PhilMeUp

Don't throw them out though, you'll need them if the car ever needs to go through any sort of licencing inspection.

If you break a rear wheel stud on a Falcon wagon or ute you have to strip the entire axle to get to the wheel stud.

How much did the 6 piston calipers cost?

I also tried a different seat mounting bolt, in the faint hope that it was the bolt threads that were damaged instead of the floor threads. I was very pleased when the replacement bolt went straight in, meaning that I won’t have to re-tap the thread. I wash my engine bays regularly as I like to keep them clean and easy to work on. However, on the Falcons, water can get past the coil cover bolts and then down into the spark plug holes. This then shorts out the plugs, resulting in the car running on less than six cylinders. On my taxi I tried some heat-proof o-rings a while ago. They have worked well, and I can now wash the engine bay without risking water getting past the coil cover bolts. I went and bought a bunch to use in the future. From the factory the coil cover bolts have a fibre washer on each one. However, on secondhand cars those washers are often broken or missing. I only removed the front five bolts because I couldn’t be bothered removing the intercooler piping, but two of those bolts were missing the fibre washers. I checked under the head of each bolt to make sure that the o-rings would seal, and found corrosion on some of them. I recently bought a Dremel, so had a go with that and a small wire brush to see if it would clean up underneath the head of each bolt. This worked much better than expected, resulting in clean surfaces for the o-rings to seal against. I put an o-ring on each bolt. I use a Ryobi cordless drill all the time for this sort of job, but for coil cover bolts I set it to the minimum torque setting to ensure that I don’t strip the threads in the head (ie where the coil cover bolts screw into). Once the bolts are in place I use a small 1/4” drive ratchet to finish tightening them. Using something so small helps to ensure that I don’t overtighten them with a full size 1/2” ratchet. Finally, I had gotten done a few odd-jobs that I had been meaning to get around to for a while. I’ve spent the last three months driving this ute around Perth without the indicators self-cancelling when I exit corners. This meant that I had to manually push the indicator stick back into place each time, which has now become subconscious. Now I’ve got to re-learn to leave it alone. The audio and cruise control buttons look as close to new as I’m going to get without buying actual brand new ones. The airbag is clean, and the steering column plastics are finally back in place - the bottom plastic had been left at home for the last few months because I knew that I would be pulling it apart to figure out the self-cancelling problem. However, I’ve since noticed that some of the Territorys came with silver buttons. They look good - I want a set of them. There’s some on eBay for $200, which is insane. I’ll start looking through Territory wrecks for a set of silver buttons. Although the steering wheel looks worse than it actually is because of the camera flash, I will be replacing it sometime in the future. I’ve got an original Momo wheel that is looking very worn, and I’ll probably get that re-covered at some point and put that in the Tornado. After not really making any more progress on the car since I got it licenced in January, it was good to have some motivation to get back into it again. I’ve improved the interior by a lot this week, and for not much cost. Getting the carpet cleaned cost me $100 and the parts that I bought cost me $80 (airbag, spare switchgear and cup holder). I’ll hopefully get some money back by selling the spare airbag on Gumtree or eBay.

Wednesday, 1st April, 2015 Tonight I wanted to replace the station wagon switchgear that I had put on with the original ute one - the difference is the switch for the rear window wiper on the station wagon set. This isn’t required on the ute, so I wanted to put the ute switchgear back on. I had replaced the ute switchgear with the station wagon one because the indicator self-cancel wasn’t working on the ute one. When I was shopping for parts I looked at another switchgear and compared it with photos from this thread. I figured out what was wrong with the ute switchgear, and it turned out to be an extremely easy fix. This photo shows the ute switchgear on the left, and the station wagon one on the right. The difference is the white plastic ring in the centre. It turns out that this is what controls the self-cancel, and that plastic ring was missing on my ute switchgear. Here’s how it works - the white plastic ring rotates with the steering wheel and and steering column shaft. The switchgear stays stationary. You can see the two plastic tabs on the ring - one on each side. It is these tabs that control the self-cancel. Imagine that the car was turning to the left. If that centre ring rotates just a fraction more then it will push the plastic rod on the left, forcing the indicators to cancel. It’s actually very simple. This time I have lined up a tab so that it is about to self-cancel when turning right (ie rotating the steering wheel clockwise). The plastic rod gets pushed, which builds up tension in the spring (there’s a ball bearing ball on the end), which forces the indicator stick to go back to its central position. In this photo, if the centre ring continues to rotate clockwise (ie turning right) then it doesn’t push the plastic rod far enough over to force the indicators to self-cancel. It had taken me some time to figure all this out, but now I know how to fix any future self-cancel problems that I might have with my taxis in the future. It’s all about that plastic ring in the centre. By now I had pulled everything apart and re-assembled it all several times. I learned that the clockspring didn’t have to be disconnected and completely removed each time, so just left it hanging there. I removed the plastic ring from the station wagon switchgear. As the plastic ring will be regularly rotating within the switchgear, I added some grease. I pushed the plastic ring into place and made sure that there was also plenty of grease where the ball bearing is (on the end of the spring). Doing all of this with wheelie bins made it easier. Putting the cable between the handle and bin meant that the switchgear couldn’t slide off and onto the ground. You can see here how the steering column shaft rotates the white plastic ring when the steering wheel is turned. The black plastic of the switchgear remains in the same place. The switchgear is attached to the top of the steering column at three mounting points. One of them is at the end of the screwdriver. There is another screw on the left side and one on the top. A ratchet screwdriver made it easier to undo and tighten the screws, and a magnet made it easy to remove them without them dropping onto the floor and bouncing into some corner where they couldn’t be found. Finally getting somewhere. The switchgear and clockspring are in place, and the next step is to put the steering wheel back on. Then I got curious and wanted to check the headlight switch wires. When the headlight switch doesn’t work then it is because one or more of these wires has broken. This is what had happened to the original switchgear that was in the ute when I bought it. Although those wires can be easily soldered back together, I had a spare working switchgear at home so put that on. I just didn’t notice at the time that my replacement switchgear was missing that plastic ring in the centre. I finally got it all back in one piece and went for a test drive. I was pretty pissed off when the headlights wouldn’t work at all - only the high beam would. It was night, and the ute was also low on petrol, so I made my way to the nearest servo via some backstreets. Then I had to go home, pull it all apart again and try and figure out why the switchgear that has been working for the last few months (except for the self-cancel) was now not working. I had well and truly had enough of all of this by now. Over it. That black plastic box in the centre of the photo is held in place by two small plastic brackets (one on each side). This gadget is the switch for high beam. I clipped it back into place properly and much to my relief all of the lights then worked as they should. Time to put the steering wheel back on, hopefully for the last time tonight. I did a bunch of testing of indicators and headlights before doing this. I had removed the steering wheel a couple of days ago to have a look to see if there was something obvious that was out of place. I put the bolt back on with my Ryobi battery-powered impact gun, which I thought had tightened up the bolt enough. However, within a short distance there was slight movement between the steering wheel and steering wheel column (ie the bolt had come loose). I didn’t expect this, and wanted to make sure that it wouldn’t happen again, so put a drop of Loctite 222 on the bolt. To further make sure that I put the bolt back in place securely, I looked up the torque setting in the service manual. I then used a digital torque wrench to tighten the bolt to the specified 38Nm. During re-assembly I had accidentally touched something on the back of the switchgear with some metal on the steering column. Sure enough, the indicators now weren’t working at all. I figured that it might be a fuse, so looked up which fuse was for the indicators - it’s the bottom right one, which is a 10A fuse. On the left is the blown fuse, and on the right is one that I bought from Jaycar last year. The Jaycar fuses have an LED in them which lights up if the fuse blows, making it obvious that it has blown.

Here you can see the difference between the two sets of audio control buttons. The lower ones are the old ones, and the top ones are the ones that I’m going to replace them with. The two sides of buttons are on the same wiring loom. However, the cruise control buttons on my new set were showing signs of wear. With a flat-blade screwdriver, I removed the cruise control buttons from each set. Once I had both sets of buttons off, I was able to pick out the best ones to keep. I put it all back together. I tried cleaning the old airbag, but the pre-existing one was in better condition. The two airbags. The bottom one is the previous one, with the best of the buttons. I’ll resell the one above.

Tuesday, 31st March, 2015 Since I started driving the Tornado I’ve been hating the dark tint on the back window. Also, with a motorbike background, I’m used to maintaining a constant awareness of everything that is happening around my vehicle. The dark tint means that even in daylight, seeing things behind the car requires a split second of hesitation, instead of seeing and identifying things instantaneously. The photos don’t show it, but it’s extremely dark and rear vision at night is almost nothing. When parking, I always reverse in, including reversing the Tornado up my long driveway at night. The black plastic tray also makes it hard to see where the ute ends when reversing. At first I couldn’t tell whether the tint was the usual stick-on stuff or part of the glass. Then I saw the clear part and realised that it was definitely stick-on. I assumed that it was going to be difficult to remove, so took the car to a windscreen place. The girl at the front counter gave me a price of $77 to remove the tint from just the one window. One of the workshop staff questioned her on this, and when she said that was the cheapest that she could quote, he went out to the car and peeled off one corner so that I could do it myself at home. He said to peel it off carefully and slowly. However, once at home I found that the whole lot peeled off in seconds. Then I went over it with some eucalyptus aerosol spray to remove the remaining sticker residue, before finishing the job off with some Windex. I’ve now got a clear back window, and can see behind the ute at night. Then it was time to go shopping for some parts. There’s a guy that I know who buys crashed Falcons at auction and wrecks them from home. He is extremely disorganised and the place is always a mess. But he’s cheap and usually has whatever I’m after at the time. I bought a BF cup holder, another station wagon switchgear (so now I’ve got two spares), an airbag with side buttons and a seat mount bolt. This all cost me $80. The cup holder got washed with detergent and water. I don’t like the standard BA-style cup holder with the flip-over lid. It doesn’t hold drinks in place properly, hence the mess from a previously spilled drink that I cleaned up on Sunday when the carpet was cleaned. The BF cup holder stands out because it’s a different colour to the gear lever surround. I’ll paint the top of the cup holder once I figure out what paint to use. The turbocharger gauge doesn’t work so I unclipped the holder and checked to make sure that the wiring is plugged in properly. It all looks correct, so I’m going to have to look into that further another time. I removed the side buttons from the airbag that I bought. I used a Torx T25 socket for this. The cable for the side buttons has this connector, which sits on a plastic mount. You can see the small plastic bump near the blue dot - to remove the white connector from the black plastic mount, lift the white connector at the rear (where the yellow and brown wires come out of) and slide the connector off the black plastic mount. The connectors on the back of the airbag were difficult to remove, so I used some needle-nose pliers to firmly jiggle each connector side to side to slide them off.

Today, I learned that the two bolts that hold the airbag in place onto the steering wheel are a Torx T27. Not a Torx T25. Which explains the cursing last night and today, when my T25 was rotating inside the bolt and I thought that I'd somehow stripped it. Off to order a T27 socket...

Yep. Taxi drivers are all self-employed. There is no insurance or coverage of any sort (ie workers comp). There will be the likelihood of a criminal compensation claim, so I'll have to look into that.

There is legislation that covers this, but what we don't have is a crystal ball. As a driver, I have absolutely no idea how each trip is going to go until the person has been in the car for a minute or two. All I can do is have a few rules in place to improve my chances (eg always position the car so that I can go forward straight away). Jobs that you initially think will go bad end up going well. Jobs that you think are safe end up going bad. You never know until the end. With this one, they were extremely arrogant. Although irritating (eg two of them insisted on smoking cigarettes in the taxi, no matter what I said), it wasn't until the final few seconds when things got physical. I was trying to get out of there, when one of them punched me in the face. No logical reason. No provocation. If it all happened again there isn't anything that I could have done differently. There were no warnings signs. It was completely spontaneous and unjustified.

Either the washer pump is blocked with algae or it's stopped working. Very easy to fix. You can buy an aftermarket pump from Repco, etc, for around $20. On the Falcons there is the one bottle. Cars with a rear wiper have a second water pump. Photo guide: http://www.fordxr6turbo.com/forum/topic/89260-photo-essay-replacing-the-windscreen-washer-pump If there's any algae or grime in the water tank then flush it out with a hose.

With the airbag off the car I was able to clean the front of the airbag with some eucalyptus aerosol spray and a towel. The audio control buttons had been grubby since I bought the car, so I was finally able to clean them. I used some Mr Sheen for this. After pulling everything apart and re-assembling it several times, I still couldn’t figure out why the indicators wouldn’t self-cancel. I had a spare set of clockspring and switchgear, so decided to try some different combinations. The second clockspring didn’t make a difference. However, when I tried the other switchgear the indicators self-cancelled when I started the car and turned the steering wheel back and forth. Thus, the problem was somewhere inside the switchgear. Despite cleaning the audio control buttons, they still look very secondhand. I’ll look for a better condition set the next time I’m buying secondhand parts off a wreck. Everything back in place. The switchgear that I’ve used for now is from a BFIII wagon that I got some parts from last year. This means that it has the controls for the rear wiper that a wagon has. This isn’t required for a ute, so I’ll go looking for a secondhand switchgear and keep this one as a spare for my taxis. My previous attempt at fixing the roof lining with aerosol glue hasn’t lasted for long. Sooner or later I’ll remove the hood and get it done properly.

While the centre console was out I gave that a blast with some water to get rid of some marks from when I spilt a drink a few weeks ago. Then it was time to put the interior back together. As it was now dark, I decided to throw everything back in, take the car home and finish the job there. Time to give the floor mats a quick clean. The problem with washing floor mats is that they are wet afterward. Putting them straight back into the car means that the bottoms of the floor mats don’t dry. I wanted to see if the Stihl blower was any good for drying them faster. This worked well - the floor mat on the left has had about one minute of the blower. The centre console went back in first, followed by bolting the handbrake back in place. I made sure that the cigarette lighter power cables were plugged in properly. I once had these cables come loose in a taxi, meaning no GPS for the night. Previously I’ve used a kitchen sponge to clean gear lever surround plastics, but these often leave water streaks. A quick spray of Mr Sheen meant no streaks. The centre console, all back in place. Behind the passenger seat I keep a toolbox of basic tools and the wheel changing kit. The threads for one of the passenger seat bolts are stripped. I’ll get a tap and die set later and re-tap the thread. The interior, all back in place. With clean carpet. That cigarette burn in the driver’s seat irritates me every time I get into the car, but I haven’t come up with an easy solution for that yet. The other side of the interior. When I originally got the car licenced I had to replace the switchgear because the headlight switch didn’t work. Luckily, I had a spare switchgear at home, but it turns out that the indictors don’t self-cancel when going around corners with this one. I’ve been meaning to figure that out since I got the car licenced, so started by removing the airbag. The two bolts that hold the airbag in place were removed with a Torx T25 socket. I bought a Wiha 76335 1/4” drive socket for this one task and used it for the first time. Removing the steering wheel involves removing a bolt which has a Torx T50 head. I loosened the bolt half way, and then wrestled the steering wheel by its sides until it broke loose. Leaving the bolt in place prevents the steering wheel from flying off when it comes loose. The clockspring. Everything looks normal. Despite the word, “Top”, and an arrow, that part actually goes at the bottom.

Sunday, 29th March, 2015 After not doing any major further work on the Tornado since I got it licenced in January, this week I decided that I was going to get the carpet cleaned properly. I found a car detailer who was going to be in his workshop today (Sunday), so agreed to meet him there. This suited me perfectly. When the time came I got a bit self conscious about the car being dirty, so decided to give it a quick clean before leaving. I like to keep my engine bays clean, so gave this one a quick rinse with CT18 and water. The trick is to avoid letting water getting past the coil cover bolts, particularly the one near the DOHC logo and the one near the oil cap. Although there are fibre washers under each bolt, water can still sometimes get past. On my taxi I have replaced these with heat-proof o-rings, and I’ll be doing the same here when I get around to it. I used the same CT18 and brush to clean the wheels, and then washed the car. You’ll notice the dent on the front corner of the car. That’s a whole another story, which is still unravelling here. Someone reversed into the car a few weeks ago. I got my Stihl blower out to blow dust off the dashboard, out of the vents, speedo cluster and ICC. This actually worked quite well. Once I got to the detailing place it was time to strip the interior, starting with the seats. Although I had done a fairly good job of vacuuming up dog hair from the carpet in front of the seats, once I removed the seats I saw that paying to get the carpet professionally cleaned was necessary. I have no idea what this brown stain is, but it will be gone soon. With the driver’s seat out, there was still quite a mess. Before cleaning, all the dog hair had to be vacuumed up. This took almost an hour. This guy’s vacuuming made quite a difference. I also noticed that although there is an FPV scuff guard on the passenger side, the driver’s one is a normal Falcon scuff guard. I’ll be looking on eBay for an FPV one as soon as possible. The seats and various interior items were kept away from the ute so that no-one accidentally knocked them over. I finally realised that after putting in a heap of hours of effort into this thing, there was actually a moment where I could sit back and do nothing, while someone else did the work. The cleaning part of the process didn’t take very long, but made a massive difference. Nothing like what it was before.

Four cameras. Two inside the car, which film each side of the interior. Two on the roof - one on each side, facing outward, to photograph people as they approach the car. Plus audio recording. It's pretty comprehensive, and very, very tightly controlled. Only Dept of Transport can access the footage, and it must be for a police request or serious passenger complaint. The only time that the footage leaves DOT is when it goes to police. Taxi companies don't get access to it. WA taxis have the most thorough camera setup in Australia. I can't figure out why other states haven't moved up to the same level. As well as identifying assailants in cases like this, they also identify and confirm driver misconduct. If a driver says something dodgy (ie sleazy remarks to females, charging for false tolls) then the audio records it. It creates a sh*tload more accountability for drivers. I'm a lot more careful with what I say these days. Very few passengers are aware of it, but the guy that thumped me will eventually find out all about it. With the bloke that thumped me on Friday night, the police will get the photos and the audio recording. We also stopped off at a hotel, where these guys tried to buy alcohol after midnight (and got knocked back). There is camera footage at the hotel as well. He'll get located, arrested and charged. The police will show him photos. If he gets a lawyer then the lawyer will get the photos, and advise him that he can't deny the hit. Defend it if he wants, but better off to plead guilty, take a fine and try for a spent conviction. Someone strangled me in the car back in November. Thanks to the camera footage he had no way of denying it. He pleaded guilty in court this week and got a $1500 fine. Also got a spent conviction, which is a shame. He's a FIFO, so money's not the problem for him - a recorded conviction would have been. But, at least he got busted and will hopefully not try the same stunt again. Thus, accountability.

Bought a messy and neglected FPV Tornado ute late last year. People that have seen the build thread will remember what a mess it was - http://www.fordxr6turbo.com/forum/topic/89684-2006-fpv-tornado-f6-ute-cleanup-resurrection/ This week I figured that I'd better get around to getting the carpet cleaned properly. Found someone that was going to be in his workshop on Sunday (today) so committed to that. Turned up. It's all locked up. Rang the mobile number on the card and got the guy's father. Who rung everywhere, trying to locate his son. No luck. Carpets not getting done today. Had a sh*t week, and as stupid as it sounds, was really hanging out to get that carpet cleaned today. -------------------------------------------- Here in Perth we have a lot of trouble with drunk Irish dickheads. They come over here, get a high paying job and then spend all their money on binge drinking. I'm a big bloke (185cm, 130kg), so I generally can get them under control by telling them that if they don't shut the f*ck up then I'll drag 'em out of the car, bash the sh*t out of them and then dump them in the bush somewhere. That's the language that works with these morons - I have to create a hierarchy. Then they calm down and behave a bit better. That wasn't going to work with this lot. Four of them, all sh*tfaced drunk and abusive. The pack mentality. One of them punched me in the face. Upper lip is torn to shreds and a front tooth got knocked out. It can't be replaced, but I paid a dentist $900 yesterday to put it back in anyway, because I don't want to deal with having a missing front tooth right now (ie can't talk properly). The tooth will fall out later on, and the quote is $12,000 to fix it properly. Tough weekend.

FG Manual: http://www2.hybrid-power.com/installation/installation/FGXR6.pdf BA&BF Manual: http://www2.hybrid-power.com/web/images/catalogues/PDF/BA%20BF%20GT2%20Installation%20Manual.pdf I had to replace the radiator in my BF recently. Tons of fun. http://www.fordxr6turbo.com/forum/topic/89684-2006-fpv-tornado-f6-ute-cleanup-resurrection/page-2#entry1523648

You can buy a kit on eBay for around $150, consisting of idle pulley, tension pulley (and arm) and drive belt. Genuine Ford parts. Good start for troubleshooting, and good maintenance move. BF: www.ebay.com.au/itm/121460979556 BA: www.ebay.com.au/itm/301353949620 FG: www.ebay.com.au/itm/301353949623 Do a search for the idle pulley part number (BA8A617A) to find such listings.

Was the payrise enough to cover buying a thermos? Get everyone in the building to keep Google searching, "How to stay awake at work when there's no coffee" and see if the IT guys pick up on it.

Get me a part number and I can see what AMCAP's pricing is. Secondhand will be the way to go, though. Edit: is the the same as the Fairmont/Fairlane ones? ie www.ebay.com.au/itm/290671043715 http://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/malaga/wrecking/fairmont-ba-2003-all-parts/1063364586 http://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/kwinana-town-centre/wrecking/wrecking-2004-ford-fairmont-ghia-/1074262609

You going to get a new one or secondhand?

Idle pulley.

These days I keep a couple of spare reservoirs. I undo the 8mm head bolt that holds it in place and swap the reservoir over for a clean one. The old one gets cleaned in the laundry sink with detergent and warm water. Once it's dry it goes into a sealed plastic bag for use next time.

For pricing on genuine Ford parts, check eBay stores such as Jefferson Ford - http://stores.ebay.com.au/jeffersonfordparts Adelaide Parts - http://stores.ebay.com.au/adelaideparts