Northpole's Vectra C SXI

[northpole10]

Thanks @NeilGo yeah if it didn't have the hiccup it would have been treated to xp2 bumpers but hey the car had other plans... I put that xp2 plan aside and probably won't happen at all. I still got an exhaust upgrade planned but that will be the last thing it'll get for the foreseeable future.

[northpole]

welll it's doing it again but I might have found something i didn't notice before... under the car where i always park is a clean oily spot... so after i checked the usual suspects (including the injector seals ( yes i had to pull off the camcover to check if the top of the rockers where washed clean again) and not finding a trace... the wife mentioned that spot on the parking spot... that prompted me to stick my fingers under the fuel filter housing... found some nice evidence of a leak... now here is me thinking the lot should be fine... right next to where the in and outlets are is a hairline crack.... ordered a new fuel filter housing from saab parts as they were the cheapest... a shame it'll take a few days as they don't do 24 hour delivery... but i might have it sooner than i think as they did respond back already that it's going to be posted today. In the meantime i have used some black window silicone on the crack while the car was running in the hope that it'll seal the hairline crack for a while(i tested it before and diesel doesn't break it down) so with some luck the car will start after leaving it for hours on end... ( it actually starts first turn of the key but than it runs into an airlock and shuts off... trying to start it after that is just a royal PITA even with me having that priming bulb installed..

But let's hope that is the last point of the fuelsystem that i didn't touch yet that is the problem... I can't think of anything else other than the gasket in the fuelpump internally being the problem... and if that is the case, I won't fix it, it'll be the cars funeral

[northpole]

well the part just arrived so i'm going to start the job of replacing the filterhousing... FYI it even cam e with a new fuelfilter installed.. they did me a solid as the fuelfilter without discount is more expensiv than what i paid for the filterhousing ( and the thing isn't a pattern part but an OEM filterhousing with an OEM vauxhall filter)... right i'm off to hopefully sortout this fuel system problem once and for all.

[northpole10]

All done car ran after having it towstarted. Now just to wait for 6 hours and see if the car will start and keep running. Took me a while as I was having a little hiccup getting the fuel pipes out of the fuel filter housing... didn't realise it was a double clip clamp holding it in... once I notices that I just pulled the coolant bottle out of the way and presto they came out..

I did put on new pipe clip clamps as they were also in the kit. I even washed the oily spot away so I can see of it leaks again in that spot (it shouldn't but hey ho 6nm is not a lot of pressure and fornthe life of me i couldn't find my small torque wrench so I did it by hand)...

Ps I actually think I broke the lid the last time Idid the fuelfilter... anyway everything i replaces was in need of replacing so ot should be fine now.

[northpole]

and 6 hours later.... the car has decided... to start at the first turn of the key and keep running! seems like it wants to go on for a few more years

[northpole10]

Drove it this morning (yes it started in one go and kept running) but noticed the engine note has gone from being tractor like to almost none exsistant... so the whole thing was slowly getting worse and I got used to the noise that I didn't investigate why it was doing it... I just thought well it'sa noisy DTI so will have to life with that tractor like noise...

It now only changes the note when you hit a certain rpm (as it did before) it makes the feel more upper-class.

[northpole]

i removed the priming bulb, it's a one-way valve thing but i suspected it to not work right... so just incase it gave me a headache i pulled it off, and i was right it's not doing it's job right upon squeezing it, it actually pushes the fuel out to both sides... it shouldn't.. so out came the priming bulb and in went a metal diesel fuel one way valve with new fuel lines and 1 quick push on connect. and when i had the one way valve on i left it disconnected for an hour, than i finished the plumbing off and went to start the car... I imagined it wouldn't start and keep running but it started straight up and kept running just fine. I think it's all done now and no more draining back to the tank problems will occur. ( it wasn't a problem yet, but was suspecting the one-way valve in the priming bulb to be gone, i was right and glad i pre-emptively took it out of the equation)

[northpole]

Now for finding love for the car again... this 10 days of searching for the problem and sorting it out have made me not trust the car to be as reliable as it was before... and this might very well be it's last days in my ownership, a shame really because other than this headache of fault finding and replacing parts(and having to wait for hours to see if the problem is still there) the car runs rather nice and doesn't even look half bad... well \i kept saying i need at least an estate or a full blown 7 seater MPV/SUV to be able to carry the and still have my subwoofers so we shall see what happens in the coming months... if i run into a good deal on either one of those (has to be petrol though) I might just get rid of the vectra.

[northpole]

well it has been solid again and trust worthy... so the love is slowly coming back... i might still pull out my fingers and put on that aftermarket rear exhaustbox...if you are wondering what it looks like...see the picture below


not only is it a straight true exhaustbox it's made by Cherrybomb... so once it's on it'll be noticeably audible( read deep base note) the oem rear exhaustbox literally dampens all the good noises so yeah i'm kinda looking forward to put it on jut need one more pipe as the oem one has a corner mounted 45 degree bend down before connecting to the mid section and somehow i can't find the right diameter 55mm OD.. 45 degree pipe ( they are either to small or to big... seems like i'm going to have to go to an exhaust specialist just for that one pipe... and the Cherrybomb box has a centered rear inlet so the replacement 45 degree pipe needs some extra length too...

[horaa]

Is that real stainless steel alloy? Having a empty pipe will it pass the mot because of the noise? I wanted to do it myself but the exhause is very noisi and i doubt i will pass mpt in romania. Reason? It’s starting to rust A LOT