Engine after sitting in humid environment

[Ducked]

Took the plugs out and gave it 3X 10 second burst on the starter, put them back in, remembered to re-connect the plug leads this time, skooshed some butane in the air filter and turned the starter and.....


nothing happened.

But it caught on the second attempt. Seems to run OK.

Rear drivers side brake locked on. Maybe I parked it with the handbrake on (DUH!) but the brake parts were treated with sunflower oil and aluminium, which I've got away with in the past, but maybe not before such a long-long-hot-wet time. Its a pretty strong glue in the wrong place.

Should probably have stopped and taken it apart but a bit of to-and-fro, in-and-out, with some noises, and it came free.

More alarming cracking noises on sharp RH turns during the (otherwise OK) test drive so I'll take it apart later. Maybe I've lost another brake shoe lining, though I dunno why that would be more manifest on turns.

I did some half...er...baked blotter spots off the dipstick before starting, after 5 mins of idle, and after a short test run around campus. Hadn't planned this and only had scrap paper (printed on the back) to hand.

I thought I might see settled-out debris going back into suspension. I never really know how to interpret those things even done carefully, and I can't see a difference here. They all show a central debris ring and, 4WIW, otherwise look velly clean. And cheap.

To the eye I'd say the ring pattern looks clearest with transmitted light, to the camera clearest with incident light. Go figure.

 

[Garak]

Originally Posted by Ducked
I did some half...er...baked blotter spots off the dipstick before starting, after 5 mins of idle, and after a short test run around campus. Hadn't planned this and only had scrap paper (printed on the back) to hand.

I thought I might see settled-out debris going back into suspension. I never really know how to interpret those things even done carefully, and I can't see a difference here. They all show a central debris ring and, 4WIW, otherwise look fairly clean.

For what it's worth, too, it looks reasonable to me.

 

[newbe46]

Just wondering, what grades or oil are sold in Taiwan? I've been there quite a few times but never really have a chance to browse through the auto parts store.

 

[Ducked]

Originally Posted by newbe46
Just wondering, what grades or oil are sold in Taiwan? I've been there quite a few times but never really have a chance to browse through the auto parts store.


Kind of a big question. The state oil company is China Petroleum Corporation, and they produce a pretty big, generally well priced range, including obsolete specs for the commercial and farming market. Then there are the usual international brands (Agip, Castrol, Mobil, Chevron at Costco, but I won't buy Chevron) and then a lot of unknowns that I tend to ignore.

CPC tend to be regarded as downmarket, as, oddly to a Brit, does Castrol.

Where it gets weird is with greases. There are NO recognisable greases on sale in Taiwan AFAIK.

I bought some 3M stuff which nobodies ever heard of, though I now think it probably isn't fake, and I brought some Comma molybdenum back from the UK. If I was doing it again I'd just use the CPC stuff.

 

[Ducked]

Originally Posted by Ducked

Originally Posted by Mitsu_Joe


The new title of the thread is hilarious on a side note...

Whaddya mean, NEW title? Someone been messing with my OLD title?



Oh, Yeh.

"Engine after sitting in humid environment"

Misses out on some important environmental variables in the original title.

See, this is what comes of various mis-guided un-American attempts to portray the original title as some kind of bizarre sexual innuendo.

That was always likely to confuse them. Truth is the first casualty.

And "humid environment"? HUMID?

Would you describe THIS as HUMID?


?

?

?

HUMID!?

Fool!

Were you born in the ocean?

Was yo midwife a dang dolphin?

Do you communicate with a series of high pitched clicks and whistles?

Are you appearing daily at Sea World San Diego?

Are you some kind of Marine Moderator Man?

It ain't "humid" Its WET! Dang WET! Real WET!

Its so wet I could donate my shorts to a mycology museum

My summer collection is GOING GREEN. Its an ECO-SCENE!

Its so WET I got FROGS livin in my sills!

Its so WET I've caught FISH in the street

[This is admittedly unusual. A flood washed a fish-farm out}

Its WET! and HOT!, and it has been for a LONG, LONG time.

Thats NICE in a..sauna..but its no dang good in an engine!

 

[Ducked]

Still making alarming cracking noises on sharp right turns, so I took the suspect LHS rear drum off.

Looks OK to me, and the shoe linings are still attached.

I washed it down (though there wasn't much brake dust inside) smeared a bit of that suspicious pink 3M grease on it, and put it back together.

First time I've bought cartridge grease (all that was available in the 3M) and I'm not doing it again. If it won't stay inside the cartridge in Taiwan temperatures I have to wonder whats going to keep it in a bearing.

I should probably re-pack these bearings, though maybe not with this stuff, plus I'm not sure I'll be able to get them out of the drum assembly (and back in again) intact.

Maybe the noise is corroded shocks. Steering column seems to have a squeal too. Got some spray grease I'll try on that when I can find it.

 

[newbe46]

I guess I didn't phrase the question properly, what I meant is what are the popular viscosity on the shelves.

 

[Ducked]

Originally Posted by newbe46
I guess I didn't phrase the question properly, what I meant is what are the popular viscosity on the shelves.


I've only bought in supermarkets. There, you got skinny, and you got thick.

Skinny isn't very popular with me so I don't pay much attention to it. Since Chinese generally need their cars to be new and shiny, I'd guess its popular with the punters.

Thick (SAE 40, 10W40, 15W40 and 20W50) does seem to be more readily available here than in the UK (Could only see "Classic" SE 20W50 in Halfords on my recent visit), and is probably mostly bought for commercial vehicles.

However, my Ford Sierra DOHC 2L came with 5L of Delvac SAE 40, so there are evidently a few other "old school" Ah Huang types out there.

You also get thicker "performance" grades in car accessory shops catering to the boy ricer trade, but they tend to be unknown-to-me brands apparently made from angel's tears, so I've never paid much attention to them.

I think I posted some shelf-shots a while ago but I can't remember what the thread was called.

 

[addyguy]

If you aren't using this car enough that it sits for months, and has 6 year old oil in it, why not get rid of it?

Cars are meant to be driven, and using them regularly help prevent running problem, especially in a harsh environment.

 

[newbe46]

Originally Posted by Ducked
I've only bought in supermarkets. There, you got skinny, and you got thick.

Skinny isn't very popular with me so I don't pay much attention to it. Since Chinese generally need their cars to be new and shiny, I'd guess its popular with the punters.

Thick (SAE 40, 10W40, 15W40 and 20W50) does seem to be more readily available here than in the UK (Could only see "Classic" SE 20W50 in Halfords on my recent visit), and is probably mostly bought for commercial vehicles.

However, my Ford Sierra DOHC 2L came with 5L of Delvac SAE 40, so there are evidently a few other "old school" Ah Huang types out there.

You also get thicker "performance" grades in car accessory shops catering to the boy ricer trade, but they tend to be unknown-to-me brands apparently made from angel's tears, so I've never paid much attention to them.

I think I posted some shelf-shots a while ago but I can't remember what the thread was called.


I'm almost laughing in my tears just from your use of words there... I know exactly what you mean by the "Ah Huang" types and "boy ricer"...

 

[Ducked]

Originally Posted by addyguy
If you aren't using this car enough that it sits for months, and has 6 year old oil in it, why not get rid of it?

Cars are meant to be driven, and using them regularly help prevent running problem, especially in a harsh environment.


OTOH, WHY get rid of it?

And what, if anything, has the 6-year old oil got to do with the question?

 

[Ducked]

Sunflower oil and aluminium treatment of the brake parts seems to have held up OK, but the clip in the lower left looked a bit out of place, and of course the drum is rusted, so I opened it up again.

Re-positioned the clip (was probably OK) and ground some of the rust off. I can't think of a binder for the drum base that wouldn't risk contaminating the friction surface. Maybe cement?

Thought of leaving the aluminium dust in for an anti-corrosion effect, but decided to tip it out. Maybe next time.

Couldn't find my spray grease so I tried working that pink stuff into the upper steering column bearing with my fingers. Didn't stop the squeek yet. Maybe I can chase it in with heat or WD40.

Would moly grease be better here?

 

[Ducked]

Took it for a test run up the coast. Havn't been up here for a while.

Shiny new coastguard station with a shiny new shipwreck next to it. Who says Taiwanese don't do irony?

I'd guess it must have been pretty "humid" when that happened, eh?

Further up, bit of ground-truthing for a student remote-sensing coastal erosion project.

10 years ago there was a 50-100 m strip of pine-wood behind a beach, but evidently the "humidity" was too much for it.

Its very "humid" now. One might almost describe it as "damp"

Car ran OK but there are, predictably, electrical difficulties. Battery light was on most of the time and when I got back I noticed my rear lights were out.

I think the cornering noises may have been accumulated polythene (which I use as a anti-seize) stopping the wheel seating properly, so I'll have to watch that.