Sifaan

beauty of it all is, even if one smart buyer figures out the car is a disaster, there's another one tripping over his feet to buy it

how much did it cost to ship the stuff? and how much volume was it (I guess you paid for volume, not weight)?

"More than 2,000 new vehicles are registered each day with the Registrar of Motor Vehicles bringing about a dramatic if not dangerous increase in the number of vehicles." WTF did they expect to happen when they slashed taxes last year?

yes, because these so called contemporary issues reduce a car to an economics equation: value of car = (selling price in future) - (buying price now) - (fuel cost) - (repairs cost) that's a bit like choosing a woman to marry based on how much dowry she brings and how cheap her tastes are.

you mean like this, right? certainly looks nicer but I don't think any aftermarket guys build it that way (would cost too much for a non-standard shape) in my case the fascia extension is just 2 small black flaps with cutouts for 2 switches, and even the original radio is standard size so no problems with going for an aftermarket unit.

sounds like an excellent reason to listen to music I was referring to something like this

probably not happening anytime soon have one of the FM transmitter things and it works OK; some people say the quality is not as good as with a MP3 player but I'm not too fussed about it; depending on whether you like to listen to music elsewhere as well, might be better to get an iPod and a transmitter for it. in your case it also be an advantage that you could use it in either car.

congrats on the purchase what engine/trim did you get and how much did it cost? I was toying with the idea of upgrading the player to one that could handle USB/MP3 CDs (are regular CDs still used by anyone?), and I was able to find units on ebay that would work with the steering control stalk. cost was about 90 pounds or thereabouts. and for the Citroen there are faceplates available to match the original radio so I imagine it would be the same situ for a 406. you might even be able to detach the faceplate from the existing one and fit it to a new one

unplug the sensor? I think then it doesn't work at all (fail-safe). one thing that might work is to measure the "default" resistance of the sensor (e.g. after not using for a while) and hook up a resistance of that value to the wires. If it doesn't cut out then, it would point fingers at the sensor. yeah, need to get it on to a diagnostics and read out the sensor values and so on which should help track down the issue; actually there were also some issues in the past where AC didn't work (as in, no cool air in the cabin) and fiddling with the buttons (turning it off, then on, etc.) got it working again, so might have been that the pressure sensor (sensor or contacts) had been a bit dodgy all along.

missing 70g? I have excess 70g (less whatever was lost in the gauge), scale measured 13.785 and 13.015 so the weighing errors are likely insignificant. not sure what you meant by transport? I took it back to Sudesh that day and he hooked up the gauge, and the pressure certainly wasn't rising high (cutoff 390 PSI); actually it wasn't even reaching 250 cos the compressor kept cutting out. unless it is thermal related (i.e. work when cold, not when warm) I think it's not a problem with contacts (although will try contact cleaner on it just in case) - ac switched on when I left work; then cutoff after a while; subsequently it was possible to get AC back working (for a while) by either switching ac off for a while before turning on again, or turning off the engine (a 1 minute timer on the safety cutout for pressure is reset by engine off).

well, the folks at wimal motors had installed the new compressor anyway. well, I'm hopeful it's a contact issue on the pressure sensor since that was disconnected in the checking process; but there is also an interesting observation that the AC worked this morning on the (short) drive to work - must run it for a while and see if the gremlin has worked itself out. btw sudesh was saying that as compressors, etc. age the amount of gas needed can increase beyond the recommendation; weighing the cylinder before/after the operation showed 770g of gas used, which is ~10% more than the 650-700g recommendation. of course some of that 770 was lost in the gauge. I'm not sure if I buy the "used compressor" argument; was wondering if tropical countries need more gas as we're trying to create a larger temperature difference between inside/outside than in temperate climates, however I think that's what the compressor duty cycle is for.

so... update is I got down a Sanden 1242 compressor off a 2006 car (cost 46 pounds inc. postage in UK) - the seller refused to send it with oil though when I took it to the folks who "diagnosed" that the compressor was faulty, they discovered that the gas was low (turned out there was about 250g of gas, when it should be 650-700g). they then pumped it up with nitrogen and said there was a leak but they couldn't detect where from, and so it could be the evaporator housing (which means a dashboard removal). How they came to the conclusion that the compressor was faulty when the gas was indeed so low is yet to be resolved, but I took it to Sudesh. He disconnected the tubings and separately gassed up with nitrogen the evaporator, the compressor and the condensor - no leaks. he then put everything back together and checked, including soapy water on the joints, and there was a leak from the low pressure end of the compressor. Why the earlier guys couldn't spot it, is yet another question to resolve (soapy water doesn't seem rocket science) anyway, the double-lip seals that PSA use are not (readily) available (Sudesh said even carmart doesn't stock it) so he tested it with 2 regular rings of same diameter, and it seemed to be holding pressure. So we decided to charge it with gas, including the UV dye (in case there was still a leak elsewhere), and when everything was hooked up, the compressor didn't switch on. He fiddled with some wire (I thought it was the power to the compressor) but turned out it was the pressure sensor on the condensor pipes and the AC kicked in; gassed the system up and cool air was blowing from both sides - so would suggest that the flap motors are not faulty. (also subsequently another guy on UK forum had similar issue - warm on driver side - and a regas helped him as well). however, driving home, I discovered the AC was not working so drove back - gas pressure still OK (no fantastic leak for 700g of gas to disappear in 10 minutes); but AC doesn't stay on - can hear the clutch kicking in, but almost immediately disconnects. as there cannot be abnormal pressure (390 PSI is the safety cutoff, guage shows ~250) and it's also not the engine temp (normal) it would appear to be a faulty reading from the sensor... As I drove home, I "tested" the AC every now and then, and once it did engage long enough to give some cold air from the vents. I'm hoping it was just because it was disconnected when pressure testing the condensor and that some contact cleaner will help it behave again. Otherwise I have to get it hooked on a lexia to figure where the cutoff signal is coming from... thanks all, will keep you posted as the saga develops :S

Madz, can you please install/enable the ignore user feature?

yeah, but most of those were updated few years ago; so you have to actually call them and ask.

usually owners get pissed about people continually calling after they sold the car, so they will usually contact the site and ask them to remove it... failing that, you can always "report the ad" to AL... trust they would investigate and remove the ad if needed

if you've been holding on to it for a long time, it will be yellow; if you drink a lot of water and go regularly, it will be colourless

finding girls to dress like that - ok, not too hard finding girls who could change the oil - bit harder finding girls to dress like that and who can change the oil - on the other hand, a car wash.... ohh la la

what is this? last week you asked and didn't get anywhere, and now asking again?

like sponsor a video on how to run a IT company

May be NSFW Video here.

assuming the seller is willing to part with it at that price it does mean that you were worrying about fuel consumption rather unnecessarily even if the 406 does 8, it will cost you ~80k for fuel, and even a car that did 12 would still cost you ~50k, so that's only 30k difference per year. but add insurance (if full insurance was 40k, that's Rs.8 per km for insurance!!), service, depreciation, maintenance, etc. your "effective cost per km" will be close to the price that cabs charge! if the car is for prestige purposes, by all means a 406 will work

then it will say unregistered actually, I never figured out why people want to hide the number anyway... with paper ads and paying by the word, I can understand people shortening 300-1234 to 300, but why go to the trouble of editing the photo?

as with so many things in life, reputations can linger longer than realities..

what is wrong with them? they're permanently locked / permanently unlocked / sometimes work and sometimes don't (sticky) / something else? don't specifically know about March, but usually the "intelligent" stuff is with a ECU that decides to send lock / unlock signals to the lock unit. however the locks might be different between models with / without central locking btw if both stopped working at the same time, then it could be a wiring issue.

well, if it cost 8000 for the service that's probably mineral oil (would cost about that much just for the oil on fully synthetic) in the UK you could do 20,000km with fully synth, but in Sri Lanka, max 10,000km - reduce to max. 5000km if using mineral oil. so if this guy has been spending 8,000 every 20,000 km then you should probably stay away from this specimen