front wheel bearing rough when rotated (5.1.3 (b) (i)) - Major
Advisory Notices
Front brake disc worn, pitted or scored, but not seriously weakened (1.1.14 (a) (ii))
Nearside rear child seat fitted not allowing full inspection of adult belt ()
Tyre worn close to legal limit/worn on edge both front tyres (5.2.3 (e))

Site if anybody cares - https://totalcarcheck.co.uk/

Thanks for the link, I've just checked ours & found it's Euro Status is 4 which makes it ULEZ compliant so should I be stupid enough to want to visit London I can enter the  ULEZ areas for free.

Despite it running really well, it's getting a new cambelt kit, which also includes a water pump, next week as although it's only done about 20,000 miles since the last one was fitted, it was 7 years ago.

It's also getting a new clutch kit as the clutch is the original one fitted when the the car was manufactured.

I wonder if my 17 year old Fiesta needs a new cambelt   

Depends if it is an interference engine. I had one bust on an old Sierra and even used the starter motor to shift it onto the verge. No other damage. With an interference engine a bust cambelt means buggered valves and pistons because they collide. Cambelts need replacing every 60,000 on some cars others might be 80,000. Of course yours may be old enough to have a timing chain instead but I doubt it. 

Quote from: Alex on April 03, 2023, 12:02:08 AMI wonder if my 17 year old Fiesta needs a new cambelt   

It depends when the last one was fitted, but if you're saying it's never had a cambelt in 17 years you could soon be finding out if it needs replacing.

It'll be at the same time that you find out your entire engine needs replacing as it's a very tight fit interference engine.

You could check that it has a cambelt as some older Fiesta engines had a timing chain.

I'm fanatical about having the cambelt replaced, at or before, the recommended interval & I'm having the perfectly working clutch changed as there has to be a good chance it will fail at some point in the not too distant future.

https://autoreplacementcosts.com/ford-fiesta-belt-chain/

Thanks for that Phil, my car is 1242 so I looked at 1.25l and year is 2005 so it looks like a Timing Belt.  Is that the same as a Cam belt ? It's never been changed as far as I know.

I came across this on YouTube and found it interesting. No guaranteed anybody else will of course.

Quote from: klondike on April 11, 2023, 08:30:16 PMI came across this on YouTube and found it interesting. No guaranteed anybody else will of course.

Interesting, it's all part of the net zero smoke & mirrors.

The green lobby use a phrase called 'zero pollution at the point of use', which means that there could be a shit-load of pollution during manufacture.

Interesting - and as I have long believed, the total picture is nothing like as straightforward as the net zero advocates would have us believe. One thing, unless I missed it, he didn't seem to factor in the energy required to produce the electricity needed to recharge an EV during its time to 'break even' - and I do wonder if India,in particular, will really be producing 'green' electricity by 2050.

You must have nodded off a bit. That was certainly mentioned. India even got special mention as taking far longer to achieve break even on emissions saved in usage over manufacturing extra emissions because most of India's electricity is produced from coal as is true for a few other places.



IMO there are at least two things that mean we won't be making the 2030 target - no sign of any of the work being done fast enough on the power grid or charging infrastructure. The power grid faces a double whammy with the heat pump target. The other is the scramble for lithium for the batteries not to mention rare earths for other aspects of electric only cars.

If they persist in the sales ban it just means that old cars will be kept going and the ones that are likely to survive longest are big old diesels.

I didn't nod off and my puzzlement was based on the fact that with the much higher average mileage in the USA, break even came sooner than elsewhere even though they would have to recharge much more often - and their batteries would wear out sooner.
Agree with you about the idiotic 2030 target

It's simple maths. Given similar amounts of carbon produced for the electricity the break even point comes at a particular mileage. The Yanks do a higher mileage so they reach that break even point much quicker. If you just left an electric car parked you'd never reach break even.

If you want to be really bamboozled watch some of Arvin Ash's videos on quantum mechanics and he hardly mentions the maths (thankfully).

If we dug up all of the roads and converted them to canals, we could revert to sail power.

Sadly just as polluting as electric when the wind don't blow it's horses - methane + a trip hazard. 💩💩💩💩

Wouldn't need horses if we built canals on an incline.  Surf all the way. 

They never thought of that back in the day...