Santa was kind this year and delivered some festive car treats with Valet Pro brushes, thin wall 16mm spark plug socket and a Gecko smelly for when the current one runs out of puff.
I decided to mount the brushes and socket in my second home for easy access and no doubt they’ll all get used soon.
Now that MK2 Escort is a thing of beauty !Popped to Blyton Park today as Dukeries Motor Club were hosting a track day for rally cars as a pre-2022 season shake down so couldn’t resist a look see. There were some amazing machines there so I’ll let the pictures do the talking.
Finally, this glorious Darrian with a yummy Millington lump, it sounded amazing. If you have never seen one click here to learn more.
Now that is a very clever mod mate.Due to my mates slight mishap with his truck canopy glass oops, I decided a mini project was required on my Amarok. I obtained the broken Truckman interior glass release handle and set about installing it on my Avenger canopy. I started with the interior cover plate and removed it to reveal the rear of the exterior handle and the central locking place which I fitted myself after numerous companies said it can’t be done.
I offered up the interior release hand but there was no way I could hold it in place, the thread was too short.
I then stripped the mechanism, drilled out the original 25mm long bars before drilling and tapping then thread locking in new 35mm M6 bolts.
This then allowed the release handle to be bolted into position.
A 40mm hole was drilled in the cover panel which allows the handle to be fitted and used.
Rather happy with the finished item, nice and neat installation. The reason behind this is should I ever wish to sleep in the truck bed which I have done a couple of times you can easily exit without having to unscrew the cover plate. The interior handle will not operate when the central locking is locked, same as the exterior handle, but unlock it and out you pop
It just makes you wonder why Audi don’t have this sorted from new. One thing I remember when I had my S3 was the gearbox hesitation/clunkiness but then again that one fell to bits. Great write up again mate.After having the Stage 1 ECU tune last year I’d also researched TCU tunes but at the time thought it wasn’t worth it. Over the last few months the limited time I’ve spent behind the wheel of the S3 I’ve began noticing the DSG niggles more and more with clunky low speed changes, aggressive down shifting when you are playing and general unpleasantness and don’t even get me start on S mode being totally unusable as a general driving option. I then read a thread started by JimboBlue which peaked my interest here. I already knew TVS were the company to use so bit the bullet and made a call to book my closest dealer which just happened to be the UK main agents for TVS being Peron Automotive.
Peron mainly focus on commercial development activities but do offer a small amount of private work so were happy to accept me for a TVS Stage 2+ TCU tune. This consists of the TCU Drivability remap in addition the TCU Stage 2 clutch pack clamping force upgrade. To read more about what TVS can offer see their official site here for DSG tuning.
On arrival at Peron last Thursday I was presented with a coffee before nervous trepidation kicked in waiting at the door where the magic happens. I received regular progress reports throughout the whole process which only took an hour and half before I was driving away with the S3 now at 20,771 miles. The DSG is reset after the tune in loaded and goes through an initial adaption process but straight away I could feel the difference in D so plodded home for my lunch.
I then popped over to meet up with Potterswheel for a chat, S3 comparison, both static and driving and a general set the world to rights discussion between a plethora of coffees. This allowed me to stick some miles on the S3 to get use to the TCU tune and make sure everything else was performing as it should be.
@Potterswheel it was great to see you again and yes, we'll have to do it again soon.
At the beginning of the day and being totally honest I was sceptical as to whether a TCU remap was for me and necessary but I can happily report the S3 now feels amazing to drive and both the ECU & TCU tunes complement each other perfectly to give you the best optimised S3 with otherwise completely stock hardware. The DQ381 box no longer races through the gears in D to keep the rpm as low as possible, gear changes are super quick and so precise. In S it no longer keeps hold of gears at high rpm when you’re not planting the throttle and the car is just such a pleasure to drive with no hesitation to release the power when asked. At crawling speeds and when pulling off it no longer feels clunky and doesn’t slur the gear changes. The parts you don’t feel are the increased clutch pack clamping forces up from factory 420Nm to 600Nm and the extra cooling and life extender tweaks which are all part of the software package TVS offer. I had no custom options as I simply wanted what should have been there when the car left the factory and that’s now exactly what I have. My total Thursday drive was 205 miles of which 42 miles was to Peron and I can honestly say the remaining 163 miles I covered with the TCU tune was an absolute delight.
Hi Harvey,After having the Stage 1 ECU tune last year I’d also researched TCU tunes but at the time thought it wasn’t worth it. Over the last few months the limited time I’ve spent behind the wheel of the S3 I’ve began noticing the DSG niggles more and more with clunky low speed changes, aggressive down shifting when you are playing and general unpleasantness and don’t even get me start on S mode being totally unusable as a general driving option. I then read a thread started by JimboBlue which peaked my interest here. I already knew TVS were the company to use so bit the bullet and made a call to book my closest dealer which just happened to be the UK main agents for TVS being Peron Automotive.
Peron mainly focus on commercial development activities but do offer a small amount of private work so were happy to accept me for a TVS Stage 2+ TCU tune. This consists of the TCU Drivability remap in addition the TCU Stage 2 clutch pack clamping force upgrade. To read more about what TVS can offer see their official site here for DSG tuning.
On arrival at Peron last Thursday I was presented with a coffee before nervous trepidation kicked in waiting at the door where the magic happens. I received regular progress reports throughout the whole process which only took an hour and half before I was driving away with the S3 now at 20,771 miles. The DSG is reset after the tune in loaded and goes through an initial adaption process but straight away I could feel the difference in D so plodded home for my lunch.
I then popped over to meet up with Potterswheel for a chat, S3 comparison, both static and driving and a general set the world to rights discussion between a plethora of coffees. This allowed me to stick some miles on the S3 to get use to the TCU tune and make sure everything else was performing as it should be.
@Potterswheel it was great to see you again and yes, we'll have to do it again soon.
At the beginning of the day and being totally honest I was sceptical as to whether a TCU remap was for me and necessary but I can happily report the S3 now feels amazing to drive and both the ECU & TCU tunes complement each other perfectly to give you the best optimised S3 with otherwise completely stock hardware. The DQ381 box no longer races through the gears in D to keep the rpm as low as possible, gear changes are super quick and so precise. In S it no longer keeps hold of gears at high rpm when you’re not planting the throttle and the car is just such a pleasure to drive with no hesitation to release the power when asked. At crawling speeds and when pulling off it no longer feels clunky and doesn’t slur the gear changes. The parts you don’t feel are the increased clutch pack clamping forces up from factory 420Nm to 600Nm and the extra cooling and life extender tweaks which are all part of the software package TVS offer. I had no custom options as I simply wanted what should have been there when the car left the factory and that’s now exactly what I have. My total Thursday drive was 205 miles of which 42 miles was to Peron and I can honestly say the remaining 163 miles I covered with the TCU tune was an absolute delight.
Love the motorsport fix, cable ties are the second man’s best friend.The Astra mk3 V6 was dug out of its Winter hibernation a few days ago as I had a couple of jobs lined up having now covered 60,777 miles. If you missed the custom LCD dash conversion that I made see here
First job was to remove the rear nearside door card to figure out where an annoying rattle was coming from.
A bit more poking, prodding and slapping and I found this loose in the bottom door, dried up sound deadening goop.
Also noted the central locking pushrod was loose so applied a tried and tested motorsport fix.
With that faffy job sorted the door card was popped back on.
Next was to sort the screen washer tubing as the pipes were showing their age having gone through a few heat cycles under the hood and had a small weep. I removed both pipes and cut them back before soaking them in boiling water so they were supple enough to be pushed on for a nice snug fit.
Last job was to try and figure out why the gearbox level plug was still weeping after fitting a crush washer which they don’t normally have anyway. Jacked the car up on its side and removed the level plug.
After a good inspection I noted a slight deformation of the alloy casing when the level plug should sit snuggly, if you zoom in you can see the dent.
The old M18 crush washer outer diameter wasn’t quite large enough to cover the damage so oil could just sneak past. I bought an M17 crush washer which was 24mm OD instead of the M18 22mm OD, filed the ID so it was a tight squeeze over the threaded section of the level plug and then added thread lock to the rear ID of the crush washer. I could have messed with chemical metal to get the mating face smooth but access is tight and I would have had to remove the drive shaft, I’m hoping my fix has sorted it so time will tell.
Level plug torqued to spec being 50Nm and as you can see the new crush washer covers the mating face damage and coupled with the thread lock fingers crossed no more damp patch reappearing.
Come painted ? Bonus if it was.I had a previously suspect rear outer right PDC sensor showing full red when it was very wet the other month on the Amarok. It’s something that first happened a couple of years ago so I swapped the rear right inner and outer sensors to see if the intermittent fault moved with the sensor here. It’s happened only a few times since then but as I had a new sensor on my shelf I cracked on with fitting. Being an outer sensor, it was much easier to swap and didn’t involve removing the complete rear bumper, just 4x bolts gave me just enough room.
Dodgy suspect sensor on the left and brand new genuine replacement on the right.
All sorted in super quick time. I was so lucky it was an outer rear sensor otherwise a full mission to remove the complete bumper would have been on the cards again.
Yes, with the chrome finish thus why I grabbed the exact part number when I swapped the sensors over.
@Dubjam yep, I work full-time, the car thing is just my over enthusiastic hobby
As the weather was nice over Easter I thought it prudent to let the GTE have a breather after its Winter slumber.
Gave it a check over and fired it up with fuel pressure perfect at 2.6bar (38psi) and voltage/coolant temp C & pressure PSI/oil temp C all good after 15 minutes warm up.
You got to love the original LCD dash, a classic in the Astra mk2. Can you ever have enough RPM gauges!
Easter Bank Holiday Monday I popped to my first visit to the Harborough Sports & Classic car meet. Lovely machinery there with something for everyone and I’ll definitely be returning for more. A very well organised event and friendly atmosphere with a £3 entry per vehicle all going to a local charity plus an Easter egg raffle this month, alas I wasn’t a winner but my mate did! The pics can do the talking so enjoy.
Owners of any mk3 FL 8V will know the Stop/Start can be rather challenging as it kicks in while the vehicle is still moving at 4mph instead of 0mph. This can be very annoying as you might be turning the wheel which suddenly becomes heavy, not actually going to come to a dead stop and just want to then get going. I could go on but I hate it with a passion on my S3, less so on my Amarok as it only activates at 0mph and can be controlled easily with brake pressure, however I still end up manually turning it off via the dash button at start up in both vehicles. I rarely use SS but wanted to retain it should I ever feel the need so tweaking VCDS to disable it permanently wasn’t an option.
I recently stumbled across SS in-line loom adaptors sold on AliExpress thanks to @Potterswheel so took a punt and bought one for my mk3 FL S3 but could only find Amarok equivalent at twice the price. A bit more searching and cross checking and the Golf mk6 uses the same SS switch plug as the Amarok V6, £30 and both looms were ordered and arrived in 8 days.
They even come with plastic trim tools included, I do have my own but these will no doubt come in handy.
First, I tackled the S3 and popped the switch panel out using proper removal tools as this can’t be done with plastic trim tools.
SS in-line loom installed and then I tested all button functions were working correctly prior to refitting the panel.
The SS in-line adaptor loom let you program the SS button behaviour as follows:
Auto-off mode - Every time the car is started, the start-stop will be automatically turned off. If it is manually turned on it will still be turned off after the car is turned off and locked.
Memory mode - Manually switch the start-stop switch once, and the start-stop state will be saved and memorized at the next ignition cycle.
Service mode (original factory mode) - The effect is the same as the original car.
I opted for auto-off mode and no longer have to press the SS button when I turn the ignition on as SS is now auto disable. You can still enjoy the wonders of SS simply by pressing the dash button should you ever feel the need to use it. Be amazed by my quality video, lol.
The Amarok was a little more challenging as the dash buttons are built into the long dash trim which is a pig to remove but I managed it without breaking any plastic clips, scary process.
Amarok SS loom plugged in place.
You guessed it another top pro quality video of the Amarok SS auto disabling, happy with that!
For anyone interested my Stop Start gizmos were purchased from AliExpress store VVVWCER here. They will work with both the 8V PFL and FL plus you may find them cheaper from other sellers on AliExpress so shop around and see what you can kind.
Can’t beat a nice bit of beedingI happened to be perusing my favourite auction site and doing some random searches and came across a set of 4x RS3/RS6/RS7/Bentley spark plugs for a bargain price. These are one step cooler than the original S3 plugs I currently run which are due for a change at the next service so I swiftly bought them. They are genuine VAG plugs part no.06K905601M (NGK SILFER8C7ES short code 91006) pre gapped to 0.7mm with copper washer. The official plugs for my MY17 S3 are VAG no.06K905601L (NGK ILFER7C8EG short code 91898) pre gapped to 0.8mm with standard crush washer these have been fitted since new when I checked what was in there last year here.
Had a good rain storm the other day and the recent S3 polish has worked wonders and it’s beading lovely.
And having had to extrude by hand (with a barrel gun!) when my glue gun had died or broken, I know just how much of a ball-ache (well, hand ache for sure) it can be! Especially in winter 
