The £650 Puma

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Package from Ford Parts UK (excellent service as always);

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An auxiliary belt to see if I can get rid of my squeaky engine and a set of genuine rear bushes. Hopefully these will be an improvement on the last set I had fitted.

Just need to find the time to get them fitted!
 
Behold - the Jegger Thunder edition!

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There was a reason for this wheel jiggery pokery. YOG asked if I wanted to try some alternative tyres to see if it cured the wobbly tracking. So today we swapped the wheels over to the pair he's getting refurb'd that are shod with nearly new Michelins, and went for a drive.

Now for the strange part - the result was the same - heavy weaving and wandering at speed meaning I haven't wasted my money on rubbish tyres - they're fine. However, it seems that I'm back to trying to track down the issue!

A few avenues to investigate which I'll post up when I get round to doing so.

Oh, and I still prefer the look of the prop alloys. :cool:
 
The Arch Bishop said:
[post]348309[/post] Package from Ford Parts UK (excellent service as always);

25189349793_bbbf59ed1c_b.jpg


An auxiliary belt to see if I can get rid of my squeaky engine and a set of genuine rear bushes. Hopefully these will be an improvement on the last set I had fitted.

Just need to find the time to get them fitted!
I agree with the service from Ford Parts UK. I've had a few bits from them with no problems.
I suspect your squeaky engine could be the idler pulley, a common fault. Has it been replaced before?
Paul
 
The Arch Bishop said:
[post]348571[/post] Behold - the Jegger Thunder edition!

25914964736_2eacc3d761_b.jpg


Oh, and I still prefer the look of the prop alloys. :cool:

I'll don my tin hat, but really like the Thunder wheels on Jegger!!
 
748 said:
I agree with the service from Ford Parts UK. I've had a few bits from them with no problems.
I suspect your squeaky engine could be the idler pulley, a common fault. Has it been replaced before?
Paul
I think that's highly likely Paul, but I bottled it and bought just the belt (also couldn't quite work out which part was the correct idler pulley on their site). Sometimes, usually after a period of dry weather, it's silent, but if the humidity is high it sqeaks like a banshee!
XAF said:
I'll don my tin hat, but really like the Thunder wheels on Jegger!!
I suspect the overwhelming majority of people on this site would agree with you, I'm just a bit strange about liking the props! :grin:
 
Just finished reading your thread
Better than most tv series can't wait for the next installment :grin:
Did you manage to remove your seized brake piston ?
Have you tried using a grease gun, just screw into bleed nipple and gently squeeze, piston will pop right out.
 
Hi Ian, glad you're enjoying it! I'm not sure I have a grease gun, but work has a compressor. Just have to actually remember to bring them in to work! I tried with a foot pump but I haven't got an adaptor that fits the threads.
 
42 pages over 3 days of reading and what a journey it's been. So well written and a pleasure to read.Can't wait to purchase my first puma now.
 
Cheers both! The journey isn't over yet!

My neighbour's ultra-cheapy Puma has truly died well beyond economical repair, so I was asked if I wanted anything out of it. I grabbed some spanners and set about removing everything I needed (and a few bits I didn't really).

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So I have a spare wheel that's round (mine is not) a decent condition engine bulkhead, an airflow sensor (worth having a spare), a throttle position sensor (mine may well be on the blink), another jack (may come in useful very soon) and a handful of fixings to replace various missing ones on my car.

I may also try and remove the engine mount as I think my own has rather a lot of play, but I ran out of time today.

I also extracted the TAPE ECU that I've bunged up for sale on his behalf which should net a large percentage of what he paid for the car in the first case!

[Salute] Farewell NAX, you were a cheap and tatty old Puma that provided a Summer of cheap driving and also offered up some decent spares. [/Salute]

So, I have a tonne of new and spare parts to go on to Jegger in the next month or so. All I need is the time to actually get them fitted...
 
Jegger is being a dick. It's official, the certificate is in the post.

First off - I spent 2 hours on the seatbelt pretensioners, carefully removing, replacing wiring, cleaning connections and fettling. The result?

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Flash-flash-flash-flash-pause-and so on.

Stupid thing. The MOT is due by the end of the month and this is an instant fail. I'm pretty much out of ideas now frankly.

I also took him for a short drive to see if the handling was as terrifying as I remember. Yes, it is still terrifying. Certainly something major wrong there...

However, at least I've had one fault finally pinpointed. I thought I'd have a go at fixing my OBD socket, so I unhooked it all and sprayed some switch cleaner around it. I could see afterwards that using my bluetooth scanner and the Torque app on my phone, it was at least trying to communicate now, but it still couldn't talk to the car.

So I remembered that tuonokid had been making nice noises about a program called Forescan, so I bunged it on my netbook, dug out my USB scanner and hooked it all up.

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And.....

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Jegger is finally talking to me! You may notice a fault code in there too - the source of all my missing power!

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Not great, but at least I can stop blindly replacing parts. My bet is on the solenoid being fecked, as the engine runs very smoothly. Also, it's clear on reflection that I don't have that VCT engine note change at the switch-over revs. It would appear that it's stuck in the high-rev-range setting which explains the lack of low and mid-range grunt.

Still, Jegger's still a dick, even if he is talking to me now. :?
 
Very good post Lee!!

Wish I could plug something into the wife to find out what's wrong with her sometimes!!
 
Well there is something you can stick into.... ah you can see where I'm going with that.... :grin:

Forscan has Oscilloscope functions (basically graphs) to show what everything is doing. I set to show the VCT valve position, voltage etc. I ran the engine at tickover and the valve shows as open. Unhooking the solenoid connector would show it as closed but as soon as I plugged it back in, it's showing open again. I may be over-simplifying it, but is that a clue that the solenoid is indeed stuck in the open position?

When I reset the DTC code, it was showing voltage percentage. When I held the throttle open a little it steadily climbed to 100% and then just reset to zero and stayed there.

Good software that must be a boon if you really understand it.
 
Hi Lee
Glad you're making some progress but thanks for the Forscan should really go to Sinisa (Wild E Coyote) as he is the one who introduced me and perhaps others to it. It is stacks better than those cheapo code readers though.
Barry
 
Good call! Sorry, I've seen you using it in various threads! Cheers Sinisa!

To be fair, the bluetooth one still didn't work as I think my OBD port struggles to power it, whereas the USB one is powered by the PC. I bought the Android Forscan as well to show support for the devs.
 
Glad I helped you all guys. It really is amazing piece of kit and I still can't understand how comes it is free?! Regarding the OBD readers: I have two WiFi ones. One is working (just barely, now and then), the other is dead from the day I purchased it, only the USB one is working as intended.
I just hope you will get on top of your problems. If you need me to record live data on VCT angle, let me know!
 
I had P1383 VCT error and made it vanish. I think it was caused by running the engine with one side of the car jacked up, just after I had replaced the gearbox, changed the engine oil and replaced the Lambda. I took it for a drive, stopped after 10 miles and ForScan showed the VCT error, so I cleared it, drove some more and it hasn't re-appeared since.
 
It's been like this for a good few years and through a good few oil changes as well. Just no low or mid range grunt.

I have done some searching to see if it's possible to unstick the solenoid in situ, and I've seen a few reports of grounding the solenoid quickly and repeatedly to jolt it back into action, but I'm not so great at electrics so I'm wondering how to go about it.
 

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