marvs

Wow, I didn't think these old barges rusted....every days a school day...

I think the previous owner lived near the coast, and I don't think he looked after it.

My mechanic said it looked like it had been parked in the sea!!

what exactly was the " uneconomical fix"?

Major emissions failure (mainly I suspect due to an exhaust leak), all brake hoses needed replacing, all brakes needed something doing (disks and/or pads), at least one tyre. I'm sure that there was more but I can't remember the details.

The nail in the coffin was the advisory list though, which was two pages long and included pretty serious corrosion to the whole rear underside, and bushes all around that will need replacing soon. So when I was offered almost £300 to have it picked up, I felt like I had to take it.

I had also been having issues with power loss and rough idling, which I'd been planning on attending to myself when I got the chance, but with everything else going wrong when it did, and my current circumstances, I didn't feel like I could justify spending the time and money on them.

This probably won't help an awful lot, but I'm sure I've seen this question raised before. Maybe not on this forum, but on one of them. Have you tried googling?

Your being very shy about how much you got for her, would be interested to know what these type of business pay for a car like that. Mike

£297. The next highest quote was £195. The majority were between £100-£130. Scrap value round our way is about £85 per ton.

Considering I paid £585 14 months previous, I was quite happy.

So a week or so ago I sadly had to say goodbye to my '93 LS400, due to a bad MOT failure that would've been uneconomical to fix :(

Here she is being taken away by CoPart, who collected on behalf of SellTheCar.com:

Incidentally, SellTheCar.com offered me more than double what any conventional scrappies would, and about £100 more than any of the other online car purchasers. There were no hidden 'admin' charges, and pick up went very smoothly. (I'm not affiliated with them in any way, just want to recommend a good service when I receive it!)

Correct. I paid the excess to the windscreen company, and they handled the rest.

If you took it to Autoglass (or a smaller company, as I did) and explain that the 'road rash' on the screen is becoming dangerous, then there's every chance they'll replace it on safety grounds. That's what happened to me. Just go and have a chat with the glass company. After all, it's in their interests to fit you a new screen, so they probably won't refuse!

I've read that some people just pull/cut out the old filter part, and replace it with a generic cut to shape domestic air con filter. So I was hoping that if at least have the old filter frame, but no such luck!

If anyone has an old manky filter or frame, please let me know, as I'd be interested in buying it...

It's very easy to get to. Hopefully the attached pic will be all you need.

Bear in mind though that there might not be a filter present. I checked my '93 to find nothing there! Looks like someone's just taken out the old filter and not replaced it.

I then asked a guy breaking a 93 LS on eBay to check his, and it was also filter-less...

I had a similar issue on my '93 - two or three minor chips, plus bad scratches/road rash on the screen.

I just took it to a local windscreen company who I've dealt with before (possibly National Windscreens, I'm not sure), and explained the problem, and that I'd like a new screen, and he was happy to do it under the insurance.

At the end of the day, I guess the insurance company just has to rely on the judgement of the windscreen fitter that the problem is bad enough to warrant a new screen. The guy I saw seemed to think that road rash was enough of a safety issue on its own to justify a new windscreen, and I was happy to pay the £75 excess!

As far as my (limited) understanding of switches goes, the double pole aspect of the switch means two inputs/channels (so left and right in this case), and the single throw means just open/closed circuit, as opposed to double throw which can be open circuit with up to two different closed circuit connections, so you could have open/signal routed to location A/signal routed to location B...

Does that make sense? And do you agree? By my understanding above, I think a double pole, single throw switch would maintain two channels.

Wiki

I've also used ATS for a recharge. I was a bit hesitant to use a chain garage rather than an air con specialist, but they seemed a lot more knowledgeable than others that I've dealt with (e.g. kwik fit!), and had good customer service.

Thanks for the info. Next time I get a chance to get the radio out I'll have a look for FML and FMR. I guess the best place to solder to either side of the cut will be an existing solder point on the board, rather than trying to solder on the PCB track?

I'm wondering whether a DPST switch would be sufficient? If I'm only using it to make/break the FM signal line to give me 'radio silence' then I'm guessing single throw is fine... Then a separate cable will be connected to the test/aux in line I've (hopefully) found. For info, this test input has three pins, which apparently fit a 'servo cable' like these: link. I could then attach the other end to a 3.5mm plug/socket.

Having said that, if I find the FML & FMR, then in a way I might as well just do your solution as written in the first post, and switch my aux into the FML & FMR lines using the switchable 3.5mm jack like you used, that way it's quite neat in that when the aux is plugged in, it's active, and when it's unplugged it's FM. However having a toggle switch with the separate aux in gives me more flexibility to run a longer aux cable, and potentially have my phone/ipod plugged in even when listening to the radio, then just switched as desired.

Decisions...!

Thanks for the offer of help, too. I'll see how I get on when I next have the head unit out.

I have a small amount of feedback from the earth signal that I took from the PCB so while the car is in the garage I am going to reroute the earth

I will then upload a step by step about how 5 little wires and a small incision can make all the difference to this car.

Hi mate,

I'm very interested to see a step-by-step for this.

On my Pioneer head unit, and some others, there's a test input on the PCB that plays audio when any source is selected, so if you can generate 'silence' from any source then the input on these pins will be heard over the speakers. So I was going to do a basic version of the mod here, but unfortunately I can't because my tape deck never stays in 'Tape' mode (always reverts back to radio), and I don't have a CD changer in my car, so I can't get a silent source.

Therefore your mod seems perfect for me!

In advance of you posting up instructions, can you explain a bit more about where it was that you cut the PCB tracks? I have a '93 car, but hopefully I'll be able to figure it out!

Thanks

Yes, the subwoofer cover is prised off from inside the car. There are two clips on each side. Then the speaker can be unscrewed with a 10mm (I think) socket.

I think my sub may be faulty too. Any ideas where you're going to source a new one from?

That's a very good sign that the problem is the leaky lubricant causing the needles to stick.

I think the extra PCB may be due to it being a 90-92 car. When I was asking about the RHD LCDs he did mention that there was an intermediate PCB for the earlier models, but my 93 (luckily) didn't need one.

I did mine shortly after buying the car and bought from the same guy and 6 years later still working fine.

That's great to know Steve, thanks. I'm glad I took a punt with this seller now. He was a very helpful guy, and it seems like the LCDs are good quality too.

^^ Good idea. Although having said that, whacking the dash never dislodged my needles.

Maybe I'm just too weedy! Or my sticky needles were just too sticky!

Can you leave negative feedback if you did a Buy It Now but the sale never fully completed? Might be a good way to at least warn others that he's a sly seller...

I've ordered plugs & leads as mine look original & I really struggled to remove the leads from the plug top so are more than likely going to break when I remove them anyway.Oils & cambelt have recently been done so no problems there.

I've also ordered some replacement floor mats.

I want to get the lcd display working on the heater/clock assembly.

The cd multi disk in the boot is powering up & accepting the cassette but I get ERR on the stereo so I'll look into that later too.

I also bought some reverse park sensors today as it's impossible to see the back of the car when parking!!

Where have you ordered your plugs & leads from? I'm interested in doing the same for mine. Same question for the floor mats actually!

Did you see my other thread on the climate LCD supplier? If you're happy to do the soldering yourself, I reckon he's the best bet. Mine was delivered from the states for ~£40 all in. No additional invoice from customs (yet) either.

Let me know how your parking sensors install goes. The kits from eBay look very good value, but when I tapped my rear bumper it doesn't sound like it's hollow, which was the main thing putting me off, as I wasn't sure how deep I'd have to drill. That and not yet knowing of a cabling route from the bumper into the boot space.

I have on street parking where I live, and I've learned that bumpers are very tolerant to the odd slow nudge!There's no moving of the other car out of the way - it's just to maximise the amount of space you have to manoeuvre in.

What's worse is when people who have no idea where their car's corners are just scrape their way out, at the expense of my car's corner paintwork!

Although saying that, my car's paintwork is in a terrible state, so I'm not too fussy about the odd new scuff here or there. So I can understand that other people would be a bit more protective of their Lex.

I can't be certain on the later cars (mine's a 93), but it sounds a lot like the 'sticky needles' issue that I had with my speedo and tacho.

It's probably due to the needle lubricant leaking onto the needle stopper behind the face, which causes part of the needle to stick to it.

See these couple of posts for more info (I've linked to the individual posts, but from there you can click the link in the top right to see the whole thread):

Sticky Needles 1

Sticky Needles 2

If you do try to fix this yourself, try a pipe cleaner rather than a cotton bud - I found a cotton bud too 'fat' and hard to get into the back of the mechanism. I soaked it in isopropyl alcohol. Then added a bit of WD40 for good measure!

Also, be VERY careful not to pull the needle around too much. I think I must have done something to the spring in the back of my speedo needle, which means that now when I am not moving my speedo sometimes reads ~30mph! It fixes itself as soon as the car moves though...

So is that long u shaped pipe in front of the radiator at the bottom part of the power steering piping? I figured it was for cooling something, but had no idea what! Mine's crusty as hell!

Hi all,

I have recently replaced the blacked out LCD in my climate control unit, and struggled to find an LCD for a right hand drive car. I did eventually find a supplier in the States, so I thought I'd share the details in case anyone else is looking for one. (I've confirmed that he's happy for me to give out his details).

The guy's name is Hai Ho (not kidding!)

His email address is ls400lcd@verizon.net

He's also on eBay in the USA. His user ID is mercuryrunner, but he hasn't always got RHD displays on eBay. Check here

He charged $50 for the RHD LCD. This also includes 6 or 7 of the little bulbs that illuminate the unit, so that you can replace these at the same time.

I went with the $12 shipping option, which also seems to include tracking within the USA and delivery confirmation in the UK.

I received my LCD within a week. It was well packed, and works perfectly so far.

The seller can provide fitting instructions. I used the tuturial on lexls.com, although I found it hard to desolder the existing pins, so I used a sharp set of wire cutters and just snipped the old pins off, then soldered the new pins on top. Be careful if you do it this way though, as I accidentally pulled off a solder pad when one of the pins didn't cut properly.

I'd say it's definitely possible for an amateur solderer to swap the LCD (I'd barely soldered anything before this). Just be careful and take your time. It doesn't even need a particularly steady hand - I was pretty nervous when I started, so was shaking a bit!

However, you might prefer to get someone else to do it. Try a TV repair shop (if they still exist??), or a fellow LOC member can probably help out.

Hope this helps someone out.