s**t I do good work.........

That has come up really good off the gun, nice work there BenJ! The front bar looks real good. Inspirational.

Cheers

ToranaGuy

Hmmm... no wonder I was thinking about an XR bar for my NF a while ago - it looks great guys!

I then grabbed the Black Pearl and got a good colour coat on the bar. A few hours of dry time, and I spent some of that removing chrome strips from the ED Ghia front bar, removing the old BA XT bar, swapping over horns, chassis mounts, installing bolts for the reo support and spacing out the factory mounts so the wheel arch would marry up better with the front flares.

This is the result.



good work but now my wife wants one

Did you tell her you will wake up with a bar in the morning for her?

That front bar looks hot Ben. well done to you and SWC.

That looks fantastic! The BA bar really ties in with the BA headlamps.

Alternator - Chronic Failure

It's been raining here in Sydney, in case you didn't know.

So, I headed out last night with my wife, in the rain, with the wipers, lights, A/C, heater fan, thermo fans, and stereo on.

Got around the corner and the volt meter dropped to zero, the warning light came on, wipers slowed, and headlights dimmed.

Bugger - obvious alternator fail.

Headed straight back home and parked the wagon for the night.


Got up early this morning, well 8am ish, and swapped in a spare 110amp alternator I happened to have laying around. Still have a spare 100amp alternator too, just in case.

Started up the engine and checked the volt meter only to find it was reading at a steady 11volts.

Hmmm, that is odd.

A quick phone call to Troyman (thanks mate) and we tossed around a few ideas. Troyman said to check the voltage across the batter, and then from the back of the alternator to the earth terminal.

I discovered that the battery was only showing 12.4 volts but the alternator showed 15.1 volts. To me this said, the new alternator was working fine, but the power was fully not reaching the battery.

Troyman suggested the fusible links could be dodgy, and I concurred with his assessment.

I removed the drivers headlight to provide good access to the wiring and discovered the fusible link was fried, along with the wires connected to the power distribution block. I raided the ED Ghia and replaced both main fusible links.

All fixed once again.

Thinking back the old alternator used to be on the engine when in the Red Sedan, and at one time got drenched in power steering fluid. I am surprised it lasted this long.

Unfortunately, as the weather sucked all day, I was not able to work on the XB bonnet.

Until next time.

Cheers
BenJ

good to see the diagnosis was correct and you got it sorted mate..

That's a bummer, but at least you had spares & it's sorted.

Last time that happened to me I was more than 150kms from home, late at night, raining as well. Alternator "half died", I was getting 11.2v out of it. Not enough to charge the battery, run the wipers, headlights & demister, so I had to get creative to get home. One headlight, no wipers, demister was a hanky....made it tho, had a spare (well actually about 5) alternator at home to fit the next day.

Gotta love parts car's!

Cheers

ToranaGuy

Stereo Surround, Antenna and Door Locks

Stereo Surround

When I installed the Eonon double din DVD Player I used an EF1 stereo surround because I liked the shape. Unfortunately the door just doesn't want work when I want it to, and I am not going to paint it if it it isn't functioning correctly.

Double Din - EF1


SWC mentioned to me, many moons ago, that he had made a double din surround from a single din version.

I had a painted single din surround collecting dust. Here it is in the car.

Single Din EF11


So this afternoon I grabbed the dremel and 10mins later I had this.

Double Din EF11


Looks much better and is more functional as well.

Antenna - Power Disable

One of the minor annoyances with the Eonon stereo is that whenever I turn on the car and the stereo is off, the antenna goes up and back down.

I have been meaning to do something about this for weeks, and finally installed a switch to cut the trigger line to the antenna.

I installed the switch in the same general location as before and here is a link to previous post on switches.

And with the new switch installed.


Not annoying at all now. And if I want to listen to the radio I can just flick the switch.


Door Locks - Anti Car Jack Function

The new alarm system has an Anti Car Jack Function that activates the first time you put your foot on the brake after the car has been going for 15 seconds. It would unlock the car once you turned it off, but I found this annoying and disconnected the input from the brake switch.

I still wanted the ability to lock the car at the push of a button, and while all Smartlock enabled cars have a button on the dash for this, my wagon is pre smartlock.

As I have the EL dash in the car, the factory button has been unused until now.



I connected 12v IGN and the alarm to the switch and now I can lock the car from inside. Not sure if I will ever need it, but I don't like to see things going unused.



Obviously, I did not work on the bonnet today. The weather, while not raining, was not clear enough to consider painting, and the bonnet needs more prep work before I can call it good enough for paint.

Cheers
BenJ

Curiosity killed the cat...

But what is a anti car jack function? And what does it do when you press the brake pedal?

Looks good Ben... I hate unused buttons so my antenna button is a on/off switch for the amp currently... Something rarely used but an unused button is a waste of real estate...

Cheers,
Tim

Anti Car Jack locks the doors after you start driving, preventing an unwanted person opening the door from outside.

Cheers
BenJ

Interesting update BenJ - even tho the weather was too poor to work on the bonnet, you got some other jobs done anyway, so progress one way or another. That's the name of the game.

Cheers

ToranaGuy

All Ford Day 2011

Hi All.

Had a great day last weekend at the Sydney All Ford Day.

The weather was fabulous and the company even better.

Here a couple of pics I grabbed of the wagon out in the sun.







Cheers
BenJ