wobble and rattle

[markthe45king]

it's me again - been a while!
lily is kind of happy, but after slashing a tyre i have had my sapre wheel put on and we are getting wobbling through the steering column at high speed (ok about 65) and today there seemed to be a rattle at high speed (although i have not yet discounted the glove compartment on that front!) from down the front end.

So i am assuming that the new wheel won't be properly weighted as it was my spare and that will need doing - but is there anything else i should check - making the most basic assumption that the nuts are tight!?

i blame these events on the loss of the oily rag which had been in the engine bay since i've had her.

Also - roughly speaking what is the going rate for a 67 4 door saloon passenger side front door please? i have all the fittings, it's just the door that has rusted through the sill....

thanks as ever

[bmcecosse]

Presumably you will be getting a replacement tyre - get it properly balanced and then see if the rattles go away. Door price will depend entirely on the condition. I'm sure there must be a good business opportunity for someone to supply reconditioned doors on exchange....

[mike.perry]

Wheel balance and check the tyre pressures

[markthe45king]

as usual - good advice - spent a tenner getting the wheels rebalanced, and now she is very smooth again and all the intermittent creaking has also stopped - so a tenner well spent!

doors next......

oh hang on - headlights - they seem lined up fine but when i put full beam on on darkened motorways i get flashed by lorry drivers coming the other way - which suggests full beam is aiming at the sky - what's the easy fix?

[charlie_morris_minor]

oh hang on - headlights - they seem lined up fine but when i put full beam on on darkened motorways i get flashed by lorry drivers coming the other way - which suggests full beam is aiming at the sky - what's the easy fix?

er when you see a car / lorry coming the other way turn your lights back to dipped.

[Alex'n'Ane]

Headlight rim off, then you will see a few adjuster screws, go park next to a modern, both put ur headlight on, aiming at a very near by wall (a few meters) then adjust the angle etc of your light to match.

[bmcecosse]

Exactly! You must not drive towards oncoming traffic on main beam! That's the whole idea of the system - when nothing around you go to main beam - but when you come uo behind another vehicle - or meet a vehicle coming the other way - you are expected to DIP the lights!!

[markthe45king]

calm down.......on any normal road i am the king of dipped headlights - my point is that if i am nearside on a motorway travelling one way and there is a lorry nearside travelling the other way flashing at me, when there are people going past me with their full beam on, that would suggest my headlights are boss eyed..... on normal beam they seem straight, but i have never stood in front of them on full beam, so i thought it best to check.

I get blinded by cars coming the other way dipped or not for some reason, so i hardly ever use full beam on normal roads as it's my pet hate, like i said, if i am getting flashed effectively 6 lanes away to the right, and only ever lorries that suggests the beam isn't pointing where it should!!

[bmcecosse]

If other cars are going past 'with full beam on' -perhaps it's they who are being flashed....... It's virtually impossible to use full beam on a motorway - even at 3am........ But as suggested - aim the car at a garage door/wall etc and set them right - or just get the MOT garage to do it for you.

[mike.perry]

My pet hate is getting stuck behind drivers creaping along unlit roads because they don't know how to use main beam in the appropriate conditions.
And yes, main beam lights do dazzle across the motorway

[Alex'n'Ane]

My pet hate is getting stuck behind drivers creaping along unlit roads because they don't know how to use main beam in the appropriate conditions.

Use of fog lights, basically never necessary, and when fitted in with the other rear lights they are almost indistinguishable from brake lights..

[mike.perry]

Who mentioned rear fog lights? Only useful in dense dayight fog and motorway spray.
Other pet hate people sitting at the traffic lights at night with their foot on the brake pedal 'cause they are too lazy to use the handbrake.

[bmcecosse]

Or to have the courtesy to switch off their headlights when in slow city traffic (or stopped) close behind another car....

[markthe45king]

one of my regular old man gripes is cars that have their lights on permanently; ok it's probably safer - but a) i can see a car in normal daylight, probably even without my glasses on and b) if you're too daft to see that it's dark enough for lights, you're too daft to be driving a car (and yes, i realise we may all forget once in a while! but it does seem to be a hammer to crack a walnut)

In the paper on Sunday, there was a suggestion that all "old cars" should run with their sidelights permanently on to make it safer for everyone. With the best will in the world my sidelights aren't going to make me any more obvious...

And Mike - i'm trusting that wasn't a dig at my "hardly ever using full beam"??

[mike.perry]

Nothing personal.
Ref permanent lights, they were fitted for the twilight conditions of Scandinavia and the rest of Europe has to comply. Reminds me of the Jasper Carrot sketch where the Volvo headlights were still on after it had been through the crusher.
The reason for not fitting permanent lights to classic and older cars is that the dynamo would not keep up with the drain on the battery, especially with 6V systems

[bmcecosse]

My 'modern' brings the lights on automatically - except - it doesn't do it early enough for me, and there is no adjustment possible. I do believe that cars should be required to run with headlamps on (or bright 'running lights') when out of town during the winter period - so say from clocks back to clocks forward.

[chrisryder]

the reason cars passing you on the motorway seem to have their headlights on full beam is that headlights dip to the left (away from oncoming traffic). when you're being overtaken by someone with dipped lights, their lights are pointing towards you.

it's just like when a car pulls over to park on the wrong side of the road. if they've still got their headlights on, their dipped to the left, directly into the road. blinding all road users.

i hear what you say, 45king, about you keeping main beam on when the lorry coming the other way is 6 lanes away, but it's still good practice to dip them when anything is coming the other way, the slightest kink in the road and your main beam is pointing accross all 6 lanes.

on a side note, i tend to drive with sidelights on in early morning and evening. basically everything except the middle of the day. when the sun is low, it can be difficult, not necessarily to see if a car is there or not, but it helps to discern its distance from you, and closing speeds.

it's now EU legislation for all NEW cars to have daytime running lights fitted. so if it's important enough for all new cars to have it, why shouldn't every other car do its best to come 'up to standard' where possible. and that's as simple as turning your sidelights on. it's not been made the law to make every car on the road have daytime running lights, presumably purely for the complexity of getting every car adapted.

i've seen 'spot the difference' style pictures of a car with or without DRL's, the most interesting one being taken in the middle of the day of a black car in the shade of some trees. you see it clearly with DRL's, but would be very easy to miss without a second glance.

be seen. be safe.

[Neil MG]

Here's a question. Apart from two red reflectors on the rear (that affected early Minors) are there ANY changes to new vehicle regulations that are enforced retrospectively?

I am not aware of any.

I am also led to believe that our roads are safer now than they have ever been (well at least since information has been collected in 1926) and getting safer every year. Despite far more vehicles there are only a fraction of the number of deaths per year.

So something is working!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reported_R ... at_Britain

[MarkyB]

Depends what you mean by new, I think that fitting screen wash system was retrospective once upon a time.

[mike.perry]

Retrospective legislation applied to the following items
Double dipping headlights, not one dips and one switches off
Two tail lights and brake lights, the early Minors had one stop/tail light and one reflector on the opposite side.
Screen washers on fixed windscreens, not folding or removeable screens although one or two people have managed to dodge the last one