1986 Toyota MR2 - get kicked into the weeds.

[georgeb]

Good morning, James, and welcome back!

That there downspout turned out well.

I'll have to try the wire wool trick. I bought some "Window Polish Stuff" but it wouldn't touch 20-odd years of grot. I must admit that although I've not been looking, I don't remember ever seeing it here. I wonder if a Scotchpad would do as well?

Anyway, now you've done the housey bits, try not to be a stranger!

[vulgalour]

How does the wirewool not cover the screen in tiny scratches? You do know you can clay a windscreen to successfully remove all the stuck on dirt, right?

[Sweetpea]

Morning George.
Er, sadly my missus has a long list of other things to keep me busy. But only enough to fill one or two lifetimes... Maybe I should start a "Sweetpea's mahoosive list of excuses" thread.

'ow do Mr V!
Sometimes your intuition lets you down. I looked at the idea and thought that it'd trash the screen too. But it doesn't seem to. I guess glass is really hard. I dug out the finest wool I could find (Scotchpad would probably work George) and I'd suggest trying it on a bit of the screen that doesn't matter too.

Using a clay bar on the glass? Yes obviously you can do that. No, the idea had never crossed my mind. Feel a bit thick for not thinking it now!

James

[vulgalour]

To be fair, I doubt using really coarse wire wool would make my screen any worse.

[tristanh]

My mates are industrial contract cleaners, they regularly wash the windows in the likes of Audi/Bmw showrooms etc, and they use purified water and good microfiber cloths. The boss said a good microfiber beats any detergent.

Delighted to see an update James

[Wilk]

Had issues with wiper skip on swmbo's car. After trying the usual.... new blades, clean glass thoroughly, I finally tried twisting the arms so the blades weren't trying to PUSH the blades against direction of travel... basically ensuring the blade was at 90 degrees to glass. Issue sorted after a couple of tweeks 👍

[Stiff]

Wire wool is fine to use (as long as it's the really fine stuff). I've been using it for years on glass and chrome to clean off overspray that creeps under the maskings when it lifts. Most plumbers merchants will sell it (or at least they used to - not bought any for a while now).
Make sure you blow all the residue off the paintwork before you polish or wipe it as it will scratch the paint if left on.

[varelse]

This is the only way I've ever used wire wool...

On topic, does anyone do new old style blades? Not the refill, but the part attached to the arm. I can only find Holden/Ford specific ones here which are wrong sizes.

[Sweetpea]

^^^How?!
Partly I ask because I can see the tree behind which suggests you burned a bomb sized bit of wool. Why'd it go round in circles? Cool photo though but.

What do you mean by 'old style blades'?


This idea of the arms being twisted and 'pushing' the blades up the screen. I'd seen that idea and checked it. Mine look ok.
I'd also noticed that opposite ends of the blades 'grab' on the screen alternately so the blade rotates back and forth around the end of the arm. Not a good description but there you are.

I suspect the problem is a combination of things. Dirt on the glass, slack springs in the arms, wear in the mech, and sloppy mounting bushes on the motor. Or to put it another way my car is knackered.

[jamesd1972]

Any progress is good progress and the house is looking very well after your efforts.
Never tried wire wool on a screen but have ruined a screen using scotch brite so be careful out there people. (For those of you interested it was on my 1977 mini clubman estate complete with disc brakes a flip off front and assorted electrical gubbins added after a parking notice was glued on and in my anger I didn't soak it off. Just to really get your goat there was a 5" x 4" mark around where the ticket was for evermore).
Juddery wipers are the worst, I've always had better luck with better brands like bosch but they are painfully expensive...
James

[sunbuilder]

best thing to use is jewlers rouge, a powder with the constituancy of talk. You add a little water and then use it as a polish. You can use it with a dremel type tool with the polishing mop attachment to remove scratches. believe it or not i used it to remove quite deep wiper scratches in my origional opel gt screen. I didnt expect it to work but it did. I actually caused some v small scratches with it by pushing too hard and not having enough water. I was able to polish these out though using the same method just a bit more gently.I did the entire screen with the dremel and got all the 40 plus years scratches off although it literally took an entire day. This was 20 years ago when you couldnt get new screens.

[georgeb]

I always had good results using the old pink Windowlene. I think that had a slight abrasive effect, but can I get it here? Can I hellers like! Need to do something with it though, driving into direct sunlight shows how opaque it really is.

Nov 6, 2017 21:56:34 GMT Sweetpea said:

I suspect the problem is a combination of things. Dirt on the glass, slack springs in the arms, wear in the mech, and sloppy mounting bushes on the motor. Or to put it another way my car is knackered.

Ah, but we know you can rebuild it. Given enough time, it'll look just like your downspout. In a manner of speaking, of course.

[varelse]

So you have the arm, which is attached to the motor mechanism, the blade, and the refill/rubber that is in the blade. I want to replace my old crappy blades with some nice new chrome ones. All you can find in an auto store here is the new black ones for moderns.

As for the wool..
Take one steel whisk, tie some string to the handle and jam it full of steel wool. I find pulling the wool apart first a bit so it's not so tightly woven works best.
Find a nice dark, not so flammable area (after/during rain works well, especially if you can get a nice flat sheet of water on the concrete to get reflections).

Set your camera to something along the lines of 30seconds and f8 or so. Might have to play around a bit depending on ambient lighting.

If you're doing it by yourself, hit your timer and then go position yourself, light the wool in one area and start spinning it in a circle. Make sure your whisk plus string clears the ground for best effect.
To get a sphere like the pic above, spin it in a circle vertically while slowly rotating on the spot.
Obviously a bit easier with more than one person, to push buttons and so on, and generally it's easier to set focus on something like a penlight, if it's in the dark.

Just as easy on 35mm, just a bit harder to check results.

[Sweetpea]

Not much of an update this one. More of a lack of success!

So the car is in storage in Canterbury. But it’s taxed and ready to roll.
I’d got it in my head that the battery may be flat so this afternoon Mrs Sweetpea and I went on a pilgrimage with a set of jump leads to bring the old car back home for a while. Time to get some charge back in the battery and maybe do a few little jobs.

Flat wasn’t quite the right word. It was utterly drained. So we pushed the car out of the garage and jump started it off the other car. Then spent a few mins swapping the cars round and locking Mrs Sweetpea’s car in the garage (which is a challenge as it doesn’t really fit).

Nicely seated in the MR2 and ready to drive home in the snow I turned on the lights. The engine stopped instantly. I think the headlamps, and headlamp lift motors were more than the alternator could provide with no charge in the battery. The volts must have dropped and the ignition cut out.
We then decided that the risk of it dumping us at the side of the road was too great and we’d swap the cars back, leave the MR2 there, and just bring the battery back.

Having pushed the MR2 around so we could jump start it again we got the Vitara out of the garage and popped it across the road. I started parking the MR2 back in the garage. And stalled it, back end against a wall so we couldn’t jump it again. We just pushed it back into the garage.


So we went to get a car and came back with a dead battery. It’s so flat I’m not sure it’ll recover.

Some days you should just stay in bed. This was one of them.

James

[georgeb]

We all have 'em!

[fastblatt]

Great day to go and collect an MR2. Freezing cold, wet (snow in places) worse day for a battery that might be good (not for one suspected of being flat) lol 😂 better luck next time. Always unhook the earth lead on mine if it’s not going anywhere (which it never does) Thanks for keeping us entertained 👍🏼

[jamesd1972]

One of these days ?

[darrenh]

Jan 21, 2018 21:31:31 GMT Sweetpea said:

So the car is in storage in Canterbury...

...Mrs Sweetpea and I went on a pilgrimage

aw yeeeeh !

[gostin]

Jan 22, 2018 10:24:41 GMT jamesd1972 said:

One of these days ?

At least he would have heated up a bit.

[Sweetpea]

Not quite ready to torch it yet thanks. Quite apart from which, 5 litres of petrol is more valuable than the car.

It actually has a big battery switch with a removable key. It's a bit of extra security, makes welding easier, and stops the battery going flat. Yes, I'd taken the key out when I left it.
But last year I made a little change which party defeated the battery switch. I wasn't sure what the effect would be.

Well I know now 'cos I wound up pushing it around in the snow and rain. (Technically "we pushed it round in the snow and rain" because Mrs Sweetpea helped - told you she was a keeper even if she is making me sand the stairs.)

fastblatt, yeah I take your point about the weather. But I'd got it in my head that the battery might be flat (correctly as it happens) and once you have an itch...

James