Music Time

Today I purchased a Freecom Tough Drive 120GB mobile USB hard drive. Its USB powered and guess what... It works with the car stereo.




I have been trying a number of different USB devices with my Kenwood head unit to see if they would work, like the Nokia N95. You select the phone to Mass storage and the head unit reads it as if it was a USB stick.




I have also wired up the audio/visual lead to the screen in the car so you can use the phone as normal but view it on a large screen.


The question now is how many music files the head unit can see, I am in the process of copying 47GB's worth of music to the drive to see if it will ok but as I am not running windows it should be fine. Navigating will be a problem, and there will be a lot of track skipping.


Not bad for 54 quid...


On another note, due to the weight of the DVD player the bit of plastic that sits under the glove box gave way this week. Need to figure out a way of re-fitting the DVD player and make it look pucker!

Oil, What Oil

Checked the car oil today and it was a little low. In fact it wasn't even registering on the dip stick.

Couple of litres from Westleigh Motor Factors and its registering again. I know where the problem is, I did not replace the sump nut washer when I did the last service and its leaking slowly from there.

Oops!

Quick fix

After washing the car I decided to take a look at why the interior lights were not working. The car was reporting that a fuse had blown but every time I changed it, it kept on blowing.

Also there was no "Always Live" power to the car so the seat did not work when the ignition was off.

I remember that I had some problems fitting the passenger sunvisor, so I took a look at this first... And guess what, I found the problem. The positive wire had split and was connected to the Shell of the car. Is was shorting the car out.



I removed the sun visor and needed to fix that before I refit it.

I also had ordered a new bit of chrome for the front windscreen as it flew off a couple of months ago. It was only 3 quid from Jag which I thought was good!.

Back to Project Sovereign

It turned out to be a bolt that had snapped so the clip that held the centre pipe to the manifold had come away.



18 years of wear and tear.


At first it looked like I would need a new clip but with some Burrows magic and a hammer I got it out.

Then it came to fitting it. I replaced the broken bolt with a shiny new one and enlisted the services of the Ramus' to tighten the clip as I pushed the exhaust back together.

Now its sounds very quite.

Project Spitfire!

Well, it rained today and anyone that lived through WW2 would have thought that it had started again. Spitfires flying above... But no it was me in the JAG!


On the way to work I noticed a burble noise coming from the Jag. When I go to Ramus' I quickly checked but could not see where the problem was.


I drove very slowly to Motor World and asked Chris to take a look. He took one look at it and confirmed it was defiantly the exhaust, however, he couldn't fix it until this evening.


So we drove very slowly to work. It made it to the gates in the car park and then bang, the car shock, the noise was deafening. It sounded like an old Spitfire getting ready to take off!


When looking closer, it looks like the pipe has come off the manifold. So should be easy to fix.


The sound is awesome but unfortunately not drivable...



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDGWLUmbB_Q

Visual entertainment. Day 3

Today I wanted to put the dashboard back together and give the car a good clean.

As the weather was touch and go I washed and poshed the car first.

I had the battery on charge all day yesterday and most of today. When I connected the battery the dashboard reported that a fuse had blown. On inspection it turned out the be the interior lights. When I changed the fuse it blew that one and the other 3 I tried. (Going to leave this until tomorrow)

Also for some reason the +12vdc "always live" from the battery to the stereo was not working. I checked it all the way back to the fuse box. When I checked the voltage at the fuse box it had +12vdc but some where there is a break in the wire.

I decided to run a new lead from the battery and this time fitted an in-line fuse. I started to put the settings back into the stereo but it was getting dark so gave up until tomorrow.

Visual entertainment. Day 2

Day two was all about mounting the screen and complete the wiring of the system.

Yesterday I purchased a gold power terminal from Halfords as I wanted to tidy up the positive connector as it had wires hanging off it.

This was not as simple as I hoped. I had to saw off the old connector and then tempt fate by cutting the cover off the wires without making a visit to A&E.

I also fitted the relay that will supply the DVD player and screen with power

I then set on the headlining, this also was a pain. I had to take most of the left hand side trim apart. (I broke most of the clips again!!!!!)

I then measured up and screwed the screen into the headlining. I made a slit in the headlining for the cable and then drilled a hole in the headlining to feed the cable.

I connected the main lead the the screen and started to put the trim back but I needed to buy some more clips to secure it in place. I wont do this until the headlining has been refitted.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxAkbTrQxIg - excuse the poor quality as it was what I sent to Ramus!

I also damaged the "Sky Slop" that goes around the gear stick and stereo. I can get another one of these on Ebay.

I could not fully test the system today as I left the boot lid up and drained the battery to the point twhere the dash board flashes because there is not enough amps to power the system.

I think its going to take a couple more days to fully finish the system

Visual entertainment. Day 1

Its all about the Visual entertainment, I wanted some thing that would help keep the headlining up once it has been refitted. I was originally looking for a set of spot lights that would go in the middle of the headlining

I spent hours upon hours looking and never really found anything I liked. Eventually I noticed that you can get an LCD monitor that attach's to the headlining.

I did not want one that you manually had to move down to watch, I wanted something different. I found a motorized unit that on a touch of the button the screen would come down.


Finding a DVD player was nice and easy.

My next issue was powering the units. I only want the unit to work when the ignition is on to save battery in case the system is left on. However, I did not want to power it off the cigarette lighter as I already have the SatNav and phone charger running off it.

This is quite a simple job just requires some wiring. I used a relay to be triggered off the cigarette socket and then wired a wire to the battery. So when the ignition is on, the relay completes the circuit to the battery and the system should turn on.

Because I now had a direct feed from the battery I wanted to make sure that every device had a fuse and the main lead was fused as well. (Picture to follow).

I wanted to mount the DVD player in the glove box but it was to long for this, I then looked at mounting it under the driver seat but when the seat is moved back it closes the gap and would crush the DVD player. The only place I could think of mounting it was under the glove box in the passenger foot well. Mounting this was quite fun and took me a couple of attempts to get right.

My task for tomorrow morning is to fix the screen to the headlining. The screen came with some screws that you just screw into the headlining but this is not the best way to do it. I have a metal plate that I will fit above the headlining and will screw the screen into this.

The stereo has an AUX input which I will use to give the DVD player audio as the car has 6 speakers and a 12" sub.

Bushes need changing

I got Chris to take a look up and behind the front wheels, as there has been some play in the steering wheel. Its not very much but we did notice a problem...





Its turns out the front bushes need replacing. I have been told this is quite a simple job and should only take 3 hours to change and of course a set of Bushes.




While we had the wheel off we also tightened the hub nut that was a little loose.

No more leaving the lights on

Last night was the final straw! I did it again, left the lights on.

I have drained the battery 3 times now doing this.

I know there is an option on the alarm to alert if the lights are left on. The only issue is figuring out how to wire it up.

Nice and simple, just need to get the +12Vdc from the side light to the alarm box.

Now the car beeps 6 times and the key fob goes nuts if you leave the lights on and lock the car.