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im looking for one too! fed up of getting sand stuck in the floor carpet!

Petrol in your oil is caused by your misfire. if fuel is unburnt it goes out of the exhaust system but if you drive a car with a missfire the fuel will strip the oil from the bore that it’s in and run down to the sump, this will create wear on your piston rings and produce piston slap. Once this happens the only way it can be solved is a rebuild so I would not drive this vehicle until you have this sorted. Once oil is contaminated it needs to be changed so do that first. Like kavvz said, I would then check your plugs. A missfire under load that is caused by ignition is usually incorrectly gapped spark plugs, faulty HT leads or the most common cracked ceramic on your spark plug. So remove them and check them all. If they are dirty do NOT clean them with a wire brush, buy new ones. Cleaning with a wire brush will just coat the electrode with steel as the material the electrode is made of is a lot harder than mild steel. If you have a distributer, then check the cap and the rotor arm; ensure that all the contacts are good. If the rotor arm is corroded, polish it up with some very very fine sandpaper. (Or a clean car tyre if you ever get stuck at the side of the road) Also check the HT leads for visual signs of damage from heat or corrosion on the connectors

ive got limo black tints on the front windows of my truck, been stopped loads of times by the police and they have never mentioned my tints being a problem

He has done this because your piston rings are worn so you are getting oil on your spark plugs? If I have understood you right and he’s changed the plugs for either of those reasons then no it will not solve any problem at all. If it’s a leak from above a shorter threaded spark plug will still be the same height once it’s in the cylinder head and if it’s worn piston rings the oil is still going to get on it as the piston compresses all that’s in the cylinder to the top... + using shorter threaded plugs in a cylinder head designed to have longer ones will mean that the electrode on the tip of the spark plug isn’t in the right position of the combustion chamber....its halfway up the threaded hole in the cylinder head! This will cause you to have a larger surface area in the combustion chamber which means you’ve just lowered the compression ratio by a fair bit, Aka lost power from your engine not to mention it’s been done on just 2 cylinders so the burn cycle from 2 will not match the other 2. Find a new mechanic.....one who knows what they are doing and not just bodging your car.

in my mates motor..... Top Speed: 170 mph - 273.58kph Machine: 1985 ford sierra cosworth Mods: way too many to list but basics are: 4x4 saphire sierra floorplan welded in, full 4x4 running gear, 6pot AP racing brakes, full safety devices roll cage, fuel cell, modified inlet manifold, larger turbo, bosh greens, side exit exhaust with no silencers... Road: m4 motorway in the uk What prevented you from going further: its an instant ban if you get caught doing over 161kph in the uk.

to avoid having to wait long periods for remaing charge that left in the ecu a "hard reset can be carried out" this is meerly joing both battery leads once dissconected for 2-3 mins. this causes the power to be shorted in a way but because its such little power it does no harm. i would not reccomend this as a means for fault clearing though, it does work on some models for that purpose but isnt good practice to do so. but i would not be worried as in short the manager is making you worry over nothing. you do NOT need to drive at 100kph for an ecu to learn. a simple 10min drive to the shops and back is usually enough for most cars, but the saving in fuel economy is going to be so minimal that if for what ever reason you have to remove the car battery, just get in the car when you next need to go somewhere and dont worry about it. you wont notice a thing different as the ecu is constantly changing fuel and igniton tables depending what demands are placed apon the engine. an ecu is not just one default running setting, it releys on its sensors to adjust the fuel and ignition accordingly especially the o2/lambda and knock sensors. easy example of this is today where i was it was chucking down with rain, not a very hot day....so the ecu will alter for this, tomorrow it may be baking hot and no rain so again the ecu will adjust for this because the inlet air temperature will be far greater than it was today, also there will be less humidity so the engine cant run with as fast an ignition table as it could today. aka its allways changing

did you dissconnect the battery when you took the steering wheel off? with any airbag fault it is best to have the SRS fault codes read, cleared then re-read if the fault code is with the airbag then, remove the multiplug to it and check for possible damage to the pins on both the air bag and the multiplug that could of been caused by it being plugged in at a slight angle. if you removed the whole steering wheel with the airbag still attached then check the multiplug to the clock spring. Did you mark the position of the clock spring apon removal and then ensure it was in the same position when you re-fitted the wheel? if not and the fault codes indicates airbag fault then this is more than likely your problem. a clock spring only has a certain amount of revolutions each way, with the wheel on its very easy to turn it too far and break it without realising. if this is the case then you will need a new clock spring but before spending money on it i would check it for continuity with a multimeter (with airbag and battery dissconected as you dont want to trigger it!)

from the things that you have listed (odd names for them i will admit) it comes across that the easiest car for you to do the things you want in my opinion would be a jap import car such as an old 200sx or skyline due to it allready having a petrol turbo engine thats rwd or 4x4 in some skyline models, has a large boot for your stereo (trunk in US), body kits and door conversions are available off the shelf as are many engine mods. (some 200sx stock internals good for over 300bhp and can be achieved via a larger turbo, exhaust system, uprated panel filter, higher flowing injectors and a remap with a electronic boost controller) there are thousands of these around the world that have been extensivly modded so you should have very little trouble in finding info, guides and parts for them via the internet. how easily avaiable parts are in lanka im not sure but when i worked on a dyno in the uk anything, literally anything i needed for a customers car from bearing shells to rose jointed rear arms we could get within 3-4days direct from japan. considering that we are a lot closer to japan here in lanka i dont think itl be hard to have stuff shipped, only thing you may have a problem with is the cost because of the huge import taxes.

i only ever use castrol oil in my cars and on cars i work on but i havent seen it sold anywhere in lanka? using the correct grade of oil is VERY important, some engines will even missfire from cold if the incorrect grade is used and always buy the best quality oil you can afford, after all its the only thing stopping your engine from grinding itself apart from the inside out. use this catrol link if you are ever in doubt of what the correct grade is http://www.castrol.com/castrol/iframe.do?categoryId=9024084&contentId=7044829

also you need a lot more than an "ecu remap" I have yet to come across a stock ecu that from a NA car that can be remapped for a turbo properly... the map sensor on a na car reads negative pressure....it wont read positive pressure like it needs to for either a turbo or supercharged conversion. this MUST be sorted or you will have no real idea how much fuel is required to not run the engine lean as just the ecu wont manage by just taking throttle position readings because as the boost pressure builds the more fuel is required to stop pre detenation. an fully mappable aftermarket ecu is required the cheapest being something like megasquirt and it MUST be mapped by someone who knows what they are doing or you will have a hole in a piston within a few mins. if your engine is not efi so has a carb then a turbo conversion is possible using the carb but it must be modified correctly to make it a "blow through" carb. you will still need to find a way to retard your ignition timing for when on boost. if anyone is doing a turbo conversion and is a bit stuck, send me an email ive done and worked on a fair few

if your going to import new ones i would see if you can get uprated ones from a company like vibratechnics. these will be heavy duty for high power conversions so you will last more than double the amount of time than a stock replacement ones if being used on a stock powered engine. the only downside is that you will experience a slight increase in vibration over stock mounts. i replaced 2 sets of stock gearbox mounts on an old car i had that was only 150bhp fwd, changed to vibratechnics mounts and never replaced since, i put up with the slight vibration as its only when at idle in traffic etc. choice is up to you mate

Depending on the engine you will need to lower the compression ratio. Either by fitting aftermarket forged pistons (stronger ones as people are referring to) or by fitting what is known as a de-comp gasket. This is a copper or aluminium copy of the head gasket and acts as an extension to the cylinder head and will reduce the compression ratio, meaning you can run more boost. But this is only good for about 14psi MAX. You will also need to increase the fuelling and retard the ignition timing for when on boost in regards to fuel economy as long as you are driving off boost it will be pretty good, supercharging on the other hand you do not get as good fuel economy as you are always running boost. Supercharging does generate lots of torque though, which is why American drag cars are nearly always supercharged. The most common supercharger that is cheaply available is the Eaton from a bmw mini as lots of minis were upgraded to the "works" spec from brand new so there are lots of used ones in Europe ready for sale and import to lanka. These units are good for up to about a 2.2L engine. There is lots to consider when converting an engine from NA to forced induction though so do your research before spending any money and do NOT buy cheap parts especially cheap actuators and boost controllers as the failure can cause the instant death of an engine. Theres also more parts required than whats on that list.......but all depends what engine your doing the conversion to.

Performance gains vary depending on engine. What you need to remember is that when a manufacture builds a car they are looking for the best averages from noise, power, economy and driveability so to make an engine quieter they will sacrifice some performance gains to increase gains in other areas by making things like the inlet manifold and filtration system more restrictive. I.e. a naturally aspirated rally car isn’t very nice to drive in stop start traffic due to the power band but it has good power and is very loud! The main gain you will have from individual carbs such as twin 40 Webbers is that each cylinder is getting its own carb so it can flow more air and fuel into the cylinder. People do the same thing with fitting individual throttle bodies but this requires a more expensive aftermarket ecu that will control the fuelling as well as the ignition. (Mega squirt is the big brother magajolt equivalent and is the cheapest standalone ecu on the market today) the gain you will have from being able to control your ignition is that you can make the timing faster to gain more power and you can adjust it to suit any other modifications you do to the engine such as better flowing exhaust manifold and system, a wilder camshaft etc. typical gain to be had from fitting individual carbs and a standalone ignition ecu is 10% minimum providing the ignition mapping is done correctly and the carbs are jetted to suit...over fuelling will lose power, under fuelling will also lose power it has to be just right.

Thanks for the positive feedback guys I just hate reading things on the internet that aren’t 100% true about cars so I have to add my bit! Ripper, I’ve got a small bit of experience with rangers but not much I’m afraid. When I worked at a ford dealer we used to sell them so would do basic work on them but anything big it would go to our other branch which was a commercial dealership. For getting parts I would try www.fordpartsuk.com they only sell genuine ford parts and are a lot cheaper than buying from a dealer. They will also ship world wide but I’m not sure about taxes when they come into lanka as I’ve only just moved here and haven’t had anything sent myself yet as I’ve left my fords in the uk. But you may not be able to get interior parts as ford tends to stop making certain spares after a 10 year period. May be worth you trying eBay, but if you can’t get hold of the bits your after send my mate at Berkshire land rover an email and he will try to source what you need second hand or new as like me even though he works on land rovers he is a ford fan His email is [email protected]

hi guys, im a qualified land rover mechanic....i did my training at the land rover technical academy in the uk, ive worked in land rover main dealers and land rover specialst garages as a mechanic and as a parts manager so i do know a little about them.... ive read the topic through and just want to highlight a few things and give my input/opinion. Firstly the freelander 1 is a great little car but like all cars its had its problems. in short the petrol versions are crap. both the 1.8k series a the 2.5kv6 have head gasket issues. yes land rover did release a modified headgaket AND oil rail for the 1.8 which has improved the problem of head gasket failure but most non dealers that fit these will miss something out. i.e. the special oil rail sealant, or that you should also fit the modified coolant tank and cap when doing the headgasket as they get stress cracks which release pressure and thus cause overheating of the system. this is often overlooked by people as the cracks appear underneath the sticker on the tank. The v6 also suffers from head gasket failure but this is normally caused by a leak on a coolant rail that sits in the valley of the V. once there is a small leak the pressure is lost and the engine overheats and warps the cylinder heads. this happens A LOT in the uk where it never no where near as hot as it is here in lanka so its no surprise that FL1's in lanka will have the problem 10 times worse. the td4 diesel engine is a different story, its a great engine but like everything it gets problems, a common cause of lack of power is the turbo hoses from the intercooler to the inlet manifold delaminate so from the outside they look fine but inside they are sucked shut starving the engine of boost. ive also replaced a fair few injectors and lift pumps on these but this is common on any diesel. If you own a diesel fl1 go and buy a crankcase breather filter right NOW. chances are it hasnt been changed during your service here in lanka and by not changing these you will cause engine running problems. this used to be every few services but land rover changed it to every other service i believe from memory but i personally would just change it every service. The tailgate doors often leak, its usually the body rubber has torn/split or the car has been hit on the spare wheel and this has made the tailgate not quite 100% straight. IRD (transfer box) do go as they tend to wind themselves up during cornering but its a very easy job to do. the pinion seals also sometimes leak but again a very easy job to replace. now onto range rover sports....... as most know the sport and disco 3 along with the supercharged range rover was done in fords ownership of land rover/jag/aston martin. the sport and disco 3 share the same chassis but its just a little longer. so naturally they share some of same problems one being the air suspension. it is common to find people jack the car up on the compressor pump thinking its a jacking point so if you buy one and the air sus wont work check this first! the compressors do also overheat and they had a problem with the exhaust valve, again a modified one is available but still we used to get these cars coming in for new pumps every few years so expect to change one in your time of ownership. other than the compressors though they dont have many air sus issues, the airbags themselves rarely leak.... they do suffer from front balljoint wear (esp with oversized wheels, i will NEVER reccomend fitting bigger that 20" wheels) lower arm, front ARB rear ARB bushes, front and rear tie rods. i know ive made them sound like a vehicle with a lot of issues but im just naming things that ive replaced a lot of in my years of working on these cars, they are an excelent drive and great off road and are in a diferent league from a defender which hasnt really changed much in the past 20 years apart from the latest TDCI puma models which have a ford transit van engine and gearbox. not knocking defenders though they but they have their place and they are not a high spec model like the fl, disco and range rover so this is naturally shown in the price. in light of getting spares, the place where i used to be a parts manager is called berkshire land rover. They are a defender builder that also has a small service department. the current parts manager is an old mate of mine and they will send parts abroad if you require them. just contact them with a full chassis number to make sure its 100% the right part. www.berkshirelandrover.com (please do not think this is an advert for them, i do not work for them any more and i will not gain from anyone buying from them, i just wanted to let you know its a good reliable place to get spares if you need them for any landrover new or old) regards to the company making a loss, land rover havent made a loss in years, jaguar has and so when the freelander 2 was created it was chosen not to be built at solihull with all the other land rovers but at the jag factory so that the brands could not be split. the reason for jags low sales is that in the uk in particular it gained a bad reputation. in the USA they sell very very well and to be honest you get one hell of a good car for your money. just like the superchaged range rover some of the jag models share the aston martin 4.2v8 and the new 5L V8. and believe me a suprcharged range rover will leave a lot of cars well behind speed wise so you can guess that the same power and torque in a small light 2wd car is very very fun! finally yes TATA are trying to split the land rover / range rover brand....the new "baby range rover evoque" is a great example of this.........underneath its pretty much a freelander 2 which funnily enough underneath is a ford kuga

'sylvi' no sorry never fitted one to a car in lanka only in england when i used to work on a dyno back in the uk. in the uk they are mostly used when people are converting an efi engine to big carbs like twin 40 webbers etc and there is no where for a distributer because its a modern engine designed with ecu controlled ignition. it is a very simple system though, you just need to get the ecu, a coil pack, trigger wheel and a crank sensor. these can all be found via ebay in the uk by searching for megajolt or megasquirt: http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=m570.l1313&_nkw=megasquirt&_sacat=See-All-Categories just make yourself some "det cans" (old pair of ear mufflers with rubber pipes to a copper tube bolted to the top of the cylinder head) so that you can hear any pre detenation when mapping the ignition and you will be fine. advance the timing untill the engine just starts to det then go back a touch and you will be ok. do NOT map when raining though as the extra moisture in the air will act in a similar way to water injection so will allow faster ignition timing that will cause fatal detenation on a non rainy hot day. sorry for the late reply by the way ive only just arrived back in lanka and havent got the internet at home at the moment.

'sylvi' no sorry never fitted one to a car in lanka only in england when i used to work on a dyno back in the uk. in the uk they are mostly used when people are converting an efi engine to big carbs like twin 40 webbers etc and there is no where for a distributer because its a modern engine designed with ecu controlled ignition. it is a very simple system though, you just need to get the ecu, a coil pack, trigger wheel and a crank sensor. these can all be found via ebay in the uk by searching for megajolt or megasquirt: http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=m570.l1313&_nkw=megasquirt&_sacat=See-All-Categories just make yourself some "det cans" (old pair of ear mufflers with rubber pipes to a copper tube bolted to the top of the cylinder head) so that you can hear any pre detenation when mapping the ignition and you will be fine. advance the timing untill the engine just starts to det then go back a touch and you will be ok. do NOT map when raining though as the extra moisture in the air will act in a similar way to water injection so will allow faster ignition timing that will cause fatal detenation on a non rainy hot day. sorry for the late reply by the way ive only just arrived back in lanka and havent got the internet at home at the moment.

errrr........most 1990 onwards cars have a minimum of an engine ecm (ecu) and a bcm...aka: body control module. it operates electric windows, sunroof, central locking, power folding mirrors etc it is (its that seperate box your refering too)a mazda may not have this but in light of ford and mazda being close with sharing engines, electrics and some bodies and that most 1990/91 onwards fords have bcms its an educated guess would be that it probably also have one. a hard reset by touching two dissconnected battery terminals will never cause a car problems so for the sake of a 2min try out theres not much to lose by trying a hard reset before going and spending any money.

buy a megajolt ecu. it is the ignition only version of a megasquirt, you can buy it pre built or as a kit and you build it yourself. its used a ford EDIS ingition module and can me programmed for any configuration of engine using a trigger wheel on the crank and a coil pack usign a 3d ignition map. http://www.autosportlabs.net/MegaJolt_Lite_Jr.

remove both battery leads from the battery and touch them together for 60 seconds. this will drain all power from the ecu which will reset it. I have done this on range rovers and bmws when the mirror have been knocked and do this, the mirrors are out of sync with each other or a few of the teeth have been damged inside the mirror. if one of the teeth has been damaged you will need it repaired, but if its just out of sync then you can just reset it by touching the battery terminals.

If a vehicle is hard to start when hot (after being driven) or when its been sat in the sun all day it is usually down to a few possible things: ECT sensor faulty (engine coolant temperature sensor) if the ecu thinks the car is cold it will trigger the injectors to fire more fuel untill the engine is at running temperature just like an old car with a carburettor uses a choke for cold starting. so if the sensor is faulty the ecu usually goes to a pre set value of treating the engine like its cold, if the engine is hot the car wont start. its just like trying to start a hot engine with the choke on, it just wont start and if it does because its over fueling so much you will have a big missfire. It could be fuel pump relay but i doubt it as this shouldnt change if the car is hot or cold. easeist way of checking if its a faulty relay is to remove the relay and bridge the connectors with a piece of wire so the fuel pump runs constantly. If the engine is turning over very slowly or not at all when the car is hot then the started motor is suffering from heat soak. turbocharged cars where the turbo is very close to the starter usually suffer from this. the way round it is to fit a heat shield around the starter motor. Basic things you need to check when the car is hot are: have you got a good strong bright blue (not dim yellow) spark to ALL of the spark plugs? what is your fuel pressure with ignition on and what is it when cranking? petrol EFI engines usually require 3-4bar of fuel pressure and MFI engines 5-6Bar.

most older boost gauges do not need the wiring connected to read. they usually require the vacuume hose to be connected to the inlet manifold using an pre exsisting blanked off nipple or by placing a T piece into a vacuume line. The wiring on an older gauge usually is just for the backing light. On a newer gauge you usually have a seperate MAP sensor that reads the boost pressure just the same as your MAP sensor will for your ecu but it converts the signal purely for the gauge to read. some gauges have these on the back of the gauge so you just run a vacuume line to the back of it like you would on an older gauge and some have it on a wiring loom so it can be mounted in the engine bay.

hello everyone Ive been to sri lanka several times as my parents both live there and hold residential visas. Im about to come back and planning to stay myself for the next 2-3 years (currently live in the uk and have uk passport etc) I currently work for a land rover specialist here in the uk and once met a sri lankan importer who said to me that i can bring a vehicle of any age into sri lanka IF i then take it back out the country when i leave and i wont have to pay the 250% tax to bring it in? Is this true? ive tried searching the interent for my answer and the sri lanka customs website doesnt seem to mention this at all only about a "gift" permit. obviously the gift permit can not apply to me as nor i or my family are sri lankan. I have come across a few posts with people mentioning "blue" permits? what is this exactly? The car i wish to bring into the country is a petrol turbo 1991 ford so it is 20 years old: can anyone please shed some light on this?