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My bumper was split in half when I had my Corolla towed out of a ravine. The mechanic zip tied it back together and I have had this "temporary" fix for well over a year now. I've tried calling some body shops recently and cannot get them to call me back. One of them did, but it was from the franchise's call center. They took my information and said they'd call me back, which they haven't. Is this a post-pandemic demand spike that hasn't yet abated? I live in the Tampa Bay area, if that makes a difference. I'm thinking it does, people drive like psychos here. There's probably a lot of dents to buff out.
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Apr 6, 2024 15:51
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| # ? May 29, 2024 09:08 |
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Slapping a bumper cover on a Corolla is not a particularly high dollar job, and they’re probably busy with insurance work because Americans have decided that we like nothing better than crashing our cars in to each other. Based on the fact that you’ve had the frankenrepair for a while, I’d recommend trying to find a salvaged cover in the same color. (I get the sense that you don’t fully care about how this looks and a looks-fine-from-10-feet repair is okay with you) The only thing you really need a specialized body shop for is the paint, and if you find a pre painted salvage cover you can probably get your mechanic to slap it on (or even do it yourself, it’s not very difficult).
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Apr 6, 2024 17:51
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That's exactly what I'd do. Find out the exact year range that your front bumper cover fits, sign up for row52.com and use that year range and your zip code and acceptable driving distance to set up an instant alert for the make model year, you'll get emails the day any car meeting your requirements shows up at a participating yard (mostly pick n pull chain yards owned by schnitzer, they own the site and are slowly pushing out all competing yards as far as I can tell) and usually they even have a picture so you can see if the bumper is smashed or the wrong color. Grab your tools, go there, practice taking the new one off on the junkyard car, swap it on your car in the parking lot and put the two halves of the old bumper in the trunk or back in the yard if they charged you a core charge. Return home victorious after hitting the closest taco truck, glizzy stand, or Chinese buffet, as our religious traditions require.
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Apr 6, 2024 20:31
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kastein posted:Return home victorious after hitting the closest taco truck, glizzy stand, or Chinese buffet, as our religious traditions require. Oh dang you're right, there's a Touareg and a Q7 at my local that I've been meaning to hit up for parts, I need to include trailer tacos in this plan.
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Apr 6, 2024 23:15
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A racoon and, given the amount of noise, some baby racoons are inside the engine bay of my 2016 Metris van (kind of tucked into a void in front of the passenger wheel well). I drove the van a week ago without hearing anything and now I hear a lot, so I'm guessing it's a recent development. I cleaned the engine bay (some ripped up insulation strewn around), rubbed some mint oil on some exposed metal (didn't think I should put it on plastic stuff), and I've left the hood open. I'm guessing I just need to wait until the racoon gets annoyed enough to move it's babies, just figured I would check to see if there is anything I missed. Not interested in anything that involves killing them all and/or driving the mom away and leaving the baby racoons to die. I don't need to drive this van at the moment and can afford to wait.
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Apr 7, 2024 00:30
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Safety Dance posted:Oh dang you're right, there's a Touareg and a Q7 at my local that I've been meaning to hit up for parts, I need to include trailer tacos in this plan. There are two more Q7s at my preferred yard, what are you looking for? I don't make it to your yard nearly as often due to the ferry ride and distance.
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Apr 7, 2024 01:37
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I'm going to poke around in the sunroof area and see if they have similar wiring harnesses to the Kentucky-fried insulation in mine. Might also take a look at the washer fluid reservoirs while I'm in there. I have to wake up at 04:30 on Monday for a call with a co-worker from Paris, so I think I'm justified in a lunchtime junkyard run.
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Apr 7, 2024 01:51
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Please post photos of your van raccoons, tezer.
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Apr 8, 2024 05:18
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We demand forbidden catte pictures
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Apr 8, 2024 05:27
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Safety Dance posted:I'm going to poke around in the sunroof area and see if they have similar wiring harnesses to the Kentucky-fried insulation in mine. Might also take a look at the washer fluid reservoirs while I'm in there. You too? I have to be at the southworth ferry dock at 550 for goon and car shenanigans. Why do we do this to ourselves Edit: and clearly I need more sleep not less since I just double posted without realizing it
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Apr 8, 2024 05:28
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kastein posted:You too? I have to be at the southworth ferry dock at 550 for goon and car shenanigans. Why do we do this to ourselves It's gotta be done. kastein posted:We demand forbidden catte pictures Domestic catte facing off with a forbidden catte through the back door a few mornings back. 
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Apr 8, 2024 06:07
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stupid question time. i recently picked up a couple carbs from some guy, a demon 650 and holley 600. i am pretty familiar with most 4-barrels, but these are my first double pumpers. in my initial poking around, checking that the accelerator pumps are shimmed correctly, setting throttle stops correctly, etc, i noticed that the demon doesn't open its secondaries all the way. holley 600 for reference:  opens about this far before the secondaries start moving:  secondaries open all the way:  ok, so far so good. the demon:  opens a lil further before the secondaries start moving:  and, when fully open, the secondaries are still a few degrees from vertical, unlike the holley (ignore the schmutz i still need to clean out of there)  so, my stupid question is, i should adjust this, right? i don't see any obvious adjustability in the linkage. the little bent rod between the primary and secondary linkages (top leftish in first photo) looks like it's easily removed, but i don't think i've seen different lengths of these before. all i can think of is to just bend it a little to resize it, but that seems pretty jank.
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Apr 8, 2024 10:27
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What's the consensus on wheel spacers here? As long as you get some that are made specifically for your car and not generic ones. Pushing out the rims a bit on E39's is pretty sexy, but is it worth it?
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Apr 8, 2024 12:11
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Reasonable thickness spacers are fine if they're proper for your car. E39 is hubcentric so make sure you get hubcentric spacers. Make sure your wheel studs are long enough to have proper thread engagement with the spacers.
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Apr 8, 2024 13:32
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What he said. Also make sure the mounting surfaces are clean and dry, torque in star pattern, and recheck the spacer to hub nut torque as required, not just the wheel to spacer lug nuts. I've had zero issues that way, even though my fellow yeehaw jeep owners think spacers are the devil and that you need to use hubcentric rings on a lug centric vehicle. (But yeah, the e30 is hub centric, so use them. Depending on whether the wheels and lug type you use are hub or lug centric, you'll want to get spacers with the correct spigot, or can use flat face ones.)
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Apr 8, 2024 13:55
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I've always been too scared of premature wheel bearing failure to run them but yeah a car with wheels that aren't 2" inside the fender is worth it.
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Apr 8, 2024 21:07
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Had a tire blow out this afternoon. They're about 5 years old, but with probably less than 10k miles on them. Can I get away with just replacing two of them? It's a front-wheel-drive vehicle.
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Apr 8, 2024 23:39
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Lester Shy posted:Had a tire blow out this afternoon. They're about 5 years old, but with probably less than 10k miles on them. Can I get away with just replacing two of them? It's a front-wheel-drive vehicle. Good thing to ask a shop (to see just how worn they are) but generally yeah put the two matching age tires on the front and the new + old tire on the rear. Your tire may have failed because of a non-wear related issue, so it's hard to recommend you keep driving on them, you really should have a shop look at your tires and give them the OK. They may have some dry rot.
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Apr 9, 2024 00:12
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Hey thread. I recently came into possession of a 2012 Mercedes diesel E Class. The engine coolant light was on from when I got it, but looking at the coolant tank it looked to be mostly full, just below the sensor so I didn't address it immediately. I drove it about 300 miles with no trouble at all. Then while in an indoor carpark (this may be relevant) a loud fan like noise started coming from the engine, then the steering wheel locked up. I turned the engine off, but the fan like noise didn't stop, but the steering wheel freed up after turning the engine back on. I also noticed the engine temperature going up quite fast (75c to 90c in about a minute). I parked up, went and bought some coolant and let the engine cool off before topping it up and everything seemed good (although the coolant level warning didn't go away) I drove it another 100 miles with no problems. Then tonight I took it on a short (around 4 miles) journey and exactly the same thing happened. Fan like whirring from the bonnet, steering locked up and engine started heating up. The first time it happened I was in an indoor car park and the second time I was driving at night, all other times I've driven it has been in bright daylight so so far there is 100% correlation between this problem and the head lights being on, I was wondering if this is likely a battery issue? Without going into detail, the previous owner of the car isn't contactable to ask about any of these problems.
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Apr 9, 2024 00:52
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Thermostat
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Apr 9, 2024 00:59
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Tea Bone posted:Hey thread. Sorry the steering wheel 'locked up' when you turned the engine off, or has it locked up with the engine running? I don't know if you've had a car before but the steering wheel is supposed to lock with the key out. Radiator fans will turn on when the coolant is warm, it is normal for some cars to do this even when the car is off because the coolant will still circulate due to convection. The rad fan may not turn on when you're driving on the highway because enough air is blowing through the radiator. Short trips locally at lower speeds may cause the rad fans to turn on because you're not going fast enough for the coolant to be cooled without them. If the steering locked up when the engine was running, the car is not safe to drive as the steering could lock while you're in motion, which could kill someone. This could be just a slightly low coolant level and normal fan/steering wheel locking with key out behavior (that you just aren't familiar with) or this could be an issue that is very dangerous.
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Apr 9, 2024 02:06
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Lester Shy posted:Had a tire blow out this afternoon. They're about 5 years old, but with probably less than 10k miles on them. Can I get away with just replacing two of them? It's a front-wheel-drive vehicle. Maybe even 1 with that mileage. Did you hit something or did it just pop? If it just popped it's probably age and dryrot that killed it. The other 3 are probably in the same condition and not long for this world. About 6 years is the recommended lifespan of tires so you're near the end. They might have been older already when you bought them. You can check this (and replacements) https://www.goodyear.com/en_US/learn/tire-basics/tire-date-code.html If they're ancient get all 4. Last thing to consider is if you have a limited slip diff. It's a big issue on AWD cars, Subarus and BMWs stand out. If you do have a LSD get 2 tires and put new in the back, old in the front. Keep the f/r pairs matched and you're golden. No LSD? Do whatever your car doesn't care. If your budget allows just get 4. If it allows but not right this second get the other 3 asap so they're similar wear and age. Ideally you don't want 1-2 new sticky tires and 2-3 old ones. It can make the car behave unpredictably.
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Apr 9, 2024 02:31
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Tea Bone posted:Hey thread. My 2011 VW diesel would go through a 'regen' cycle for emissions purposes that cranked up the exhaust gas temps and forced the fans to run. If I turned the engine off while it was going through this cycle then the fans would continue to run for a while to help cool things down. That's what it sounds like to me, but I don't know if you're benz has something similar.
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Apr 9, 2024 03:11
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VelociBacon posted:Sorry the steering wheel 'locked up' when you turned the engine off, or has it locked up with the engine running? I don't know if you've had a car before but the steering wheel is supposed to lock with the key out. It was "locking" up while the engine was running, very scary. I used quote marks there because it didn't lock in the same way it does when the key is out, rather it just got very heavy so it could just be that power steering went rather than it locked entirely.
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Apr 9, 2024 03:39
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honda whisperer posted:Maybe even 1 with that mileage. Did you hit something or did it just pop? Yeesh yeah, these are from 2017, guess I'm getting all four. As far as I can tell, it wasn't like I ran over a nail or anything; it looks like a blowout in the sidewall.
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Apr 9, 2024 04:32
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Sorta car related, because it's the cars fault. But I have a pair of cheap coveralls I use when working with my cars and in the shop and they've gotten really dirty and greasy. I guess they should be washed fairly regularly but what should I do now that they've gotten this disgusting. I don't want to put them in our washer like this. I was thinking of soaking them in a detergent solution in a tub outdoors a few times before tossing them into the washing machine to get the worst off them, not sure what I ought to use. Washing soda, lye, soap, regular detergent for clothes?
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Apr 9, 2024 09:41
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Take them to a laundromat.
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Apr 9, 2024 13:37
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His Divine Shadow posted:Sorta car related, because it's the cars fault. But I have a pair of cheap coveralls I use when working with my cars and in the shop and they've gotten really dirty and greasy. I guess they should be washed fairly regularly but what should I do now that they've gotten this disgusting. I don't want to put them in our washer like this. Soak them in a tub overnight with oxyclean. Then, wesleywillis posted:Take them to a laundromat.
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Apr 9, 2024 14:05
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You know this made me realize I've never been to a laundromat in my life.
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Apr 9, 2024 15:26
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When I lived in a crappy overpriced concrete apartment building with washers that cost money to use and were always broken I'd choose the shittiest washer in the laundry room and apply an entire can of brakleen to my nasty wrenching clothes as prewash right before putting them in on hot/hot with double detergent. It worked. Not recommended for washing machines you actually don't want to fix, or in buildings you would mind burning down :vee:
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Apr 9, 2024 15:58
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NitroSpazzz posted:Reasonable thickness spacers are fine if they're proper for your car. E39 is hubcentric so make sure you get hubcentric spacers. Make sure your wheel studs are long enough to have proper thread engagement with the spacers. kastein posted:What he said. Also make sure the mounting surfaces are clean and dry, torque in star pattern, and recheck the spacer to hub nut torque as required, not just the wheel to spacer lug nuts. VelociBacon posted:I've always been too scared of premature wheel bearing failure to run them but yeah a car with wheels that aren't 2" inside the fender is worth it. Cool ok. But yeah I'm also a bit worried about the load on the wheel bearings, the suspension and perhaps it introducing problems like vibration.
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Apr 9, 2024 17:07
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Lester Shy posted:Yeesh yeah, these are from 2017, guess I'm getting all four. As far as I can tell, it wasn't like I ran over a nail or anything; it looks like a blowout in the sidewall. Heavy blows. If the sidewall failed and you didn't hit a pothole that made you yell gently caress it's time. There's a tire thread in here too that's great for picking the best tires for use, expense, and desired characteristics you want. Also +1 for tire rack testing and reviews being legit. Price does not equal quality here. Cheap quiet and grippy are possible.
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Apr 10, 2024 01:11
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Alright, stupid question for the stupid question thread: I'm gonna be in the market for a newer car sometime later this year, and all signs point to a lil ol' civic hatchback at the moment. Decision isn't set in stone, but here's the question: Is a 5.1" ground clearance going to give me more issues than the mpg boost is worth from what I'll get in a civic hatchback over something like an HR-V? I have to park on a gravel lot at work and the bumps/potholes that form only get leveled out maybe once a month or once every other month at best. I see other low-clearance sedans and coupes in the parking lot, but the majority of them are SUVs or pickups. I'm not against a CR-V, but any of those with less than 100k miles is a bit pricey for me to consider for a used vehicle. The fuel economy is important bc it seems like I'll be driving more for work in the coming months and a hybrid is gonna be too costly for registration/maintenance reasons.
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Apr 10, 2024 02:10
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my 2020 miata has 5.75" of clearance and i'll huck it down fire roads. You'll be 100% fine.
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Apr 10, 2024 02:30
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Buy the car based on what you do the most driving on. You spend maybe 1% of your time on the gravel parking lot. It's not important. Cars handle potholes all the time.
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Apr 10, 2024 02:44
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Also keep in mind geometry kicks in a lot when talking about ground clearance. If you've got 5" and there's a rock dead center, your right front has to go down more than 10" for clearance to kick in. And probably more considering that the other 3 suspension components are gonna hold it up a little bit.
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Apr 10, 2024 03:09
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Both good points to know! I have a really bad habit of making mountains out of molehills and this has been bugging me the last couple days. Cars are not my forte and this means I'm definitely factoring in things that don't super matter in the long run.
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Apr 10, 2024 03:36
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little_firebird posted:Both good points to know! I have a really bad habit of making mountains out of molehills and this has been bugging me the last couple days. Cars are not my forte and this means I'm definitely factoring in things that don't super matter in the long run. Yeah it's not a factor at all. There are a lot of other good small cars too so if you have the chance to go test drive a lot of things you might find another little econobox you like. Specifically I'd make sure you try a golf hatchback.
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Apr 10, 2024 03:43
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Jonny 290 posted:my 2020 miata has 5.75" of clearance and i'll huck it down fire roads. You'll be 100% fine. Cue an exactly 0.65 inch tall dent in the civic.
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Apr 10, 2024 04:46
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| # ? May 29, 2024 09:08 |
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 i have 3.25" between the ground and the headers, and ive taken it down some pretty sketchy roads and unmaintained driveways. gotta take a careful line, but it's doable. 5+ inches would be no problem
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Apr 10, 2024 04:53
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