The saga of my non functional A/C is now over. The 300SE is blowing cold air. It would want to after all the parts I had to change to get this far. The final piece of the puzzle was the Klima relay. This relay controls the engagement of the compressor and had burned out when the clutch shorted. I ended up buying a rebuilt...
I have always admired the W116 model. However, since the introduction of the W126 in 1980 the W116 has lived in its shadow. My 450SLC has been my primary car for most of the time I have owned it, but with three children, this is no longer possible. As I needed something that could fit three child seats in a row, a W116 would...
My E-Type has had ongoing problems with the brakes holding on. This has been on and off since I bought the car in 2010. Over that time, I have pretty much renewed the entire braking system. Turns out, that might be part of the problem. What I have learned, is that the reproduction E-Type Master Cylinder can be problematic. So much so,...
My fight with the W126 Air Conditioning system is almost over. When I purchased the car, the A/C worked rather well. After the water pump gave out, it looks like it shorted out the compressor clutch. Changing out the clutch is not much different to changing out the whole compressor, so I sourced a new compressor and receiver/drier. This was rather irritating as working...
My efforts in getting the wiring right at the front of the DS continue to disappoint. This time, I made a harness to test multiple wires at the same time. This helped somewhat, but I think there may be something not hooked up right at the headlights. As my car has been fitted with relays, the headlights should both come on at the same...
One of the first and easiest jobs after the repaint was to fit the Citroen DS Mirrors. Before the repaint I was continually having the mirrors adjust themselves at speeds above 80km/h. That is, they would slowly fold inwards until they were touching the car. I was also disappointed with the quality of the previous mirrors, so purchased new ones of a higher quality. ...
The windows in a Citroen DS are frame-less. This means they need careful adjustment so they seal properly and wind up and down to the correct height. When my car was painted, the panels were refitted much better than before – they now generally line up! A proper panel alignment meant my doors were in slightly different positions than before the paint. Not only...
The 2017 Rolls Royce Concours was held at historic Linnwood House, Western Sydney. As usual, they had a number of guest clubs including the Antique and Classic Car Club, Rover, Alvis, Wolseley, Jaguar, Range Rover etc. For some reason the Rover display was very small – perhaps they had another event running at the same time? I attended in 2015 when the...
I’ve owned my E-Type for over 5 years now. During my ownership there has been one issue that has consistently plagued the car – brakes that do not release when they should. Over my ownership I have replaced pretty much the entire braking system, and some components twice! A couple of months ago, I had the master cylinder and booster replaced. At first, I...
The Citroen DS has easily removable front wings. They can be removed in a matter of minutes for various maintenance jobs. Instead of one big plug like you would find on other cars (e.g. a Mercedes-Benz), individual bullet terminals need to be connected up for all the wiring to things like indicators, headlights, horns etc. Turns out that when my car was painted, the...
My story of fixing the W126 climate control can be summed up by: If everything points to a problem with an expensive part, don’t waste your time trying to replace the cheaper parts around it in a futile hope it will solve the problem! After trying a used Climate Control Unit, new fan resistor etc, I finally bit the bullet and bought a rebuilt...
I’ve been fighting with the W126 Climate Control system for the last few months – and it’s been winning. When I purchased the car in November last year, it was a very hot day and the A/C worked great. It had a new radiator, so I took the evidence of leaking coolant to be history rather than a current problem. Turned out the...
The 300SE has been suffering from poor hot starts. It required a lot of cranking before it fired. On a K-Jet car, this is normally caused by a faulty fuel accumulator. From what I understand it’s the job of the fuel accumulator to hold fuel pressure after the car is switched off. I also planned to change the fuel filter as I didn’t know...
The Sydney German Car Show 2017 was held today and as usual it did not disappoint. A great selection of Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Porsche, VW and Audi’s were on display. The only downside was that aside from the Micro cars, there was no representation from the niche German cars. There was also only one pre-war car. This event has really grown...
I had a couple of small jobs on the 250SE I had been meaning to do for months. Since the car is to be displayed at the German Car show, it seemed like a good time to do them. One of the hubcaps was in poor condition. I had another set of used hubcaps painted almost a year ago now. However, I...
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