MOT Failure

[Julian Voelcker]

49141-60010 ACCUMULATOR, FR
49151-60010 ACCUMULATOR, RR

That's the easy part, however unfortunately they don't have Toyota part numbers on them

They usually have a white sticker on them giving production dates and a code that translates to front/back and left/right.

They also have some manufacturer's part numbers on them.

Usually when we swap them we have the receiving vehicle so it's easy to work it out and also we label them when removing them.

Unfortunately in this case John isn't fit enough to read the numbers for us.

 

[uHu]

What's the problem with finding the right spheres?
There are only two types, front sphere 400 cc, rear sphere 500 cc. They look the same, just slightly smaller for the fronts. Left and right are the same, and all years are the same.
Somebody said that you can look in through the hole and see the membrane, and that if you can't see it it's shot, non-revivable. As long as the membrane is intact, there is a chance it will be ok after re-gassing/pressurising.

 

[Dark Dude]

Whats the best (non back breaking) way to access the spheres for a visual inspection. Via the wheel arches or the engine bay?

John

 

[Julian Voelcker]

I have a pile of spheres here with what initially appears to be no obvious way of identifying them, however thanks to Frank checking his and through a process of elimination I now can.

Fronts have MUV 200-400 stamped on them and rear ones have MUV 200-500 on them - the last number is obviously the volume.

So John, email me your details and I'll get them shipped out in the morning.

 

[Dark Dude]

Julian

I'll touch down with you in the morning. Thanks to everyone on this forum for helping me out of this very expensive hole. I have my spheres. Julian has valuable information he'll be able to use in the future and Mr T (bless his heart), gets kissed by Anne Robinson and comes away with nothing. Hooray!

John

 

[Chas]

Kissed by Anne Robison?

I wouldn't wish that on even a Toyota dealer

 

[Dark Dude]

Chas

We are going way off subject here but I for one wouldn't kick Ms Robinson out of bed. I think she is a bit of alright.

John

 

[Chris Coombs]

John

Looking down the barrel of that rather large impending bill has you hallucinating!

Take a break and check your glasses.

Happy to hear that you are getting it all sorted - let us know if it all ends happily please.

 

[Dark Dude]

Chris

There isn't a single man or woman on this forum that hasn't at some time been looking down that barrel. I'll come back with a full report of all my adventures with Hanna, no worries.

And there is nothing wrong with my eyesight, what's is wrong with a bit of MILF. Helen Mirren is to die for........

John

 

[frank rabbets]

Hi John

Helen has never had a baby so cannot be a MILF perhaps a WILF

Frank

 

[Dark Dude]

Hi John

Helen has never had a baby so cannot be a MILF perhaps a WILF

Frank

Frank, My dear man.

There are mothers and then there are Motherfxxxkers! Anne Robinson is the former while Helen Mirren is the latter. Both are mothers!

John

PS: This is going so way off subject!

 

[Dark Dude]

Re: MOT Failure: Part One

I don't like going over ground that has already been covered and in the case of the LC100 AHC spheres, Nathan has already submitted enough photo's on this subject. That being the case I've decided to edit this piece to suit.

The trouble with AHC sphere is that when they go wrong, they do it slowly, in mission creep, with no warning lights in the dash board to tell you that something is up. It was Sharon who first noticed that our frequent trips to the Royal Free Hospital were getting more "bumpy" despite the many silent policemen lying in wait along the way. This I ignored, to my crying shame until the day Sharon chucked up her guts, all the way north, up the M1 and M6, on our way home last Christmas. So last weeks MOT failure really didn't come as much of a surprise. It was only my vain attempt of holding my head in the sand, trying NOT to think about a invoice from Mr T. Nathan was my salvation......

A quick e-mail sourced a pair of quality used six month old spheres from Jon Wildsmith, which had been gathering dust for two years awaiting liberation from Overland Cruisers. Julian did the business and the spheres were with me the next day. My plan was straightforward. Out with the old and mashed down, in with the "new" and fully functional. So yesterday morning, Hanna, the spheres and I took a final bumpy trip to Sawtry, Cambridgeshire to visit the guys at Pleiades.

First the JW spheres were given a pressure test where we discovered that both spheres had lost more than half of their 327 psi of pressure over the span of their very short (6 months) working lives. So now I was presented with a choice. Fit the JW spheres as is,( which was never going to fly), get the JW spheres regassed or exchange my JW spheres for a set of Mr T originals that had already been regassed by Martin. My decision was a simple one. Jon Wildsmith DNA was better in than exchanged with non JW DNA and with that the JW spheres were taken off to engineering by Martin's colleague to be re-worked with Pleiades magic. I wanted to take some photo's during this process but was flatly denied by Martin. One look at ebay will suffice as for an explanation why. So while all this was going on, this left Martin and I with the task of getting the old "mashed down" spheres removed. I always thought that the front spheres were located somewhere in the engine bay, so I was somewhat surprised to discover that they were in fact located underneath the car, along the chassis rails, which was going to make for easy removal. It still took Martin a good 20 mins, a chain ratchet device and tons of elbow grease to get the job done and the old spheres off. On first inspection, with the old spheres now lying in a pool of fluid, it was pretty obvious that they were now scrap metal. One look in the black hole, with no sign of the diaphragms, was the confirmation that they could not be saved.

From there everything else went very quickly. Before I knew it the NOW freshly painted and re-gassed JW spheres were fixed and fitted and Hanna was back on the road. The result was instant and dramatic. Better standard ride height, better road manners with no bumpy, bumpy! Alas, there was a problem after a quick road test. The AHC suddenly stopped working, with Hanna refusing to do her party trick of going up and down. During the operation we had introduced a massive air lock into the AHC system and the car needed bleeding from all four points, front and back. So back we returned to the garage and half an hour later, my girl was good to go. The whole process from arrival to settling the bill took no more than three hours. The only thing we didn't manage to do was perform a full AHC flush because Martin didn't have any fluid!

So would I recommend Pleiades as a viable alternative (to Mr T) for anyone wanting to maintain that silky smooth ride that is ONLY available from a functioning AHC system? Well yes, I would! Given that in most cases, Martin provides a "while you wait" service and the whole day cost me £144 (inc VAT), for having the front spheres renewed, me thinks going to Pleiades is quite frankly a no brainer.

Martin also does a retrofit sphere for the LC100 based upon the spheres used in the Citroen C5. These were designed from the off to be much stronger and be able to take a heavier load than the ones designed for the LC100. My personal opinion is that these would be great replacement for the original rear spheres, especially if you're like me, using your truck as a loadlugger. But whatever your decision, trust me, you won't regret a visit to the boys at Sawtry and neither will your bank balance....

John

 

[uHu]

Grreat write-up. Thank you John, for sharing.

Two comments (to build on this excellent prose):
Keeping an eye on the wear/condition of the gas-springs (spheres) is just as critical as keeping track of the state of normal steel springs. Coils or TBs also get worn, or loose the lifting capability. It's just that the method of checking the springs differ between gas springs and ordinary steel springs. It's not any more creepy with gas springs, and there are no warning lights for steel springs either. At least in principle, as I see it.

The best way to remove spheres is with a 36 mm thin open ended spanner. (I bought a cheap one and ground it down to a suitable thickness - was it 8-9 mm?)

 

[Dark Dude]

Re: MOT Failure: Part Two

Well today it was back to Hertford Tyre and Exhaust to complete the 2nd part of my MOT servicing via a detour to Mr T in Enfield, where I picked up two tins of AHC fluid (£65.06 inc VAT).

Now I know that Dave who runs Herts T&E wouldn't mind me saying this about him (and if he does mind it's too late) but his attention to detail is almost too painful to watch, verging on the anal. Before a single tool was raised in anger, Dave picked over the car with a fine tooth comb in his quest of identifying anything that raised concern. He would be the first to admit that he doesn't know everything about Cruisers, preferring to reserve his talents for his beloved Ford Mustangs (if you want someone who is, then Julian at Overland is your man) but he is a damn good mechanic of the old school variety. What needed to be done, was done and if something didn't need to be touched, it was left alone. Just the way I liked it. Plain common sense. No blinding science. As part of his standard service, he dumps all the air in all of the tyres (including the spare) and then re-inflate them with NITROGEN. Now that's what I call service!

When I brought the car a year ago I was assured by the seller that it would be fully serviced on purchase. Well it was pretty evident today, that the car hadn't been serviced for a very long time. That just pisses me off! And that's why parts alone (ex VAT) cost me £259.07p! The good news is that I'm now on top of my car and that hopefully this will be money well spent as part of my long term investment in my car.

With most of the mechanicals now well and truly sorted, it was time to turn our attention to the rear number plate, which had been hanging off the Spare Wheel Carrier since the thing was fitted to the car, last year. Dave came up with a great solution which would have put the great Jon Wildsmith to shame. This involved much bending, welding and drilling of metal but we still had the leave the spare wheel off the carrier so that the car could finally pass it's MOT, which it passed with flying colours. The wiring still needs a bit of work (as well as a extension) but I'm very pleased with the overall result.

So what has all this, getting the car through it's MOT, cost me, over the last three days. £770.29p to be precise. That's a lot money by anybody's standard but given that a single used Mr T sphere was recently advertised on ebay for £500 each:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Toyota-landcr ... 8134726407

I really can't complain I suppose. It could have been a whole leap worse but alas, it still hurts!

PS: Thank you to everyone on this forum who has helped getting me through this process. If it wasn't for you guys, I would have blown a load of money on the advice of a "professional" on shocks that I didn't need and which would have resulted in my car STILL failing it's MOT. It seems some MOT's are really not worth the a4 white paper they are now printed on.....

John

 

[Dark Dude]

Grreat write-up. Thank you John, for sharing.

Two comments (to build on this excellent prose):
Keeping an eye on the wear/condition of the gas-springs (spheres) is just as critical as keeping track of the state of normal steel springs. Coils or TBs also get worn, or loose the lifting capability. It's just that the method of checking the springs differ between gas springs and ordinary steel springs. It's not any more creepy with gas springs, and there are no warning lights for steel springs either. At least in principle, as I see it.

The best way to remove spheres is with a 36 mm thin open ended spanner. (I bought a cheap one and ground it down to a suitable thickness - was it 8-9 mm?)

uHu

I couldn't agree more! And come next year I intend to do just that, renew the Springs and Shocks all round. They are the originals and have been on the car, from new, for twelve years and I think it's high time they are retired and sent to the great scrap yard in the sky. Alas I'm not made of money and hopefully they should be able to last another 12 months of easy motoring, especially given the fact that the spheres are all now fully functional.

John

 

[TonyP]

Well done on getting it through the MOT , bit painfull on the old wallet, but at least you know it's sorted now.

 

[Dark Dude]

Sorry to hear about your troubles.
From reading your posts in two threads, it seems like you are on the right track when it comes to sorting the mot fail.

Just to clarify, on an ahc vehicle, the shock absorbers are hardly the cause of lack of damping. Main problem with them is when the seal is worn out after 2-3-400 k miles, that they start leaking. The damping (shock absorber function) happens in the actuators, which is the ribbed blob to which each sphere is attached. The four valves in each actuator adjust the damping in 16 steps, but is dependent on the hydraulic fluid moving through, which it will stop doing when the sphere is flat.

The spheres don't last for ever, and there is no trouble code or built in detection for flat spheres. The way to test them is by counting graduations, which is mentioned in another post in here.

You will keep your spheres longer, and have a better "ride", if the the ahc pressure is correct; i.e that the steel springs are doing their part, and the spheres get to do only their part of the lifting. This is where checking the neutral pressure comes in. When changing the spheres, you could get the neutral pressure adjusted/checked at the same time. Pleiades probably has a suitable pressure gauge. It is enough to check one side only, front and rear (as long as the steering wheel is kept straight). If Pleiades can't do it, I think I saw an offer to use the Mr.T-tester in a post above here. (That's the other method for checking the neutral pressure)

I'll be contacting Warren in the very near future to check the neutral pressure of my "new" AHC setup. Peace of mind. You can never be too careful and it is free unlike going to Mr T.

John

 

[frank rabbets]

Glad you got 12 months MOT John.
I have my 80 and 100 MOT this month !!
Only had 100 for a year now. Bought it from Croydon Toyota who had serviced it "oh yeah". Got it back home and had to do a proper servce and replace 5 tyres. Also repair the damage they had done to the front hubs when doing their service. They did send a cheque for £1200 though.
My 80 which I've had since 1998 has never failed MOT. Once I had a close shave. I missed a giant hole in tail exhaust so they told me to come back in the morning with it repaired. There was the certificate waiting for me. [MOT computers do have their advantages].

Frank

 

[Dark Dude]

Frank

Dave and me were talking about this very subject yesterday. What is the point of having an Mr T stamp in your service manual, when the work that stamp represents has either been done poorly or not at all?

Dave can be contacted here via his website:

http://www.hertfordtyres.co.uk/

I was recommended to him by other LC100 owners on another forum and so far so good. Please note that he does not offer a comprehensive service for Land Cruiser owners, he won't touch anything to do with the AHC for one but like I said he is a damn good mechanic for anyone (located in North London and the Home Counties) who is in need of a good, professional and reliable service for their trucks. And you can't ask more than that!

John

 

[Ecoman]

Frank
What is the point of having an Mr T stamp in your service manual, when the work that stamp represents has either been done poorly or not at all?

I have to agree with this point.

My Hilux had nearly a full service history by Toyota main stealers. I was going to carry this on so booked it in to get a service and a few other jobs done at the same time. I was about to travel to Budapest in it and wanted it to be spot on. I arrived on the day and asked to speak to the mechanic to explain what issue I had been having. After a brief explanation the mechanic looked a bit vague and then he just shrugged and said "this is going to be a new one on me I've never worked on anything this old before so I'm taking your word for it!" I took my keys back and walked out.

The next day I was booked in at a local 4x4 garage and they did everything I had asked for and even did a few jobs that had been missed on previous dealer services